Assorted content to end your week. – Nicola Davis, Pamela Duncan and Carmen Aguilar Garcia report that the toll of long COVID in the UK has surpassed a million people. And Jane Dalton reports on the UK’s massive increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations – which in past waves had tended to
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Accidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jon Henley writes that COVID is surging across Europe as governments and people alike ignore desperate warnings not to let their guard down. And Eric Topol writes about the reality that reinfection produces even worse outcomes than initial exposure – even as governments
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Mariano Zafra and Javier Salas offer a handy visual aid as to how COVID-19 spreads indoors – showing that masking is a valuable partial solution, but that effective ventilation can significantly reduce community transmission. And Jessica Wong reports on the results of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On personal choices
It remains clear that the victim of Scott Moe’s careless driving isn’t about to give up on finding out what happened – even if the local media continues to operate under Moe’s orders not to so much as ask questions. But if Moe is avoiding questions about the crash itself,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Unmaintainable
Particularly as parents face difficult decisions in determining how to handle a return to unsafe schools in the midst of a pandemic, it’s no surprise that the Moe government’s secrecy about the infrastructure deficit it’s accumulated in the education sector is raising some outrage. But it’s particularly jarring to see
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Lomond cleared by Citizen’s Rep of wrongdoing in email deletion #nlpoli
In a report on his investigation, Citizen’s Representative Barry Fleming said that while deputy minister Ted Lomond had directed the deletion of a single email related to Carla Foote’s move from Executive Council to The Rooms, Lomond did so believing it was a transitory record that could be deleted under
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on the “hush memo” issued to Saskatchewan doctors, and the Moe government’s eagerness to limit any voice for public servants to an ineffective whistleblower process. For further reading…– David Giles previously reported on the Saskatchewan Party’s plan for a snitch line to centralize all concerns about the health care
Continue readingDemocracy Under Fire: Rural Election Coverage Disappearing
“National media coverage of rural Canada during elections is thin, and local outlets are disappearing. The overall quality of Canadian debate suffers.” So says Barry Wilson in the online magazine policyoptions.irpp.orgas a long time rural resident myself I cannot help but agree and so will highlight a few of Mr
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Cannabis and culture #nlpoli
Politics and policy are much more complicated things than they appear to many people. Change is possible, but effective change can only come if we see the world as it is, not as some people imagine it might be. Canada’s legal cannabis policy in most Canadian provinces is a failure. There
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On buried dangers
There have been a few recent reports dealing with issues surrounding the Northern Village of Pinehouse – including a systematic refusal to answer access to information requests to which continued at last notice, the disappearance of the village’s website and public records, an inspection recommending the removal of Pinehouse’s mayor
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Josh Bornstein writes that in Australia like elsewhere, the combination of increasing corporate profits, stagnant wages and resulting inequality can be traced to the reduced bargaining power of workers. Jim Stanford notes that New Zealand offers an example as to how to reverse
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Nathan Robinson discusses how the language of “meritocracy” is used to entrench structural inequality: The inequality goes so much deeper than that, though. It’s not just donations that put the wealthy ahead. Children of the top 1% (and the top 5%, and the
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Nalcor contractor secrets still safe under revised law #nlpoli
Anyone who cracked out the champagne over the bill that would purportedly shed light on Nalcor’s embedded contractors might want to spit some back in the bottle for another day. Bill 19 went through second reading on Thursday, putting it one step closer to becoming law by the end of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Joel French discusses the need for Alberta to implement a more thorough and progressive tax system in order to ensure it has the revenue to support its residents. – Meagan Day highlights how Bernie Sanders’ new labour bill would empower workers and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: 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
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – The Canadian Press reports on new research showing how wealth shocks at any level of income or wealth are associated with a higher risk of mortality: Middle-aged Americans who experienced a sudden, large economic blow were more likely to die during the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Lana Payne offers her take on the need for Canada to catch up to the rest of the developed world in providing social supports: Canada is sitting at a dismal 17 per cent, down at the bottom of the pack with Ireland,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Elizabeth Piper reports on Jeremy Corbyn’s much-needed declaration that under a Labour government, the financial sector will serve the public rather than the other way around. And George Monbiot comments on the role the left needs to play in reversing the accumulation
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Andrew Sheng discusses the role of oversimplified assumptions about economic development in exacerbating wealth and income inequality: The American era has been very comfortable with the timeless, universal model of the free market. Inconvenient problems such as inequality are market failures, which the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Matt Bruenig writes that the concentration of wealth and power which is largely being attributed to crony capitalism is a natural byproduct of laissez-faire economics as well: An economy that distributes the national income based solely on the marginal productivity of each
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