Opinion
Red Deer expressway not arriving by express
I share some of city Coun. Paul Harris’s skepticism about the proposed 20th Avenue expressway. Although experience in both Edmonton and Calgary shows that a ring road on the edge of the city does indeed improve traffic movement, I just don’t see Red Deer ever needing a six-lane route.
Experience also shows that whenever a major project such as this is undertaken, it’s far cheaper when the land for the route has been set aside in advance. Witness the upheaval and astounding land acquisition costs for any city trying to retrofit LRT routes into existing neighbourhoods. READ
Defying the polls, again
British Columbia Liberal Leader Christy Clark pulled off an upset for the history books on the West Coast on Tuesday night, confounding every pre-election poll and prediction, retaining power for her centre-right coalition. READ
B.C. students lean to the left — is that leadership?
If I were a B.C. resident, realizing that my children and their classmates at school were the only ones in the country whose mock election ballots did not match those of their parents, I’m not sure how I’d like it. Goodness knows (and so does my family) that my lifelong attempts at raising a brood of rampant socialist ideologues hasn’t quite worked out. But that’s just me. Oh well, there’s always the grandchildren. READ
Here comes the future
The story so far: Cody Wilson, who describes himself as a “crypto-anarchist” and almost certainly wears a Second Amendment belt-buckle, had a bright idea early last year. No government could ever oppress its people again, reasoned the 25-year-old law student at the University of Texas, if everybody in the world was able to manufacture their own guns at home. READ
The dark, deadly side of globalization
It is the dark side of globalization. This is the pressure of companies and consumers in the rich countries to profit from exploitation and desperation among the poorest of the poor in high-poverty, developing countries. READ
The race to the bottom
In a giant leap backward, Alberta Education Minister Jeff Johnson recently announced his plans to scrap the Provincial Achievement Tests (PAT) currently written by Grades 3, 6 and 9 students. READ
Love that lasts a lifetime
It was a Nov. 22 early evening in 1969, the seventh anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, when the front doorbell rang. A rambunctious three-year-old child playing in the hallway was told by her Mom to quiet down while she opened the door. READ
Bhutan redefines progress as happiness
My parents lived through the Great Depression of the 1930s and were profoundly affected by it. READ
Clark not out of race
Less than a week before voting day in B.C., Christy Clark has risen from the dead. But the rest of Canada should take note — a large part of the Clark resurrection is based on the British Columbia premier’s campaign against Ottawa and Alberta. READ
Israel takes sides in Syrian civil war
After making two major air strikes in and near Damascus in three days, Israel informed the Assad regime on Monday that it is not taking sides in the Syrian civil war. But of course it is. READ
Fashion turns kids into sex objects
It’s a scorching hot July weekend in Central Alberta and the family decides to leap into the cooling waters of Sylvan Lake. But what to wear at the beach? Worse yet, their four-year-old daughter has outgrown her bathing suit, so what to do? READ
Is Trudeau a real threat?
A perplexed reader asks why the ruling Conservatives are trying so hard to take Justin Trudeau down. Should they not just let the Liberals and the NDP kill each other off? What exactly is it about Trudeau that has the ruling party so rattled? The answer begins but does not end with the polls that report a big boost in Liberal fortunes. READ
The art of getting along
I don’t do Facebook. I don’t Tweet. On those rare occasions when I need to borrow someone’s cellphone, I have to ask the owner how to turn it on. Texting? Forget about it. Divorced from the social network, I am quite outside the global discussion that will likely formulate answers to the great questions of our times. But if one has friends (not to be confused with the Facebook variety), and if they trust you to listen, you can eavesdrop on the parts of the chatter that are interesting. READ
Drones and Guantanamo: politics vs. logic
John Bellinger is the last person in Washington you’d expect to criticise President Barack Obama for making too many drone strikes. It was he who drafted the (rather unconvincing) legal justification for targeted drone killings when he was legal adviser to the Secretary of State in George W. Bush’s second administration, and he still supports them. But he went ahead and criticized Obama anyway. READ
$3.1 billion can’t be sloughed off
The $3.1-billion loss of tax money by the federal government to protect us from terrorist attacks is not quite as bad as the first headlines suggested. But for a Conservative government that presents itself as a careful fiscal steward, it’s still pretty embarrassing. READ
The sad reality of warfare: part of the human condition
Of course human beings have always fought wars. Of course a quarter of the adult males in the typical primitive society died violently, in wars and in fights. (I’m using the banned word “primitive” here because it’s shorter than “hunter-gatherer and horticultural non-state societies,” not because primitive peoples are inferior.) READ
High price of faulty thinking
In 2008, when Queen Elizabeth was being briefed by economists on the turmoil in financial markets that led to the global financial crisis, she asked them a pointed question: “Why did nobody notice it?” She had a good personal reason to ask — the financial crisis wiped out about 25 per cent of her personal investment portfolio, or about $40 million. READ
Alberta’s new reality
Bill Lough, president of the Society of Parents and Friends of Michener Services, gave voice to a demand that all governments elsewhere in Canada face routinely: give us what we want or we’ll vote you out. That’s been said in Alberta before, in letters to the editor and in small group gatherings, but in reality it’s never had much force — nor even much conviction. READ
Canada’s native tragedy
When Canadian political leaders come together in the wake of a tragedy such as the suicide of Rehtaeh Parsons, they show they can act quickly in the face of public outrage. But that action raises another question about inaction. READ
Embracing future economic potential
Ontario, Canada’s most populated province, took a big hit with the 2008 financial crisis. Its automotive industry was devastated. Its manufacturing industry faced a much weaker U.S. export market while its competitiveness was undermined by the resource-driven rise in the exchange rate of our dollar. Factories closed, unemployment rose and communities suffered. Ontario’s fiscal position deteriorated sharply as tax revenues fell and stimulus costs escalated. READ
