Not His Peers

Former Canadian, remember he renounced his Canadian citizenship, Conrad Black, Lord Black of Crossharbour, will be judged in the United States by the working class. Which belies the old adage; of being judged by your peers.

• Video: Jury selection at the Black trial

Since he has a peerage, I guess they could have held court in the House of Lords. But then they would have acquitted him being good old boys and all.

The mask of invulnerability has begun to slip. For months, Conrad Black has scatterbombed his assailants with bombastic bravado and patronising put-downs. But as he arrived in Chicago to face a criminal trial which could consign him to dotage in jail, the scandal-hit media mogul looked tired, pale and faintly fearful.

The former Telegraph owner and friend of Lady Thatcher faces charges of racketeering, fraud, money laundering, tax evasion and obstruction of justice. With his bulky frame leaning on a courtroom table, he has spent two days listening to childcare niggles, health woes and financial hardships which jurors need settling in order to spend three months on a $40-a-day (£21) stipend sitting in judgment over him.

It is a window on to the life of ordinary folk which Black has never been near. He admits as such, complaining that his Rolls-Royce lifestyle of vintage wine, tuxedos and multiple homes is key to his downfall: "Since biblical times, and probably before, the wealthy have been envied and condemned."

But instead of throwing himself on the mercy of the Queen and her Lords, Lord Black high tailed back to the country he despises, that of his birth, the one he renounced his citizenship of.

And promptly hired crackerjack Canadian lawyer Eddie Greenspan to represent him in the United States. Which didn't go over well last week. Judge Is Not Amused by Conrad’s Black’s Lawyer

And there is further irony here, for the Black Lord is fan of that other famous racketeering Chicagoan; Al Capone

Jeffrey Cramer, the young prosecutor who is expected to deliver the government's opening argument today, even looks like Eliot Ness, who put Al Capone in jail for 11 years for tax evasion.

So perhaps to truly be judged by his peers Lord Black would not appear before his fellow British Lords but the Lords of Crime, like Capone, who like Black were busted on Rico charges.



Also See:

Conrad Black

Criminal Capitalism: Black Lord Dodges Tax Man

Criminal Capitalism: Black & Radler,Thick as Thieves

Criminal Capitalism: Lord Black Fugitive

Criminal Capitalism: Black gets his comeuppance

Criminal Capitalism: Hollinger's Black Eye

Criminal Capitalism: Black Out

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Conrad Black, crime, fraud, racketeering, Al Capone, Hollinger, Radler, Chicago, Lord Black, newspapers

Wall Street Deja Vu

I draw my readers attention to this article from the business section of the Saturday Globe and Mail. If you are regular here you will know I have said this exact thing.

Disturbingly, bankers, investors and regulators have seen this movie before. The boom-bust scenario now playing out the market for subprimes – loans to the riskiest borrowers – is remarkably similar to other recent episodes when the basic principles of sound lending were ignored or forgotten, until it was too late. There was the technology bubble of the late 1990s, as well as the trust and savings-and-loan crises of the 1980s.

Then, as now, financial institutions dramatically reined in credit after getting burned on bad loans. Indeed, the flight of lenders from the tech bubble of the late 1990s drove many of them toward the perceived stability of consumer credit – including home equity loans and mortgages.

How the industry got in this mess, again, is a disturbing tale of lending excess.

The simple explanation for why HCL and other lenders made seemingly uneconomic loans is because they could. A thriving aftermarket quickly turns subprime mortgages into bonds, flipping the revenue stream to investors around the world. Most banks no longer keep the loans in-house, so they don't care if homeowners can't keep up with payments. Instead, they make money on lucrative fees and push the risk up the line to an investment dealer such as Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. or Goldman Sachs Group Inc., which then passes it on to hedge fund and pension fund investors.

American finance, the much touted Wall Street Bull market is living in a consumer driven bubble. There is no real boom, just a growth in credit, loans and party mow pay later consumption. Later comes sooner than the market expects.

What is scary is that folks pensions are tied up in these get rich quick schemes like variable and sub-prime mortgages. Which they weren't when the Junk Bonds and later the Savings and Loans meltdowns occurred.

See

China Burps Greenspan Farts Dow Hiccups

Housing Bubble

Housing

Economy



Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
homes, mortgages, housing, bubble, US, economy, Canada, sub-prime mortgage, Wall Street, crash, recession,

Fat Boy Needs Election

To lose weight.

Don't Let Them See You Sweat: Harper didn't look Healthy

Otherwise he gets portly in office, much like Henry VIII sans the wives.

Baby Fat

Of course since he shares his wife with John Baird he may just be trying to look like him.

During elections he loses weight, after all politics is the other sport of Kings.
















Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
John Baird, Canada, MP, Minister, Government, Conservative, gay, homosexual, Mrs.Harper, PM, PM's, wife, Laureen Harper, Stephen Harper,

Joseph Cherniak

The difference between them is the mustache.

Jason goes on another purge.To Cherniak: Blogger, banish thyself!

He suffers from political bulimia and the strong man syndrome; that need to purge, purge, purge.

Luckily it was only from his personal commercial Liberal blog roll.

No Progressive Bloggers were harmed. Since Audacious Ontology still is a member of the PB blog roll.

While Cherniak claims he purged AO for posting NDP material on their blog perhaps it was actually because they were critical of Israel. Nah Jason would never do that.

France acknowledges Palestinian unity; will canada, or continue to bow to the US and Israeli Lobby?

See:

Cherniak


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
liblogs, Liberal bloggers, Cherniak, politics, Canada, blogs

May Day For MacKay

Guts, chutzpah, strategic genius. All these terms apply to Green Party Leader Elizabeth May who announced on CTV Question Period this morning that she is running in Central Nova, Nova Scotia, Peter MacKay's riding. It was announced on the Atlantic TV network of CTV last night.Love satellite TV, makes Antigonish as close as St. Albert.

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May speaks with CTV's Question Period on Sunday, March 18, 2007.

Green Party leader to take on Peter MacKay

Updated Sun. Mar. 18 2007 12:20 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

The leader of the federal Green party has declared her candidacy in the Nova Scotia riding currently held by Conservative MP Peter MacKay.

Elizabeth May made the announcement Sunday afternoon on CTV's Question Period in Antigonish, which sits in the northeastern Nova Scotia riding of Central Nova.

May is facing a steep battle in her effort to unseat MacKay -- Harper's minister of foreign affairs who has represented the riding since 1997 and whose father Elmer held it from the early 1970s to the early '90s.

"Are you crazy?" Question Period co-host Jane Taber asked the Green Party leader, adding why she wouldn't run instead in B.C., or a vacant London, Ont. riding, where polling shows she would have a significantly better chance of victory.

Crazy as a Fox. This is a brilliant political play. Her high profile as Leader of the Greens offsets their poor showing in this riding last election. It forces out Mackay to actually return home and fight for his seat.

No longer the other 'leader' of the Conservatives, Peter MacKay the quisling who as the last leader of the Progressive Conservatives destroyed that Grand Old Party by merging with the Republican-Canadian Alliance of Harper.

He lost the leadership bid against Harper, then he lost his girl friend and leadership opponent Belinda Stronach. As Foreign Minister he has been a loser, a puppet on the strings of Harper. He is toast.

May always spoke about her intentions to go back to her Maritime roots, and sure enough she has followed through. She will make MacKay work to win his riding, that means he will spend more time at home then on the road.

She will unite Liberals, NDP, and yes progressives who are conservative behind her. And by running against MacKay she can make the Green Party stand out on issues other than the environment. As she did in her very successful London, Ontario by election bid.

Yes I have been critical of May, because I don't think she is a socialist. Though she is a progressive and a social democrat, more so then many in the Liberals. She is an advocate for the Distributism of Rev Dr. Coady of the Antigonish movement.

"I'm from here and I want to run where I'm comfortable," she added. "I want to represent a region that I care about, and this place where I'm standing, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, is known for the Antigonish movement -- a local economic development approach that was about sustainability -- before they used that world. "I want to take that message nationally and relaunch the Antigonish movement."

As I said here before the Antigonish Movement is a form of distributism, developed by the left wing social reformers in the Catholic Church. It is their version of the Social Gospel as advocated by CCF founder J.S. Woodsworth and members of the NDP like out going Bill Blaikie.

These six principles were later endorsed by Dr. Coady.

• The Primacy Of The Individual
  This principle is based on both religious and democratic teaching: religion emphasizes the dignity of human beings, created in the image and likeness of God; democracy stresses the value of the individual and the development of individual capacities as the aim of social organization.
• Social Reform Must Come Through Education
  Social progress in a democracy must come through the action of citizens; it can only come if there is an improvement in the quality of the people themselves. That improvement, in turn, can come only through education.
• Education Must Begin With The Economic
  In the first place, the people are most keenly interested in all concerned with economic needs; and it is good technique to suit the educational effort to the most intimate interests of the individual or group. Moreover, economic reform is the most immediate necessity, because the economic problems of the world are the most pressing.
• Education Must Be Through Group Action
  Group action is natural because people are social beings. Not only are people commonly organized into groups, but their problems are usually group problems. Any effective adult education program therefore, must fit into this basic group organization of society. Moreover, group action is essential to success under modern conditions; you cannot get results in business or civic affairs without organization.
• Effective Social Reform Involves Fundamental Changes In Social And Economic Institutions
  It is necessary to face the fact that real reform will necessitate strong measures of change that may prove unpopular in certain quarters.
• The Ultimate Objective Of The Movement Is A Full And Abundant Life For Everyone In The Community
  Economic cooperation is the first step, but only the first, towards a society that will permit every individual to develop to the utmost limit of her/his capacities.

Distributism has both a left wing and a right wing in Canada. The Antigonish Movement was its left wing, Social Credit, also a form of distributism, was its populist right wing. As a Catholic alternative to socialism when in the hands of right wingers it degenerated into Corporatism.

What they share in common along with the old CCF and the United Farmers of Alberta, since all these movements began in the 1920's, is that they are advocates not for the working class but for producer movements.

They are advocates for farmers and fishermen's cooperatives,their class arises from the peasantry but in North America became a producer class, neither workers nor businessmen, but a section of the petit-bourgeoisie that were landowners, or owners of their own means of production such as fishing boats. What they and the CCF and other forms of Cooperative Socialism is that arose from Proudhonism and the idea of a cooperative commonwealth, producer, and worker cooperatives as an alternative economy to big corporations and banks.

Distributism then fits well within the current Green Party ideology that melds a social moral and political progressivism with a classical liberal utilitarian economic agenda. Where the old Antigonish movement and other forms of progressive producer movements advocated for that class, the Green Party appeals to the later industrialized mass base of Canadians who do not identify themselves so much as workers but as consumers and citizens. If you read the Antigonish statement in this light, it is the core of Elizabeth May's ideology, if not the Green Party's.

With this she can appeal to fiscal but socially progressive conservatives, to Liberals and Dippers. And she can effectively challenge Peter MacKay who is the scion of the old family politics of Central Nova, having been coroneted as the local MP after his father.

She challenges that old Conservative family compact, and their failure to deliver the goods for Atlantic Canada. As she so correctly pointed out, not a single Conservative slush fund give away announcement in the past two weeks has been about Atlantic Canada.

She can make social issues the focus of the Green Party campaign, and this will make her run against MacKay formidable. A serious challenge and it will give her and the Greens much needed national news coverage. Already in her interview today she challenged the Conservatives on their attack on social programs, as well as their failure on the environment, and their warmongering foreign affairs policy.

I would say that if there ever was a case for Strategic Voting, this would be it. Yes I know heresy, however while the Green Party vies for popularity with the NDP between elections, they have not been a serious threat to the party in elections as they have been to the Conservatives as we saw in the London by election when May ran .

For this pragmatic reason I believe May will seriously challenge MacKay. And as she showed in London she has the election machinery to do it. Beating him is a long shot but a strong second place is worth the run. She knows that, and has made a strategic decision that benefits all progressive voters in that riding , regardless of party affiliation.

There is another riding that the Greens should focus on and encourage strategic support for; Wild Rose in Alberta where they came in second place last election. With a national mobilized campaign and priority publicity the Greens will focus on taking on the big blue machine in Alberta, garnering them more publicity.

Elizabeth May put Atlantic Canada in play today, and that will mean that forgotten region of Canada will get more coverage in the weeks, and months to come, including when we have an election. On that day, Central Nova will be in the news daily and not just as an after thought.

See:

Green Party

Elizabeth May

Peter MacKay


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, Nova Scotia, Elizabet hMay, Peter MacKay, Green Party, politics, election, Conservatives
SocialCredit, producerism, distributism, Antigonish, Dr.Coady, cooperatives, economics,

Don't Bank On It.

That the banks will voluntarily concede on the issue of ATM fees.

If ATM fees were eliminated, customers would be subsidizing the customers of other banks who use their machines, argues the Canadian Bankers Association. If people want to forego the convenience fee, they should use their own bank's machine.

A red herring, a straw man, and a spurious argument since the oligopoly of the five banks already share their customers since the jointly own Interac, Cirrus, Plus etc. the ATM operating systems. And as such charge fees to stores using Interac, and to private ATM operators. They are literally cash registers for the Big 5 Banks, if not one arm bandits.

But banks don't seem to have convinced either the broader public or their political masters why a fee is necessary.

John Lawford is one lawyer eager to argue against the banks in upcoming finance committee hearings. "There is no need for fees at all," says Lawford, who represents about 4,000 Canadians through the Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

Banks collect an estimated $154 million annually in convenience fees, based on figures supplied by the Canadian Bankers Association – a tiny sliver of their overall profits. But it's an issue that gets Canadians' blood boiling.

A drop in the bucket, but don't forget this is only one set of user fees. There are service charges and exorbitant credit card charges which the Banking Committee needs to look at. Since the banks love to get us to pay for their screw ups.

But if the government were successful at getting the banks to eliminate fees, it might not solve consumers' pocket-book problem.

Banks might just shift the fees to another service, says U of T's Booth. Previously, banks raised service fees to recoup losses on 1970s loans to foreign countries such as Brazil, Argentina and Mexico, he says.

While the banks and others advocate you take out large amounts of money at one time from the ATM to avoid withdrawal charges, I point again, that this is simply shifting the burden on the consumer who is being gouged. You are charged by your branch, the ATM you use and further a monthly service charge. The ATM's were instituted to reduce branches and staff costs. The private ATM's were approved by the Competition bureau to provide competition to bank ATM's, though the Big 5 run Interac/Cirrus/Plus that ATM's use.

In February, the Toronto marketing research firm TNS Canadian Facts announced that 81 per cent of Canadian adults surveyed in the fall of 2006 had used a bank machine during the previous month, up from 78 per cent a year earlier, and that nine out of every 10 cash withdrawals had been made at a bank machine.

Furthermore, deposits of cheques and cash at ABMs doubled those made in branches, and in fact only 53 per cent of Canadian adults had visited a branch in the previous month, the lowest percentage since 1994.

So the solution is that the Big 5 banks eat the costs and make it back from stores that use ATM for your purchases, which they charge .50 for. And from the private ATM's, who can charge you whatever they want.

And if this is not solved by the Bank Act Review, it will be real money in your pocket issue that will dwarf any tax break promises the Conservatives make in the next election.

See

Banks

Monopoly

Service Charges

ATM

Bank Profits

Credit Cards


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Jack Layton, ATM, NDP, Banks, service charges, bank charges, credit card, bank profits
, Canada,, jobs,, layoffs,, profits, workers,, bank, workers,,

Priming For An Election

The Conservative Party and the PM spent the weekend leaking election threats. On Saturday before the Conservatives election preparation school in Mississauga, the Party leaked this; Tory memo warns of snap vote

No they don't have a mole, this is party strategy tried and true , release your own memo, they did it last election as well.

It was followed up with this in the afternoon when Harper addressed the troops gathered. Election could come 'at any time,' PM says

But the polls say otherwise; Poll suggests federal parties at stalemate

While those that are wildly optimistic might take heart with this headline which uses the same poll numbers but suggests the glass is half full. Conservatives maintain lead in poll

The bottom line is that unless the budget is defeated there will be no election. ANALYSIS-Canadian govt survival hangs on Monday's budget

Why? Because Harper would not get a majority. Despite his desperate need to call an election.

Even his right wing allies at the National Post, voice of the Conservatives in print, are pointing out his flaws;Comment: Harper spends like it's 2005,

If there is no election, then his whole political platform since gaining office will come under scrutiny. And it won't be a pretty picture.

His childcare spaces and wait time priorities are failures. He has revived Liberal programs, Who's the real flip-flopper? His crime bill will pass, with amendments, and his Clean Air Act will come back with amendments and hard targets. In other words through out the next four months until the summer recess his government will have egg on its face.

Which can only help the opposition.

So besides the budget what could trigger an election that the Conservatives are priming us for? A strong showing by the ADQ and the Liberals in the Quebec election. The former gives Harper seats in Quebec, the latter makes the Conservatives look good in Quebec when they pay for the fiscal imbalance.

Election-ready budget
Toronto Star, Canada - 23 hours ago
Much of the cash will be aimed at Quebec, but other provinces such as Ontario will wind up with more money for post-secondary education and similar ...
Will budget seal the deal for charest? Montreal Gazette (subscription)
Analysis: Budget may add up to majority National Post
Fiscal Imbalance: your questions answered CTV.ca

It's Texas Hold Em until then.
Quebec election tight three-way race: Poll




Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, budget, politics, Conservatives, Harper, Liberals, Dion, NDP, Harper, PQ, BQ, ADQ, Quebec, election, election2007

Jack Ain't Smiling

NDP launches ‘Leadership and Fairness’ campaign

And Jack ain't smiling in any of these TV ads. He gives the viewer the stiff upper lip. Serious stuff. Do I smell spring election in the air?

	Jack Layton on environmental leadership » View Ad
	Jack Layton on better health care » View Ad
	Jack Layton on the prosperity gap » View A

Timing is everything, and since the Liberals don't have TV ads, and are moving towards the Conservative position on issues, well this should help the NDP in the polls.

Meanwhile the Liberals hit the road with Dion No-Show, that is he makes a hit in the national media but not with the local folks where he visits.

Liberal leader Stephane Dion was on the offensive as he spoke to about 200 Liberal supporters in Vancouver Sunday night.

Meanwhile the Liberals having spent over a year reviewing policy in preparation for an election have come up with....nada, nothing, zip.

So we are left with Dion issuing press releases where he flip flops again, while whining that the Conservatives stole the Liberals platform.

Like their support for the Made In Alberta plan for environmental intensity targets.

In 2005, the former Liberal government proposed regulations that would require companies to reduce the "intensity" of their greenhouse gas emissions. Dion was environment minister at the time. But in recent weeks, several Liberals have hinted they are revising their plan.

There is again the perennial pre election talk about the need for a merger of the Left, but which left is that? There is no coherent left in the Liberals, many being more Red Tories like Brison and Stronach than social democrats.

As I said before the NDP needs to attack the Liberals on their weakness; their failures to develop a national day care program, their support for the war in Afghanistan, their support for increasing police powers against civil liberties, their failure to support anti-scab laws, their flip flop on the environment.

These are of course the same positions the Conservatives embrace. By defining themselves in opposition to the Conservative program, the NDP does something the Liberals cannot and will not do.






Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Layton, Dion, Liberals, Harper, Conservatives, politics, Canada, NDP, left,

Infantile Leftism

Juvenile delinquency is not political even if some folks claim it is. This is no different than the riots on Whyte Avenue last year. The political and media message are lost in the vandalism.

Some will claim this is Black Bloc Anarchism, I on the other hand believe it is simply infantile leftists trying to justify their juvenile delinquency as political when it is no different than drunken louts on Whyte Avenue fighting riot cops.

The demonstration was supposed to be for 'making a statement ',but the message got lost.

ENOUGH!! A Woman's Place is NOT at home!
Call to action: International Day Against Police Brutality, March 15 (details below)

On Thursday, March 8th -- International Women's Day -- Montreal police brutally attacked and injured three women who came to the aid of Jaggi Singh when the police arrested him at the annual Women's Day celebration in Montreal.

As the state spins it, Jaggi Singh is to blame for everything! We see it very differently. The arrest of Jaggi Singh and the brutalization of the three women are inextricably linked. Jaggi Singh was there to celebrate International Women's Day with his sisters and got arrested. As women we are very familiar with being blamed for our own victimization -- the woman who was raped "asked for it", what was she doing out there anyway? Why was she dressed like that? Milia Abrar, who was murdered in Montreal in 1998, had challenged traditions: she asked for it. The missing women, mostly Indigenous sisters, along the 'Highway of Tears' asked for it. The women at École Polytechnique asked for it. The woman whose partner killed her asked for it. The women who were brutalized by the police on 8th March asked for it!

However the result was vandalism, which is neither radical nor revolutionary, but reactionary. And you can tell from the headline below, the message got lost in the reporting. Nice going folks. You didn't make the point, you missed it.

This is neither Direct Action nor Anarchism in Action. It is just a justification for hooliganism. It is reactionary, like soccer hooliganism, as it brings more police violence on people. It does not expose that violence as unjustified in the mind of the public.

Anarchism is about propaganda and agitation aimed at educating the masses that they can be self reliant, self sufficient and live in a cooperative fashion without the State, police or fear of violence. Supporting or engaging in this kind of vandalism is the antithesis of that message.

See my previous posts on the futility of this kind of infantile anarchism.

More than a dozen arrested after Montreal anti-violence demo turns ugly

Rioters build a fire in the middle of the intersection of Berri and de Maisonneuve as demonstrators protest against police brutality. Thursday in Montreal. (CP PHOTO/David Boily) Anti-police rallies turn ugly in Montreal, Vancouver CBC British Columbia - 4 hours ago Anti-police rallies in Montreal and Vancouver turned violent Thursday as demonstrators clashed with police, leading to several arrests. Montreal police arrest 15 at demonstration Globe and Mail More than a dozen arrested after Montreal anti-violence demo turns ... Canada.com 680 News - Canoe.ca all 28 news articles »

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Vancouver, Montreal, Black Bloc, Jaggi Singh, anarchism, anarchists, riot, police, police brutality

Anarchy and Science

This months Carnival of Anarchy

Science and the spirit of Anarchism

After a brief discussion in the comments section of the last posting here is the announcement. Our next Carnival will take place on this site around the weekend of March 23-25th, Friday night to Sunday. The subject for this roundtable will be science and the spirit of anarchism. This includes anything related to the bright light of inquiry, ie. software, electronics, climatology, biology, medicine, or what have you ... viewed from a more or less libertarian standpoint. As usual it would be helpful if members would spread the word about this event on their own blogs and websites. See you then.








Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
carnival of anarchy, anarchy, anarchists, blogs, blogging, weblogs, bloggers, libertarian, libertarians ocialism, left libertarians, mutualists, individualism, individualists,