NDP Clearest Alternative, Globe & Mail Is Loathe To Admit

The G&M must be loathe to report stories like this. But the NDP are so much in the lead and seen as the party of clear change, that they have no choice. But, that doesn't stop them from trying to tilt the story in the Conservatives favour. Let's take a look at where the G&M has problems writing a news story:

Canadians will be asked to choose between political stability and renewal - G&M states here that we currently have political stability. Funny, since when do these mean political stability?:
- subverting democracy (Bill C-51, Bill C-377, Bill C-23 among many others, cheating in elections)
- racking up the most debt of a Canadian government ever,
- running a deficit for most of their time
- balancing a budget only by looting from the EI fund
- ignoring the urgent issue of Climate Change
- focusing our economy on the oil extraction industry to the great detriment to the manufacturing industry.
-  corruption and cronyism
- warmongering instead of peacekeeping
- and the list goes on.
A more accurate line would be:
Canadians will be asked to choose between gross fiscal mismanagement & the brink of fascism, and stability & democracy.


Pollster Nik Nanos said the NDP has staked out the clearest policy positions in opposition to the Conservative Party, while the Liberals have a more nuanced approach.
- Okay, these were probably Nik Nanos' words but using "nuanced" here is a nice way of saying that the Liberal policy positions are mainly just like the Conservatives, except for when they try to copy some of the NDP policies to try to steal their support. History shows that time and again, the Liberals, whose policies mirror (especially more recently) those of the Conservatives, always campaign on the left only to toss these left leaning policies to the wind if they win the election.

The NDP has been working hard to reassure Canadians its economic policies would be largely in line with those of the current government. The biggest change proposed by the NDP is to increase corporate taxes, although party officials said the planned rate, to be revealed in coming months, would be “reasonable.”
-  Actually, the NDP has been working hard to show Canadians that its economic policies would NOT be in line with those of the current government. The NDP plans to NOT waste money on more and bigger prisons (not needed as the crime rate has been steadily dropping), unnecessary/problematic/costly jets, corporate welfare, unaccountable missing $3.1 billion, and many other porky Conservative pies. NDP governments, on average, have a much better fiscal record than Conservatives.

Party officials said the NDP is looking for candidates with an economic background who could serve as ministers of finance or industry. The recent upswing in the polls could make that easier.
- It may well be that the NDP is looking for more candidates with economic backgrounds, but they already have a number of MPs with economic backgrounds. And unmentioned here is Erin Weir, who has been suggested as a potential Finance Minister.

While both parties want to replace the Conservatives, their partisans have been at one another’s throats. Last week, the Liberals suggested Mr. Mulcair’s flirtation with the Conservatives in 2007 undermined the NDP’s promises to clean up the environment.
- The G&M fails to mention that this has been debunked a number of times, including recently by some high-up Conservatives.
- And "undermined the NDP's promises to clean up the environment"? The facts on this story actually result in boosting the NDP's seriousness about cleaning up the environment. 


I'll leave you with a few choice comments made after the G&M news item (these are all in the top ten most liked comments, and from the G&M readers no less!):

Mr Leblanc's first paragraph is flawed, or the poll was flawed. The choice is not between "change" and "stability." It is between "change" and "no change." I certainly would neither call what our economy had gone through in the last year as anything approaching stability, nor would I call the government actions in domestic and foreign policy as stabilizing.



My wife and I are in the over 65 age group and for the first time ever will be voting NDP as we have seen never ending corruption with the Libs and Cons for way too many years. Many of our friends have also decided to vote NDP as it is clearly time to send a big message to all elected officials, the voters are fed up and will not take it anymore and you will be forced to understand this come the election.



choose between political stability and renewal,..........
Nope......It's choosing between getting a country back to sanity...or carrying on with the most corrupt, crooked, manipulative crew of PROVEN liars and cheats This country has ever been controlled by .....A government rife with contempt, disrespect.....There have never been so many from a political party involved in fraud, lies, election irregularities...legal proceedings, and criminal investigations...ever.....
Duffy, Wallin, Brazeau, Porter, Grestein, Stewart/Olsen, Wright, LeBreton, PMO staff
A LONG list of crooks......
It's about voting OUT crooks and taking the nation back from the brink of fascism!!


the first sentence claims there is a choice between change and political stability. Huh? If the government loses an election in Canada, that does not mean there is less stability.
By the Globe's definition of that term..I guess North Korea has the most political stability of all.

Oh Noes! The Grope & Fail To Become A Pay Site

Over the past few years the news reporting and columns in the G&M have really gone down hill, IMHO. I used to read a lot of the G&M as part of my daily news reads. But lately, I read maybe a few articles per month now. So, for me, no big loss.

The Globe and Mail announced today that they will limit free on-line reading beginning in the Fall.


Toronto Star article.
The metered paywall will allow site visitors to read a certain number of stories per month for free, starting in the fall. The number of free clicks hasn’t been decided yet, Crawley said. The paywall will be for the entire site, not just the Report On Business, as previously anticipated.

See also:
David Climenhaga's Alberta Diary blog: A leaky paywall won't keep the Globe and Mail afloat
If the Globe is so desperate it has to stop paying staff to survive, a leaky paywall to protect uninspired copy produced by overwhelmed journos isn’t going to save it.

Toronto Mayor David Miller Did An Excellent Job Handling The Strike

The Toronto Star, The Globe & Mail and the National Post have gone all out to attack Toronto Mayor David Miller's handling of the strike and of the deal he reached with the unions. They claim that he caved in and gave the unions what they wanted from the beginning. If not directly saying that he failed, they put a negative spin on his name and his achievements regarding the strike.

However, he was very successful in his handling of the strike and of the deal finally reached.
He set up temporary dump sites all over the city right away.
He got injunctions against strikers right away if they caused undue delays (so they couldn't keep on delaying people at those sites).
He organized existing management staff to work on keeping the streets and parks as clean as possible.
And, regarding the deal, he managed to get it so the banking of sick days will be phased out - this will save the city millions of dollars.

The unions wanted to completely keep on banking sick days. The city wanted to get rid of the banking of sick days. A compromise was reached to phase the banking of sick days out. This is about as fair a deal as could be reached. And, that's what you end up getting when you negotiate - a bit of give and take - a compromise.

The MSM seem to think that he should have been able to get rid of the banking of sick days all at once. This would have been very unfair to the workers, and impossible to get through the negotiations during the strike. And, it would have been impossible to get if the mayor had got the Province to legislate the workers back to work. If this had happened, the negotiations would have gone to binding arbitration. And with this, the unions always get a better deal - they most likely would have kept the banking of sick days completely.

So, what would you have preferred - a harder approach by the mayor, resulting in either the strike going on for months (and getting no better of a deal than we got), or back to work legislation sending the workers back to work and binding arbitration with no change in the banking of sick days,
OR
The deal we got with the phasing out of banking of sick days?

All in all I would say Well Done David Miller!

Banked Sick Days Frozen, Toronto To Save $Millions (MSM Misleads Public In Toronto On Issue of Banked Sick Days)

TheStar.com | GTA | Banked sick days in city offer
The title, todays poll on the Star's site, and the article seems to stress the point that workers will continue to bank sick days. This is very misleading.
In the article, you can see that new workers will not be able to bank sick days and that current workers will have their banking of sick days frozen to what they have already. This means that they will no longer be able to bank any more sick days from here on. The Star reported on the freeze of sick days yesterday as well

Here is the quote from the article:
New employees will not have the option of banking unused sick days. Current employees can cash out their banked days at a discount and move into a new short-term disability plan, or may have their sick bank frozen to draw on for days that may not be covered by the new plan.

And the Globe and Mail completely leaves out this point and claims that they can continue to accrue credits

The MSM has been attacking the unions stance and the mayor David Miller's handling of the issue from day one. They don't like the mayor and they would like to see a more conservative person in the mayor position. So, they are doing all they can to smear the current mayor. But, he has done a good job in handling the strike. The city has been far cleaner than during the last summer garbage workers strike (which went on for a shorter period). And, the city has managed to stop the workers from continuing to bank new sick days - which is what the city wanted all along. This will save Toronto millions of dollars.
The headline, more realistically should have been Banked Sick Days Frozen, Toronto To Save $Millions

UPDATE
Okay, so the details are finally released.

Current employees can either continue to collect and bank sick days (the collecting is not frozen at this point for these people, contrary to what was reported in the Toronto Star over the past 2 days)
Or
They can cash what they have in now and switch to the new short-term plan (which does not include banking sick days)

New employees will be enrolled in the short-term sick leave plan and will not be able to bank sick days.

Here is a link to the agreement.

Still, this phases out the banking of sick days and it seems like a number of current employees will opt for cashing out and joining the short-term plan.

Prior to the strike, the unions did not offer this, nor, would they agree. If the strike had gone to binding arbitration (like, if the workers were legislated back to work by the province - which probably would have happened with a more conservative mayor), the city would not have gained this phasing out of sick day banking, but would have been stuck with it for all employees, current and new.

So, hats off to Miller and his team for accomplishing this phase out for the city.