Two articles I stumbled across this morning, ostensibly on the Spanish banking bailout, have brought two other articles from the somewhat more distant past into mind. The first (in the first group) is “Europe’s Fail-Out: 4 Reasons Why Spain’s Bailout Is Doomed Already,” from the Business section of the Atlantic website. The second is “Fitch […]

[UPDATED MARCH 31: CONGRATS M. TRUDEAU BOXEUR ; SEPTEMBER 28 : RUN JUSTIN RUN ; APRIL 15, 2013 : WON JUSTIN WON … scroll to bottom of page]. Back on September 25, 2005 – some six and a half years ago, believe it or not (we have trouble ourselves) – we posted something called “The […]

Not that anyone is paying much attention (right now). But we’d just like to add our voices of support (or at least special interest) for the federal NDP leadership candidacy of Nathan Cullen – MP for the vast northern BC riding of Skeena-Bulkley Valley. A few weeks ago, Barbara Yaffe noted in the Vancouver Sun […]

A little too unhappily, this week began with reports from our Canadian banks on slower growth prospects for the domestic economy. See, eg, on Monday, September 12: “Canada’s growth to slow, RBC says” ; and then, just one day later: “Canada could be 1st into recession, bank warns.” At the bottom of these prognostications were […]

According to Martin Regg Cohn, in “Ontario’s political air war – the battle of the campaign ads … launched during the final game of the hockey season” last night, the Tim Hudak Conservatives’ mindless “anti-tax commercial” (part of  “a wave of new commercials blasting [Ontario Premier Dalton] McGuinty as ‘The Tax Man’”) won first prize. […]

The 41st Parliament of Canada has not even held its first meeting quite yet. But already Jack Layton’s new Quebec-majority NDP official opposition is showing just how different it is from anything the federal New Democrats have ever known before. Former Ontario NDP leader Stephen Lewis, son of former federal leader David Lewis (silent partner […]

Several years ago I was at a conference on Canadian disaster management, where provincial representatives agreed that flooding was a recurrent problem shared by everyone – and quite arguably the first priority for any joint cross-Canada disaster mitigation policy. It never makes business sense to offer insurance against something almost bound to happen. And in […]

[UPDATED MARCH 30, APRIL 5, 8, 11, 13, 22, MAY 1, 3]. There now appears no escape from the spring election “skillfully brought on by Mr. Harper” (despite his seven-year-old protests otherwise). For the tedious technical details, see, eg: “Harper government set to fall Friday, setting stage for vote in early May” and “Harper government […]

In 1933 the incomparable Percy Robinson published his still too-neglected minor classic, Toronto during the French Regime, 1615—1793. In the book’s last chapter he noted how, in the 1930s, the capital city of Ontario (then still only the second-largest city in Canada, behind Montreal) was “the citadel of British sentiment in America.” Over the subsequent […]

It is probably quite politically clever that “Conservative MPs will soon be asking their constituents for advice on what to do about the economy … Prime Minister Stephen Harper has sent a letter to the Tory caucus asking each MP to proactively seek out ideas on the next phase of the government’s economic action plan.” […]