Make no mistake about it: Carole James will be gone as NDP leader well before the next provincial election. But remember: in politics, like comedy, timing is everything. And the next BC election isn’t scheduled until Tuesday, May 14, 2013.  Yes, 2013.  So for the NDP there’s no rush: in fact, it would be politically dumb to replace James […]

Last Monday I had the opportunity to go somewhere I’d never been before: a City council meeting. I was assigned a story about the Museum Select Committee and was encouraged to attend the meeting by my editor so I could see the Committee’s presentation.  Usually, I curl on Monday nights, but I managed to find a spare and off...

 We should have known it was too good to be true. Harper’s many, many repetitions of his government’s commitment to get all the troops out by July 2011 are well known. I think he may actually have meant it because by these repeated statements he framed the issue so strongly that all Canadians expected – […]

Rossland sure has had its share of hot spots in the past.  One of them was the Allan Hotel, which stood where our Subway sandwich shop now stands. The Allan was built around the mid-1890s and until its complete destruction in 1978, it buzzed with a cafe, a beer parlour, and a supper club called the Loose Cabooze.  At some...

Now that I’m back from some well-enjoyed fun in the sun, I am amazed at the number of people who have suggested the biggest story that happened in BC in the past few weeks was the decision by Premier Gordon Campbell to step down.  They are wrong.   As repeatedly explained on this blog long […]

I used to play trumpet, and my crowning musical achievement came not with playing reggae and ska/rocksteady covers at the Garden Works Christmas party (1997), but with having had the privilege of playing “Taps” at my elementary school’s Remembrance Day assembly, circa 1989.    As the only trumpet player in my school band, the...

For those considering issue triage — picking five or six issues to focus on — in the fight to rid the country of the current government, one area that is critical to the outcome is exposing the Harper government’s construction of the national security state.   I am referring here to the commitment of the […]

 Dark Reading (www.darkreading.com) has a list of their “Top Four Social Engineers of All Time”. These are people who have become experts at conning other people. Two, Kevin David Mitnick and Frank Abagnale, have criminal pasts. Frank Abagnale was the subject of the movie Catch me if You Can. The third is a consultant who […]

The pretty village of Kaslo on Kootenay Lake has a population of less than 2,000 and one licensed daycare, the Periwinkle Children’s Centre. The centre has a long history in the community and also a long history of the same problems repeating themselves.  Sarah Lawless, chair of the board of directors for the non-profit centre, […]

 Ed Broadbent, one of Canada’s most respected progressive sages, sat down with the CCPA’s Trish Hennessy to talk about the Canada he grew up in and how it’s changed over his lifetime. During this candid conversation — in Mr. Broadbent’s own Ottawa backyard — he reflects on the profound shift away from equality. When he […]