Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- The Lever examines new research showing how private equity is systematically funnelling risk and underperformance to less wealthy investors. And Charlie Warzel discusses how the AI investment fad is based on mass delusion, while Rick Morton notes that it's also predicated entirely on the retroactive validation of systematic illegality. 

- Ned Resnikoff discusses how the Trump regime is determined to turn American cities into war zones - even as they were previously safer than they'd been in decades - as a pretext for his plan to exert military control over them. Adam Tranter notes that anybody actually concerned with people's lives and well-being would be pushing for low traffic neighbourhoods and people-friendly communities. And Trevor Melanson discusses how Chinese EV imports could give Canadians far more and better options for cleaner and safer transportation. 

- William Foege discusses how public health needs to fight back against the cynical misinformation of antisocial populists and scammers. And Nick Tsergas studies the growing body of evidence that COVID-19 has long-term effects on people's bodies whether or not they've been diagnosed with long COVID - making any avoidable transmission a wilful choice to make people sicker. 

- Finally, Jeremy Appel highlights how Air Canada's flight attendants were able to fight back against the exploitation of unpaid labour. Dale Smith examines the rise of Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code which the Libs have taken to using reflexively to squelch strikes and allow employers to run roughshod in collective bargaining, while Verity Stevenson points out how workers' determination to stand up for themselves in the face of that interference should lead to questions as to whether it should be allowed in the first place. And Kim Siever offers a warning that surface friendliness from an employer is no guarantee of respect or job security. 

Tuesday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Tim Dickinson laments that so many corporations, universities and other entities with the resources to stand up to Donald Trump are instead choosing to enable his authoritarianism. And David Dayen offers a look at the U.S.' crumbling economy even as the Trump regime tries to destroy all the data sources which would allow people to recognize it, while Evan Williams notes that Canada has made substantial progress in rerouting its car purchases to avoid both tariffs and U.S. suppliers. 

- But lest anybody think all is hunky-dory in Canada, the Canadian Press reports on new Statistics Canada data showing that income inequality continues to get worse by the year. Jonathan Lambert highlights how cash support is among the most effective interventions to improve the health of infants. And Cat Hobbs discusses how public ownership could make rail and other transportation more affordable. 

- Trevor McFadyen writes that the Carney Libs' heavy-handed intervention against Air Canada workers shows their disdain for collective bargaining. And Peggy Nash's view that the flight attendant strike could be a turning point in defending the right to strike in Canada will hopefully prove prescient - as the workers' refusal to back down has led to bargaining wins which were supposed to have been ruled out by an employer-biased government. 

- Finally, Peter Brannen warns of the potential that the climate breakdown will lead to the Earth's sixth major mass extinction. Geoffrey Johnston writes that this has been a summer of the climate emergency (though surely only one among many to come). Sonal Gupta reports on the large number of First Nations affected by wildfires. And Ajit Niranjan reports on new research showing that the harms caused by wildfire smoke are far worse than previously known. 

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- John Conway discusses the Cons' project of destroying Canada's social safety net.

- But the good news is that Stephen Harper is running into a few roadblocks along the way. For example, the rule of law - as a Federal Court judge has concluded that the Cons' attempt to impose an arbitrator with connections to both their own party and Air Canada to rule on a collective agreement for Air Canada's workers.

- And Thomas Walkom writes that there are limits to what the Cons can impose on the general public in trying to push the Gateway pipeline:

Harper’s hope was that this combination of toughness, smear and crass ideology — particularly if repeated endlessly in the right-wing media — would convince a big chunk of the broad Canadian middle. The strategy does, after all, work in the U.S.
But it hasn’t here. Public opposition to the scheme is so intense in B.C. that even the avowedly pro-business, governing Liberals have joined in.

Add to this the nightmare of aboriginal politics. First Nations along the pipeline route are threatening to tie up the project for years in court — which they can do.

And the broad public? My guess is that, Joe Oliver notwithstanding, most Canadians don’t regard environmentalist David Suzuki, or even B.C. Liberal premier Christy Clark, as dangerous radicals funded by foreign gold.

What they do see is an increasingly shrill federal government whose bully-boy tactics aren’t working.

- Finally, Jordon Cooper comments on the costs of ignoring mental health as a public policy issue:

Across the country we have seen what happens when we underfund mental-health programs. It leads to an increase of people on the streets, it forces police into becoming mental-health workers, and in some situations it leads to deaths. Mental health is a complicated field but until we start to publicly address how we doing, how is it going to get better?

The bar to get help is too high, takes too long, and people end up too close to the edge. We deal a lot with the symptoms in our society - why not tackle the problem directly?

Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Trish Hennessy is on board for an Occupy Canada movement:

To my friends adopting a wait-and-see approach, I say: The least they can expect from progressives who have been criticizing the system (some since Woodstock) is a little help from their friends.

Occupy Wall Street, and the emerging movements flowing into Canada, is evidence that our democracy is alive and well; and that democracy happens in between trips to the ballot box, not just at election time.

The ground is heavily contested and powerful elites are counting on us to stay at home, turn on the TV, and passively judge whether the ‘reality TV' of real-life public demonstrations is worth pinning our hopes on or not.

The revolution is finally going to be televised but dude, do you seriously want to watch it from the comfort of your couch at home? Or do you want to be a part of it?

- The Star and the Globe and Mail both decry the Cons' regressive anti-labour positioning. Meanwhile, Rod Mickleburgh notes that Lisa Raitt may end up putting herself out of a job in the process of attacking unions and workers at every turn.

- Barrie McKenna notes that the tax-goodie model for corporate research and development has proven to be a miserable failure - which figures to be particularly problematic when our current federal government won't stand for the type of direct investment that actually produces results.

- Finally, a double dose of Dan Gardner. First, he criticizes the Cons' war on knowledge. And in tweets assembled by pogge, he points out how the Cons' dumb-on-crime policies include direct discrimination against property renters.

Parliament In Review: June 16, 2011

While June 16 was a shortened day due to the NDP's weekend convention, it wasn't lacking for a few notes of interest.

Issue of the Day

While the Cons took the opportunity to serve notice of their intention to impose back-to-work legislation at Air Canada, the NDP's focus on pensions offered an ideal response - encapsulated in Jack Layton's question which of course received a typical non-response from Stephen Harper:

The government should not be getting involved so early on in the process and picking winners. The workers are currently fighting to protect their pensions. They do not have a choice, because the government did not do what was necessary to strengthen and protect the retirement pensions of workers here in Canada.

Why does the government want to impose a pension model that leaves people to fend for themselves?

Meanwhile, the Cons seem to have somewhat anticipated the issue, using one of their members' statements to criticize the NDP for having an interest in improving the Canada Pension Plan. No word yet on their progress in excising all references to Jim Flaherty proposing exactly the same thing.

Cooperation Runs Amok

The day saw several outbreaks of civility in various forms - including a round of mutual back-patting on the mega-trials bill which all parties agreed to pass, and Elizabeth May asking a question to enable Irwin Cotler to finish a speech which got cut off. But the spirit may have gone a bit too far in a round of "points of order" which were nothing of the sort in response to the news of an Air Canada settlement.

In Brief

Within the debate on the mega-trials bill, Joe Comartin took the opportunity to point out the Cons' habit of trotting out the same victims of crime on multiple occasions in support of legislation they themselves kept from passing. Peggy Nash introduced a private members' bill against animal cruelty. And the Cons offered some signal as to how they plan to deal with the NDP's ascent to Official Opposition status: by simply whiting out "Liberal" and replacing it with "NDP" in repeating their stale attacks.

On warped incentives

Chris nicely highlights the Cons' stunningly quick resort to back-to-work legislation after a mere day of Air Canada's CAW strike, at a point where there's been little if any impact on anybody.

But it's worth noting as well how it is that such legislation will indeed serve as an attack on workers: in effect, Air Canada and other federally-regulated employers will lose virtually any trace of incentive to bargain reasonably if they can count on having their preferred outcome imposed by statute whether or not legislation is even remotely needed. And Canadians who recognize that there's a fundamental problem with removing any motivation for institutions to deal reasonably with workers (or indeed anybody else) will have every reason for concern that the Cons are choosing such an unnecessary outcome out of spite toward workers.

Heresy

Jim Stanford makes Free Market Jesus cry.