The Capitalist System

Long Live May Day

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Sex Workers Want A Union

Sex Workers across the world are protesting today demanding the right to unionize. It's May Day.

India
Kolkata sex workers seek recognition as labourers

Taiwan

Prostitutes to ride for more rights

OLDEST PROFESSION: Sex workers will appeal to the government today to decriminalize their way of earning a living and will announce the formation of a labor union

Sex workers call for an end to policemen 'fishing'

Canada
Canadian prostitutes bought, sold and forcibly moved, study shows


Also See:

Legalize & Unionize the Sex Trade

Whose Family Values?

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Russia Celebrates May Day

No tanks, no commisars, finally Russia has a real May Day. And real workers and commies celebrating and demanding the end of Mafia Capitalism.
Ivan Klyuchenko, a 17-year-old starting university this year, said: "Our industry is in ruins and wages are pitiful. A lifetime of work is not enough to buy a room in a Moscow suburb."
Trade unions, Communists march through Moscow on May Day



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Carnival of Investing

Ah shucks what can I say I posted my article; Income Trusts are a Ponzi Scheme to Canadian Capitalist and he has kindly published it in his 20th edition of the Carnival of Investing.

Call it contributing my two bits worth. And rather ironic that a lefty gets published in a Capitalist Blog.

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Census 2006 Count Me Out

In the 1980's a scandal erupted that Census Canada/Statistic Canada had given information to the RCMP as part of their spying on Canadians operation.

This was the time when the RCMP were exposed for infiltrating unions, burning barns, infiltrating the left and anti-war movements, universities and the Quebec nationalist movements. The Canadian Census was supposed to be secure and confidential. And it was a crime not to fill in your census form.

Well I refused, and when I got called from the irate bureaucrat from Stats Canada informing me that I had to comply I replied I would be happy to if he in writing could assure me that my information was secure and not subject to being handed to the RCMP. Well all a fluster he informed me my information was secure, and I assured him I would only believe him when I had it in writing. Suffice it to say he did not provide me with that assurance in writing. Nor did he press charges.


Today Statistics Canada has contracted out its data collection to Lockheed Martin, yes that Lockheed Martin the company that advertises on US television about how it is Defending America.

This means our data is not secure. Vive Canada.ca has launched a campaign to halt this contracting out and failing that are calling for Non Participation in the 2006 Census.

Count Me Out!

Lockheed Martin (the biggest U.S. weapons contractor and in fact the biggest weapons contractor in the world) is working on the next Canadian Census. That's because Statistics Canada chose to contract out the part of the census dealing with software, hardware and printing to Lockheed Martin--despite the fact that Stat Can promotes itself at home and internationally as a leader in information gathering.

What this means is that your tax dollars for the census will go to a non-Canadian corporation. It means that Canadian jobs will be lost due to the automation of the census. And it means that a large part of the census will be handled by a corporation that makes weapons of mass destruction. A corporation that reaps huge benefits financially from the war in Iraq, a war that Canadians rightfully oppose. A corporation that works behind the scenes to influence U.S. public policy to help maximize its own profits. A corporation that is leading the development of the Star Wars missile-defense program for the Pentagon. A corporation that is consistently rated one of the worst corporations in the world for various reasons including human rights abuses. And a corporation that might invade your privacy.

Say no to Lockheed Martin's involvement in the Canadian census. Say yes to Canada. Join Canadians across the country and BOYCOTT the census.

We offer suggestions for several different actions you can take, from sending an email form letter, to simply completing only the paper census rather than the online census, to a full boycott. To find out how you can take action, just click here: census.vivelecanada.ca

To access only the email form letter, click here: census.vivelecanada.ca/letter.php

For more information on the issue, visit: The Census Issue

And please visit our partner site on this action, CountMeOut.ca

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Carnival of Socialism is Out

The Carnival of Socialism is now online here. Enjoy




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Workers Control

When the bosses go bust the workers take over. And such has happened at a unionised pork processing plant in Saskatchewan. When the bosses shut down the factories, the workers need to take over and make them work.

Such is the current situation in Newfoundland with the closing of the FPI fish processing plants. There the communities, which are the plant workers, need to take over these plants and run them for themselves. And the recent history of workers control in Quebec shows they can do it more profitably.

Of course it is only when the bosses give up and move out because the plants are not 'productive' that is not profitable due to lower wages and other cost reductions available abroad, that workers are offered the opportunity to run the plants themselves. In reality we run our plants, schools, hospitals, etc. all aspects of capitalism for ourselves already, the captialists, shareholders, and managers are parasites who live off our labour. We can libe without them they cannot live without us.


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The Origins and Traditions of May Day

I wrote the Origins and Traditions of Mayday in 1997. Yes way back then, it was one of my first web postings. It was used to launch MayDay on the Web and the Edmonton May Week celebrations that have continued since.

Here it is again and the original web page is here.

An Australian labour historian used it as the basis for his article on May Day which expands on my points.

THE ORIGINS AND TRADITIONS OF MAYDAY

By Eugene W. Plawiuk


The international working class holiday; Mayday,
originated in pagan Europe. It was a festive holy day
celebrating the first spring planting. The ancient
Celts and Saxons celebrated May 1st as Beltane or the
day of fire. Bel was the Celtic god of the sun.

The Saxons began their May day celebrations on the eve
of May, April 30. It was an evening of games and
feasting celebrating the end of winter and the return
of the sun and fertility of the soil. Torch bearing
peasants and villager would wind their way up paths to
the top of tall hills or mountain crags and then
ignite wooden wheels which they would roll down into
the fields

The May eve celebrations were eventually outlawed by
the Catholic church, but were still celebrated by
peasants until the late 1700's. While good church
going folk would shy away from joining in the
celebrations, those less afraid of papal authority
would don animal masks and various costumes, not
unlike our modern Halloween. The revelers, lead by the
Goddess of the Hunt; Diana (sometimes played by a
pagan-priest in women's clothing) and the Horned God;
Herne, would travel up the hill shouting, chanting and
singing, while blowing hunting horns. This night
became known in Europe as Walpurgisnacht, or night of
the witches

The Celtic tradition of Mayday in the British isles
continued to be celebrated through-out the middle ages
by rural and village folk. Here the traditions were
similar with a goddess and god of the hunt.

As European peasants moved away from hunting gathering
societies their gods and goddesses changed to reflect
a more agrarian society. Thus Diana and Herne came to
be seen by medieval villagers as fertility deities of
the crops and fields. Diana became the Queen of the
May and Herne became Robin Goodfellow (a predecessor
of Robin Hood) or the Green Man.

The Queen of the May reflected the life of the fields
and Robin reflected the hunting traditions of the
woods. The rites of mayday were part and parcel of
pagan celebrations of the seasons. Many of these pagan
rites were later absorbed by the Christian church in
order to win over converts from the 'Old Religion'.

Mayday celebrations in Europe varied according to
locality, however they were immensely popular with
artisans and villagers until the 19th Century. The
Christian church could not eliminate many of the
traditional feast and holy days of the Old Religion so
they were transformed into Saint days.

During the middle ages the various trade guilds
celebrated feast days for the patron saints of their
craft. The shoemakers guild honored St. Crispin, the
tailors guild celebrated Adam and Eve. As late as the
18th century various trade societies and early
craft-unions would enter floats in local parades still
depicting Adam and Eve being clothed by the Tailors
and St. Crispin blessing the shoemaker.

The two most popular feast days for Medieval craft
guilds were the Feast of St. John, or the Summer
Solstice and Mayday. Mayday was a raucous and fun
time, electing a queen of the May from the eligible
young women of the village, to rule the crops until
harbest. Our tradition of beauty pagents may have
evolved , albeit in a very bastardized form, from the
May Queen.

Besides the selection of the May Queen was the raising
of the phallic Maypole, around which the young single
men and women of the village would dance holding on to
the ribbons until they became entwined, with their (
hoped for) new love.

And of course there was Robin Goodfellow, or the Green
Man who was the Lord of Misrule for this day. Mayday
was a celebration of the common people, and Robin
would be the King/Priest/Fool for a day. Priests and
Lords were the butt of many jokes, and the Green Man
and his supporters; mummers would make jokes and poke
fun of the local authorities. This tradition of satire
is still conducted today in Newfoundland, with the
Christmas Mummery.

The church and state did not take kindly to these
celebrations, especially during times of popular
rebellion. Mayday and the Maypole were outlawed in the
1600's. Yet the tradition still carried on in many
rural areas of England. The trade societies still
celebrated Mayday until the 18th Century.

As trade societies evolved from guilds, to friendly
societies and eventually into unions, the craft
traditions remained strong into the early 19th
century. In North America Dominion Day celebrations in
Canada and July 4th celebrations in the United States
would be celebrated by tradesmen still decorating
floats depicting their ancient saints such as St.
Crispin.


Our modern celebration of Mayday as a working class
holiday evolved from the struggle for the eight hour
day in 1886. May 1, 1886 saw national strikes in the
United States and Canada for an eight hour day called
by the Knights of Labour. In Chicago police attacked
striking workers killing six.
The next day at a demonstration in Haymarket Square to
protest the police brutality a bomb exploded in the
middle of a crowd of police killing eight of them. The
police arrested eight anarchist trade unionists
claiming they threw the bombs. To this day the subject
is still one of controversy. The question remains
whether the bomb was thrown by the workers at the
police or whether one of the police's own agent
provocateurs dropped it in their haste to retreat from
charging workers.

In what was to become one of the most infamous show
trials in America in the 19th century, but certainly
not to be the last of such trials against radical
workers, the State of Illinois tried the anarchist
workingmen for fighting for their rights as much as
being the actual bomb throwers. Whether the anarchist
workers were guilty or innocent was irrelevant. They
were agitators, fomenting revolution and stirring up
the working class, and they had to be taught a lesson.


Albert Parsons, August Spies, George Engle and Adolph
Fischer were found guilty and executed by the State of
Illinois.

In Paris in 1889 the International Working Men's
Association (the First International) declared May 1st
an international working class holiday in
commemoration of the Haymarket Martyrs. The red flag
became the symbol of the blood of working class
martyrs in their battle for workers rights.

Mayday, which had been banned for being a holiday of
the common people, had been reclaimed once again for
the common people.


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May Day Headlines

And now your headlines from the class war.

Capitalism does not go unopposed even in the heart of the Beast; Immigrants across the United States down tools for MayDay

And in Europe workers as of May Day are 'free labour' able to cross borders for jobs. New EU country workers get wider chance to seek jobs

Gee someone should tell all these cops and governments that unions are irrelevant.......

May Day Demonstrators Rally Across Asia
Workers across Asia rallied Monday to press for better conditions, often encountering a heavy police presence and, in some places, outright resistance.


May Day demonstrations quelled by massive police presence in Cambodia capital

- A leading trade union leader was arrested Monday as thousands of police brought the capital to a virtual standstill during a government clampdown on unauthorized May Day demonstrations, an opposition leader said. Chea Mony, leader of the Free Trade Union, was arrested by police and detained for two hours on grounds that he was organizing unauthorized demonstrations, said Sam Rainsy, leader of the opposition.

Indonesian police out in force for nationwide May Day rallies

Demonstrations were planned in major cities across Indonesia, with up to 50,000 people expected in the capital alone to protest government plans to revise a labor law -- cutting severance packages and introducing more flexible contracts that would chip away at worker security. "Don't change the law," thousands of laborers chanted at Jakarta's main downtown roundabout, as others arrived in buses and trucks, waiving green, yellow and red flags and banners expressing their demands.

High alert for Philippine May Day

Strikes to follow May Day: Cosatu SABC News

And this is why MayDay is still relevant and important even today.

EUROMAYDAY 006

Europe marks May Day

'Preserve May Day significance'
Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana urges workers and employers to preserve the significance of the world May Day celebrations to be observed on Monday. In a statement ahead of the celebrations, the minister said it was important for everyone to think of those who were still denied basic worker rights. "On Monday South African workers, as part of the global community, will be joining their counterparts around the world in celebrating the achievements and fruits of the struggles that were waged by their forefathers more than 100 years ago."
As we will be celebrating, it is important to note that this year's celebration coincides with the 60th anniversary of the historic mineworkers' strike of 1946. It is the struggles of this nature that led to the current improvements in our working conditions," he said. It was important for people not to treat the May Day holiday as an ordinary public holiday, the minister said. "The freedoms that we enjoy today resulted from attempts by the government and its social partners to ensure the realisation of those struggles and I would therefore like to remind our fellow countrymen and women that as we celebrate, we should pause to spare a thought for those who are yet to enjoy these basic conditions."

And here is why workers still need a union.......

No happy May Day for 350 Govt workers

Bangalore: It's May Day on Monday. But as workers around the world are celebrating their special day, 350 government employees in Bangalore have little to rejoice. They have been working on contract for more than a decade, and now, the Supreme Court has said that they have no right to regularisation. A case in point is B C Karunakar, who has been working as a typist at the Commercial Taxes department for over 20 years. But despite working here for two decades, he isn’t a permanent employee just like his colleague, T Govindaiah who has put in 22 years of work in the organisation.They've worked for 20 years without increments, medical facilities, and privileged leave. And now they will now retire without pension.

And in Montreal workers kicked off May Day early with a protest against the Charest Neo0Liberal agenda. May Day comes early to Montreal

And check out these sites.

LabourStart for up to the minute May Day headlines.

May Day and related topics on the Marxists Internet Archive


May Day - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


May Day on the Web


Galaxy > Community > Holidays and Observances > May Day

The Daily Bleed May Reference Page:


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Why Income Trusts Fail

Sure they make huge payouts to their investors and managers but because of this they are suseptible to becoming a ponzi scheme, whereby their payouts are more than their earnings as we find with the recent collapse of one of the oldest Income Trusts in Canada; Superior Propane. As the old saying goes it its too good to be true...it is.

Superior is one of the earliest business trusts, having traded publicly since 1996. It became one of the blue-chip names in a hot investment sector that since 1999 has seen 31 business trusts, or 22% of the sector, cut or suspended distributions. DISTRIBUTIONS: Have exceeded more than 90% of available cash in each of past five years. Superior units drop 25%

And this is why Income Trusts ran into trouble in the last two years, not because of the Federal government but the 'gold-rush' mentality to invest and get quick payouts encouraged by managers who were dipping into the till in these Trusts.

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Headlines from the Progressive Blogosphere

I am running two news aggregators in my sidebar, that ugly thing to the left everyone seems to hate. They are both from Sustainable blog. Introducing the "Headlines from the Progressive Blogosphere" Tool I reccomend those folks in the Canadian Progressive Blogger community consider joining to make this a more continental aggregator.



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Cut Income Taxes Now

Even at the highest wages the average worker in Canada is still not making what our Politicians and Corporate CEOs or heck even an NHL player makes.

Albertans continue to make more than residents in any other province, according to Statistics Canada.

StatsCan's monthly report on payroll employment, released yesterday, showed people in this province had average weekly earnings of $794.72 in February.

That's up 0.5% from January and 5.1% from February 2005.

Ontario was second, at $786.75, followed by B.C., where the average weekly earnings came in at $742.82.

Only residents in Canada's north made more than workers in Alberta.

Employees pulling in the highest salaries in the country work in the mining and oil and gas sectors, where the average weekly earnings in February were $1,330.35, up 2.8% from a year ago.

That makes the annual salary for these mining, oil and gas workers $63,856.80

For the average Albertan,earning just under $800 weekly,makes $ 38146.56 annually. That works out to be $19.86 per hour. These are in unionised trades.

The average Albertan working currently in our hot market is making $10 hour. Which works out to still be below the povery level at $19,200 annually.

And that does not include the many working at minimum wages still, which is means they are earning far below the poverty level, but are still not able to benefit from tax credits.End Welfare Create A Living Wage

For a real break for working class families in Canada no one should have to pay income tax until they earn OVER $100,000 annually. Because for example those highly paid workers listed above, will earn that much annually in overtime wages on top of their annual salaries.

Salaries between $30,000 and $100,000 pay the MOST income taxes in Canada.

Those earning $200,000 or more pay less.Quick Tax Facts 2005

And you have till midnight May 1st to file your annual tax return.

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I Don't Do Mornings

Do not disturb takes on new meaning in a billybog in Australia.

Best to leave sleeping crocs lie, even Captain Hook knew that.



A crocodile in northern Australia has chased a storm-clearance worker up a tree and made off with his chainsaw.

The 4.4m (14.5ft) saltwater crocodile called Brutus apparently took exception to the noise of the saw.

The worker was clearing a tree that fell on the crocodile enclosure at the Corroboree Park Tavern, 80km (50 miles) east of the northern city of Darwin.

Tavern co-owner Linda Francis said: "Fred virtually gave him the chainsaw, shoved it at him.

"It was still going and he took the chainsaw onto the ground and proceeded to smash it and it stalled. The crocodile didn't cut himself, just broke a few teeth."

Mr Shappert said the saw was destroyed.

"He chewed on the chainsaw for about an hour-and-a-half, then we finally got it out."

Saltwater crocodiles are known to attack small boats, apparently disturbed by the sound of outboard motors.

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End Welfare Create A Living Wage

It was a policy of the NDP and Red Liberals in the 1960's to call for a Guaranteed Annual Income, a social wage. Today we call it a Living Wage.

Quick. What radical social policy has had the support of the Liberal Party, the former Reform Party, the NDP, civil rights leader Martin Luther King, free-market economist Milton Friedman, the Canadian Council on Social Development, the Canadian Manufacturers Association, certain taxpayers and poverty groups, and even Richard Nixon when he was president? The guaranteed annual income. No, I would not have guessed it either. If such a radical idea attracts such a motley crew, two thoughts come to the cynical mind: they can't all be talking about the same thing; and, why don't we have it yet?Guaranteed annual income

Whether you call it a GAI or LW it is the same, a social wage based on the value of each person in Canada. Real welfare reform can only be made through a policy of GAI/LW.

As a recent CCPA study of Welfare Rates in B.C. shows;

There is currently no rhyme or reason to how welfare rates are set,” says Steve Kerstetter, author of A Better Way to Set Welfare Rates, also released today by the CCPA, “In theory, welfare incomes are supposed to cover the basic necessities of life. In practice, they are set arbitrarily by the provincial cabinet with no regard for the actual cost of living.”

Whether it is provinical minimum wages or AISH or welfare, the fact remains that these social wage programs do not meet the needs or real social value/social captial of Canadians.

That can only be met with a social wage, as studies done by the Federal Government have shown. HRDC/SRC studies found that single mothers on welfare got jobs and stayed in those jobs if their welfare benefits WERE NOT CUT OFF. That allowed them both cash and benefits supplements to their minimum wage. In other words it created a social wage, a GAI or living wage.

That this study has been ignored is an understatement. As all such studies have shown, the working poor, who pay taxes, are hurt most by government tax credit programs, becuase the benefits are aimed at those who earn less than poverty levels, while those who work for minimum wages earn just above the poverty level.
Income Poverty in Canada: Recent Trends among Canadian Families 1981-2002


In earning this amount, their benefits and tax credits get clawed back. Such will be the case when the Harpocrites issue their baby bonus, child credit. The working poor who need all the money they can get will face a double burdern, they will lose their existing tax credit for children, because the Harpocrite baby bonus is taxable income, and will boost their earnings above the current Liberal child tax credit means. Secondly they will then be ripped off because the $1200 will be taxed income.

In order to have genuine social reform of welfare and all income assistance programs, which affect women in particular whether as single mothers or seniors surviving their spoouses, we need to have a GAI. Why Women Would Gain from a Guaranteed Livable Income


This is something that was supposed to have happened by now, but continually is placed on the back burner because it affects women as social wage earners who do not get paid for their social labour. Whose Family Values? Women and the Social Reproduction of Capitalism

References;

GAI-Forum Info Page

Rise of Capitalism and Social Welfare

Welfare Reforms in Canada

Also see:

Living Wage articles




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Harpers Secret Deals wth the US

We learned about the softwood lumber deal because the Americans announced it first, now we learn a secret deal over NORAD has been signed by the Harpocrite, again from the Americans. This is the real meaning of his statement that Canada will have a new relationship with the United States. More arbitrary autarchic decisions by the Harpocrite, with no consultation with Parliament. Reminds me of Oliver Cromwell.

"I was astounded, absolutely astounded ... There's been no consultation with opposition parties ... no consultation with Canadians whether these are steps they want to take," said New Democrat MP Dawn Black, the party's defence critic.She wondered why Canadians had to learn from American officials on Friday — rather than the federal government — that the two nations had renewed their long-standing defence partnership. Opposition slams `secret' NORAD deal signing

As for NORAD well it wasn't very effective in halting the attacks of 9/11 now was it.

CNN.com - Panel: US unprepared 'in every respect' on 9/11

The North American Aerospace Defense Command and the Federal Aviation
Administration "struggled, under difficult circumstances, to improvise a homeland defense against an unprecedented challenge they had never encountered and had never trained to meet," the commission's staff concluded in a report read at the hearing's opening.

Oh yeah that's because VP Dick Cheney who was hiding out in the Presidential bunker, was in charge, while el presidente Georgie Porgie was flying around unavailable for two days. StandDown.net - Exposing NORAD's Wag The 911 Window Dressing Tale ...


So what was the use of NORAD? Besides tracking Santa Clause.

And if it is a joint command, between the Canadian Forces and the US Armed Forces, then why can it be overruled by the executive branch of the US government?

Oh right NORAD will be the command centre for Ballistic Missle Defense, the new Star Wars program that Derek Burney has been promoting since he entered the Harpocrites PMO.




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Jane Jacobs RIP

Jane Jacobs was one of Canada's most influential public intellectuals, along with Marshall Mcluhan .

While an American by birth she was Canadian by choice. Her work on cities and urban culture changed the view of the metropol for many an urban planner, architect, and municipal libertarian/socialists.

The life and death of Jane Jacobs

Jane Jacobs, one of the greatest legends of Greenwich Village, died on Tuesday. Though she had moved to Toronto some years ago, Jacobs — who was 89 — will never be forgotten here.

Greenwich Village, Soho, Little Italy and the Lower East Side would not be the same today without Jacobs’s pivotal efforts to save large parts of them from misguided planning and transportation schemes.

In 1969 Jacobs moved to Toronto, and was involved in stopping the Spadina Expressway, arguing that cities are for people not cars. Although cited as the originator of the term “social capital,” Jacobs’ concept of urban development is the struggle by neighbourhoods for “self-government,” and her ideas are far removed from advocating accumulation of any kind of capital.

She was an original thinker and activist intellectual like Saul Alinsky and Noam Chomsky.

Her first book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, published in 1961, became a bible for neighbourhood organizers and what she termed the “foot people”. Her views embraced the marketplace, supported privatization of utilities, frowned on subsidies, and detested the intrusions of government, big or small. “I’m kind of an atheist,” she said. “As for being a rightist or a leftist, it doesn’t make any sense to me. I think ideologies are blinders.”

Her work influenced the Montreal Citizens Movement and folks around Black Rose Books, as well as hearlding a libertarian municipalism that Murray Bookchin would later promote.

Mrs. Jacobs scorned nationalism and argued in her 1980 book, The Question of Separatism, that Quebec would be better off leaving Canada. Moreover, she argued that some cities would be better off as independent economic and political units.

She published her last book in 2000 at the age of 83. She passed away this week in Toronto at the age of 89.

The central premise of her book, The Nature of Economies, is that economics is a web of connected forces subject to the same laws as all other living things in nature. At the time in March, 2000, she told The Star’s Judy Stoffman: “This will be a radical idea to those who think of human beings as being outside nature. Human beings are neither adversaries of or the inevitable masters of nature. They live by the same processes as all nature.”

Outgrowing Jane Jacobs and Her New York New York Times


Jane Jacobs, mischief-maker and contrarian

Jane Jacobs, 1916–2006 In a way, Jane Jacobs, who died this week, did to urban renewal what Rachel Carson did to DDT and Ralph Nader did to the Corvair.

The Rich Life of Jane Jacobs CounterPunch,

What Jane Jacobs did for Ottawa

My friend Jane Jacobs



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PC Non Smoking

The Calgary Conservative MLA who oversees the provincial agency on the attack against addictions, figures a new-look Alberta Tory government, complete with a fresh-out-of-the-box frontman, could nix nicotine in public places as early as spring next year. So the politicians ready for battle, once the Conservatives pick their general. As for the smokers who feel their rights are being denied, Dave doesn't blink. "They still have the right to smoke. They just can't smoke everywhere." Smoke ban battle heats up

We don't smoke everywhere, we can hardly smoke anywhere anymore, in fact we can't smoke in public period. And the draconian attacks on smokers go unabated, we are such whimps when it comes to standing up for our rights.

One of them is the right to smoke in a well ventilated, smoke free environment. But such an alternative is not enshrined in any of the anti-smoking laws in the province. A combination of electorstatic dispersion systems and effective air exhaust would be required, but such systems have not been an option in bylaws passed in Alberta.

Because the taxpayer funded lobby groups like ASH claim that even that is too much for them. They, like the vegan anti-hunting types who are opposed to all hunting period, want NO SMOKING period.

Oh did I mention they are taxpayer funded, with taxes made off cigarettes. We actually pay for these loon's to ban us from public. Did I mention smokers are whimps, we are so guilt ridden that we can barely put up a fight against these extremist laws. And they have only 300 members. 300!!! But they have the doctors monopoly on their side. And whimpy politicians, who have a moral agenda because they are opposed to smoking due to their belonging to a religious cult.

Yep the Alberta PC party is living up to its initials by being Politically Correct. Typical they continue beat up on the poor, the disabled and addicts.

Environmental Tobacco Smoke
in the Nonsmoking Section of a Restaurant:
A Case Study

This study tested the concentrations of environmental
tobacco smoke (ETS) components in a small
restaurant/pub with smoking and nonsmoking areas—
a facility outfitted with a heat-recovery ventilation
system and directional airflow. The ETS levels in the
nonsmoking area were compared with those in other
similar restaurants/pubs where indoor smoking is altogether
prohibited. The results indicate that ETS
component concentrations in the nonsmoking section
of the facility in question were not statistically different

See Smokers Rights



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Alberta, PC's, Conservatives, ASH, smokers, smoking, anti-smoking, smokers-rights

Whyte Trash Avenue

Ah spring has sprung in Edmonton, how do I know, let me count the ways....broken windows up and down Whyte Avenue. The usual trash blowing down the street, and heck that was before the Oilers were in the playoffs. Now with the playoffs there are more cops on Whyte and we should see a reduction in trashing. Cops on Whyte


After the playoffs the trashing of Whyte will continue because the city still has not restricted the amount of bars opening, nor have they effectively developed a community based policing policy for Whtye.

One of those policies would be that bar, lounge, alcohol serving establishments would pay a head tax to the Old Scona Business Association, and the Strathcona Community league, a per person capacity charge. This tax would then pay for damages to stores along Whyte. Cause that damage is going to occur, Oilers or no.

The street from Mill Creek to 109th cannot handle the thousands of drunks and partiers that it attracts on weekends as soon as the weather warms up. And this year the warm weather means we had trashing all the way up and down Whyte between 99 St. and 109St. already even before the playoffs. And before the dreaded July 1 Canada party, which in 2001 resulted in a drunken riot.

And for those folks who live off Whyte, the funds could be used for community clean up of the broken bottles and trash that gets left around, and for propety damage.

Yep tax the bars who serve the booze that causes the probelms, oh and while we are at it, a bit of capacity enforcement by the beat cops would put the owners in line as well. Shut a few bars and lounges down and folks will enforce the laws on their own.

Unfortunate but true. Taxes and regulations work in making capitalists do 'the right thing'.

Old Strathcona: building character and commerce in a preservation district
Journal article by Karen L. Wall; Urban History Review, Vol. 30, 2002

Following civic celebrations for Canada Day 2001, Edmonton's Whyte Avenue in the Old Strathcona Historical Preservation District was the scene of the worst riot in the city's history. Hundreds of people headed to the area and more emerged from the bars as they closed. Violence was directed mainly toward property destruction, vandalism, and looting--and toward the police riot squad that responded to reports of disturbances. Analysis of the event attributed blame to several influences, including actions of the media in associating Canadian patriotism with beer and partying (hockey sticks were a favoured weapon), and the reportedly aggressive and confrontational attitude of the police. Most common contributing factor, though, was previous calls to City Council to finally act on the long-standing problems related to the fact that activity in the Old Strathcona area was not regulated. It's Edmonton's party street, a dense concentration of bars and dance clubs and coffee houses and restaurants, where people come to play ... the street is also packed with young people cruising in their cars. They head there, almost out of herd instinct, because Whyte Ave is 'the' place to go. (1) In thirty years, a community-driven heritage conservation program had evolved into a commercial leisure magnet for the entire city, raising questions about the definition of "successful development."

Old Strathcona's Challenge

Old Strathcona - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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There's one born every minute

So I read the headline and thought uh oh this is serious, we could be in for trouble.

Beware the sophisticated style of spam to come
Unless new weapons are designed to keep junk mail at bay, spammers are about to get the upper hand in the war in cyberspace.

Then I read the article and realised, nope not me. I am not stupid.

"If you get a piece of email from someone you know, it's written the way they normally write their email and signed the way they sign their email [and] it says, 'Hey, click on this link,' what are you going to do? Well, you're probably going to click on the link," Aycock told CBC News. Spammers get increasingly sophisticated: Calgary study

That's why I use mail washer, to prescreen my email, and you should too, after all it's free.


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Softwood Baseball Bat

Well the Harpocrites have given the American protectionists a big stick with which to beat us with.

US lumber producers may use softwood deal money to sue Canada

A stick bought and paid for by us with illegal tarrifs,ouch.

But the pain doesn't stop there.....

The agreement includes a cap on Canada's share of the U.S. lumber market and a sliding tax triggered when the North American price falls below $355 US for a thousand board feet. UBS Investment Research analyst Jaret Anderson said "the fact Canadian producers will pay a larger export tax in a weak lumber market may be problematic for Canadian producers."Good in good times, but . . .

ouch, ouch, ohh stop the pain.

But at least the Harpocrites made this guy happy.....which was all that mattered to them......U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins yesterday called the softwood lumber deal the proof that Canada matters in Washington, and the precursor of a new era of co-operation between the two countries.US hails new era after deal

That's just adding insult to injury. Stop already. Oh the pain, the pain.

More criticism of the Softwood Sellout


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