Downtime

I'm not writing much here these days, but since it generated a few emails yesterday, here's a link to a piece in yesterday's Western Star with a very general overview of federal Liberal leadership rules and timelines as affected by last weekend's convention in Ottawa.

More info available soon via http://www.liberal.ca/

Better late than never

I'm grateful that it has finally happened, but it is worth asking why it has taken journalists, university professors and the Leader of the NDP (or any other members of the House of Assembly) so long to come around to a very basic concept that some of us have been advocating for several years.

Inflation

On May 24, 2005, a by-election was held in the federal riding of Labrador, after the unfortunate passing of MP Lawrence O'Brien.

One interesting thing about that by-election is this little graphic found on the Elections Canada website:



It is particularly interesting in light of this excerpt from a recent CBC story describing the expenses incurred in the most recent federal election in Labrador by Conservative candidate and now Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, Peter Penashue (emphasis added):

"In total, Penashue spent more than $115,000 on his successful election bid. Russell spent just over $37,000."

Assuming Penashue's expenditures are within the prescribed limits, and assuming CBC's reported figure is correct, that's an increase in allowable expenditures of more than 53% in six years in a single riding.

To say the least, that seems odd.

I told you so

For years, this corner has described the growth of spending (a.k.a. Williams popularity subsidization) over the past eight years by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador as quite simply unsustainable.

Up to now, Tories (and others) have disagreed with that assessment. Fair enough.

Judging by the last quote in this CBC story, it would appear that at least one Tory has suddenly come around:

"Our spending at the rate that we've been doing over the last eight years — and it has been very necessary for a number of very good reasons to do that — is not sustainable in the long run,"

- Kathy Dunderdale

Decoding Dunderdale

James McLeod has a great piece in the Telegram today. It comes complete with a great headline derived from a quote the Premier provides, all of which, in its own subtle way speaks volumes about the Newfoundland and Labrador Government's unchanged half century-long view of how things ought to work in the fishing industry.

First, the headline:

'Can't constantly turn to government': premier

And the relevant bits (with emphasis added)...

"Everybody in this province can't constantly turn to government and say, 'you fix it. You subsidize it.' We can't pay people to work. We can't pay people to live in communities in this province," she said.

In Marystown - the part of the province Dunderdale is originally from - she laid a lot of the blame at the feet of the union, which rejected a plan to keep the plant open earlier this year.

Union members voted against a plan to keep the plant open for 18 weeks per year for the next three years.

"Eighteen weeks' work opposed to no weeks work - that's what people have got to ask themselves now," Dunderdale said.

(The St. John's Telegram, December 3, 2011)

The missing adjective in the Premier's comments is that everybody can't constantly turn to the provincial government.

In other words - what the Premier is saying is precisely what provincial governments for decades have cited as the guiding principle for the processing sector in Newfoundland and Labrador. That is, the provincial government can't "pay people to live in communities in this province" but if only those uncooperative bastards in community x and y would've taken eighteen weeks work (for EI purposes) we could have put Ottawa on the hook and "constantly turned" to that government to "pay people to live in communities in this province" instead.

As long as this mentality drives fishery policy in our province, absolutely nothing will change.

Mona Eltahawy

I met Mona Eltahawy, albeit briefly, in New York at #pdf11.

Watching her today, with two casts on her arms and a horrifying story of her treatment at the hands of Egyptian police was disturbing.

Her hands may be broken, but her spirit isn't. Here's the speech she gave at Personal Democracy Forum earlier this year: