Chrysler Inc. vs. Liberal Inc.

Better to take over a failing Big Three Auto company than to play in the back benches of a failing political party.

Onex, Magna eyeing joint Chrysler bid: report

Belinda Stronach leaving politics for Magna

Belinda Stronach to return to Magna as it grapples with Big Three auto woes

Belinda Stronach, the former Canadian cabinet minister who made national headlines for both her political and personal life, has decided not to stand for re-election and will rejoin the ranks of Magna International Inc. (MGa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research) as the auto parts company's executive vice-chair.

The Liberal politician, the daughter of Magna founder and Chairman Frank Stronach, said on Wednesday that encouragement from the company's leaders played a part in her decision.

"My father is looking to the future, the company is facing important strategic decisions, and the Canadian and global auto sector and economy are in a period of great challenge," Stronach said in a statement.

"So I am stepping aside from elected politics for the time being and will now take part in public life in a different way."

While in the Liberal party the best she could do around globalization was focus on mosquito netting.

Belinda Stronach focuses on global projects

Now she can focus on the real impact of globalization and how Daddies company exploits workers world wide.

Magna International's workforce dropped by about 1,150 net jobs in Canada last year as tough industry conditions dented the auto-parts colossus.

It marks the first time in more than a decade that annual employment at the country's largest industrial employer declined.

Magna's annual information form shows employment fell about 5 per cent to 21,050 from a peak of 22,200 in Canada during 2005.

Magna's information form also reveals that while employment decreased here, the company's overall workforce in 23 countries climbed marginally by 450 jobs to a record 83,250 in 2006 from 2005. Every other region in the Magna empire posted job gains.

Senior Magna executives have said in recent years that the company can stay competitive only by producing parts in lower-cost regions and near where auto makers build new assembly plants around the world.

It has led to strong increases in Magna's workforce in Mexico and Asia in recent years.

Although auto makers have expanded some operations here during the past decade, they have added only one assembly plant.

Three other assembly operations have also closed.

This shows that the good ship Liberal is leaking from all seams after electing Dion to be Captain. He relegated Belinda to the back bench, a big mistake.

And clearly internal party communications are not good, since the Liberals would not have appointed their favorite pet feminist Martha Hall Finlay to a safe seat in Toronto if they knew Belinda was quiting. Since she was the candidate in Newmarket kicked out for Belinda.

Of course with the woof and wiff of capitalist deal making over Chrysler during the past two months on could say this was a unexpected momentary decision. But clearly since she decided not to contest the leadership for the party, the writing was on the wall.

The selection of Dion as leader and his lack luster performance since then can only have hastened her decision. Whose your daddy? Well Belinda knows. Better to work for a Strong Daddy than a weak Dion.

As I have said many times Dion is the safe man, the safe choice, the third way, all which makes him a lame duck. Belinda leaving is a sure fire indictment of all the Liberals failures to change, despite Gerard Kennedy's assertions otherwise, and Dion's failure as Leader.

See:

Chrysler Made In Canada?

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Real Leadership

With these poll numbers Jack Layton can say that he would make a better PM than Stephane Dion. Since he got more support in Quebec and in the West than Dion and his support is competitive with the "Official Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition".

While Dion has been on another of his invisible tours of Canada, his third since the beginning of the year, Jack's visibility has been in the house thanks to the deal making the NDP is willing to do in order to keep parliament functioning. Jack has been an effective opposition leader, Dion has not.

Thus if it quacks like a lame duck, and walks like a lame duck, it's name must be Dion.

Keep those poll numbers coming in, they just make Liberals quack up.

H/T to Wundrick



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Public Pensions Fund Private Partnerships

The battle of publicly funded pensions funds, your money and mine, being used in collaboration with private equity firms, hedge funds, to do leveraged buyouts needs to be seriously addressed, since those who pay into these funds have no controlling say over the fund managers.

As Robert Blackburn of New Left Review has written, the pension funds created over the past fifty years are huge new source of capital available for use to shore up capitalism.

But it is still public money, from union or public sector and government pensions. But without any meaningful corporate regulations giving the owners of these funds, us, any say in how they are invested. The democratization of public and institutional funds needs to be on the agenda of unions, the left, and the public. While institutional funds like pension funds call for their rights as shareholders, they do not allow their own shareholders the same rights of representation.

Teachers' BCE campaign gaining support

Some of BCE Inc.'s largest shareholders are lining up behind the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan and pledging to support the pension fund if it attempts to lead a takeover of the telecommunications company or even oust its embattled senior management.

Teachers, exasperated with BCE's weak stock performance under chief executive officer Michael Sabia, has already approached U.S. buyout firm Providence Equity Partners Inc. to explore a bid for the company worth close to $40 a share, according to sources.

That hefty price -- about a 30-per-cent premium to where BCE was trading last month -- could be enough to sway many of the company's long-suffering investors if Teachers decides to act. Although it chose not to submit a formal bid after BCE indicated it wasn't interested in selling, Teachers ratcheted up the pressure on the company in a regulatory filing this week by signalling its intentions to shift from a passive investor to an active one. Several investors said the only way BCE may be able to fend off an unwanted suitor now is for Mr. Sabia to step aside.

He said Teachers, like many investors, has become frustrated by what it views as unresponsive management and the glacial pace of Mr. Sabia's turnaround strategy.

In a filing with U.S. regulators on Monday, the pension fund said it was "exploring its options" regarding BCE, and sources confirmed it has been in contact with several buyout firms and pension funds in both Canada and the United States about the prospect of a takeover. The filing came less than two weeks after it was revealed that BCE had spurned another advance from private equity titan Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., which has allied itself with the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.

These sources described the KKR advance as a "wake-up call" for Teachers, which is bent on leading any privatization effort of the Montreal-based parent of Bell Canada. One person familiar with the matter said the $106-billion pension fund is dismayed by the cool reception its proposals have received from both Mr. Sabia and BCE chairman Richard Currie. Mr. Sabia and Mr. Currie could not be reached for comment.

"At some point the shareholders will speak," said one person familiar with Teachers' plans. "Boards of directors are supposed to represent the shareholders at the table."

See

P3

AIM High

Your Pension Dollars At Work

P3= Public Pension Partnerships

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CN Strike No Hinderance To Honorary Degree

CN strike resumes Despite CN workers rejecting CN's earlier contract offer in an overwhelming vote, CN CEO E. Hunter Harrison will still receive his honorary degree from the University of Alberta for Leadership in Business. LOL.


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CN


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A Surge in Terrorism

The war in Iraq is a failure as is the White Houses so called war on terror. In the fourth year of the war in Iraq all that has been done is that Iraq has created the conditions for a surge in asymmetrical warfare in the region. Not exactly what was supposed to happen.Qaeda claims responsibility for Algeria blasts

Algiers Blast Follows Casablanca Raids

Although there was no apparent connection between the events in Morocco and Algeria they illustrate how North African countries are struggling to deal with Islamic extremists. Steinberg is convinced that there is a new organized Jihadist scene in North Africa. "One has to expect further attacks in the region," he said.

'This is an incentive to pursue the war on terrorism without respite,' Communication Minister Nabil Benabdallah told Reuters, adding the incident was 'in the framework of horrendous terrorist acts in Morocco and other Maghreb countries'.

Governments in North Africa fear violence may spill over from Algeria after the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat renamed itself Al Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb with the aim of fusing similar Islamist groups together.

Al-Qaeda's beliefs are those of Salafism, which originates in the Saudi Arabia as the State religion.

The movements of Islamic fundamentalism are those of America's client state in the region; Saudi Arabia, attempting to subvert its neighbours in order to keep its own house stable.

Like Bush who tells Americans it is better that Iraqis die in the war on terror to keep America from being attacked, the House of Saud declares better to export its own terror abroad than to have it come home.

See:

Sadr Surge

Surge In Iraq

Vietnamization of Iraq

Calling A Spade A Shovel

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Venezuela From the Left

Some Left views of the current political situation in Venezuela.

One from the Trotskyist critical support solidarity perspective;

The political situation in Venezuela – interview with Yonie Moreno, member of the CMR in Venezuela

And these two from the critical support perspective of Anarchist Venezuelans;

Proudhon's Ghost Stalks Venezuela

An Anarchist Analysis of Venezuela


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Chavez

Venezuela

Latin America


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Privatizing Healthcare

The Law is an ass. In this case the flaws of Canada's Health Accord act are used to get around the principle and spirit of the law. In fact while saying they are not costing the public system a loss of doctors, they are in fact doing just that. But not from B.C.'s jurisdiction, but from the public health care systems in Alberta and Manitoba, where doctors are just as scarce. Which shows why a decentralized provincial system which allows competition for the same human resources is joke when if comes to equalization of services in a federalist state.

Private BC clinic to reopen

The False Creek Urgent Care Centre, which was criticized by some as a direct assault on Canada's public health-care system, agreed to stop admitting B.C. patients within days of its opening last December. Now, after obtaining legal advice and rounding up a roster of out-of-province doctors, the clinic is on stronger legal footing, Chris Freimond said.

And Health Minister George Abbott said this time it appears the private clinic is operating within the law.

The Canada Health Act and the province's Medicare Protection Act prohibit doctors or clinics from billing patients for medically necessary services that are covered by publicly funded medicare.

To get around this legal barrier, Dr. Godley has recruited a team of emergency physicians from outside the province, Mr. Freimond said.

Mr. Abbott said if the clinic hires doctors from outside the B.C. Medical Services Plan, then no laws are being broached.

Mr. Abbott said he was told the clinic has hired two doctors from Alberta and one from Manitoba.

By bringing doctors from out of province, Dr. Godley said the clinic will not be raiding the public system. He added that the clinic will relieve pressure on hospital emergency rooms and help reduce waiting times.

See:

Medicare

Healthcare


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Sadr Surge

What was under reported in the news was al-Sadr's call to end armed struggle back in January, before the U.S. declared its surge. It was a ceasefire, one sided, that was ignored by the Iraqi government and the Americans. Now that the surge is on in earnest, well so is the surge in Iraqi resistance.

But the surge itself is based on a "pox on both houses" approach. The general idea is that there are Sunni extremists and Shia extremists (including Al-Sadr). So the U.S. military is pressing the Iraqi government to fight both. And U.S. military operations are explicitly directed against both Sunni inusurgents and Shia radicals.

The problem with this approach is that many Iraqi Shia (including many in the government) believe one side in Iraq is right and the other side is wrong. The Iraqis on the street who share this view are the people most vulnerable to Al-Sadr's incendiary message.

Al-Sadr Calls for Resistance Against the US

Thousands of Shiites heed al-Sadr call, march to Najaf

Iraqi Shiites burn US flags on regime fall anniversary
New Straits Times - 6 hours ago
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Shiites burned and trampled on US flags in the holy city of Najaf on Monday at an anti-American rally called by firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on the fourth anniversary of the fall of Saddam Hussein.

See:

Surge In Iraq

Vietnamization of Iraq

Calling A Spade A Shovel

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Gallipoli And Vimy

While we had Vimy Celebrations this weekend coinciding with Easter, and ending today, the Australians and New Zealanders will celebrate the WWI battle of Gallipoli with Anzac Day at the end of the month.

A disaster on the scale of the battle of the Somme in WWI and Dunkirk and Dieppe.in WWII. As 'colonial' nations under the tutelage and control of the British Imperialists farmers and workers became cannon fodder in their Great War with Germany.

Tactically speaking, the plan is for British artillery to pound the Turkish position until precisely 4:30 when the ANZAC forces would attack from their trenches. In what may be an indicative blunder that no one in the military would care to admit to, the respective commanders fail to synchronize their watches. The ANZAC commander, Major Barton, realizes that the bombardment has inexplicably ceased seven minutes too soon. The Turks have had time to return to their trenches. Amazingly, the English Colonel Robinson (John Morris) orders the attack to go forward.

In what seems a counterintuitive tactic, the soldiers are ordered to empty their rifles of all ammunition and charge with "bayonets only." The first wave is cut down by heavy machine gun fire. Most of the men don’t make it but a few yards. A second wave meets an identical fate.

However for Canada, Australia and New Zealand , it was our recognition of the need for transparent autonomous military operations, that created our national identity on the battlefields of Gallipoli and Vimy.

How Hill 145 and Vimy changed everything

It was then that things changed. Instead of headquarters officers planning the operation in secrecy and isolation they did something unique. They planned the assault and then included every soldier in the plan. Maps, details and objectives were made a part of the daily training for six weeks. Model layouts of the ridge and Hill 145 were studied, not just by commanders, but by every soldier. Exercises were run in the weeks before the assault on a field laid out to simulate Hill 145 and the ridge. Units learned terrain, timing and cover. Where, up to that time, the taking of a position had been the objective of a platoon commander; it was now the objective of the whole platoon, and every soldier in that platoon knew the objective, the plan to take it and what adjacent units were doing.

The battles at Vimy and Gallipoli mark our true day of 'national' independence which would lead to real independence later from the British Empire. It is the military which creates the modern Canadian/Australian/New Zealand state's of the 20th Century from the rubble of the British Commonwealth.

Our countries national identities were formed because we fought Britain's wars, and in doing so we were blooded, and survived to challenge their ability and authority over 'our' state. Our view of ourselves as Canadians, Australians, or New Zealanders, as citizens of a nation was created in the trenches of France. Such was not the case for the State which would not come until after the Charter of Westminster and WWII. And indeed in Canada's case not until we had our own Charter in 1982.

"April 25, 1915, is a date etched in Australia's history. To many this is Australia's most important national day. Commemorative services are held at dawn, the time of the original landing."

“New Zealand’s experience at Gallipoli fostered an emerging national identity, and it’s important we create an environment that allows those traveling to Gallipoli to respectfully connect with their past and understand the massive sacrifice made by their forbearers,” said Rick Barker.

"Every nation has a creation story to tell; the First World War and the Battle of Vimy Ridge are central to the story of our country," Prime Minister Stephen Harper told those gathered, including Canadian veterans and high school students.

And it is a central event in Turkey's modern nationhood. Showing that nationalism in the 20th Century was the result of the fragmentation and destruction of the old Imperialist polities of the 19th Century.

Even though they were in the opposing ends of the battlefield, the Battle of Gallipoli left huge marks in the psyches of both Australia and New Zealand on the one side, and Turkey on the other. Even to this day, ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) Day is celebrated in both those countries, and it is considered that the battle marked the birth of the collective national identities of both those nations, replacing that of the collective identity of the British Empire. In Turkey, the battle is seen as one of the finest and bravest moments in the history of the Turkish people - a final surge in the defense of the motherland as the centuries-old Ottoman Empire was crumbling; which laid the grounds for the Turkish War of Independence and the foundation of the new Turkish Republic eight years later, led by Atatürk, a commander in Gallipoli himself.

See:

The Working Class Dies For Harper

Royal Newfoundlanders Died For the Seal Hunt

Draft Dodgers in Dukhbour Country

Stanway's Sombre Reflection on Somme

WWI Xmas Mutiny

Christmas in the Trenches

The Vimy Myth

The Best Laid Plans

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Bad Forest Management And Climate Change

What is worse climate change or climate change and pine beetles? Well according to industry sources the later. But note the highlighted section of this article, the industry itself is to blame for the beetle infestation because of its forestry practices. You don't need a weatherman to know why the forests don't grow.

Industry says climate change already impacting forests

Governments and all industry sectors in Canada must quickly "re-tool" to deal with climate change, says the Forest Products Association of Canada.

Avrim Lazar, the association's president, said the forestry industry is already witnessing a manifestation of climate change -a mountain pine beetle epidemic -destroy massive tracts of valuable forest.

"Canada has been protected by its cold weather forever," said Jim Fyles, scientific director of the Sustainable Forest Management Network and McGill University professor.

But now, in addition to the pine beetle, "there may be all sorts of bugs ... whose populations, always kept low by these cold winters, will increase as the temperatures rise," he said.

The development of useful policies and practices is required, Fyles said. In the forestry sector, for instance, the creation of a forest that is resistant or resilient to pests, should be a prime goal.

In Western Canada, past practices involving forest management and forest fire management have often worked to create "almost pure stands" of one species of tree.

A mixed forest featuring different species and trees of all ages creates "a landscape that is much more difficult for these epidemics to propagate in," Fyles said.

See:

Environment

Environmentali$m

Aspen Mystery

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