Government and Human Wretchedness
What is government if not a living reminder of our human wretchedness, of the fall made secular, of the post-lapsarian world and the prison house of procedure and law that…
Education
Well, duh…
…of course teens are going to wander off to the nearest fast food joint instead of paying for a cheese-less, whole grain slice of za! That’s what I woulda done.…
Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Chantal Hebert theorizes that Canada’s political scene has taken every turn Jack Layton might have hoped for since his passing last summer, while…
Separate schools: the subject that won’t go away…
… damn right it won’t! There was a good piece on Saturday by Kate Heartfield (one of the better writers at the Shitizen) about the inefficiencies of the publicly-funded separate…
Free Post-Secondary Education Makes Money
Free post-secondary education would increase incomes, and income taxes would not just recover the initial cost to government but would actually generate additional public revenue. This paper from the Canadian…
Arguments For Free Post-Secondary Education
1. Free post-secondary education is a student loan that the country takes out and gets more money back than it ever put in. The government will receive more money from…
Politics over education of children
B.C. spends $1.7M on ads in teachers’ dispute, CTV BC, June 14, 2012 “The B.C. government’s ad campaign defending their position in the teachers’ dispute has cost more than $1.7…
Free Post-Secondary Education Is Bad Because You’re Afraid Of Change
You have a reason to oppose free post-secondary education? You sure do, it’s your unwillingness to change. The fact is a majority of Canadians do offer justifications for opposing free…
How to Eliminate Tuition Fees (and do it right)
Quebec student group CLASSE has come forward with an offer of what it would take to end their almost four-month strike: the elimination of tuition fees by 2016. The plan…
Canada’s Self-Imposed Crisis in Post-Secondary Education
On June 7, I gave a keynote address to the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees Education Sector Conference. My PowerPoint presentation (with full references) can be found at this link.…
Crazy shit…
…. or as WK calls him – a Kooky Katholic… Yes. David Warren is at it again! He is the main reason why I don’t subscribe to the Shitizen anymore.…
Get with the program … um, what should we call Catholic bishops these days?
So the Ontario Legislature passed a bill that allows “Gay-Straight Alliances” in all schools that receive public funding. That’s both the non-sectarian schools and the Catholic (Roman or Eastern) schools.…
Ms. Broten…
… should suggest that Constitutions can be changed… Education Minister Laurel Broten met with representatives from the trustees’ association Monday. “Let me be absolutely clear,” Ms. Broten said in an…
Vancouver Secular Parenting Meetup
While I don’t have kids of my own (yet), I see the need for a larger secular parenting support within the freethought/humanist movement. This is why I’m excited to be…
It’s time to end of public funding for religious schools
In light of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association opposition to gay-straight alliances, and Ontario's large budget deficit, the Green Party of Ontario is the only party showing courage and…
The Erosion Of Educational Integrity
I rarely write directly about education these days, now that I am several years into retirement and believe that dwelling upon the past can be unhealthy. Every so often, however,…
Seven reasons why you should support the Quebec students’ call for low tuition fees
Despite the remarkably poor media coverage of the early days of the protests (especially in English Canada), it seems that the Quebec student protestors have finally succeeded in sparking a…
The Ontario Liberal Party is losing me…
… and fast! I know that there is more to the OLP than just this single issue. But this issue is very important to me as a voter and as…
Making Casserole Music in Regina
–Outlaw Snowy Bear and Jamie It was a nice warm evening, and I got together with about 80 other of Regina’s finest people to make our voices (and our pots…