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If you only read one article about the Budget fiasco, read this one
If you’ve been avoiding reading about what all the political nerds are getting so excited about here is a truly fantastic analysis of the situation. If you only read one article about it, read this...
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A Vigil for Our Budget
Tonight, today, right now, MPs are in parliament for an unprecedented marathon of voting on proposed changes and deletions to the omnibus budget bill C-38. If you’ve been sleeping under a rock for the...
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Health Care Dissent: Here’s What The Conservative Wing Wanted To Happen
I find the entire argument conservatives are making against healthcare here so bizarre.As if healthcare were one type of market just like any other, it isn’t. First, we are talking about insurance, so...
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You’re Wrong Adam Goldenberg
Adam Goldenberg has an opinion on strategic campaigning and he is off base in so many ways. Green party leader Elizabeth May has suggested that her party and the NDP refrain from running candidates in...
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On The Benefits of Winning, In Canada
After reading this post on the future of the Liberal party from fellow DemReform blogger and every hopeful Liberal over at Curiosity Cat, I found my response turned into it’s own blog post. A snippet:...
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Rob Ford’s Bizarre Defence Is Undemocratic
Update: This is now also cross-posted up at Huffington Post Canada. This is just bizarre: “Like I said, for the last 13 years, I’ve always defined a conflict of interest that there’s two parties....
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Yes David, the Conservative movement has two sides, but it also has two parties.
True words written by David Brooks. But the next step is for him to realize that the Democrats are not actually socialists at all but are the Traditional Conservatives he is talking about and pining...
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Could the Liberal Party Become The Open Party?
Here’s a short survey from the Liberal Party on foreign ownership rules for natural resources. There are two interesting things about this. First, foreign ownership of our natural resources, especially...
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How much will you pay to be listened to on Facebook?
Reblogged from Computationally Thinking: Facebook is having a Red Barn moment. If you ever played Farmville you'll know what I mean. Farmville was fun for the first little while, planting, pulling in...
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The oil in those pipelines…
Note to Mr. Romney on this paraphrase about the price of gas:“It was $1.80 per gallon when Obama came in and now it’s over $4 per gallon….something something…pumping oil in by pipeline from Canada.” At...
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Economicus Illogicus
Economicus Illogicus Prime Minister, I simply don’t understand you’re approach here. You’re an economist right?So tell me, what is there to gain by rapidly extracting and selling resources in this way?...
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The Long Form Census Debacle Starts to Show Its Impact
As predicted the dropping of the mandatory long form census last year is starting to be felt in the statistical results being collected. First problem: Language Data. New language data may be skewed as...
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FIPA Treaty to go into Effect Thursday…Is It Right For Canada? Why the Hurry?
This Thursday a new treaty is due to come into effect between Canada and China without debate or public discussion. It is called an Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPA) with...
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Col Mustard, with the Camera, In Camera
Today Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was testifying in a libel case against him. I just tuned in for a few minutes and her this gem: “…in camera” is a bit of an oxymoron because no cameras are allowed.” -...
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Progressive Voters Unite! …Around Someone…
So in case you hadn’t heard there is a by-election coming up on Monday, three in fact, and the polls look interesting. The most exciting is the by-election in Calgary Centre where polls indicate a...
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Sorry grandma, but I'm casting my (hypothetical) vote for the Greens
Reblogged from Metro News: For this week’s column, I was going to write about the Grey Cup (Go Stamps!) or the ever-missed Santa Claus parade. But the Calgary Centre byelection was never far from my...
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Who ever said Canadian politics was dull?
What an exciting day to be a political addict in Canada. Who says Canadian politics is boring? People who aren’t paying attention, that’s who. At least four exciting things happened yesterday. Yes,...
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A mayor should …
A mayor should not be removed from office — a first for Toronto, if it happens — for a simple misjudgment, if it does not involve corruption. And if there is anything the sometimes bumbling Rob Ford is...
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Voting For, Against and Together
Great proposal from Andrew Coyne. I couldn’t have said it better myself, and I’ve tried, and tried and tried. “The opposition parties would agree on a single candidate to put up against the...
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It’s worse than we thought and everyone is to blame
So, scientists are finding that once again, it’s worse than we thought regarding global carbon emissions. Particularly interesting here is the list of the top 10 polluting countries in 2011. Can you...
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How will the Republican Party Beat Magic Robots in 2016?
Two amazing quotes in this very long article. Gingrich said. “On the left you have a natural grouping. You have the sense of, ‘What’s this week’s cause? And we did turtles this week. What can we do...
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Conservative Party Does Not Believe in Equality of Voters
This fascinating and scary post just showed up on the FairVote Canada Facebook page: The Conservative version of equality. Bigger picture below. A couple of things to notice here and I’ll just leave it...
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Rob Ford’s Apology and Promise to Continue is Unacceptable
Mayor Rob Ford has apologized sincerely for something , he won’t say what. He then spends part of the rest of his Sunday radio show attacking the media and his opponents who keep hounding him…despite...
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Mayor Rob Ford The Time Traveller
Rob Ford spoke to the media twice today, twice! The first time he admitted that yes, he had in fact smoked crack in the past but he doesn’t really remember it (which is why he wants to see that video)....
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Marois: It’s not a priority for me to break up the country…right now.
So Pauline Marois wants to focus on issues other than a referendum on breaking up Canada. “It’s not a priority for Quebecers at the moment and it’s not my priority either. Our priority is to reinforce...
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The Freedom of MPs
Andrew Coyne isn’t always great, but when he’s great, he’s great. Spot on here. Andrew Coyne: Trudeau helps the cause of democratic reform (by not pursuing it) MPs should be free to vote as they wish...
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Toronto Is More Than The Core
Marcus Gee makes a nice attempt at an ode to Toronto as opposed to the idea of Ford Nation: “Toronto isn’t Rob Ford. Toronto is more than that”. Unfortunately, I think he missed the point of why there...
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Goodbye Robin.
Robin Williams has always been a part of my life. One of the earliest proper TV shows I remember watching was Mork and Mindy, about a strange guy with a name like mine who happened to be an alien and...
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The Judoon Summarize Today’s Toronto Election News
A Message from the Shadow Proclamation summarizing today’s events in the Toronto Mayoral election.: RoFo no go fo mo of TO. RoFo go fo cou of TO so, MoFo no go fo cou of TO MoFo go fo scho bo of TO....
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Ranking the Lesser of All Evils
So we finally know exactly who will be on the ballot for mayor of our quiet little town of Toronto. It’s not who we expected, which isn’t surprising in a strange way, but it is done. In a sane world...
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Toronto’s Future Isn’t Written Yet
If you make to the end of the Back to the Future movie trilogy, past the flying cars and cowboys the last scene has a sage bit of wisdom to help you get through life…and voting: Jennifer: I brought...
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Should America Make Voting Mandatory?
So US President Obama recently suggested that making voting mandatory. There are multiple reasons for this, one being that the people who don’t vote are more likely to be low income and democrat so it...
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On the significance of sound and fury.
Oh journalists, you love a strong response to an unanswerable question don’t you? The media are really into nailing down what each party leader thinks about coalitions after the next election at the...
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If an election falls in the forest and nothing changes…ever, is it still a...
I’m an outsider to Alberta politics so I’ll try to avoid talking about which party should win or what policy issue is most important. But there are some disturbing, anti-democratic threads in the wave...
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Executed Prisoners Are Not Political Props
Huffington Post: The Conservative Party of Canada uses the execution videos of the people they want to protect as props to attack Liberal leader as unprepared for leadership. Whether military action is...
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The one simple thing you can do next week to improve your life, you won’t...
Vote.Filed under: Politics
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Are you fighting with your partner or friend all the time? One simple fix you...
Bring your friend or partner to vote. Vote.Filed under: Politics
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Wow. This will change everything. Find out how to ensure you aren’t left out!
On Monday, vote.Filed under: Politics
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Seven simple steps that will change everything. You won’t regret it.
On Monday, get out of bed half an hour early to do a little bit of planning how to vote. Find your voter information card to find out where to vote or if you don’t have one type in your postal code...
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Amazing advice! One thing you can do today. The results will astound you!
Vote.Filed under: Politics
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Come on Colorado, Just Take One Whiff, What Harm Could It Do?
Colorado may be about to try out another experimental lifestyle habit, single payer universal healthcare: Colorado May Replace Obamacare with Single Payer Prominent Democratic Consultants Sign Up to...
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My Letter to my MP on Electoral Reform
Dear Mr. Saini, I am one of your constituents and I must say very happy you won your seat and your party won the recent election even though I am not always a Liberal voter. I was unable to attend your...
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Teaching Yellow Dogs New Tricks
This is an interesting point by Stewart Prest at the Ottawa Citizen: Here’s an argument for Proportional Representation – the yellow dog effect. A yellow dog riding is what some call a ‘safe riding’...
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Message to Trudeau: #StickToThePlan
According to this article the Prime Minister had some words the other day in Montreal’s Le Devoir newspaper about how much support is now needed for different kinds of electoral reform. They weren’t...
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Don’t Throw Away Our Shot
For the first time, we find ourselves not as a reflection of another power. Our politics is not a derivation of Westminster or Washington anymore. Our politics is specific to us, not a derivation from...
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Yes, Change is Hard and Requires Math, That is Why We Elected You
So it seems that the response about the electoral reform committee (EMME) process is that there are lots of committed, organized, focused, passionate people who want to make this country better,...
View ArticleDust Off That Blog, It’s Election Time
Whew, it’s been a while hasn’t it? There’s dust everywhere…how do you even get dust inside a blog? Oh well. There’s an election in Ontario on June 7, 2018 and well, I have opinions (see @rateldajer for...
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On the Burning of Bridges
So we just got another call from the Peter Mackay campaign to ask for our support. I don’t think he gets it. We just laughed and laughed. Sigh…. Many people who used to vote Progressive Conservative,...
View ArticleEarly Soundbite Grading-Part 1
So it’s a few days into **Election 41** and I’m still trying to finish all the grading for my Spring courses. But I can’t help bring out the red grading pen for some party leader moments this week. ##...
View ArticleStrategic Voting in a Toss-Up Riding
Just had a very nice chat with one of my local candidates for #Elxn44 in #KitchenerCentre. It was @morricemike of the @CanadianGreens. He does bookable short calls with voters to talk about issues....
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