Five weeks and $610 million dollars later, we have ended up more or less right back where we started. While some seats may yet flip as mail in ballots are counted, at time of writing no party has gained or lost more than two seats compared to before parliament was dissolved. Canada has another minority […]
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Are you ready to shed a tear? “Champagne problems: Toronto restaurants facing shortage of big-name bubbly” was a headline in a Toronto Star article of September 10. A local restaurateur suggested this reason for the shortage: “people (are) being more celebratory now that things have kind of come back.” A broad range is covered by […]
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The long months of COVID have been brutal for many people in Canada and around the world. COVID has exposed and pressure cooked many of the pre-existing conditions and problems: inequality, run-down public health systems, utterly inadequate care for seniors, opioid pandemic and more. Repeated government failures have made COVID far worse. The delayed response […]
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Getting Off the Treadmill “Working 9 to 5, what a way to make a living Barely getting by, it’s all taking and no giving They just use your mind, and they never give you credit It’s enough to drive you crazy if you let it.” Dolly Parton, “9 to 5,” 1980 It will come as […]
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“He who pays the piper calls the tune.” Never has this saying proved more true than in a recent case from the University of Toronto. Last year, one of the U of T’s major donors learned that the university was about to hire a scholar whose ideas (supposedly pro-Palestinian) he disapproved of. Journalist Linda McQuaig […]
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The Afzaal family: Yumna Afzaal, daughter, aged 15 – killed Madiha Salman, mother, aged 44 – killed Salman Afzaal, father, aged 46 – killed Talat Afzaal, grandmother, aged 74 – killed Fayez Afzaal, son, aged 9 – seriously injured Sunday, June 6, in London, Ontario saw a sickening, mind-numbing event – the premeditated, cold-blooded killing […]
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Ditch the patents, Nationalize Big Pharma Canadians have understandably been concerned first and foremost with fighting the virus in their own backyard. But COVID is a worldwide threat and there won’t be a real victory, or real safety, until it’s won around the world. Vaccination in Canada has been moving along at a steady pace […]
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Doug Ford began his press conference Friday, April 16 with “we’re losing the battle.” Knowing Ford, many expected him to continue with “but we’re winning the war.” Mercifully, he spared us that. It would have been more than a stretch to make that claim given the latest grim figures from Ontario for the virus. The […]
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How Canada lost its publicly owned vaccine producing facilities Phew! The vaccines have arrived. Notwithstanding the conflicting and confusing information regarding AstraZeneca, most Canadians are relieved to be seeing that the vaccination program, having previously experienced some hiccups, is now rolling out relatively efficiently, although unevenly and with the risk of more bumps in the […]
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“You don’t get me, I’m part of the union.” The Strawbs, 1973 Something is stirring among Canada’s workers. The percentage of unionized workers is up. This might seem surprising given the widespread closures and hundreds of thousands of layoffs due to COVID and the world recession. Jim Stanford (former economist at Unifor) wrote in the […]
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