Sunday Morning Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- Lana Payne's column for the Labour Day weekend comment on the role unions play in pushing for advancements for everybody.

- Paul Krugman offers a reminder that a focus on GDP alone as a measure of economic development misses the issue of inequality. And Simon Kuper discusses how the wealthiest people have looted their own countries in order to further distance themselves from the rest of society, while Assaf Razin and Efraim Sadka study the consequences of elite-driven globalization in undermining fair revenue systems and the social programs they fund.

- Neil Schoenherr reviews Gerrit De Geest's new book on how marketing has contributed to rent-seeking by the few at the expense of the many. And James Wilt argues that instead of focusing on consumer behaviour, we should be working on developing models of production and consumption that are less destructive:

There is nothing inherently wrong with the consumption of energy and materials. The problem is that consumption is largely undemocratic, exploitative, and unsustainable: all realities that can be dramatically altered.

We know that many socially destructive sectors consume a vast chunk of resources. For example, the U.S. military is the institution which consumes the greatest amount of oil in the world. At last count, over half of the energy used in Canada was consumed by the industrial sector – the likes of mines, factories, and fossil fuel extraction. A 2011 study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives concluded that the top one per cent of income earners in B.C. emitted almost six times the amount of carbon pollution as residents in the bottom 10 per cent.

And corporations have created a status quo of obscene food waste, planned obsolescence, and entrenched fossil fuel interests that obstruct a rapid transition to low-carbon communities.
...
We must abandon the language and sentiment of overconsumption and organize our cities and towns through unions, co-ops, community centres, and activist organizations – with a primary focus on improving conditions and services in low-income communities of colour.
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The so-called problem of consumption is a convenient distraction from the hard work that needs to be done to overhaul the exploitative and destructive systems that currently concentrate a vast majority of the wealth and power in the hands of the very few. Such greed won’t dissipate by individual moralizing or using fewer plastic bags.

It’ll take radical collective action – and an impassioned desire for all of us to be able to consume more of the things that are sustainable, just, and fulfilling.

- Finally, David Climenhaga notes that the obsession with the rule of law trumpeted by pipeline pushers against protesters has disappeared now that the Federal Court of Appeal has held that approvals handed out without meaningful consultation are themselves illegal.

Friday Evening Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- David Moscrop makes the case for a long-overdue inheritance tax in Canada:

Over time, if left unchecked, capitalism facilitates the pooling of wealth — cash, property, business ownership, investments — among a select few. This is as true in Canada as anywhere else. That pooling implies not just the concentration of wealth but also the concentration of authority, influence, proximity to decision-makers, and all the other tactical tools it takes to get things done the way you want them done.

That concentration of power ultimately undermines democracy. When a small elite hog the wealth and the power, the rest of the people are either marginalized or shut out altogether.

The most obscene way that wealth is made is through large-scale inheritance. Passing along wealth facilitates the concentration of resources in the hands of the few, generation over generation. In Canada, inheritance is a serious problem that prevents not just equal outcome but even equal opportunity.

- Wanyee Li highlights how soaring housing prices in Vancouver have made it nearly impossible for middle- and working-class citizens to become homeowners. And Ryan Cooper points out the role social housing needs to play in building cohesive and functional cities.

- Nick Loenen discusses the value of an electoral system which encourages cooperation and genuine majoritarianism rather than artificially assigning absolute power to one leader with a minority of the total party vote.

- Meanwhile, in a prime example of how artificial majorities lead to abuses of centralized power, Mike de Souza exposes how the Libs allowed Kinder Morgan to raid the public treasury without keeping anybody informed of their plans. And David Sirota reports on Donald Trump's latest scheme to hand free money to banksters at public expense.

- Felice Frayer reports on a new study showing the connection between on-the-job injuries and opioid deaths.

- Finally, while the Saskatchewan Party tries to wish away its Global Transportation Hub scandal, Geoff Leo reminds us of just 20 of the outstanding questions about the fiasco while finding nobody willing to answer them.

[Edit: fixed typo.]

Saturday Morning Links

This and that for your weekend reading.

- Simon Enoch offers his take on Saskatchewan's latest budget - including what little the Saskatchewan Party has learned, and how much it's still getting wrong:

(W)hile the 2018 budget is more measured in that it doesn’t replicate a 2017 budget that saw cuts and tax increases land disproportionately on the shoulders of the poor while simultaneously lavishing multiple tax breaks on corporations, it certainly doesn’t do the more vulnerable in our province any favours. The province is suspending the Saskatchewan Rental Housing Supplement (SRHS), which will force the poorest in the province to devote even more of their meagre earnings towards rent. This continues the government’s myopic focus on wrenching cost-savings from programs explicitly designed to support the poorest in the province. While the government did increase education spending by $30 million, it restores little more than half of the $54 million that was cut last year. School boards will be forced to find even more “efficiencies” in the classroom, even as student enrolment expands.  As we have seen in the past, these “efficiencies” seem to fall disproportionately on special needs supports and programs.

If there is a small sliver of a silver-lining in this budget, perhaps it’s the government’s growing recognition that austerity during a downturn is bad economic policy. It’s better to allow positive economic growth fight your deficits than deep cuts that can jeopardize positive economic growth, a point the CCPA Saskatchewan Office has been at pains to make over the past few years. After two years of negative economic growth, the economic assumptions in the 2018 budget are betting that a return to positive economic growth will do much of the heavy lifting of fighting the deficit. While this is welcome, it further throws into question the wisdom of the 2017 budget cuts and the government’s embrace of austerity, all evidence to the contrary.

- Bruno Caprettini, Fabio Schmidt-Fischbach and Hans-Joachim Voth study the connection between U.S. welfare spending and a willingness to volunteer support for World War II efforts - signalling the reciprocity of expectations between governments and citizens.

- Mike De Souza reports that Justin Trudeau was warned by the civil service that it was pushing the Trans Mountain expansion too quickly and without adequate consultation. And Gary Mason points out how Trudeau's bungling of the issue could cost him support among all kinds of voters no matter what ultimately happens with the pipeline proposal.

- Tom Korski exposes the Libs' commissioning and placement of state-sponsored "news". And Alex Boutilier reports on what may be the most appalling suppression of actual government records yet, as Library and Archives Canada wants to wait eighty years to respond to a single access-to-information request.

- Finally, Lana Payne offers a warning about the spread of anti-social, right-wing populism across much of Canada.

Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Sean Farrell reports on a new OECD study recommending the application of inheritance taxes to reduce wealth inequality.

- And Harry Quilter-Pinner discusses Finland's confirmation that the obvious solution to homelessness - providing housing to people who need it - is also the best.

- Nicole Goodkind analyzes how the Trump Republican tax scam has served entirely to enrich the already-wealthy. And Paul Krugman charts Paul Ryan's political progression from economic snake-oil salesman to fascist enabler - while noting that it mirrors that of the Republican party as a whole.

- Ethan Cox highlights how Kinder Morgan is shaking down Canada in trying to have the Trans Mountain expansion rubber-stamped (and paid for by the public to boot). Jennifer Ditchburn offers a reminder that any discussion of the constitutional implications of Trans Mountain needs to account for the Indigenous rights which have been edited out of most mainstream discussion, while Rachel Gilmore reports on Perry Bellegarde's warning about First Nations being left out of any new decision-making process. And Alyssa O'Dell writes about the wave of activism to protect land and water in British Columbia - and the hundreds of arrests so far in response.

- Finally, Joe Romm reports on new research showing that some of the most drastic anticipated consequences of climate change are materializing a century earlier than expected.

Thursday Morning Links

This and that for your Thursday reading.

- Ashley Renders reports on the Canadian mining companies which are using corporate trade deals to threaten developing countries with billion-dollar claims to stifle environmental protections. And Mike Blanchfield and Andy Blatchford report that China wants any trade deals to similarly privilege investors alone while making no allowances for workers or the environment.

- Chantal Hebert notes that there are few options to paper over the conflict between the reasonable expectations of British Columbians - based on political promises and environmental interests - and his subsequent attempt to push through the Trans Mountain expansion. Linda McQuaig argues that there's no reasonable way to compromise about the health of our planet - which is what's ultimately at stake in debating large fossil fuel infrastructure. And David Climenhaga writes about the dangers of looking to Ottawa to override provincial authority.

- Alana Semuels exposes the predatory lending practices which are perpetuating the U.S.' racial divides in housing and wealth.

- Richard Foot points out that a tragedy such as the Humboldt Broncos' bus accident should spur discussion of ways to make highways safer. And Terra Ciolfe observes that Saskatchewan's track record has long been one of extreme danger compared to other provinces.

- Finally, Tom Parkin writes that Ontario's election looks to be a battle for working-class votes - with the main question being whether Andrea Horwath's NDP can win over enough voters to ensure that Doug Ford can't win as a perceived default alternative.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Linda Givetash reports on the increasing cost and decreasing availability of housing in Canada. And Patrick Greenfield and Sarah March note that an appalling increase in the number of homeless people in the UK is being reflected in the number of deaths on the street.

- Tithi Bhattacharya points out that the resurgence of labour activism in the U.S. is developing largely in the education sector which is increasingly treated as unappreciated "care work". And Sandi Tolksvig discusses the grossly undervalued work which women contribute disproportionately to others' well-being. 

- Ainslie Cruickshank and David Ball write that there's no way a remotely competent pipeline operator could be surprised by the public reaction to the TransMountain expansion, while Tim Harper notes that Justin Trudeau has trapped himself by deciding to cheerlead for a project which has never addressed either environmental concerns or aboriginal rights. And Jeff Carruthers argues that the logical resolution involves upgrading more bitumen in Alberta, rather than imposing its transportation in a dirtier and more dangerous form.

- Finally, Patrick DeRochie discusses the need for federal climate policy to meaningfully work toward our emission reduction targets, and not defer to provincial schemes (particularly ones which fall short of the mark).

Wednesday Evening Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Diane Cardwell points out how carbon politics are threatening renewable energy just at the point where it would win a fair fight against fossil fuels. And J. David Hughes finds that any case for Kinder Morgan's Trans Mountain pipeline falls apart in the face of realistic assumptions about oil prices.

- Meanwhile, Emma Gilchrist digs into the many environmental positives of the B.C. governance agreement signed between the NDP and the Greens.

- Laurie Monsebraaten reports on the sale of a large chain of child care centres to a foreign parent which figures to result in lobbying for lowered standards and higher profits. And CBC News reveals that KPMG-linked foreign entities saw fit to destroy the evidence which could have allowed the Canada Revenue Agency to track down tax cheats.

- Taylor Bendig discusses the end of the line for the Saskatchewan Transportation Company, while Erin Weir highlights the fact that Brad Wall's desire to shut down province-wide public transportation had nothing to do with funding and everything to do with ideology - as evidenced by his refusal to see whether federal funding could help to maintain services.

- Murray Mandryk writes about Wall's complete lack of accountability surrounding the Global Transportation Hub fiasco.

- Finally, Nancy Merrill argues that sufficient legal aid funding is an essential part of a just society.

On pipelines to nowhere

I'll be taking a look at the individual candidates in the NDP's leadership race over the next little while. But before I start into that review, I'll pause to discuss the most bizarre development of the leadership campaign so far.

As I noted in reviewing the first debate, Peter Julian's choice to brand himself largely through his opposition to the Kinder Morgan and Energy East pipelines figured to turn what could otherwise have been a broadly acceptable campaign into a highly polarizing one. And a combination of nonsensical reactions to Julian's message and a lack of pushback on his part has taken the division to extremes which look highly dangerous for the NDP as a whole.

At the outset, here's Julian's position on pipelines in the context of resource development generally (emphasis added):

Mr. Julian said it is “very clear” to him that the NDP must oppose pipelines and work towards transitioning to clean energy.

Mr. Julian says the government should refine and upgrade raw bitumen from the oilsands in Canada, instead of exporting it. The risk of spilling the diluted bitumen the pipelines carry was not worth the reward, he said. 
...
Mr. Julian said building refineries and using the resulting product in Canada would create more jobs than pipeline construction ever would, and it would decrease Canada’s dependency on oil imports. It would also eliminate the need for pipelines, he said.

The same article notes that both Guy Caron and Niki Ashton are also opposed to Kinder Morgan and Energy East, and that the comparatively pro-pipeline position among the current candidates is found in Charlie Angus' slightly different emphasis as to the balance between the interests of pipeline operators and the people whose territory they use.

Somehow, that modest different in positions - coupled with Julian's emphasis on pipelines as an issue - has led to outbursts from NDP supporters which would fit far more comfortably within a Wildrose Party policy debate.

In one case, that's consisted of the classic capital-friendly position that any questioning of a business' wishes is predominantly an attack on the labour share of the resulting economic activity.

On that front, pipelines offer less wage bang for the buck of profit stashed away than nearly any other type of development Canada could pursue. And Noah Evanchuk's form of the theory is also false in attributing a hatred of refineries to Julian when he's the one candidate actually proposing to encourage more of them.

Even worse, the latest criticism of Julian from Doug O'Halloran has sunk to the level of echoing Ezra Levant's tired theme that some fabricated difference between "our oil" and "their oil" trumps the problems with locking ourselves into a future of burning carbon generally.

Unfortunately, Julian himself doesn't seem to have done much to set the record straight. And that might make sense for his campaign: to the extent he's trying to paint himself as the top choice for environmental voters (defined by opposition to pipelines), he may well have more to gain than to lose by allowing those attacks to stand unchallenged. 

But from the standpoint of talking responsibly about resource management, it could be disastrous for the NDP if its leadership debate serves to legitimize exactly the messages the party is trying to fight in the wider political scene. And hopefully the candidates who are trying to downplay the pipeline question will make that fact clear - and push both Julian and his critics toward the right balance.

Surely, Kinder Morgan is celebrating the increased economic activity in English Bay

Just think how many cleanup- and remediation-related profits might be lost if we'd retained the capacity to contain a fuel spill before it spreads.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- For those looking for information about today's day of action against C-51, Leadnow and Rabble both have details.

- Meanwhile, CBC reports that a professor merely taking pictures on public land near a proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline site is already being harassed by the RCMP under current law. Tonda MacCharles notes that lawyers currently involved in dealing with classified-evidence cases have joined the call to rein in the Cons' terror bill, while PressProgress points out that airlines are also raising serious concerns about the unfettered power handed to a single minister to dictate the terms of air travel. And Stephen Maher rightly questions whether CSIS is anywhere close to being up to the tasks assigned to it under C-51.

- Jeffrey Simpson calls for us to treat terrorism as a relatively small one of a number of dangers to be managed, not a basis for welcoming a radical reshaping of our society to be more intrusive and less inclusive. And Susan Delacourt comments on the Cons' irresponsible choice to sow baseless fear for the sole purpose of frightening people into emptying their pockets, while hoping the message will lose its power by the time Canadians go to the polls:

(E)ven seasoned marketers know that repetition has its limits. As far back as 1970, the University of Toronto’s Daniel Berlyne produced research showing that repeated exposure to novelty in advertising breeds familiarity at first, then boredom or contempt — the “two-factor” or “wear-in, wear-out” effect.

By marketing wisdom alone, then, this all-fear approach in the current political climate is a risky gambit. Sustaining the nation in a constant state of fear, all the way through an election months away, is a tall order for a government that may have its own wear-out concerns after nearly 10 years in office.

And at the risk of seeming naive or idealistic, it would be nice if higher principles than marketing — like the responsibility and privilege of governing — guided our politics back to the high road in these debates on tolerance and terror.

As a country, Canada is better than the politics of fear that is being marketed to citizens at the moment.

- Rick Salutin writes that Justin Trudeau has given away the game in acknowledging that he's supporting C-51 solely for crass political purposes of his own. But I remain baffled as to why Trudeau would hold the illusion that the Cons will somehow avoid criticizing him merely because he's giving them everything they want out of sheer cowardice.

- Finally, Simona Chiose reports on the Wynne Libs' plan to turn Ontario's university system over to employers in establishing program designs and tuition levels. And Simon Enoch calls out the similarly distorted premises behind the Saskatchewan Party's consultation on liquor retailing.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Jeremy Warren reports on the latest Canadians for Tax Fairness events working to ensure that Cameco and other megacorporations pay at least their fair share. And Sheila Block and Kaylie Tiessen point out that Ontario could do plenty to reduce its deficit by reining in regressive tax giveaways.

- APTN documents the devastating reality that people who can't afford overpriced food in Northern communities are having to forage through garbage dumps in order to scrape by. And naturally, Leona Aglukkaq and the Cons are concerned...that anybody's finding out about that fact, leading them to try to gag the officials speaking up.

- Which is to say that if the Cons were to apply the standard proposed by Michael Harris - taking the simple step of removing each cabinet minister who can reasonably be seen as the last person fit for the job - they'd be left with no cabinet at all.

- Gary Mason observes that there's ample reason for an increasing number of political leaders to raise red flags about pipelines - as that stance merely reflects the public's concern about climate change and other environmental damage:

Despite conditional approval from the National Energy Board, most believe the Northern Gateway pipeline will never get built because of opposition to it. The courts have given First Nations new powers to fight developments that encroach on their land. Outside of aboriginal communities, public opinion regarding pipelines is at best divided – although there seems to be a growing societal angst about climate change that is palpable.

Kinder Morgan, which also wants to add a pipeline to the West Coast, is encountering that sentiment now. Protests at Burnaby Mountain, where the company is trying to do some exploratory work, have become daily events and have spawned arrests and ugly international headlines. Once upon a time, the odds of the Kinder Morgan pipeline going ahead were considered extremely good. Not any more.

 - And CBC reports on Kinder Morgan's failed attempt to criminalize opposition to its pipeline expansion.

- Finally, the new chair of the Transportation Safety Board argues that Canada is well short of having appropriate regulations in place to be able to count on the safe shipment of oil by rail.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Rick Smith discusses the growing public appetite to fight back against burgeoning inequality - along with the need to make inequality a basic test for the fairness of any policy:

(I)t is significant that a finance minister of our decidedly right-wing government showed the political courage to criticize a policy that will clearly make inequality worse. This test — whether a policy choice will exacerbate inequality — should be the test for any government in making political choices.
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[The Broadbent Institute's wealth inequality] data, though disheartening, can help focus the minds of Canadians and our elected officials to understand the urgency of taking action to combat inequality.

Because in the end this situation is the result of political choices, not some inevitability. As Ed Broadbent, a long-time champion of combating economic inequality, has explained, “Democratic politics, at its best, is about choosing what kind of society we want to live in.”

And deep and persistent inequality shouldn’t be a characteristic of Canadian society. 

- Meanwhile, Rebecca Vallas and Joe Valenti criticize one policy choice which does little other than entrench wealth inequality, as asset limits which prohibit people from accessing social assistance if they own even a modest vehicle strip people of their assets and trap them in poverty without serving any useful purpose. And in a similar vein, Angelina Chapin laments Ontario's insufficient social supports which result in parents having to choose between food and school supplies for their children.

- Bryce Covert weighs in on how unpredictable hours in the retail sector cause nothing but stress and frustration for workers. And Peter Cappelli points out the futility of telling workers to seek more education when employers are more interested in employees who have received on-the-job training (which they don't want to provide themselves).

- Harsha Walia rightly argues that after thirteen years of sacrificing rights to a war against a vague concept, it's about time to replace unfocused fear with solidarity.

- Finally, Glen Thompson exposes the latest attempts by the oil industry to make sure nobody can be held responsible for the environmental risks it wants to impose on the Canadian public:

The new [Kinder Morgan] pipeline, it seems, is as complicated as the first mission to the moon, with a robust 15,000 page draft plan, guiding a small army of civil engineers, scientists and project leads. It took no less than nine expert presenters with technical analysts standing by, to present an hour and a half project overview to the FVRD Board. Sitting two rows deep, the project leads extolled advanced science and gleaned wisdom distilled from forensic analysis of past catastrophes. The presentation team successfully stick-handled their way through the Boards member's queries; air quality, the depth of the pipeline in deep rooted agricultural crops, financial compensation capacity and riparian protection.

The second event was a long afternoon of Kinder Morgan being slow cooked by fully qualified, and at times pointed, questions from a highly informed group of community leaders, advocates and government agency analysts. Kinder Morgan walked away roughed up, limping a bit, but uninjured. Every concern it seemed, had a graph, a published opinion or a mitigation plan and supposedly every bit of it, was reasonable, given the daunting task of moving extremely heavy oil, over mountains, in February.

At the FVRD meeting, a single phrase, made by the pipeline's head director, hung in the air like a high fly ball. I'll never forget the finality in his voice, "Once the oil leaves the dock, Kinder Morgan holds no obligation or responsibility, even 10 metres out -- that's the carrier's liability." Nobody caught the ball.

The oil cargo that was loaded into the Exxon Valdez traveled safely through the supply pipeline from Prudhoe Bay without incident. The Alaska coast disaster had nothing to do with the pipeline, and everything to do with the carrier. The Kinder Morgan director's sharp statement pulls the sheet off the question: Who will take Kinder Morgan's oil out of the Port of Vancouver?

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Gar Alperovitz suggests in the wake of Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century that it's long past time to reconsider who controls capital - and make a concerted effort to democratize that control:

The name of the game — Piketty’s book fairly screams it — is capital: who gets to own it, benefit from it and derive political power from it. Accordingly, it may be of some interest to note that in significant part because of the pain and failure of our current reality, many of those local laboratories of democracy are, in fact, exploring new (and sometimes old) ways to own capital and are seeking to democratize it.

Take participatory ownership. Even as union membership has trended steadily downward, for instance, the number of people involved in worker-owned firms has increased, from 250,000 in 1975 to about 11 million working in more than 11,000 firms today. Add to this approximately 130 million Americans who are members of some form of co-op, another type of democratized ownership; this number is increasing daily just beneath the surface of what our hollowed-out local newspapers are able to report on. Credit unions — member-owned one-person, one-vote banks — control more than $1.1 trillion in assets, as much as those of some of Wall Street’s largest financial institutions.

New ways for capital to be owned broadly by the people — or, again, democratized — are also beginning to show up in city and state politics. Boulder, Colorado, for instance, is in the process of municipalizing its electric utility, what one might call localized nationalization. The city council of Richmond, California, recently voted in favor of the mayor’s plan to utilize eminent domain powers to prevent foreclosures by taking over housing from banks if a major fight over mortgages is not settled in a reasonable way. In recent years, some 20 states have had legislation introduced to establish state banks similar to the one that has been operating successfully in North Dakota for almost 100 years. Land trusts — public or nonprofit ownership of land to benefit the community in diverse ways — have increased from a mere handful three decades ago to more than 250 now operating in 45 states and the District of Columbia.

No one believes these experiments in democratic ownership are at this stage going to alter how capital is owned to deal sufficiently with Piketty’s big trends. On the other hand, powerful forces are driving the new developments — namely, growing social and economic pain and a sense that none of the old ways work.

- And Jared Bernstein and Matt Bruenig make the case for wealth taxes in particular to counter inequality (while likely leading to a more productive economy to boot).

- Thomas Walkom notes that the Cons are trying to take credit for radically changing the temporary foreign worker program when they're really doing little more than changing the titles applied to disposable workers. Bill Curry reports that Jason Kenney wants to preserve low-wage temporary worker streams at least past the next federal election - signalling the Cons' interest in avoiding answering for their efforts to drive wages down. And while Murray Mandryk is far too willing to buy the Cons' spin, he's absolutely right to point out the gall of the Saskatchewan Party in demanding that employers be handed cheap workers rather than paying market wages.

- Trish Hennessy suggests that Kathleen Wynne should use a majority government as an opportunity to eliminate Harris-era anti-tax legislation. And the CP introduces one of the next right-wing strategies to demand a response, as the Cons have assembled a panel to attack Canada's health care system at public expense.

- Finally, Mychaylo Prystupa reports that Kinder Morgan's idea of environmental responsibility is to recycle oil spill response plans which were rejected as ill-founded by the EPA - though there's no indication yet that a National Energy Board more interested in boosting oil shipments at all costs than looking at the merits of an application will take note of the faulty assumptions.