Candidates Answer Four Questions (or not): Part I
Last week, I posted an editorial criticizing negative campaigning, and posed questions for our local candidates to answer -- without mentioning other candidates or other parties. Here are two of our local candidates' answers to the first set of four questions; the third candidate, Liberal Jim Postnikoff, was unfortunately unable to respond in time. Where possible, I have looked through the Liberal platform and attempted to find the Liberal approach on the topics of the questions, and inserted what I could find.
COLUMN: Fair Shares -- the moral way to distribute social wealth: PART II
This continues a discussion begun in Part I, last week. Bad Capitalism: exploitation If there is one single thing that separates me from most Lennonesque liberals and progressives who want One World, it is not my affection for defined and qualified Canadian nationalism. It is that I am anti-capitalist, whereas the majority ...
Editorial: Negative campaigning and being well-informed
Every day, my inbox is littered with vitriol from two of BC's political parties, about each other. They're each titled "press release" but I haven't been publishing them. Perhaps that's wrong-headed of me, but I don't want to encourage the negativity. Why am I opposed to the nastiness? Because I want voters to vote, and to...
COLUMN: The moral way to distribute social wealth -- Part One
Capitalists,Liberals, Nationalists, Intellectuals News about money We have been treated to the spectacle this month of a half-dozen Bombardier executives planning to split 32 million dollars among themselves as bonuses, at the same time as the corporation has announced it is about to lay off 14, 000 workers worldwide. It was...
Report: Government oversight compromised?
A report released recently by Evidence for Democracy shows that resource capacity and scientific independence are the most pressing scientific integrity issues within the BC government. "Evidence-based decision-making" has become the mantra of governments, but without good evidence, it's a difficult promise to deliver. Without...
LETTER: Canadian Federation of Students replies to Selkirk students
Selkirk Students Deserve Fair, Transparent and Democratic Referendum (On April 5) the Castlegar Source published a letter to the editor containing misinformation about Selkirk College students' membership in the Canadian Federation of Students. The letter leaves out some critical information that Selkirk students need to ...
River Talk — Truth, Reconciliation and Columbia River Treaty
Eileen Delehanty Pearkes has been researching and writing about the history and politics of water in the upper Columbia Basin since 2005. Her book on the Columbia River Treaty, A River Captured, was released in 2016. Recently, her travelling exhibit on the Columbia River Treaty, curated for Touchstones Nelson, won a national...
LETTER: Canadian Federation of Students sues Selkirk College students
Students at Selkirk College have become embroiled in a legal battle for the right to vote about their membership in a national student group, according to Selkirk College Students’ Union Director at-Large Santanna Hernandez. “Students submitted a valid petition for a referendum on membership in the Canadian Federation of...
COLUMN: Oceans and Life
The federal government recently created two marine protected areas in the Pacific region and has committed to increase ocean protection from one per cent to 10 by 2020. But will this be enough? Canada has the longest coastline of any nation, but our country doesn’t end at its ocean shores. With a 200-nautical-mile economic ...
Caribou, Logging, Wolves and Corporate Donors
What poses the greatest hazard to BC's endangered Southern Mountain Caribou -- habitat loss, wolves, or corporate donors? Or are all three of those factors linked, and if so, how? This opinion piece is from DeSmog Canada. Read and contemplate. The B.C. government is granting logging permits in critical caribou...