"Or you are abominably wicked;
You are a toad."
And after I had thought of it,
I said, "I will, then, be a toad."
- Stephen Crane -
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CLASSE struggle in Quebec
What began as yet another ordinary student protest against an increase in university tuition fees has finally turned into a full-fledged political battle between the Liberal government (which, in this case, has the support of a majority of Quebeckers) and a coalition of radical students and left-wing activists, with the Parti Québécois discreetly fuelling the fire – although it stopped short of embracing the student leaders’ most extravagant demands.
The student “strike” – a misnomer, since students aren’t salaried workers and are just boycotting their courses to their own detriment – has been going on for two months. Protesters, sporting their trademark red cotton squares pinned to their shirts, have occasionally blocked bridges and the harbour, as well as access to financial institutions and government buildings, bringing some disruption to downtown Montreal. There have also been episodic scenes of vandalism, to which police have responded by spraying tear gas at the demonstrators.
Even though it’s been the longest period of student unrest in Quebec history, the government hasn’t budged – again, a first. A few loud demonstrations used to be enough to make governments shelve projects for raising tuition fees that were always among the lowest in Canada.
For years, Quebec university education has been offered at bargain prices. In constant dollars, today’s students pay less to get a degree than in 1968 – and, sadly, the low tuition hasn’t resulted in an increase in graduation rates, which, in Quebec, are still in the bottom range of Canadian universities.
The Charest government’s proposal is quite reasonable. The projected hike would increase tuition by $325 annually over five years – not enough, certainly, to restrict access to students from disadvantaged families, since the province has a generous system of loans. Last week, the government offered substantial improvements to this system, but student leaders flatly rejected the offer without bothering to consult their members. (Although about a third of the student population is said to be participating in the boycott, this number is deceptive. The “strike” votes were often taken by a show of hands rather than secret ballot, and this in sparsely attended meetings.)
The government hoped the Easter holidays – and the prospect of losing a whole semester – would put a damper on the action, but the boycott movement took on new life last week, with quasi-daily demonstrations imaginatively designed to fuel the media’s insatiable need for spectacular events.
The movement has been taken over by a radical faction known as CLASSE (for Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante). This group calls for totally free universities, even for foreign students. So, of course, there’s no use in negotiating improvements to the loans system since, in CLASSE’s dream world, there’d be no need for loans (even financial aid by parents or spouses shouldn’t count).
How could Quebec afford such “free for all” universities? The student leaders’ solution is wonderfully simple: Make the rich pay, reduce the salaries of university administrators, forbid universities from spending money on anything else other than teaching and research, and – better yet – change the system. CLASSE’s media-savvy spokespeople recently declared that their movement was just the “avant-garde” of an anti-capitalist revolution. “It’s more than a student strike; we want it to become a struggle of the people.”
For now though, the “people” are just hoping their kids go back to class.
I’m not entirely sure how accurate this commentator’s depiction of the Quebec student protests is, especially considering that the article ignores the constant violent of the police to the protests.
Still an interesting read, though.
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Violent Montreal student protest nets 17 arrests
Premier calls social disruption ‘unacceptable’
Riot police used tear gas and concussion grenades on hundreds of students protesting outside Montreal’s Palais des congrès Friday, where Premier Jean Charest was speaking at a symposium on northern development.
The mayhem reached deep inside the convention centre, where Charest’s keynote speech was delayed after a group of protesters gained access to the building and confronted police guarding the meetings.
Two police officers and at least two protesters were injured in the standoff, and 17 people were arrested.
Friday’s action is the latest in Quebec’s escalating student movement against planned tuition-fee increases.
Charest admonished the students and said the social disruption is “unacceptable.”
“This is 2012, this is Quebec. We have had ministers find tanks of gas on their verandas… Molotov cocktails in front of their offices. There are ministers who have had death threats,” the premier said.
“I find it unacceptable that one student association refuses to condemn violence,” he added, singling out CLASSE, the movement’s most militant group.
Charest said debate over Quebec tuition reaches back two decades, and his government’s decision to raise fees was made over a year ago after consultation with different groups.
[…]
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Canadians OK with higher taxes to fight inequality
Canadians are willing to pay more taxes to help close the growing income gap and want corporations to pay higher tax rates too, according to a new poll released Tuesday.
The survey of 2000 Canadians, commissioned by the left-leaning Broadbent Institute, found that 23 per cent are “very willing” and 41 per cent are “somewhat willing” to pay slightly more tax in order to protect social programs such as health care, post-secondary education and pensions.
The Broadbent Institute, named after the NDP’s former leader Ed Broadbent, argues that protecting social programs would help reduce income inequality.
Liberal and NDP voters are the most supportive of this proposal, the results showed, but 58 per cent of Conservative voters are also in favour of it.
“This attitude toward paying slightly higher taxes is reflected equally in high-income and middle income Canadian households. It’s only their governments who are offside,” the report, the first from the newly established think tank, said.
The phone survey was conducted between March 6 and March 18. The results are considered accurate to within 2.2 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
A majority of Canadians – even wealthy ones – are behind the idea of raising income taxes on people who earn more than $250,000 and more than $500,000. The poll found 83 per cent are in favour of that idea.
And 73 per cent agree with raising corporate taxes back up to 2008 levels. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government has steadily lowered the rates since taking office in 2006, arguing the tax breaks help corporations create more jobs. The NDP and Liberals are opposed to the lower rates, saying they haven’t helped create new jobs and that corporations are just sitting on higher profits.
The survey, conducted by Environics Research Group, found that a majority of Conservative voters support higher corporate taxes.
It also shows that 69 per cent of Canadians support the introduction of an inheritance tax on any estate valued at more than $5 million.
The Broadbent Institute says the poll shows that the problem of income inequality is not an ideological one and that even the wealthy agree that they should play their part in addressing it.
It calls on governments to match public opinion and take action to reduce income inequality.
The survey showed that 77 per cent of respondents agree that widening income gaps are a big problem for Canada that will have long-term consequences and 71 per cent agreed that income inequality undermines Canadian values.
I would laugh, but this isn’t funny anymore.
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Woman arrested for assault based on Facebook photo
Lizz Aston has never been in a fight in her life.
For one thing, she’s hardly a physical threat at 5-foot-2 and 115 pounds.
However, another woman claims Aston beat her last November at The Piston bar on Bloor St. W.
Aston, a 28-year-old artist, was charged two months later based solely on a Facebook photo and a generic description offered to police by the victim’s boyfriend.
Aston laughs when questioned about the charge, withdrawn by the Crown on March 27.
“I’ve never even been in a fight,” she says with a smile. “A friend of mine said that, ‘Even when Lizz gets angry she gets cuter.’ ”
The smile soon fades as Aston discusses the allegations, which prompted a court appearance and several thousand dollars in legal bills.
The Nov. 19 incident at The Piston began when two couples were involved in a dispute over a coat. Several blows were struck.
Aston said she knew nothing of this at the time.
On Jan. 5, after returning from a visit to Cuba with her boyfriend, Aston received an email from an officer pointing out that the victim identified her as the woman who struck her.
The victim is believed to have gotten Aston’s photo from the friends list on the bar’s Facebook page.
“I thought they might have been looking for someone that resembled the girl, with brown hair and bangs,” Aston said.
Police asked Aston to come in to speak with officers and she did so two days later. She was read her rights, finger-printed and processed.
Police took away a bobby pin and scarf, she said.
Aston said she tried to show police text messages proving she was at an art opening for a friend on the date in question, but the officer didn’t seem interested in that information.
She said she has only been in the bar about three times, the last time in September.
The officer who laid the charge was identified by Aston as Const. Kristal McCullough of 14 Division.
Toronto police have defended their actions.
“We believed there were reasonable grounds to arrest her,” said Const. Tony Vella. “The Crown has a higher threshold in that they have to have reasonable prospects of a conviction.”
When asked if there would be an internal investigation in the matter, police spokesman Mark Pugash said police do not comment on internal investigations.
“Despicable” doesn’t even begin to describe this entire situation. Using Facebook as grounds for arresting people? What’s next - someone says something offensive and off to the jailhouse they go?
For fucking shame.
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Today’s story:
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Ezra Levant: The Harper government missed the chance to make meaningful cuts
Seriously: Out of a $276-billion budget, the Conservatives found only $5 billion in cuts? And only over three years?
That’s like someone who weighs 276 pounds saying they’re going to lose five pounds. Over three years.
Except even that’s not true. Because three years from now, the government’s own budget document says it’s going to be spending
$297 billion.
That’s not cutting. That’s expanding. That’s not leaner. That’s 7.4% fatter.
The Conservatives are spending 7.4% more over the next three years. But even that’s not the worst of it. They’re going to be wringing 17.6% more taxes out of Canadians in the next three years.
Will you be getting a 17.6% raise over the next three years? Maybe. Will your company grow its revenues 17.6%? Could be. That would be called an economic boom.
It’s possible. If America doesn’t hit a double-dip recession. If Europe doesn’t collapse in a domino effect from the bankruptcy of Greece.
Sure, it’s possible.
It’s true that some of the federal budget is uncuttable spending. Like the interest payments on our debt. That’s $31 billion this year. So what about the other $245 billion?
Blaming uncuttable spending is like saying you can’t lose weight because so much of your weight is bones. No — debt servicing is barely 10% of government spending.
This is a timid budget when the government did not need to be timid. Finally, after five years, Stephen Harper has a majority in Parliament, and a divided, weak opposition. If there ever were going to be cuts, it would be now, early in his mandate — not on the eve of an election three or four years from now.
There were some trifling cuts, to be sure — $5 billion, over three years.
But what do these cuts say about the priorities of this government?
The budget announced fully $1.1 billion in cuts to National Defence. Which just happens to be precisely the annual corporate bailout given to the CBC — an obsolete
holdover from a bygone era, before 500-channel TV, satellite radio, YouTube, iTunes and Netflix.
If Brian Mulroney could privatize Air Canada and Paul Martin could sell off the last government shares of Petro-Canada, why is Stephen Harper still insisting that taxpayers own a TV station?
That question stands alone; but when juxtaposed next to the fact that our Canadian Forces will be gutted by precisely the amount of the CBC’s annual bailout, it moves from a lost opportunity to a grave disappointment.
Oh, the CBC’s corporate bailout will be trimmed a sniff — they’ll have to make do with $27.8 million less this year. Which is a trick, of course; just last year the CBC got a special “top-up” of $60 million.
You can cut my personal budget by $27.8 million, too, if you like, if you give me a
$60 million top-up right before. What a joke.
Yes, of course there is good news in the budget, too.
For example, there are new fixed deadlines by which the government’s regulatory reviews of major economic projects must be completed. The circus-style procedure of bureaucrat Sheila Leggett’s review of the Northern Gateway Pipeline proposal — where literally thousands of “witnesses,” including young school children, foreign citizens and even characters like “Jack Sparrow” and “Cave Man” are allowed to testify for months on end — is being stopped.
And the illegal practices of environmental “charities” — namely their highly partisan political campaigning, often on behalf of foreign meddlers — will be curtailed. Anti-Canada lobbying won’t be banned. It just won’t get a Canadian charitable tax receipt anymore.
Those are important changes. But they’re not really budgetary changes. A budget is about taxing and spending. And in that department, this Conservative budget — and the double-digit tax increase over the next three years — is hardly something to celebrate.
The lack of cuts to the budget is, in my opinion, a political maneuver for the Conservative Party to acquire footing as the “natural ruling party of Canada,” a title that had been previously given to the Liberals.
And so, we have no real fiscal conservative policies.
If you are an American that is contemplating coming to Canada to avoid financial collapse in the US, you might as well stay where you are.
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The criminalization of black America
- There are more African American adults under correctional control today — in prison or jail, on probation or parole — than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began.
- As of 2004, more African American men were disenfranchised (due to felon disenfranchisement laws) than in 1870, the year the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified, prohibiting laws that explicitly deny the right to vote on the basis of race.
- A black child born today is less likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born during slavery. The recent disintegration of the African American family is due in large part to the mass imprisonment of black fathers.
- If you take into account prisoners, a large majority of African American men in some urban areas have been labeled felons for life. (In the Chicago area, the figure is nearly 80%.) These men are part of a growing undercaste — not class, caste — permanently relegated, by law, to a second-class status. They can be denied the right to vote, automatically excluded from juries, and legally discriminated against in employment, housing, access to education, and public benefits, much as their grandparents and great-grandparents were during the Jim Crow era.
I have no use for the link this post leads to, but I think we should take a moment to appreciate the irony of a socialist website criticizing the unintended consequences of a socialized criminal justice (sic) system.
As for the 4 bullet points, I’ve made these points over and over and over and over on this blog, and more and more it seems like the following picture is a depiction of anyone who argues against the drug war or attempts to call attention to the inherent injustices in the US criminal justice system:
I realized this recently when a fellow law student told the class that he didn’t care much whether it was indeed true that the death penalty is disproportionately imposed upon black people, because “what’s the alternative…are we going to stop punishing murders just because it’s not always fair?” FACEPALM OF ALL FACEPALMS. Maybe it mitigates his seeming racism that he didn’t sound like he believed the statistics anyway, which seems to be a common thing amongst hardline conservatives. They have some sort of mental block which prevents them from acknowledging that injustices can occur in the good ol’ US of A. I’ll of course continue to rail against these things, but I can’t help but think it’s hopeless because most people don’t care until it’s their family member that is subjected to unjust treatment at the hands of the state’s thugs. Everything else is just a long string of “isolated incidents.” LOL.
As a sidenote, I always find it interesting that the left takes up the cause of defending against injustices, and yet it is their own policies that subject people to the harm they claim to detest. A perfect example is the idea that convicted felons should be barred from owning firearms. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Let’s release people from prison back into poor neighborhoods with high crime rates, and then let’s prevent them from being able to defend themselves. So that, even if a felon was reformed and had no intention of committing any more crimes, the law effectively makes that person a criminal, subject to arrest at any moment, if he wants to be able to protect himself or his family. And on top of that, knowing how incredibly brutal police are toward poor minorities, it seems pretty contradictory to feign outrage over police abuse while at the same time supporting laws which disarm everyone except for police.
It is also these same people who are most fervent in supporting draconian DUI laws which have expanded the discretionary power of police in being able to detain drivers on a whim. And the brunt of that burden is born by poor immigrant communities that are constantly subjected to police checkpoints, and black people who are constantly pulled over for DWB (driving while black), all under the guise of “protecting the roads from drunk drivers.”
Long story short, it isn’t a surprise to those of us who are paying attention that bad things happen when you grant one group of people the power to use violence and force against another group of people. These are all predictable consequences of the state.
