Tim Heffernan and Martin LeBrun are Ontario and BC educators. They say that school days are the best days of our lives. This may be debatable at the best of times. But as the topic of this year’s return to school dominates media and family discussions, one thing is certain: everything is uncertain. With the […]
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In 1967 the Boxtops sang “Give me a ticket for an aeroplane, ain’t got time to take a fast train.” 53 years later in the Canada of COVID-19, the chances of going anywhere, whether by plane or train or even long-distance bus, are severely limited. Even before COVID, Canada’s transportation system between towns and cities […]
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Socialist Alternative has produced a summer special issue, #15, of our magazine, after a break due to COVID-19. We plan to return to normal production with an autumn issue out in September. The Whole System is Rotten Defund the Police – Re-Fund Social Services
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Kshama Sawant is a member of Socialist Alternative in the US. Working people just won a historic victory! Today, Seattle City Council took the final vote to pass an Amazon Tax that will raise well over $200 million per year to fund affordable housing. While the political establishment and corporate media will try to claim […]
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Written by a BC stepdad. Closure of BC schools due to coronavirus marked a sudden double transformation in lives of school-aged children: their homes became classrooms, and their parents became their teachers. During the last two months much has been written about the difficulties teachers and parents encountered since long-distance learning commenced in BC. In […]
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The metaphors of war have been in abundance since the onset of COVID-19. In Britain, the Queen, in a speech, evoked the WW2 song, “We’ll Meet Again.” The Italian Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte, also invoked WW2 when he used Winston Churchill’s words to talk about Italy’s “darkest hour.” Donald Trump has described himself as a […]
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Written by a BC teacher. After weeks of hearing about the nightmare of states in the US reopening their economies amid the COVID-19 pandemic, we knew it was coming. The reopening of the Canadian economy! Granted, the pandemic has not been as devastating in Canada as in the US, but that doesn’t say much. The […]
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In 1983, The Police, recorded a song called “Synchronicity.” Some of the lyrics: We know you, they know meExtrasensorySynchronicityA star fall, a phone call,It joins all,Synchronicity The word synchronicity generally has positive connotations and is briefly defined as a “meaningful coincidence.” Could it be a coincidence, meaningful or otherwise, that the Ontario Minister of Education […]
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Katya Raetz and Marty Harrison are frontline health workers and ISA members. The figures for those infected and deceased are outdated as soon as they are reported. More than 3.5 million have been infected so far and about 240,000 have died (4 May). These figures are not reliable because standards differ between countries and testing […]
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As the old saying goes, “It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future.” While this statement contains a lot of truth, it should not blind us to the fact that some clear political tendencies are emerging from the coronavirus crisis. It is safe to say that one of the big political losers from […]
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