Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Jillian Berman reports on research showing that the predictable effect of decreased unionization is a transfer of wealth from workers to shareholders: The jump in corporate profit over the past few decades can be explained largely by a decline in union membership over
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350 or bust: Ottawa: Buying Ads Is Easier Than Rooting Out CPC Corruption
Power, like a desolating pestilence, Pollutes whate’er it touches. Percy Bysshe Shelley, Queen Mab What a week in “Ottawapiskat”! In Canada’s capital city the embattled government of Stephen Harper is facing one scandal after another, topped yesterday by the very public exit from the CPC caucus of MP Brent Rathgeber.
Continue readingCanadian Political Viewpoints: Ahead of the Eight Ball
Just when we thought things couldn’t get lower in Ottawa, CBC News breaks the story of the PMO’s special fund; an ultra-secret cash reserve that few people knew about. The covert existence of such a fund is bad enough, but the cash trail for it is where things really start
Continue readingSaskboy's Abandoned Stuff: Rathgerber Out of the Strong, Stable, National, Majority, Conservative Government
Who could forget Harper’s “strong, stable” majority comment during his victory speech in 2011 after his party swept to surprise power on a wave of election fraud supporting his party? Two years later, the Cons have lost disgraced Minister Penashue to a campaign overspending (and illegal contribution) crime for which
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Frances Russell makes the case for mandatory voting as an antidote to vote suppression: At first glance, entrenched opposition to mandatory voting in all the English-speaking democracies – Australia excepted – is puzzling. Given all the obligations of citizenship in a democracy
Continue readingCanadian Political Viewpoints: Whither the Teflon Don
For the better part of the last few months, the Harper Government has tried and failed to change the channel. When the government prorogued Parliament in the face of a unified opposition coalition, political junkies were outraged and the public yawned. When caught outspending the national election limits through the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Juxtaposition
Bert Brown this week, shedding crocodile tears over blind partisanship in the Senate: The real problem, Brown told HuffPost, is that the overwhelming majority of senators don’t do the job they were appointed to do. Senators are supposed to represent their province’s interest “but they don’t,” he said; they just
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Mike Konczal discusses the distribution of U.S. tax breaks and incentives, and finds that measures normally presented as offering breaks for everybody in fact serve mostly as giveaways to the wealthy: (T)he government is very responsive to the interests of the top 20
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: The road to abolition
Ian Peach’s guest post at Pundits’ Guide is well worth a read in setting out a feasible path to Senate abolition. But I’ll note that the exact wording of an abolition resolution would need to be somewhat more complex than that proposed by Peach – while the political push might
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – David Cay Johnston and Miles Corak both discuss the results of a study which compares economic outcomes in technologically advanced countries, and shows that tax giveaways to the wealthy exacerbate inequality without doing anything at all to contribute to economic development. – And
Continue readingSaskboy's Abandoned Stuff: Women In Short Pants Run Around, Bullying MPs
It’s always good to hear Elizabeth May speak in the House. Today was no disappointment, as she took the Prime Minster’s Office to task for being a totally unaccountable creation of the unwritten constitution, where $10,000,000 goes each year to die. May: The guys in short pants who run around
Continue readingSaskboy's Abandoned Stuff: Nothin’ To See Here #cdnpoli
John Gormley attempts to sing a lullaby; Mixes up the words. [L]eave us alone to reconnect with life and keep the warmth coming. And get back to us when you’ve fired some Senators and Toronto is done. […] advice is neatly summarized in Seven Things You Need to Stop Doing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – A new Ipsos-Reid poll shows that nearly 90% of Canadians support higher taxes on the rich generally, and million-dollar incomes in particular. And there’s an obvious need for change based on how distorted tax systems already are – as Reuters reports on a
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Advance warning
Colby Cosh is starting to buy into the theory that the Clusterduff scandal is being strategically revealed to divert attention away from Robocon. My greater concern is that if there’s a Con strategy at play, it lies in the possible aftermath of reports like this. The more stories we hear
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: NDP Leader Tom Mulcair Grills PM Harper On Senate Expenses Scandal (VIDEO)
Last week, Prime Minister Stephen Harper fled to South America to avoid the unraveling Senate expenses scandal. On Monday, he skipped Question Period in the House of Commons. He did show up in the House on Tuesday and NDP Leader Tom Mulcair roasted him. Prosecutor style. Short, precise questions. The
Continue readingThe Scott Ross: How Harper Made The Senate More Accountable, Even If Just A Little
If Justin Beiber was in the Canadian Senate it would be the most watched institution in all of government, and, undoubtedly, the most accountable. For if the Biebs walked down the Ottawan red carpet into that similarly coloured chamber, his every action would be televised, sensationalized, and scrutinized. There wouldn’t
Continue readingThe Scott Ross: How Harper Made The Senate More Accountable, Even If Just A Little
If Justin Beiber was in the Canadian Senate it would be the most watched institution in all of government, and, undoubtedly, the most accountable.For if the Biebs walked down the Ottawan red carpet into that similarly coloured chamber, his every action…
Continue readingThe Scott Ross: How Harper Made The Senate More Accountable, Even If Just A Little
If Justin Beiber was in the Canadian Senate it would be the most watched institution in all of government, and, undoubtedly, the most accountable. For if the Biebs walked down the Ottawan red carpet into that similarly coloured chamber, his every action would be televised, sensationalized, and scrutinized. There wouldn’t
Continue readingCanadian Political Viewpoints: Rethinking the Senate
I’ve had to give this topic a lot of thought, given my past views favouring reform of the Senate over complete abolition. For the longest time, at least from my perspective, it had appeared that corrupt Senators was the abnormality in the Upper Chamber rather than the norm; of course,
Continue readingSong of the Watermelon: On the Limits of Scandalmongering, or Why I Don’t Care About Rob Ford’s Alleged Crack Use
For all my political ideals and self-conceptualizations, I cannot for the life of me seem to get myself more than superficially interested in the scandals that plague the holders of public office. The Rob Ford crack video hubbub is a case in point. Yes, it is funny. Yes, there is
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