Saturday, February 6, 2010
URGENT - Harper signing away our sovereignty while parliament is closed
excerpt:
In return for this “concession” from Washington, Ottawa has agreed to pay an unacceptably high price. Under the deal, Canadian provinces and municipalities will permanently give up the right to favour local companies in awarding contracts. Government procurement at the municipal and provincial levels is an extremely important economic development tool, crucial for job creation, the encouragement of Canadian firms and the development of home-grown technology. At a time when cities are rebuilding their transit systems and are refitting homes to make them more energy efficient, it is the height of folly to open all these contracts to American bidders. (Given the multiplicity of measures used to protect them from outside bidders, it is foolish to imagine that Canadian firms will have an equal opportunity to bid on U.S. state and municipal contracts.)
What makes the Harper government’s deal particularly maddening is that the Buy American provisions in the U.S. Recovery Act violate the spirit if not the terms of NAFTA that guarantee the right of Canadian firms to bid on U.S. federal government projects with the exception of defence contracts. Instead of publicly and loudly asserting that Washington is violating NAFTA, the Harper government is bribing the Obama administration to stop doing that by opening up tens of billions of dollars worth of public contracts in Canada to American corporations.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
World's leading medical journal finally admits that Wakefield was wrong - vaccines don't cause autism
The anti-vaccine movement lost steam Tuesday after the world’s leading medical journal officially retracted a controversial autism study that has caused millions of parents around the world to fear childhood vaccines.
The study, published in 1998 in the British journal the The Lancet was the first to report a purported link between a vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella and the onset of autism. That reported association, which has since been discredited, formed the crux for the argument that MMR vaccines can cause autism and many in the anti-vaccine movement used the paper as proof of their claims.
Experts say the rare move by the Lancet to pull a published paper should help to correct the public record, though many added that more work is needed to remove the publication’s harmful legacy.
“This sends a very strong signal this research is not to be believed,” said Paul Hebert, editor-in-chief of the Canadian Medical Association Journal. “For something that is published, taking it out of the public record is effectively saying it never existed.”
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Sunday, January 31, 2010
CBC to begin charging to be quoted
Not that I quote a lot of CBC articles, but this is ridiculous.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has signed up with iCopyright, the American copyright bounty hunters used by the Associated Press, to offer ridiculous licenses for the quotation of CBC articles on the web (these are the same jokers who sell you a "license" to quote 5 words from the AP).
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Friday, January 29, 2010
Harper, accountability and democracy
Lawrence Martin:
(The Conservatives) campaigned heavily against Liberal abuse of power and promised a new era of accountability. And the Accountability Act did, in fact, contain many fine reforms. But as Duff Conacher of Democracy Watch (who advised the Conservatives on the legislation) will tell you, a goodly number of the proposed reforms never made it to the table, and others that were enacted have since been violated in spirit. When Stephen Harper's all-controlling proclivities are factored in, the end result has been a further worsening of the problem.
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Thursday, January 28, 2010
More people in Quebec think Elvis is alive than like Stephen Harper
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To begin, CROP (Quebec's most credible pollster) reports that only 5 per cent of Quebecers are "very satisfied" with the job the Harper government is doing, a number well below the Elvis Threshold -- the number of respondents who would also report that Elvis is still alive. Another 32 per cent are somewhat satisfied.
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"Harper and his too-clever-by-half cronies in the PMO neglected to consider a very important constituency"
News on an interesting report on Canada and Canadians by the Institute of Wellbeing.
Harper plans to help women and children in the 3rd world, he reduced support for them in Canada
Harper talks big on the world stage about women and children, yet back at home he has been cutting funding for women's issues and child poverty for years.
The example in this article is about Inuit children and how little Harper cares for them.
Libby Davies wants to spank Harper
Interview recently with Libby Davies, NDP House Leader.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Flash protest rallies against prorogation
Reports on recent flash protests at various locations, mainly 2 protests where Tony Clement was speaking.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Parliament carries on, oh, but wait, without the Conservatives.
So how did it go yesterday? The first day on Parliament Hill post weekend prorogation rallies saw the opposition parties arrive to carry on with regular business on matters like youth unemployment, while the government treated us to a pretty coordinated effort to distract from prorogation.
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Monday, January 25, 2010
Green Party leadership troubles
Trouble has been brewing for a while behind the scenes in the Green Party; today it boiled over in David Akin’s National Post piece, which highlighted the upheaval over May’s leadership in the wake of a mass exodus of senior party officials. The exodus included the firing of Political Campaign Director Catharine Johannson, the resignation of Executive Director Maureen Murphy, and the resignation of the party’s Federal Council Donna Dillman — all in addition to the recent firing of 4 of the party’s 7 organizers and 3 other staff resignations, including its long-awaited and just-hired Quebec Press Secretary. Rumors are that the Greens are facing dire financial consequences, which has no doubt prompted widespread cutbacks.
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Wednesday, January 20, 2010
The direct cost of Prorogation
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In combining the direct cost of Canadians paying for a Parliament to do nothing for 22 days and the indirect cost of Parliament's lost time due to scrapping a portion of viable Bills, the total cost of prorogation can be justifiably approximated at $130,407,733.
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More Conservative Spin
Yesterday, Conservative anyonymice (sic) were offering a new reason for prorogation. The PM, we were told, wanted to ensure that ministers with new portfolios had time to bone up before facing their opposition critics in Question Period.
Pish.
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And, Stockwell Day is now in charge of reigning in spending. His experience? He was Alberta's treasurer - the per capita spending then in Alberta was the highest of any province in Canada. They put a big spender in a position to reign in spending.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Staff gutted at Rogers-owned CITYTV Toronto
Citytv is cutting shows, production staff and on-air talent including veteran CityNews at Six anchor Anne Mroczkowski.
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Ott wouldn’t comment on other staff cuts but the story on Citytv’s website lists the “remaining on-air staff” and they don’t include: Lara Di Battista, Pam Seatle, Farah Nasser, Jee-Yun Lee, Marianne Dimain, Merella Fernandez, and Michael Serapio.
On Tuesday afternoon, the online biographies for those eight broadcasters were all removed from the website.
Mroczkowski had worked there for 23 years. Di Battista and Seatle are both also veterans.
An unknown number of production staff were also laid off.
...The mood inside the Rogers building was grim, as most employees were fearful for their jobs.
“It’s just awful,” said one employee who was not part of the cuts. “Basically, ever since Ted Rogers died, so did the vision of Citytv as a national network player. Nobody has any vision. The bean counters have taken over and they want to turn us into Omni 3.”
The purchase of Citytv was a signal change for Rogers, which is much better known for providing the cable signal than actually running TV stations. It’s previous experience with broadcasting was with community programming stations, and it’s Omni brand of multicultural stations, which are both much cheaper to run than full fledge TV stations, that buy content from U.S. networks. As well, with only five stations in big cities across Canada, the Citytv brand was much smaller compared to the national coverage of its competitors, CTV and Global.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Who does this lazy Parliament represent anyway
Excellent post by Bill Longstaff regarding what the make-up of parliament actually represents and what it does not.
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A telling passage from one letter particularly caught my eye:
Judging from the current “representation” most Quebecois want to quit the federation; most Canadians are reluctant to elect women; there are no Conservative supporters in Vancouver, Montreal or Toronto; there are no Liberal supporters in Alberta. There are no New Democrat supporters in Saskatchewan and remarkably few elsewhere, and no Green supporters anywhere in Canada.Although it appears farcical, this is indeed what the current makeup of Parliament suggests, and it's a sad and disturbing message. The fact that Conservatives are not represented in our three major cities and Liberals are not represented in Alberta, even though many people in those areas support those parties, contributes to dangerous divisions in an already regionally divided nation. That millions of Canadians are unable to help elect someone who represents them is a democratic tragedy.
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Crisis in Haiti deepened by problems of the past and the international community
Since a devastating earthquake rocked Haiti on Tuesday--killing tens of thousands of people--there's been a lot of well-intentioned chatter and twitter about how to help Haiti. Folks have been donating millions of dollars to Wyclef Jean's Yele Haiti (by texting "YELE" to 501501) or to the Red Cross (by texting "HAITI" to 90999) or to Paul Farmer's extraordinary Partners in Health, among other organizations. I hope these donations continue to pour in, along with more money, food, water, medicine, equipment and doctors and nurses from nations around the world. The Obama administration has pledged at least $100 million in aid and has already sent thousands of soldiers and relief workers. That's a decent start.
But it's also time to stop having a conversation about charity and start having a conversation about justice--about recovery, responsibility and fairness. What the world should be pondering instead is: What is Haiti owed?
Haiti's vulnerability to natural disasters, its food shortages, poverty, deforestation and lack of infrastructure, are not accidental. To say that it is the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere is to miss the point; Haiti was made poor--by France, the United States, Great Britain, other Western powers and by the IMF and the World Bank.
Now, in its attempts to help Haiti, the IMF is pursuing the same kinds of policies that made Haiti a geography of precariousness even before the quake. To great fanfare, the IMF announced a new $100 million loan to Haiti on Thursday. In one crucial way, the loan is a good thing; Haiti is in dire straits and needs a massive cash infusion. But the new loan was made through the IMF's extended credit facility, to which Haiti already has $165 million in debt. Debt relief activists tell me that these loans came with conditions, including raising prices for electricity, refusing pay increases to all public employees except those making minimum wage and keeping inflation low. They say that the new loans would impose these same conditions. In other words, in the face of this latest tragedy, the IMF is still using crisis and debt as leverage to compel neoliberal reforms.
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Saturday, January 16, 2010
Only in Canada: Harper's prorogation is a Canadian thing
Go searching for the last time a Westminster-style parliament was shut down to free its leaders from unwanted censure or scrutiny — and you'll end right back in Canada, where you started.
It turns out, no other English-speaking nation with a system of government like ours — not Britain, Australia or New Zealand — has ever had its parliament prorogued in modern times, so that its ruling party could avoid an investigation, or a vote of confidence, by other elected legislators.
Only three times has this happened, all in Canada ...
Friday, January 15, 2010
I'm glad I got my flu shots
In comparison, the number of hours lost is much great than what is lost with just the regular seasonal flu
Gilmore said the last time the province documented such significant loss in hours was during the blackout in August 2003
The last time I had the flu I was off work for a week. Now that I am self employed, I really can't afford a week off.
MSM beginning to come around?
It’s kind of amusing to watch the second guessers in the media take aim at their comrades for being wrong on the public’s negative reaction to Harper proroguing Parliament.
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Thursday, January 14, 2010
Fair Vote Canada's letters to the PM and to the Opposition leaders
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(excerpt)
At present the House of Commons embodies and projects a series of ridiculous untruths. Judging from the current “representation” most Quebecois want to quit the federation; most Canadians are reluctant to elect women; there are no Conservative supporters in Vancouver, Montreal or Toronto; there are no Liberal supporters in Alberta. There are no New Democrat supporters in Saskatchewan and remarkably few elsewhere, and no Green supporters anywhere in Canada...
Each of you should now be asking: does my party really want democratic representation for all Canadians, and what will my party risk or sacrifice, now, to achieve it?
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Worst Governer General Ever?
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Harper deliberately chose to pick a political fight with the opposition just six weeks after promising to work with them. Faced with certain defeat, he demands Jean prorogue Parliament. Did she consult with the leader of the opposition to see if he could lead a government? There’s no sign she did. Instead, she simply gave in.
Fast forward one year and Harper is again in trouble—this time over his government’s handling of the Afghan detainee torture issue. On the last day before the Christmas holidays, MPs passed a motion calling on the government to release thousands of uncensored documents on Afghan prisoners. Harper promised the committee looking at the issue they would receive “all legally available documents.” Instead, he prorogues Parliament, thus disbanding all committees in both the House and the Senate and killing government bills, no matter how close they were to approval.
And as many others have argued, Harper’s timing said everything. He chose to announce on December 30 – the same day five Canadians were killed in Afghanistan and at a time when the public and media were focusing on the announcement of Canada’s Olympic ice–hockey team that Parliament wouldn’t resume until March 3. Even more troubling is that Harper didn’t even bother to follow tradition and make his “request” of the Governor–General in person, instead telling her over the phone. Yet, the Governor General’s official residence is right across the street from the Prime Minister’s Sussex Drive home. Constitutional expert C.E.S. Franks, a Queen’s University professor, called Harper’s actions “an affront to the dignity of the office of Governor General.”
The British magazine, The Economist, an influential and largely right–wing publication, stated in an editorial, “Mr. Harper’s move looks like naked self–interest.” The magazine, which once dubbed former Prime Minister Paul Martin “Mr. Dithers”, said Harper’s a competent tactician with a ruthless streak. “The danger in allowing the Prime Minister to end discussion any time he chooses is that it makes Parliament accountable to him rather than the other way around.”
Top Ten Reasons Stephen Harper Prorogued Parliament
Comic, but true!
(By true, I mean it had everything to do with the Afghan Detainee Scandal, etc.)
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