On childcare in Ricochet
I forgot to post the piece I wrote on the NDP’s universal childcare proposal for Ricochet. Here it is belatedly. It was published last weekend and tries to situate the…
Canada
Where Saskatchewan Comes To Count
Saskatchewan’s lovable radio host asks: “What are you thinking and feeling about 1) our Canada today b) yesterday on the “Hill” and c) the cowardice and evil in our midst.…
Parliament Hill Shooting: Statement by Ottawa Police Service
Here’s the Ottawa Police Service’s statement on today’s shootings at the National War Memorial and on Parliament Hill. The post Parliament Hill Shooting: Statement by Ottawa Police Service appeared first…
Ottawa Attacked
A sad day of note in Canadian political history, as Parliament Hill was under gunfire today. A soldier was also shot at the nearby War Memorial. Putting the day’s events…
Harper, the Dog of War
For Harper, 6 CF-18s in Kuwait, all war all the time, phoning up the Pentagon asking where we can become more militarily engaged…all these things lead to a war posture,…
Join Ricochet: A new take on independent media.
Have you joined yet? No? So, you’re good with corporate media spinning things for you, against your personal, community, national and ecological interests? Oh. Ok. 🙂 Ricochet is an audacious…
If You Read But One Thing About Universal Childcare This Week
Line them up here. In this one section of universal childcare analysis by one of the smartest people in the country, Michal Rozworski, we see a number of significant policy…
Transportation After Fossil Fuels: A Decade Away?
Once upon a time, I rode the maglev at the Japan pavilion at Expo 86. Since then, I’ve come to see that that was the Commodore Vic 20 of high…
Regina Women’s History Month #womenhistory
October is Women’s History Month. This year I was invited to the event at the Conexus Arts Centre, and I’d suggest you check it out next October.
How to Spot an Ecology Troll
Start with an oil spill apologist/minimizer. Work with the twisted logic that since all ships and oil tankers don’t crash all the time, any concern over one that might is…
The Madness of King Stephen
As excuses for war go, claiming a conflict to be “noble” is really scraping the bottom of the barrel. It’s something you resort to when there’s simply nothing left to…
Political Eh-conomy Radio: Looking towards childcare in Canada, with lessons from Sweden
https://politicalehconomy.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/podcast-141016-childcare.mp3 This week, the federal NDP reignited a national debate over childcare by proposing a universal $15 per day childcare program. This is the focus of today’s episode, which features…
Harper’s Zipper: Stuck Again
ANALYSIS Conservatives’ copyright law changes could backfire Does the government really want to trigger a debate over the use of political attack ads? By Kady O’Malley, CBC News Posted: Oct…
Is Canada the Sweden of anything?
There was an odd article last week on the explainer site Vox that argued Sweden doesn’t achieve its relative equality with very progressive, “soak the rich” taxation. While Matt Bruenig…
Gazette Calls Out Harper on Climate Change
It’s one of the grand old English-language papers in Canada, the Montreal Gazette, and its editorial board has had enough of waiting for the Harper regime to act on the…
Are Canada’s Rails Safe?
All signs are pointing to no. And the railway companies are starting to ship way more goods much more explosive than Canadian grain.
Harper govt gets failing grade on environmental record: federal watchdog
Read this Oct. 7 Globe and Mail story by Josh Wingrove on a scathing report from a federal government watchdog on the Harper government’s environmental record. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s…
Means-test the rich, or another argument for eliminating tuition
Here’s an oversimplified choice for how to fund post-secondary education. Imagine you have two options for dealing with how people pay for post-secondary education: Universal free tuition, means-testing to see…
Rafe: Tories will win in 2015 on Iraq position; what does that mean for Canada, environment?
Stephen Harper addressing UN Security Council (Sean Kilpatrick/CP) The environmental policy of Ottawa will now depend upon what the Tories desire for the next five years. Why do I say…
Canada’s Militarized Foreign Policy
Perhaps the ultimate legacy of the Bush/Cheney regime was the militarization of America’s foreign policy by which the use or threat of military force came to displace diplomacy as the…