Calgary’s main attraction
What is Calgary's most popular attraction? The Calgary Stampede, you say? Flames games, perhaps? The Calgary Zoo? Wrong, wrong and wrong.According to an article in Fast Forward Magazine, in 2010…
Bill Longstaff
Occupy Wall Street—a Sixties moment?
Is Occupy Wall Street a Sixties' moment? Will it bring about lasting change or simply fade away? Either way, it is overdue. Started in New York, inspired by the Arab…
A message from Forest Lawn for workers everywhere
The workers at Sobeys' Forest Lawn supermarket, the only unionized Sobeys in Calgary, are currently on strike. The pickets have been on duty for two weeks. Doug Smith of the…
Premier Redford’s male cabinet
The recent election of Alison Redford as leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta, and thus the premier of the province, was healthy progress for women in Canadian politics.…
Congrats to Tawakul Karman and friends
I was a little surprised at the Nobel Peace Prize awards for 2011. I had felt sure the winners would include a leader from Egypt's Arab Spring revolt, the Arab…
Pembina comments on the federal environment commissioner’s report
I intended to comment on the October Report of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, offering as it did yet another disappointing, if not depressing, account of the…
Loss of party subsidy is loss for democracy
Democracy is about political equality. To be democratic, a political system must in essence belong to all the people equally, and if it is to belong to all the people…
Cities—the provincial option
The possibility of Toronto becoming a province has popped up in the news again. The idea has floated around for years, supported by a variety of civic thinkers including the…
At least read the bloody book
We in Christendom have a history of "Christians" using religion to justify violence of all kinds, from war to burning people at the stake. Indeed, exploiting one of history's gentlest…
CIA undermines aid agencies
That the CIA does sleazy stuff is hardly new. Perhaps we shouldn't have been surprised then that they exploited children to help track Osama bin Laden.In order to confirm his…
Palestine and the churlish U.S. veto
It seems so little to ask. A people, already recognized as a nation by most other nations, requests full membership in the UN. It should be a shoo-in. Palestine is…
British cooking a hit in Berlin
Black is white, down is up, and British cooking is popular in Berlin. It's true! Berlin has seen the opening of a spate of cafes and bars featuring British food.East…
Barack Obama, the world’s leading assassin, and his private army
Within the U.S. military is another military, a secret military. Not secret in its existence—although even that can be shadowy—but secret in its operations. Except when it scores a public…
The best voting system for Canada
We have seen four provincial referendums recently offering alternatives to the First Past the Post (FPTP) voting system and all failed to bring about change. A major reason for the…
Democracy week Sept 12-18
The United Nations has declared September 15th the International Day of Democracy. Fair Vote Canada is expanding the day to Democracy Week, September 12th to the 18th. The week, according…
Barbie dolls are killing Chinese workers
Harmless, Barbie dolls are not. They are, in fact, responsible for exploitation, misery, and even death for thousands of innocents. According to the human rights group Students and Scholars Against…
Sweden: hIgh taxes and highly competitive
The daily press, diligently promoting the interests of its corporate owners, continually insists that taxes must be kept low to ensure Canada's economy is competitive. This refrain is dutifully chorused…
Americans pissed at politicians, particularly at the GOP
This has been a summer of discontent in American politics. According to The Pew Research Center, 79 per cent of the U.S. public are dissatisfied with the way things are…
Fukushima—radiation damage that just won’t quit
I admit to a love-hate relationship with nuclear power. One day I am all for it because of the large amounts of relatively green power it can provide. I wonder…
Busting the union-busting bills
Anti-union legislation has been all the rage in the U.S. following last November's election of a number of right-wing governors. Most notorious is Wisconsin's Scott Walker, infamous for his polarizing…