Monday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading.

- Michael Harris tears into the Cons for their latest set of Senate abuses:

It is time once more to throw up on your shoes over the Senate. We all did that when Liberal Senator Andrew Thompson went missing in action for a decade at public expense — our man in Mexico.
This stable of political studs put out to pasture at public expense for party loyalties costs Canada $92.5 million annually in salaries, senator allowances and administrative costs...

Each lottery winner in the Senate receives a base annual salary of $135,200. The Speaker of the Senate, currently Conservative Noel Kinsella, pulls down $187,500.
...
The Americans figured out that an unelected Senate had no part in a democracy in 1911.

But that didn’t stop this unelected body from killing by stealth Bill C-311 after the House of Commons had passed the climate change bill. And this under a prime minister who once promised that he would never allow an unelected Senate to go against the will of the majority of Members of Parliament.

- Marilyn Reid comments on the role of free trade agreements in facilitating corporate control over government policy. But Stuart Trew notes that the end result isn't inevitable, as several Latin American countries are discussing ways to make sure that trade agreements don't unduly interfere with democratic decision-making.

- The Guardian discusses how the UK Cons' privatization agenda is putting many essential social services at risk - including the availability of safe donated blood. And Jim Holmes nicely sums up the effect of corporatizing wastewater treatment in Regina.

- Vanessa Brown reports on the people's housing summit being held at 3 PM tomorrow to give mere renters some voice in Regina's development (in contrast to Michael Fougere's developer-heavy version which considers a $300K house to be an example of "affordable housing").

- Finally, Mia Rabson laments the Cons' choice to make Canada's census more expensive and less informative. And Daniel Wilson writes that First Nations will be hit particularly hard by the Cons' "don't want to know" attitude toward social realities.