I’m Becoming an Oil Baron
For those who complain there’s nothing in the news but COVID these days, try the Alberta section. Lots going on. For example, our government just laid off 26,000 school support…
Alberta
Imagine Alberta Without Kenney
Imagine an Alberta government not under investigation for election fraud? One that doesn’t fire tens of thousands during a pandemic so Ottawa can pay them instead? A provincial government which…
Back to the 30s?
“We are facing a period of profound adversity unlike any we have since the 1930s,” Alberta Premier Jason Kenney said last week. The premier was referring to the province’s economy…
Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Kenan Malik discusses how the coronavirus pandemic has exposed the fragility of the UK’s social and economic structures: The economic burden imposed…
the 2020-21 Alberta budget
I’ve written a ‘top 10’ overview of the 2020-21 Alberta budget, tabled on February 27. The link to the overview is here.
The Cartel Still Rules … Sort of
It isn’t easy to convince nominally free-market Albertans that monopoly and government interference in the market made us rich, but of course they did. Nothing has contributed more to the…
Cost savings associated with Housing First
I’ve written a summary of a recent study I co-authored on savings to the health and justice sectors associated with Housing First (i.e., the immediate provision of subsidized housing, along…
Is Kenney Coming After Our Pensions?
Premier Jason Kenney, ardent free market conservative, has started sounding a little like Peter Lougheed, a former premier with more progressive conservative leanings. Indeed Lougheed was once labelled “Peter the…
Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Heather Scoffield points out that the Trudeau Libs’ definition of poverty (for the purposes of claiming credit for having reduced it) excludes…
Team Alberta update
NOTICE TO PRO-ALBERTA FOLKS: Back from Calgary. Met with many smart Albertans. Got ideas for our non-partisan, citizen-led group. Next steps: a name. Membership. And a launch party at @DaisyGrp.…
Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Joseph Stiglitz writes about the need to cultivate solidarity as an alternative to neoliberal selfishness. And Chuck Collins reminds us how the very…
Calling all Alberta fans
As I thumb this out, I’m in Calgary to teach at the Faculty of Law. Excited to be back. All of you can call me “professor,” please. Anyway. Around this…
Buffalo Declarations and other Bull.
There is an odour emanating from the politics of self justification in Alberta. And it is not that of the wild prairie rose. It is the greed and the false…
income support for low-income households in Alberta
Next week, Jason Kenney’s UCP government will table its second budget. With that in mind, I’ve written a blog post titled “Ten things to know about income support for low-income…
Ten things to know about subsidized rental housing in Alberta
In anticipation of next week’s Alberta budget, I’ve written a ‘top 10’ overview of subsidized rental housing in the province. Points raised in the blog post in include the following:…
Have they ever lied to you before?
Teck Resources, the Vancouver-based company that wants to dig the largest open pit tar sands mine in Canada, tells us that the enterprise wants to be “carbon neutral” by 2050.…
Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Ed Broadbent and Andrew Jackson highlight how among its other advantages, a national pharmacare program would prevent workers from being tied to…
A Letter from an Albertan to His Prime Minister About the Tech Mine
Over the weekend I wrote a letter to Prime Minister Trudeau about the proposed Teck Frontier tar sands mine and cc’d appropriate parties. The letter is below. I felt it…
Is it ‘The Peoples’ Pipeline?
After checking further, it is confirmed that Global Television news anchor Dawna Friesen actually called the Trans Mountain pipeline, ‘the peoples’ pipeline.’ I suppose it seemed appropriate when the following…