Thursday Morning Links

This and that for your Thursday reading.

- The OECD is the latest independent observer to confirm Thomas Mulcair's point that dutch disease is a real problem for Canadian manufacturing. And Marc Lee calls for a green industrial revolution as a better path toward economic development and environmental responsibility than the Cons' focus on resource extraction alone.

- Andrew Coyne sees the ongoing opposition resistance to the Cons' omnibus anti-environment bill as a battle for the very soul of democracy:

This is how it happens. This is how it has happened: the more powers government acquires at the expense of Parliament, the harder it is for Parliament to resist still further encroachments, or even to recall why it might. And if somebody doesn't stop it, somewhere, this is how it will continue.

So this is just a start. As gratifying as it is to find, notwithstanding an earlier column, that Parliament still has some fight in it, it can't end here. The opposition must be prepared to bloody the government's nose again, and again, and go on doing so, for as long as these abuses continue. It must be prepared to do so, what is more, in the face of public indifference or even hostility. It cannot count on appealing to public sentiment. It has to teach the public to care. It has to teach them why it matters.

It's an oddly appropriate way to protest: by voting, repeatedly, futilely, endlessly. It has become a somewhat degrading ritual — could there be a better symbol of how ruthlessly all parties, not just the Conservatives, whip nearly every vote than the sight of MPs in obedient little rows, standing up and sitting down when they are told? But it can mean something real again.

- I haven't posted yet about Dean Del Mastro's personal election financing scandal, largely because it seems like a relative trifle in comparison to the electoral fraud carried out across the country. But Saskboy points out there may be a connection between the pollster which received $21,000 in unexplained cheques and the Cons' wider efforts to use public resources for partisan gain.

- Finally, Jennifer Britton makes the case for Saskatchewan to actually build on its strength in the Crown sector, rather than settling for having our Crowns left to wither or used as ATMs for private-sector operators. And Linda Cuell shares many of my concerns with the Sask Party's plans to attack the province's workers yet again. [Edit: fixed link.]