Minister Julian Fantino
Minister Veterans' Affairs
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON
Dear Minister:
You and your government's attitude toward all Canadians is so boorish and tiresome that we do our best to tune you all out, but when you attack vets we really get angry.
Every member of the Conservative party in the government who is approached--by anyone- (except when you are campaigning) to answer for his or her behaviour takes the same position: "you serve me!" On top of that, you talk nonsense that all and everything you do is "unprecedented," like no other, when in fact, every one of those claims is false. Using Canadians like bathroom tissue then claiming great wonders apparently to exonerate, doesn't wash.
We are ashamed of what you do and how you do it; it is destroying our country, our future and our souls.
Yours truly
cc: Prime Minister Harper
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
Thursday, January 16, 2014
Cleantech
If the US government is coming out strong for clean tech, Canada’s federal government seems committed to the exact opposite: the economic engine of the oil sands, and anything that supports it.
Cleantech investment tops $6.8 billion: US leads while Canada chooses oil
16 January 2014. Global market intelligence firm the Cleantech Group reports that worldwide venture investment across all clean technology sectors totaled $6.8 billion during 2013. This signals a positive shift in the market after five consecutive quarters of decreasing investment, beginning in early 2012. Distributed generation, resource sharing, agriculture, and the digital oilfield theme are popular areas.
In 2013 the energy efficiency sector led the way with $1.3 billion invested and 20 per cent of the sector total, followed by the transportation sector and then solar. These strong numbers are welcome news for the sector following a recent report by 60 Minutes suggesting that ‘cleantech’ may have become a dirty word.
But the good news for green doesn’t stop there. The US Department of Energy has announced a $3 million initiative to support American clean energy entrepreneurs. The National Incubator Initiative for Clean Energy (or NIICE) "will support a strong national network of clean energy incubators and early-stage companies," the department wrote in a release. While $3 million may seem like spare change for the US — the Department of Energy's 2014 discretionary funding request to Congress topped $28 billion in total — the department has seen relatively small investments pay dividends before. CleanTechnica noted that the Department of Energy's SunShot initiative pumped $92 million worth of investments into solar energy companies that then attracted close to $1.7 billion in private investment.
If the US government is coming out strong for clean tech, Canada’s federal government seems committed to the exact opposite: the economic engine of the oil sands, and anything that supports it. Now, CBC’s investigative The Fifth Estate highlights moves by the Harper government not just against media coverage of climate and environmental concerns, but on government labs themselves. Key research centres and programs have been closed and scientists who have been conducting research in a variety of critical environmental areas have been muzzled or dismissed. Media access to federal scientists has been obstructed: simple media requests are left unfilled for months; questions are often required ahead of time; and answers are filtered through government public relations departments. The Fifth Estate episode shines a spotlight on the research of Sidney, BC Fisheries and Oceans scientists Dr. Peter Ross, who studied toxicology in marine mammals, as well as David Schindler, retired from the University of Alberta, whose work on toxicology in animals around the oil sands brought images of deformed fish to the media.
16 January 2014. Global market intelligence firm the Cleantech Group reports that worldwide venture investment across all clean technology sectors totaled $6.8 billion during 2013. This signals a positive shift in the market after five consecutive quarters of decreasing investment, beginning in early 2012. Distributed generation, resource sharing, agriculture, and the digital oilfield theme are popular areas.
In 2013 the energy efficiency sector led the way with $1.3 billion invested and 20 per cent of the sector total, followed by the transportation sector and then solar. These strong numbers are welcome news for the sector following a recent report by 60 Minutes suggesting that ‘cleantech’ may have become a dirty word.
But the good news for green doesn’t stop there. The US Department of Energy has announced a $3 million initiative to support American clean energy entrepreneurs. The National Incubator Initiative for Clean Energy (or NIICE) "will support a strong national network of clean energy incubators and early-stage companies," the department wrote in a release. While $3 million may seem like spare change for the US — the Department of Energy's 2014 discretionary funding request to Congress topped $28 billion in total — the department has seen relatively small investments pay dividends before. CleanTechnica noted that the Department of Energy's SunShot initiative pumped $92 million worth of investments into solar energy companies that then attracted close to $1.7 billion in private investment.
If the US government is coming out strong for clean tech, Canada’s federal government seems committed to the exact opposite: the economic engine of the oil sands, and anything that supports it. Now, CBC’s investigative The Fifth Estate highlights moves by the Harper government not just against media coverage of climate and environmental concerns, but on government labs themselves. Key research centres and programs have been closed and scientists who have been conducting research in a variety of critical environmental areas have been muzzled or dismissed. Media access to federal scientists has been obstructed: simple media requests are left unfilled for months; questions are often required ahead of time; and answers are filtered through government public relations departments. The Fifth Estate episode shines a spotlight on the research of Sidney, BC Fisheries and Oceans scientists Dr. Peter Ross, who studied toxicology in marine mammals, as well as David Schindler, retired from the University of Alberta, whose work on toxicology in animals around the oil sands brought images of deformed fish to the media.
Monday, January 6, 2014
"States have adopted “right-to-work” laws that undercut unions. And so on."
The Year of the Great Redistribution
By Robert Reich
January 05, 2014 "Information Clearing House - One of the worst epithets that can be leveled at a politician these days is to call him a “redistributionist.” Yet 2013 marked one of the biggest redistributions in recent American history. It was a redistribution upward, from average working people to the owners of America.
By Robert Reich
January 05, 2014 "Information Clearing House - One of the worst epithets that can be leveled at a politician these days is to call him a “redistributionist.” Yet 2013 marked one of the biggest redistributions in recent American history. It was a redistribution upward, from average working people to the owners of America.
The stock market ended 2013 at an all-time high — giving stockholders their biggest annual gain in almost two decades. Most Americans didn’t share in those gains, however, because most people haven’t been able to save enough to invest in the stock market. More than two-thirds of Americans live from paycheck to paycheck.
Even if you include the value of IRA’s, most shares of stock are owned by the very wealthy. The richest 1 percent of Americans owns 35 percent of the value of American-owned shares. The richest 10 percent owns over 80 percent. So in the bull market of 2013, America’s rich hit the jackpot.
What does this have to do with redistribution? Some might argue the stock market is just a giant casino. Since it’s owned mostly by the wealthy, a rise in stock prices simply reflects a transfer of wealth from some of the rich (who cashed in their shares too early) to others of the rich (who bought shares early enough and held on to them long enough to reap the big gains).
But this neglects the fact that stock prices track corporate profits. The relationship isn’t exact, and price-earnings ratios move up and down in the short term. Yet over the slightly longer term, share prices do correlate with profits. And 2013 was a banner year for profits.
Even if you include the value of IRA’s, most shares of stock are owned by the very wealthy. The richest 1 percent of Americans owns 35 percent of the value of American-owned shares. The richest 10 percent owns over 80 percent. So in the bull market of 2013, America’s rich hit the jackpot.
What does this have to do with redistribution? Some might argue the stock market is just a giant casino. Since it’s owned mostly by the wealthy, a rise in stock prices simply reflects a transfer of wealth from some of the rich (who cashed in their shares too early) to others of the rich (who bought shares early enough and held on to them long enough to reap the big gains).
But this neglects the fact that stock prices track corporate profits. The relationship isn’t exact, and price-earnings ratios move up and down in the short term. Yet over the slightly longer term, share prices do correlate with profits. And 2013 was a banner year for profits.
Where did those profits come from? Here’s where redistribution comes in. American corporations didn’t make most of their money from increased sales (although their foreign sales did increase). They made their big bucks mostly by reducing their costs — especially their biggest single cost: wages.
They push wages down because most workers no longer have any bargaining power when it comes to determining pay. The continuing high rate of unemployment — including a record number of long-term jobless, and a large number who have given up looking for work altogether — has allowed employers to set the terms.
For years, the bargaining power of American workers has also been eroding due to ever-more efficient means of outsourcing abroad, new computer software that can replace almost any routine job, and an ongoing shift of full-time to part-time and contract work. And unions have been decimated. In the 1950s, over a third of private-sector workers were members of labor unions. Now, fewer than 7 percent are unionized.
All this helps explain why corporate profits have been increasing throughout this recovery (they grew over 18 percent in 2013 alone) while wages have been dropping. Corporate earnings now represent the largest share of the gross domestic product — and wages the smallest share of GDP — than at any time since records have been kept.
Hence, the Great Redistribution.
Some might say this doesn’t really amount to a “redistribution” as we normally define that term, because government isn’t redistributing anything. By this view, the declining wages, higher profits, and the surging bull market simply reflect the workings of the free market.
But this overlooks the fact that government sets the rules of the game. Federal and state budgets have been cut, for example — thereby reducing overall demand and keeping unemployment higher than otherwise. Congress has repeatedly rejected tax incentives designed to encourage more hiring. States have adopted “right-to-work” laws that undercut unions. And so on.
If all this weren’t enough, the tax system is rigged in favor of the owners of wealth, and against people whose income comes from wages. Wealth is taxed at a lower rate than labor.
Capital gains, dividends, and debt all get favorable treatment in the tax code – which is why Mitt Romney, Warren Buffet, and other billionaires and multimillionaires continue to pay around 12 percent of their income in taxes each year, while most of the rest of us pay at least twice that rate.
Among the biggest winners are top executives and Wall Street traders whose year-end bonuses are tied to the stock market, and hedge-fund and private-equity managers whose special “carried interest” tax loophole allows their income to be treated as capital gains. The wild bull market of 2013 has given them all fabulous after-tax windfalls.
America has been redistributing upward for some time – after all, “trickle-down” economics turned out to be trickle up — but we outdid ourselves in 2013. At a time of record inequality and decreasing mobility, America conducted a Great Redistribution upward.
They push wages down because most workers no longer have any bargaining power when it comes to determining pay. The continuing high rate of unemployment — including a record number of long-term jobless, and a large number who have given up looking for work altogether — has allowed employers to set the terms.
For years, the bargaining power of American workers has also been eroding due to ever-more efficient means of outsourcing abroad, new computer software that can replace almost any routine job, and an ongoing shift of full-time to part-time and contract work. And unions have been decimated. In the 1950s, over a third of private-sector workers were members of labor unions. Now, fewer than 7 percent are unionized.
All this helps explain why corporate profits have been increasing throughout this recovery (they grew over 18 percent in 2013 alone) while wages have been dropping. Corporate earnings now represent the largest share of the gross domestic product — and wages the smallest share of GDP — than at any time since records have been kept.
Hence, the Great Redistribution.
Some might say this doesn’t really amount to a “redistribution” as we normally define that term, because government isn’t redistributing anything. By this view, the declining wages, higher profits, and the surging bull market simply reflect the workings of the free market.
But this overlooks the fact that government sets the rules of the game. Federal and state budgets have been cut, for example — thereby reducing overall demand and keeping unemployment higher than otherwise. Congress has repeatedly rejected tax incentives designed to encourage more hiring. States have adopted “right-to-work” laws that undercut unions. And so on.
If all this weren’t enough, the tax system is rigged in favor of the owners of wealth, and against people whose income comes from wages. Wealth is taxed at a lower rate than labor.
Capital gains, dividends, and debt all get favorable treatment in the tax code – which is why Mitt Romney, Warren Buffet, and other billionaires and multimillionaires continue to pay around 12 percent of their income in taxes each year, while most of the rest of us pay at least twice that rate.
Among the biggest winners are top executives and Wall Street traders whose year-end bonuses are tied to the stock market, and hedge-fund and private-equity managers whose special “carried interest” tax loophole allows their income to be treated as capital gains. The wild bull market of 2013 has given them all fabulous after-tax windfalls.
America has been redistributing upward for some time – after all, “trickle-down” economics turned out to be trickle up — but we outdid ourselves in 2013. At a time of record inequality and decreasing mobility, America conducted a Great Redistribution upward.
Robert Reich, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration.
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"Our Western culture is in a state of total collapse. Our institutionalized world is increasingly hostile to any utterances of truth that would be upsetting to the status quo."
Truth: The Enemy of the State
By Butler Shaffer
By Butler Shaffer
| "It is the responsibility of intellectuals to speak the Truth and expose lies." - Noam Chomsky |
January 05, 2014 "Information Clearing House - My book, The Wizards of Ozymandias, was dedicated “To the memory and spirit of Sophie and Hans Scholl and the White Rose, who reminded us what it means to be civilized.” These wonderful young people – most in their teens or twenties – lived in Germany during the Hitler regime, and spent much of their time writing and distributing leaflets exposing and criticizing the policies and practices of the Nazi state. They were found out; brought to trial; found guilty of treason, the demoralization of the troops, and abetting the enemy, and summarily beheaded. Sophie’s Gestapo interrogator raises the same arguments one hears directed against such modern speakers of truth as Chelsea Manning, Ed Snowden, Julian Assange, Glenn Greenwald, and others. Those whose moral and intellectual standards can rise no higher than to whine “the law is the law,” would do well to consider the exchange between Sophie and her prosecutor. The Nazi functionary declares: “Without law, there is no order. What can we rely on if not the law?” Sophie responds: “Your conscience. Laws change. Conscience doesn’t.”
Our Western culture is in a state of total collapse. Our institutionalized world is increasingly hostile to any utterances of truth that would be upsetting to the status quo. The mainstream media and most of academia long ago gave themselves over to propagandizing on behalf of defending and/or enhancing the coercive power structure of the state. When war policies are under discussion, retired Army generals or officials from “think-tanks” funded by the national defense industry, are trotted out to “debate” such non-issues as how many troops to send in, who to attack, etc., etc., all to maintain the pretense of having a “fully-informed” public. But when was the last time you saw a Robert Higgs, Noam Chomsky, Lew Rockwell, Amy Goodman, Justin Raimondo, Angela Keaton, Karen Kwiatkowski, Chris Hedges, or other critic of the war system allowed to raise the kinds of questions that are not supposed to be asked in this best of all possible worlds? Do you recall the insult to human intelligence perpetrated by the GOP (Grand Old Pettifoggers) in its efforts to prevent Ron Paul from expressing his contrary views?
Noam Chomsky’s above quote doesn’t go far enough: it is the responsibility of all thinking people – not just so-called “intellectuals” – to speak the truth and to expose lies! To this end, increasing numbers of people understand that the sources to whom they have been conditioned to look for truth, analysis, and understanding, have largely failed in their roles. To put the proposition more frankly: more and more people have grasped the fact that the free flow of information is disruptive of the interests of the institutional order, whose established position depends upon suppressing or destroying all evidence of the lies, conflicts, contradictions, and destructive nature upon which its primacy depends. This is why so much of the media and academia are peopled with those unable or unwilling to shed light on the dysfunctional nature of the well-ordered madness of the world; men and women who remain content to tread water at the shallow end of the human gene pool!
The political establishment has implicitly embraced the mindset of Hitler’s Propaganda Minister, Dr. Joseph Goebbels:
| The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State |
| can shield the people from the political, economic and/or |
| military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally |
| important for the State to use all of its powers to |
| repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the |
| lie, and thus by extension the truth becomes the greatest |
| enemy of the State. |
This is why the state is so threatened by such modern technologies as the Internet, as well as by the “whistleblowers” who insist on exposing the state’s embarrassing truths to the general public. It is also why the classic The Emperor’s New Clothes needs to be read to every child – as well, perhaps, to adults.
Cable news channels continue providing platforms for those who remind us that the whistleblowers “broke the law,” and need to be punished. They recite their bromides with the kind of self-assurance that comes from the delusion that they are
actually saying something profound. I find it particularly amusing to hear such babbling coming from lawyers who ought to know that all laws are meant to be broken. Imagine what would happen if every legal dictate were to be obeyed by everyone: no speeding or reckless driving; no illegal drug use; no murders, rapes, or robberies; no discriminatory hiring practices; no zoning violations; etc. What would be the likely consequences? Men and women might then begin to ask the kinds of questions the state could not afford to have asked: why do we need the police, or courts, or prisons? In the world of realpolitik, those who are driven not by a need for social order, but by the ambition for coercive power over their neighbors, would have to dream up new “wrongs” to be policed. The mania that underlies political programs based on “climate change” is just one example of how those who want power over others must invent more and more “conflicts” with which to rationalize their coercive ambitions. It is this sense that Edmund Burke had in mind when he characterized lawyers as “the fomenters and conductors of the petty wars of village vexation.” The habit is not confined to lawyers!
This also explains Randolph Bourne’s observation that “war is the health of the state.” The war system – whose schemes and chicanery the whistleblowers have been exposing – depends upon the kinds of endless conflicts with the rest of the world that will cause Boobus Americanus to part with his liberty, wealth, and life.
Sophie and Hans Scholl and their White Rose friends had minds capable of distinguishing what was legal and what was right, a skill that depends upon separating what is popular from what is true. Sophie’s insights were reflected, years later, in Hannah Arendt’s observation: “The aim of totalitarian education has never been to instill convictions, but to destroy the capacity to form any.”
Butler Shaffer [send him e-mail] teaches at the Southwestern University School of Law. He is the author of the newly-released In Restraint of Trade: The Business Campaign Against Competition, 1918–1938, Calculated Chaos: Institutional Threats to Peace and Human Survival, and Boundaries of Order. His latest book is The Wizards of Ozymandias.
Copyright © 2014 by LewRockwell.com.
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