Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bryan Borzykowski recognizes that many Canadian families are weathering the COVID-19 crisis only by taking on more debt – though it’s worth questioning…
May 2020
Saturday Photo: The Gift of Tulips
Last year about this time our neighbour, the horticulturalist, brought home several hundred tulip bulbs that he’d saved from being thrown out. They’d been used to decorate the hall for…
Red on White – There’s Your Problem.
Many Vancouver Islanders get a little uncomfortable when they spot a white licence plate with red letters. That means a stranger in our midst, an Albertan. Not without cause Alberta…
While We Dream Of a Better World, Sinister Forces Are at Play.
Lockdowns are golden opportunities for those with a mind and the means to exploit them. Under the cover of coronavirus, all kinds of wickedness are happening. Where you and I…
Moscow Mitch Wants to Fight That Other Pandemic.
The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, wants Congress focused on fighting what he calls the “second pandemic.” Fortunately Mitch already has a vaccine for this contagion. Mitch is worried that…
Ignorance Over Pride in Emo
It’s 2020 and there are many things that are normal parts of our society today that just weren’t decades ago. We’ve progressed a lot as a society and we’ve got…
Cowichan Valley Branch of CMHA placed in probationary status; focus on improving transparency and service delivery
May 15, 2020 VANCOUVER (B.C.) May 15, 2020 – In response to an independent investigation into its Cowichan Valley Branch, the BC Division of the Canadian Mental Health Association…
Still King
Stephen Harper’s ghost still haunts the Conservative Party. In fact, Michael Harris writes, it’s still driving the Tory Bus: The CPC is supposed to be doing some soul-searching in the…
An autopsy or a resuscitation?
An interesting question was raised in the Toronto Star the other day. There was an opinion piece by Bob Hepburn proposing a national commission on the reconstruction of the Canadian…
The Mirror & the Light by Hilary Mantel returns to top of Alberta independent bookstores’ fiction bestseller list
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold by independent booksellers in Alberta during the week ended Sunday, May 10, 2020. The lists are compiled…
Those opposed to opening the economy need to up their game….
This pandemic is no fun for anybody, but let’s not kid ourselves, for some its not that bad. On the financial side of the equation things are actually pretty good…
Freedom-of-information request provides insight into stakeholder involvement in the Municipal Forest Reserve consultation
Originally published by https://sixmountains.ca. For the second time, I’ve had to resort to a freedom-of-information request to the Municipality of North Cowichan to find out more about the consultation process…
Andrew Scheer: Now Even Some Cons Are Calling Him A Zombie
As I'm sure you know, I believe that Andrew Scheer is the most morally depraved leader in modern Canadian history. He was already known to be a serial liar, a…
Musical interlude
Esthero – Black Mermaid
Ford’s Delicious Cheesecake Third Strike?
As our fight against Covid-19 continues apace we’ve slowly started to see some activities come back to normal faster than maybe we would have hoped. One is the behaviours in…
Countdown to the Memorial Day Incubation Weekend in America
I believe it was Monday that America hit the 80,000 Covid death threshold. Today the American death toll has reached 88,000. And the Memorial Day long weekend arrives in a…
Conservatives are weaponizing the COVID-19 pandemic to promote nationalism
Originally published by Rabble.ca Nicholas Erwin-Longstaff May 13, 2020 POLITICS IN CANADA As the coronavirus pandemic ravages the world, the dangerously unstable foundations of the globalized economy have been laid…
I Rest My Case
Yesterday I offered, shall we say, an unflattering appraisal of the American ‘character’ and psyche. Further evidence supporting that assessment is to be found in the following video: Perhaps those…
COVID-19 both exposes and provides cover for the precarious nature of western economies
Inside the wall, apartment buildings similar to the one they observed earlier line the streets and there are people everywhere. Sisko explains that the place is a Sanctuary District, but…
Why Capitalism Can’t Cure Global Pandemics
We frequently hear that COVID-19 is the worst pandemic since the influenza of 1918. It is forgotten that another pandemic known as “the third plague” (because it was “the third…