Canada Post lost $748 million in 2023, up from $548 million the year before, and another $76 million in the first quarter of 2024, bringing the Crown Corporation's losses to almost $3 Billion in six years.
May 3, 32024 - "Canada Post recorded a loss before tax of $748 million in 2023. Results were negatively impacted by the post-pandemic surge in parcel delivery competition, the ongoing erosion of Transaction Mail, and continued growth in addresses and delivery costs....
"In the post-pandemic parcel delivery landscape, competition has accelerated at a pace not seen in the company’s history. Canada Post’s estimated parcel delivery market share has eroded from 62 per cent prior to the pandemic to 29 per cent in 2023. At the same time, Transaction Mail continues to decline in both volume and as a revenue source. In 2006, Canadian households received an average of seven letters per week; in 2023, they received two. Delivering fewer letters to a growing number of addresses is compounding the financial pressures on the Corporation.
"In 2023, revenue fell by $240 million, or 3.3 per cent, compared to the prior year, dropping across all three lines of business – Parcels, Transaction Mail and Direct Marketing. The 2023 loss before tax widened by $200 million from a loss before tax of $548 million in 2022. The cost of operations in 2023 rose by $11 million, or 0.1 per cent, compared to 2022....
"Under the Canada Post Corporation Act, the postal service has an obligation to serve all Canadians in a financially self-sustaining manner based on revenue generated by the sale of postal products and services, not taxpayer dollars. Over the last 20 years, the amount of mail Canadians receive has declined by more than 50 per cent, while the number of addresses has increased by more than three million. This has resulted in lower revenues and higher costs.... Without changes to align the postal service to the needs of Canadians today, Canada Post projects larger, unsustainable losses in future years."
May 24, 2024 - "Canada Post recorded a loss before tax of $76 million in the first quarter of 2024 as revenue for Parcels and Transaction Mail declined and Direct Marketing picked up. The segment’s loss before tax improved compared to the same period of the prior year due to the receipt of non-recurring dividends partly related to the divestiture of SCI Group Inc. (SCI). Without these dividends, Canada Post’s loss before tax would have been approximately $224 million, compared to a loss before tax of $107 million in the first quarter of 2023.
"In the first quarter, Canada Post’s revenue declined by $56 million, or 1.5 per cent, compared to the same quarter of the prior year. Parcels results continued to be negatively impacted by the competitive environment, while Transaction Mail volumes continued to erode. In Direct Marketing, Canada Post Neighbourhood Mail service benefited from new business and higher sales.
"Canada Post’s loss from operations in the first quarter was $221 million, expanding by $109 million compared to the $112-million loss from operations it had recorded in the first quarter of 2023. The cost of operations increased by 2.8 per cent in the first quarter compared to the same period a year earlier.... Parcels revenue declined by $59 million, or 5.4 per cent, while volumes fell by 2 million pieces, or 1.1 per cent, compared to the same period in 2023. A crowded and competitive parcel delivery market continued to negatively affect results for the line of business.... Transaction Mail revenue fell by $20 million, or 1.3 per cent, as volumes declined by 16 million pieces, or 1.1 per cent, compared to the same period a year earlier. Transaction Mail revenue and volumes declined as consumers and mailers continued to shift to digital channels.
"The company maintained its regulated stamp prices at 2020 levels through the first quarter of 2024. In May, Canada Post raised its regulated postage rates after receiving Governor-in-Council approval of its proposed increase. For stamps purchased in a booklet, coil or pane, which represent most stamp sales, the rate has increased by seven cents, to 99 cents per stamp. The stamp price increase took effect on May 6, 2024, and did not impact first quarter results."
August 28, 2024 - "Republican officials on Iowa’s state objection panel voted Wednesday to remove all three Libertarian candidates for Congress from the ballot, citing the Libertarian Party of Iowa’s failure to follow state laws concerning the process for nominating political candidates. The 2-1 vote means 1st Congressional District candidate Nicholas Gluba, 3rd District candidate Marco Battaglia and 4th District candidate Charles Aldrich will not appear on the ballot this fall unless they successfully appeal the decision in court by Sept. 3.
"Libertarian Party of Iowa Chair Jules Cutler said they would likely appeal the decision. Cutler said she was disappointed by the decision, but not surprised. 'It is about silencing us,' she said. 'Yes, it is about making sure that they are in a better position to win. If you want to win, how about you campaign, not silence other people.”
"Gluba, Battaglia and Aldrich said they would run write-in campaigns if they don’t get back on the ballot.
"The state objection panel is made up of Republican Secretary of State Paul Pate, Republican Attorney General Brenna Bird and Democratic State Auditor Rob Sand. Pate and Bird voted to remove the Libertarian candidates from the ballot, and Sand voted to keep them on....
"Republican voters from each of the three congressional districts filed objections to the Libertarians being on the ballot. Alan Ostergren, a prominent Republican lawyer in Iowa, represented the objectors. He said the Libertarian Party of Iowa’s county conventions were not valid because they were held the same day as its caucuses. Iowa law says county delegates’ terms start the day after the caucuses.
"'This flaw is fatal. It means that the purported delegates to a state and district convention that were selected at the county level were not validly selected on Jan. 15,' Ostergren said. 'It means the less than two dozen individuals who met in Des Moines to purport to nominate candidates for these three congressional seats had no legal authority to represent the Libertarian Party of Iowa'.... He also said the party failed to submit lists of delegates to county auditors, as required by state law.
"Cutler said the Libertarians held county conventions '181 minutes too early' — meaning they did not wait until midnight after the caucuses to hold the county conventions. She also admitted the party did not submit lists of delegates to county auditors. But, Cutler said, these should be considered technical violations and are not grounds for kicking people off the ballot.
"'It is embarrassing that we didn’t do it. It is a learning process. It is growing pains,' she said. 'But at the end of the day, we are substantially compliant with the law.'
"Sand, who voted to keep the Libertarians on the ballot, said there is no legal basis for removing candidates from the ballot because of 'nitpicky' issues with internal political party business. 'If this panel is making decisions, we are supposed to aim in terms of inclusiveness on the ballot, not trying to exclude people,' he said.
"Bird said there is precedent for the state objection panel reviewing nominating conventions. She said she doesn’t want to keep people off the ballot for small technicalities, but there are obligations major political parties have."
"More Canadians are receiving Employment Insurance benefits, as unemployment continues to grow across the country."
August 25, 2024 - "The number of Canadians receiving Employment Insurance benefits has risen over 10% since the same time last year, according to new data released by Statistics Canada. According to new data released on Thursday, 474,000 Canadians are receiving Employment Insurance benefits, rising 6,000, or 1.3%, since the previous month, marking the second consecutive monthly increase. Since June 2023, regular EI beneficiaries have increased by 44,720 to 473,980 recipients, a rise of 10.4%....
“'In general, variations in the number of EI beneficiaries can reflect changes in circumstances of different groups, including those becoming beneficiaries, those going back to work, those exhausting their regular benefits, and those no longer receiving benefits for other reasons,' reads the report....
"Unemployment reached 6.4% in June 2024 across the country. This saw a similar rise from the year prior, growing 0.9% from 5.5% in June 2023, which had risen 0.5% from 5.0% in June 2022.
"Statistics Canada attributed the rise in unemployment to 'more people search[ing] for work, while overall employment held steady.' However, the more people searching for work were new immigrants to the country.... Canada’s population grew by nearly 100,000 between May and June 2024.
"While EI recipients rose by 1.3% between May and June 2024, not all provinces saw an increase. Alberta, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia were the only three provinces to see a decrease in recipients, at 1.7%, 1.4%, and 0.2% decreases, respectively.
"The biggest increase in EI recipients between May and June 2024 was found in Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec, and Ontario, at 2.7%, 2.5%, and 1.7%, respectively.... Ontario saw the biggest increase by a large margin in EI recipients year-over-year, rising 25.1%....
"Canadians who last worked in natural and applied sciences have seen a 26.3% rise in accessing EI over the last year. Following that are those who worked in manufacturing and utilities, as well as legislative and senior management, which saw increases of 21.8% and 20.8%, respectively. Conversely, those who last worked in natural resources and agriculture, art, culture, recreation and sport both saw annual decreases in EI beneficiaries, at 7.2% and 1.2%, respectively....
"The increase was led by men aged 25 to 54 years old, which saw a rise of 12.8% in EI beneficiaries year-over-year, followed by women in the same age group, which saw a rise of 10.5%....
"Despite the recent rise, EI beneficiaries have fallen greatly from [a] peak in Jan. 2022 of 671,390, the furthest the data goes back."
In a letter to the US House Judiciary Committee, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said that the Biden-Harris administration pressured Facebook to censor posts about both COVID-19 and the infamous Hunter Biden laptop.
27 August 27, 2024 - "In a letter sent to US House Judiciary Committee Chairman, Jim Jordan on Monday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged the Biden-Harris administration pressured Facebook to censor COVID-19 information, as well as news about the infamous Hunter Biden laptop. The letter comes more than a year after Meta provided the committee with thousands of documents as part of its investigation into content moderation on online platforms, reports Fox News, adding Meta has also provided the committee with access to a dozen employees for transcribed interviews.
"'There’s a lot of talk right now around how the U.S. government interacts with companies like Meta, and I want to be clear about our position,' Zuckerberg wrote. 'Our platforms are for everyone, we’re about promoting speech and helping people connect in a safe and secure way. As part of this, we regularly hear from governments around the world and others with various concerns around public discourse and public safety.'
"He told Jordan that in 2021, 'senior officials' from the Biden administration and White House 'repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humor and satire.' Zuckerberg said Facebook did not agree with the censorship.... Zuckerberg wrote. [that] 'I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it'....
"Fox News reached out to the White House for comment, with a spokesperson responding, 'When confronted with a deadly pandemic, this administration encouraged responsible actions to protect public health and safety. Our position has been clear and consistent: we believe tech companies and other private actors should take into account the effects their actions have on the American people, while making independent choices about the information they present.'
"Zuckerberg also confirmed the FBI 'warned' the platform "about a potential Russian disinformation operation about the Biden family and Burisma in the lead up to the 2020 election," reports the Post Millennial, adding the FBI also laid out a hypothetical Russian "disinfo campaign" would include a fake story about a discovered Hunter Biden laptop in an attempt to discredit Biden's campaign. The New York Post broke the story, which is now known to be true.... Zuckerberg wrote the impetus for the platform to censor and suppress the New York Post's reporting on the laptop was a direct result of the FBI's warnings."
Pavel Durov, the founder and CEO of social media app Telegram, has been arrested in France for not removing user content from the platform when ordered to by the authorities.
26th August 26, 2024 - "In 2013, the Russian authorities searched the home and offices of social-media magnate Pavel Durov.... [T]he raid was widely believed to be in retaliation for his platform’s persistent refusal to censor critics of the government. VK, Durov’s Russian-language competitor to Facebook, had consistently rejected the Kremlin’s demands to block the accounts of Putin’s domestic opponents and to hand over data belonging to protesters in Ukraine. In 2014, he sold his stake in VK, resigned as CEO, and fled his home country. Durov, a self-described libertarian, says he was not prepared to do the state’s bidding. Since he left, VK is now more or less controlled by the Kremlin.
"More than a decade later and Durov is in trouble with the law again. His newer app, Telegram, is in the firing line this time. He was arrested and detained on Saturday and charged with 12 crimes, seemingly all in connection with Telegram’s failure to comply with the authorities’ requests to remove certain content. But Durov was not arrested in Russia this time. He was apprehended as his private jet touched down in France.
"The 12 charges include ‘complicity’ in alleged crimes as diverse as child exploitation, fraud, drug trafficking, money laundering and terrorism. As despicable as such crimes may be, it is unprecedented for the authorities in a Western liberal democracy to hold a social-media platform and its founder criminally liable for content shared by others.... The commonsense principle that social-media firms are not directly responsible for their users’ content had held firm until relatively recently in Europe.
"Yet, in the past few years, Europe’s illiberal elites have been gripped by hysteria about the supposedly malign influence of major tech platforms.... [A]lmost every societal problem is now pinned on an excess of online freedom. This has prompted a series of laws, from the EU’s Digital Services Act to the UK’s Online Safety Act, which effectively treat platforms as publishers of user-generated content, threatening them with fines if they fail to remove posts that contravene their rules.
"Telegram has over 900 million users worldwide and is well known for its laissez-faire approach to content and its fierce protection of its users’ privacy. It hosts both private conversations and ‘channels’, which allow a single user to disseminate messages directly to large numbers of followers. But its terms of service do prohibit terrorist content, scams, illegal pornography and incitement to violence. Notably it has removed ISIS-linked channels and white-supremacist groups involved with the ‘January 6’ storming of the US Capitol.
"Durov, the sole owner, insists his platform is neutral and ‘not a player in geopolitics’. Nevertheless, Telegram is especially notorious for hosting pro-war Russian bloggers.... This has led to suspicions that the Kremlin has more control or influence over Telegram than Durov lets on. The Russian government’s call for his release over the weekend has only compounded these fears.... Yet, on the other hand, there is no evidence that Telegram has censored, say, critics of Putin. Notably, it is also highly popular in Ukraine. It remains one of the few platforms to allow Russians to access information about the war that isn’t filtered by the Kremlin. Telegram also proved essential for those organising pro-democracy protests against the CCP in Hong Kong in 2019. To characterise the app purely as a propaganda tool for authoritarians like the Russian government, as many observers in the West are keen to do, is to miss the bigger picture. Durov’s own past run-ins with the Kremlin also suggest he is sincere in his libertarian beliefs.
"Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, was quick to defend Durov in the wake of his arrest. Musk, himself persona non grata among the Western liberal establishment, thanks to X’s more liberal speech policies, claims there is a political vendetta against Telegram and Durov. Musk argues that Instagram, owned by Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, ‘has a massive child-exploitation problem, but no arrest for Zuck, as he censors free speech and gives governments backdoor access to user data… He already caved into censorship pressure.’ In other words, while all platforms have unwittingly hosted illegal content, just as Telegram is alleged to have done, the European authorities are primarily interested in targeting those platforms that refuse to accede to their demands to censor political dissent.
"Certainly, some of those defending Durov’s arrest are not making any effort to dispel this impression. A piece in the Guardian has hailed it as a ‘smart move’ that could panic tech executives like Musk into censoring more content at governments’ behest. That ‘nagging fear [of arrest] is no bad thing’, it said. (Earlier this month, a former Twitter exec wrote another piece in the Guardian calling explicitly for Musk’s arrest.) It is hard not to suspect that allowing unfettered political speech is Telegram’s real crime in the eyes of the elites....
"The criminalisation of Pavel Durov sets a deeply troubling precedent. If social-media execs are to be held liable for posts on their platforms, then a ramping up of pre-emptive censorship seems inevitable. Europeans must stand up to this now, lest they lose their online freedoms for good."
August 24, 2025 - "The median family income has seen a year-over-year decrease in all parts of Canada due to inflation, according to numbers from Statistics Canada. In 2022, after-tax income was $60,800, according to data released on Aug. 19. While that was a 2.5 percent increase from 2021, when including the annual inflation of 6.8 percent, after-tax income was 4 percent lower than the previous year.
"The decrease in median family income was seen in all provinces and territories, StatCan said. The largest decrease was in Nunavut at minus 8.4 percent, followed by the Northwest Territories at minus 7.2 percent. Nova Scotia saw the third lowest drop in family income at minus 5.6 percent.
"StatCan said that the median family after-tax income for 2022 was about equal to pre-pandemic income. Broken down by province, Quebec, the Yukon, and B.C. saw increases in the median family income from 2019 by 5 percent, 1.7 percent, and 1.3 percent respectively. All other provinces saw a drop....
"Almost all types of family groups saw a drop in median income in 2022, when adjusted for inflation, StatCan said. Younger families saw the biggest decrease, with single-parent families where the parent was under 25 years old seeing a 15.1 percent decrease in income. Median income for this family group was $24,690, according to the data.
"Single Canadians 25 years and younger saw a 12.9 percent drop in median income to $17,650. That was the lowest median income of all family groups. Couples 25 years and younger saw a 9 percent decline in median income to $45,070 in 2022. Older Canadians also saw a decrease, but not as much as younger families....
"Some cities saw increases in median family income between 2019 and 2022, with the biggest increase in Sherbrooke at 6.2 percent. Montreal saw the second highest income increase 5.2 percent, followed by Trois-Rivières at 5.2 percent and Saguenay at 5.1 percent. Cities that saw the largest decrease in family income were Edmonton at minus 5.1 percent, Windsor at minus 4.3 percent, and Kitchener–Cambridge–Waterloo at 4.1 percent."
Was Hitler's National Socialism really socialism? In the Marxist paradigm, obviously not: it was a "far right" manifestation of "late-stage capitalism". But the Marxist paradigm is not the only way to look at it.
December 8, 2020 - "Words are powerful things in that they enable us to share a common world of understanding with our contemporaries and, in the written form, with generations long past. But too often words can just as easily cause confusion, misunderstanding, and conflict among people in any society. One such word that keeps causing this type of confusion and conflict is 'socialism.' What does it mean, what forms has it taken, and why does it generate so much intellectual 'heat' rather than 'light?'
"This has come up, again, in a recent article by Ronald J. Granieri, who is research director of the Lauder Institute at the University of Pennsylvania, on why 'The Right Needs to Stop Falsely Claiming that the Nazis were Socialists' (Washington Post, December 5, 2020).... He seethes with frustration that those he calls on the political 'right' attempt to classify the German Nazi regime of the 1930s and 1940s as 'socialist.' Yes, the formal name of the Nazi Party was the National Socialist German Workers Party ... [and] prominent Nazis may have played to the 'working-class resentments' with the hope of attracting people away from the communists and the democratic socialists ... but there was no directed and consistent challenge against private property....
"Granieri says: 'National Socialism preserved private property, while also putting the entire resources of society at the service of an expansionist and racist national vision, which included the conquest and murderous subjugation of other peoples.' The Nazi regime, therefore, cannot be considered to be 'socialist,' because National Socialism was not interested in controlling the means of production or redistributing wealth to build an egalitarian utopia....
"Granieri also takes a swipe at the Austrian economist and Nobel Prize winner, Friedrich A. Hayek, for attempting to put the socialist label on Nazism in his book The Road to Serfdom (1944).... Hayek was 'enormously influential,' he says, on both Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and 'Hayek’s assertion that all government interventions in the economy led to totalitarianism continues to animate popular works' that warn of the 'genocidal dangers' from implementing a welfare state.... Granieri would rather drop all of this distracting labelling controversy and search for ways for 'protecting citizens against the negative exigencies of the market'.... He also wants 'rightists' to drop harping on early 20th century American Progressives who heralded and advocated eugenics as a means of designing superior human types. (But, wait! Were they not simply 'following the science' as widely understood and accepted at the time?)...
"[I]n the house of collectivism there have been many socialist mansions. Among the early 19th century French socialists there was a diversity of views as to whether the socialist society to come, for instance, would be an industrial or agrarian paradise. There were disagreements about whether people could reason their way into radical social change, those whom Marx labelled the 'utopian socialists,' or whether it would come only in its own good time due to inescapable historical evolution and revolution, as Marx insisted.
"The first socialist party to seriously move towards political influence in the second half of the 19th century was the German Democratic Socialists, who shunned the call for violent revolution, and amassed a growing number of votes in electing their candidates to the Imperial German Parliament by pursuing power through the ballot box. This frightened the German powers-that-be, so besides attempting for a while to suppress the German socialist party, Otto von Bismarck, as Chancellor of the German Empire in the 1870s and 1880s, introduced all the major component elements of the modern welfare state as well as interventionist regulations over parts of German industry and trade. Bismarck’s brand soon was labelled 'state socialism' or sometimes 'monarchical socialism'....
"Further to the East in Europe, more doctrinaire Marxian socialists in Imperial Russia rejected the niceties of elections and legislative welfare-state reforms. Only violent revolution could break the capitalist hold on the exploited masses, with, as Lenin came to insist, a dictatorship of the proletariat once in power. This resulted in a schism between democratic and dictatorial socialists for a good part of the 20th century. But ... while these two groups of socialists denounced each other over the means of coming to power, well into the second half of the 20th century they almost all agreed on the desired end: the abolition of private ownership of the means of production and the introduction of central planning....
"From these forms of 'socialism,' Granieri’s desire for a democratic 'balancing of interests' based on the expediency of what 'works,' Bismarck’s state socialism seems the closest to what he is looking for. As William Dawson expressed it in Bismarck and State Socialism (1891), 'No department of economic activity should on principle be closed to the state.... The state socialists say that this must be determined by expediency, and by circumstances of time and place.' (pp. 4-6) It was a state socialism in which, as an American admirer of the German system, Frederic Howe, expressed it in his book on Socialized Germany (1915): 'The state has its finger on the pulse of the worker from the cradle to the grave. His education, his health and his working efficiency are matters of constant concern'.... Howe later served in FDR’s New Deal Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) that attempted to plan the output of American farming....
"Granieri insists that National Socialism could not be 'socialist' because it did not pursue a 'utopian' ideal for greater equality for all as a whole. But this presumes that the only legitimate utopian dream, and therefore benchmark for labeling something 'socialist,' is the one that Granieri considers good and right. In fact, the Nazis had a utopian vision for the future; it began with their notion of German race purity on the basis of which they rejected the older Prussian idea of aristocratic and class hierarchy. All 'real' Germans were equal and were to be given opportunities for education, occupational and professional advancement as the means by which they could make their contribution to the high good of the German people as a whole.
"That Nazi egalitarianism was limited to only those 'real' Germans possessing the racial characteristics that guided their ideological thinking, with Jews classified as the lowest and most treacherous of race enemies, does not change the fact that they, too, were 'utopians' with social equality goals, but only for those within the 'in-group.' This was nothing but a variation of the Marxist theme that the world is divided into irreconcilable social classes, with the 'capitalists' being the inescapable 'class enemies' of 'the workers.' And as in the Soviet practice, they and their children were stripped of all rights and opportunities, and made into permanent pariahs to be reeducated to serve 'the building of socialism' or liquidated.
"It may be a notion of a utopia that both Granieri and I would reject, but for many in the Nazi leadership and among the wider German population at the time, it was believed in and worked for, no matter [how] reprehensible it may seem to others.... This is what made it a 'national' socialism rather than an international socialism. Its call and appeal were to a segment of humanity defined by asserted racial characteristics, rather than a call for all workers of the world to unite regardless of who or where. In retrospect, this meant that National Socialism could never have a following great enough to conquer and control the world, since its pool of members was definitionally too limited.... Most of the world’s population had to find itself in conflict with Nazism precisely due to its race-based exclusivity....
"It would be possible to draw upon any number of Nazi sources to determine and decide whether National Socialism was a form of 'real' socialism. In 1936, Nazi educator Friedrich Alfred Beck said in Education in the Third Reich, a text meant as a guide for German teachers around the country:
National Socialism has restored the concept of a people from its modern shallowness . . . By people we understand an entire living body which is racially uniform and which is held together by common history, common fate, a common mission, and common tasks . . . Education, from the standpoint of race and people, is the creation of a form of life in which the racial unity will be preserved through the totality of the people . . .
Socialism is the direction of personal life through dependence on the community, consciousness of the community, nationalism is the elevation of individual life to a unique (microcosmic) expression of the community in the unity of the personality.” (Translated in: National Socialism [U.S. Department of State, 1943], p. 28)
"The individual lives through the community, and race and nation define to which community an individual owes his allegiance. Rather than social classes, National Socialism classifies people by race category. This makes you who you are and provides meaning to your life, in the Nazi worldview.
"But what about National Socialist economics? Let us look at Gustav Stolper’s German Economy, 1870-1940 (1940). Stolper was the long-time editor of a German economic magazine oriented toward a classical liberal viewpoint. He was forced to leave Germany with Hitler’s rise to power due to his politics and his Jewish family background, and found refuge in the United States. Stolper explained some of the socialist aspects to Nazi ideology and policy:
The National Socialist party was from the outset an anti-capitalist party. As such it was fighting and in competition with Marxism.... National Socialism wooed the masses [from three angles]. The first angle was the moral principle, the second the financial system, the third the issue of ownership. The moral principle was ‘the commonwealth before self-interest.’ The financial promise was ‘breaking the bondage of interest slavery’. The industrial program was ‘nationalization of all big incorporated business [trusts]’.
By accepting the principle ‘the commonwealth before self-interest,’ National Socialism simply emphasizes its antagonism to the spirit of a competitive society as represented supposedly by democratic capitalism . . . But to the Nazis this principle means also the complete subordination of the individual to the exigencies of the state. And in this sense National Socialism is unquestionably a Socialist system . . .
The nationalization of big industry was never attempted after the Nazis came to power. But this was by no means a ‘betrayal’ of their program, as has been alleged by some of their opponents. The socialization of the entire German productive machinery, both agricultural and industrial, was achieved by methods other than expropriation, to a much larger extent and on an immeasurably more comprehensive scale than the authors of the party program in 1920 probably ever imagined. In fact, not only the big trusts were gradually but rapidly subjected to government control in Germany, but so was every sort of economic activity, leaving not much more than the title of private ownership.” (pp. 232-233; 239-240)....
"Guenter Reimann, in The Vampire Economy: Doing Business Under Fascism (1939), highlighted that while most of the means of production had not been nationalized, they had nonetheless been politicized and collectivized under an intricate web of Nazi planning targets, price and wage regulations, production rules and quotas, and strict limits and restraints on the action and decisions of those who remained; nominally, the owners of private enterprises throughout the country. Every German businessman knew that his conduct was prescribed and positioned within the wider planning goals of the National Socialist regime.' Not much differently [from] the state factory managers in the Soviet Union, even at that time under Stalin, the German owners of private enterprises were given wide discretion in the day-to-day management of the enterprises that nominally remained in their possession. But Nazi planning agencies set output targets, determined input supplies and allocations, determined wage and work condition rules, and dictated the availability of investment funds and the rates of interest at which they could be obtained through the banking system, along with strict central control and direction of all import and export trade....
"[W]e can turn to a more recent historian of the Nazi regime, that being Goetz Aly in, Hitler’s Beneficiaries: Plunder, Racial War, and the Nazi Welfare State (2007). Aly 'focus[es] on the socialist aspect of National Socialism' so as to better understand 'the Nazi regime as a kind of racist-totalitarian welfare state.' Aly emphasizes that the ideology and practice of the Nazi regime were in fact deeply socialist. Within Germany, among the German people of 'pure Aryan blood,' the ideal was an egalitarian social order in which every German would be freed from traditional class barriers so that he might have the opportunity to rise to any level of success in serving the fatherland. The welfare-state policies begun by Bismarck ... were viewed by the Nazis as a prelude to a complete guarantee of a quality standard of living for all 'real' Germans that would be paternalistically provided by the National Socialist state....
"Aly points out that before and during World War II, the German 'capitalist class' was made to pay its 'fair share' for the benefit of the rest of the German people. Taxes were proportionally far higher on the 'rich' in Germany than the rest of the population. During the war the government established mandatory overtime pay in all industries and imposed wage increases to keep 'the masses' loyal to the regime – all at the expense of German business. At the same time, German industry worked under government-commanded four-year plans from 1936 until the end of the war in 1945....
"But it was only after the war started that the machine of redistributive plunder was really set into motion. Every country overrun by the German army not only had to pay the costs of the occupation, but also was systematically looted for the benefit of the German population as a whole.... In every occupied country the Nazis initiated similar confiscatory policies with local accomplices with whom they shared looted Jewish property. (Only in Belgium and Denmark did large segments of the population and the bureaucracy resist participating in this plunder of the Jews.) The Nazis first nationalized Jewish property and then distributed it to those deemed worthy among the German or occupied populations.... Aly estimates that because of this looted property and the goods sent back to Germany by soldiers, many, if not most, Germans enjoyed a more comfortable standard of living throughout most of the war than the civilian population in Great Britain.... The vast majority of German families continued to feast, even under the allied bombings, thanks to the locust-like seizure of anything and everything across occupied Europe....
"No doubt this summary of the content of Goetz Aly’s analysis of the National Socialist welfare system and its version of central planning would convince Ronald Granieri even more that the Nazi regime should not be classified as 'socialist.' But in my view, it demonstrates that all of its characteristics find their family resemblance in socialist regimes. Institutionally, the starting premise is that the individual is little or nothing, and must view himself as dependent upon and working for a wider 'common good,' other than his own personal self-interest.
"In the name of 'the people' those in political authority, whether in that position through votes or violence, establish in the name of 'the people' the hierarchy of social goals, purposes, and collective ends for which a set of government planning policies, interventions and welfare redistributions will be set in motion. Individual choice and decision-making as consumers and producers are significantly reduced or even totally eliminated with government central planning and decision-making replacing voluntary association and exchange.... Prices and production no longer fully reflect the valuations and appraisements of the multitudes of interacting buyers and sellers in the society – which means all of us.... Instead, government plans and interventions determine or heavily influence wages and prices, along with what gets produced and how much; which means everything concerning our personal lives, livelihoods and standards of living.
"In other words, extensive and intrusive government regulations, restrictions, redistributions, and imposed centralized plans demonstrate what Friedrich A. Hayek was arguing over 75 years ago in The Road to Serfdom: that the more government command and control replaces market-based choices, decisions, and opportunities, the less freedom we have over increasing corners and aspects of our lives....
"Ronald Granieri may very well pooh-pooh this because he may not consider some loss of personal liberty something much to despair when it’s replaced with compulsory political paternalism that 'guarantees' various material wants for some that he considers more important than the degree of freedom forgone by some others. But I would ask him to at least admit that this is freedom lost for a coerced 'security,' ... still a compulsory 'taking,' whether done by a voting majority or dictatorial elite.
"And I would further ask him to concede that whether he agrees with the ends and goals of other socialists, their use of command and control and their introduction of some form of institutional central planning to pursue their declared 'social good' makes their system just as much a 'socialist' one as any other that Ronald Granieri might endorse or look more favorably upon. So, whether he likes it or not, the Nazis, too, were socialists, just a different stripe than the ones he feels more comfortable with."
The UK's new Labour government has put the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act (passed in the last Parliament) on hold, and is considering repealing it.
July 25, 2024 - "Controversial new powers for universities and student unions to be fined for failing to uphold freedom of speech have been put on hold by the government. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said that would allow time to consider whether the law, which was due to come into force next week, would be repealed....
"The Higher Education Freedom of Speech Act, which was passed last year, said universities had a duty to 'secure' and 'promote the importance of' freedom of speech and academic expression. It would have allowed the OfS to fine or give sanctions to higher education providers and student unions in England from next week. It also included a new complaints scheme for students, staff and visiting speakers, who could seek compensation if they suffer from a breach of a university's free-speech obligations. But a government source told the BBC the legislation would have opened the way for Holocaust deniers to be allowed on campus, and was an 'anti-semite charter'." Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cv2gj1x11nmo
577 academics have now signed an open letter to Bridget Phillipson calling on the education secretary to restore the Tories’ Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023. The act strengthened impositions on universities to support free speech on their premises and would introduce a complaints scheme to resolve issues.Richard Dawkins, Niall Ferguson, Kathleen Stock and others have signed.
"The letter spells out that the act won’t be “burdensome” as Labour claims because government analysis has compliance cost at a tiny £4.7 million and that the complaints scheme would keep cases out of court.... Labour’s response is indignant: 'We make no apology for pausing the Tories’ hate speech charter, which would have allowed antisemites and holocaust deniers free rein on campuses'....
Black Ribbon Day, August 23, commemorates the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia which led to their joint attack on Poland and the start of the Second World War a week later.
August 21, 2024 - "Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. That’s why the Alberta government is marking one of the darkest days in 20th Century history by commemorating ‘Black Ribbon Day’ — the 85th anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.... [O]n August 23, 1939 the foreign ministers of Germany and Russia signed the Nazi-Soviet Pact that set the groundwork for the invasion of Poland and the start of the Second World War a week later on September 1.
"In a statement, the UCP government said it plans to mark the ignominious event with a special event in the rotunda of the Legislature on Friday. 'On the 85th anniversary of Black Ribbon Day we pause to look upon the horrific events of the past and renew our resolve to forever honour the victims of tyranny,' said Legislative Assembly Speaker Nathan Cooper. 'People from around the world observe Black Ribbon Day and we stand with them to uphold the importance of freedom from oppression now and for the generations to come.'
"On August 22 [1939], Joachim von Ribbentrop flew to Moscow to finalize the treaty.... The so-called Hitler-Stalin pact, signed the next day, guaranteed peace between the parties and was a commitment neither government would aid or ally itself with an enemy of the other.... [T]he treaty included the Secret Protocol, which defined the borders of Soviet and German spheres of influence across Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland which would later make up the Iron Curtain....
"‘Black Ribbon Day’ originated in the protests held against the Soviet Union in western capitals, including Ottawa, in the 1980s that led up to the Baltic Revolutions in the countries directly affected by the deal and its aftermath starting in 1989.... In 2009 the European Parliament formally recognized August 23 as the European day of Remembrance for the Victims of Stalinism and Nazism which was briefly even acknowledged by Russian president Vladimir Putin.
"[Putin] backtracked in 2014 and called the treaty as 'necessary for Russia's survival.' Then in February 2021, the State Duma voted in favor of a law to punish the dissemination of 'fake news' regarding the Soviet Union's role in the Second World War, including claiming that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union held equal responsibility due to the pact." Read more: https://www.westernstandard.news/alberta/day-of-infamy-alberta-govt-marks-85th-anniversary-of-nazi-soviet-pact/57170
August 23, 2013 - "Black Ribbon Day, also called the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, originated in the 1980s. Central and Eastern European refugees then living in Canada organized a series of peaceful protests on both sides of the Iron Curtain to draw attention to the rampant human rights abuses perpetrated by authorities across the Soviet bloc. They chose August 23, the anniversary of the infamous 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany to hold the annual rallies.
"On August 23, 1989, about 2 million people formed a human chain spanning more than 600 kilometers across the Baltic republics. Known as the Baltic Way, this protest is seen as a defining moment in the Baltic states' battle for independence from the Soviet Union. As the Soviet bloc crumbled in 1991, Black Ribbon Day demonstrations were held in as many as 56 cities around the world.
"Today, Black Ribbon Day commemorates both victims of Stalinism and Nazism and, more generally, all those who died, suffered, or perished under authoritarian regimes. In 2008, the European Parliament became the first entity to formally designate August 23 as a day of remembrance for victims of Stalinism and Nazism. Canada followed suit in 2009 and Georgia, in the Caucasus, one year later." Read more: https://www.rferl.org/a/black-ribbon-day/25083982.html
The Ontario Crown has withdrawn all charges against Randal Linton of Waterloo, Ontario, who was charged after video of him at a 2021 anti-lockdown rally circulated online.
August 02, 2024 - "The Crown Attorney's office has officially withdrawn all charges against Randal Linton, a Waterloo resident who attended an anti-lockdown rally in 2021.
"Mr. Linton had been charged with failure to comply under the Reopening Ontario Act and an additional charge under the Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act. Upon conviction, Mr. Linton could have been jailed for a maximum of 1 year and fined up to $100,000.
"As part of the resolution, Mr. Linton agreed to make a $300 donation to the local Food Bank.
"Mr. Linton attended the rally to protest the government's restrictions on social gatherings, a stance captured on video - which eventually led to the charges being issued by the police.
"Adam Blake-Gallipeau, lawyer with The Democracy Fund (TDF), expressed satisfaction with the outcome. 'Mr. Linton's participation in the rally was a legitimate exercise of his Charter rights to peacefully assemble and express his views. We are pleased that he can now move forward with his life,' said Blake-Gallipeau.
"TDF's advocacy resulted in the withdrawal of the charges through negotiation, highlighting the importance of vigorous defence counsel in protecting individual rights.'I wouldn't have been able to pay a serious fine, and the stress on my family was huge. I'm grateful for the work TDF did,' Mr. Linton commented....
"About The Democracy Fund: Founded in 2021, The Democracy Fund (TDF) is a Canadian charity dedicated to constitutional rights, advancing education, and relieving poverty. TDF promotes constitutional rights through litigation and public education and supports an access to justice initiative for Canadians whose civil liberties have been infringed by government lockdowns and other public policy responses to the pandemic."
August 20, 2024 - "In April of 2020, our portly, red-faced Aw, shucks governor, Tim Walz, was my hero. He’d closed the public schools in our state on March 15th, but spoke — this former teacher and coach — with solemn grace. 'I want to be very clear about this: A decision to close school has a magnitude of consequences,' he said.... Our state was in good hands, it seemed, with a leader who was thinking through all the consequences.
"Then he alone among Democrat governors worked with the wacky Trump administration.... Walz was making cordial calls to the Donald, working out resourcing for the ventilators we’d been told Covid patients would desperately need. President Trump — then in his shutdown send-everyone-a-check phase of the pandemic — actually praised Gov. Walz and issued an uncharacteristically kind tweet....
"I corresponded with a friend living in New York City.... We agreed her situation was scary and her governor deranged. But mine! 'Minnesota may be the best place in the country right now,' I wrote. 'It’s finally warm. The governor is a huggy bear kind of leader who’s been spot-on through this whole thing'....
"On May 25, everything changed. In the Twin Cities, we heard about George Floyd a few hours after he was killed. We saw the footage on our local news stations. My husband and I were horrified, but not surprised; Minneapolis police had a long history of aggression and violence. We saw this as a tragic regional problem. But within 30 hours, our city — our neighborhood — was literally on fire. We lived in St. Paul, across the river from where Floyd was killed, but the cities are seamlessly linked. Riots from Minneapolis traveled east and a stretch of University Avenue, less than a mile from us, went up in flames. Around us, all the stores where we’d been waiting in line for entry since Covid began were boarded up and closed....
"We waited for Walz to speak. I expected him to come out and move among the heartbroken protesters — whose cause I sympathized with—but stand firm and excoriate the outsiders who were in our city throwing smoke bombs and looting. We needed a leader; we deserved one. The police had betrayed us (again). Our neighborhoods smelled of burning cars and decay. We couldn’t buy groceries or pick up prescriptions.
"But after releasing a short safe televised statement denouncing the killing of Floyd, Governor Walz stayed locked inside his mansion. Night after night, newscasters begged him to reassure the public and try to establish order. He did nothing, except put us law-abiding citizens under strict curfews that police enforced by firing paintballs at people who stepped outside their doors.... The governor I’d been trusting to 'keep us safe' hid while the city raged and burned. His contribution was to threaten and lob things at us when we stepped outside to walk our dog.
"I don’t know if Tim Walz changed that week, or I did, or both. But what I saw as his cowardice and failure to lead just continued. When Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey called Walz for help, the governor not only stonewalled, he savaged Frey, saying, 'I don’t think the mayor knew what he was asking for' — and demeaned National Guard troops in the same shouty interview, calling them '19-year-olds who are cooks.'
"It was all theater, big egos playing out on a media stage. Meanwhile, we in Minnesota had lost our social lives, our jobs, our pastimes, and our freedom to move at will. Everything felt dangerous and mean. We were still under Covid orders; now there was a layer of rolling curfews on top. But the rules were capricious and arbitrary. Who you were mattered. A lot. Funerals, by Walz’s own executive order, were limited to 10 people, who were not allowed to hug, touch, or sing.... Yet, Walz attended a massive indoor funeral for George Floyd — along with all the local notables who were cheering on his Covid regulations, including an unmasked can’t-ruin-my-hair Sen. Amy Klobuchar.
Walz et al. at George Floyd funeral.
"There was no satisfactory explanation, just a vague reference to 'the greater good' and 'civil rights' and doublespeak from Dr. Anthony Fauci — the unofficial Covid czar—who said he was 'very concerned' about Covid-19 spreading at protests and celebrations of George Floyd’s life but 'The only thing we can do as public health officials is to keep warning people to be careful.'
"This, despite the fact that Governor Walz had set up a Covid “snitch line”—immediately upon writing stay-at-home orders in March—so Minnesotans could report one another for ‘violations’ and police could intervene. Residents who’d been asked to call and tattle on their neighbors for having a dinner party watched the governor clap, brush shoulders, and sing in praise to George Floyd, a man killed by the very police who’d been empowered to walk into any Minneapolis home, any time, because the owners had been accused by some anonymous caller of a Covid-related crime.
"Am I just naive? Maybe. But this is the point where I became truly terrified of the man who’d commandeered my state — and my life.
"Twelve days before Thanksgiving, as Walz’s second lockdown went into effect (the snitch line not only still operating, but flooded with calls), his press conferences surged in what felt like a nightmarish Orwellian cabaret. Winter was setting in. Minnesota skies were steely gray; the nights frigid and dark. We’d been banned from seeing our families over the holidays.
"The days ground on and Tim Walz looked like a man drunk on newfound power. He appeared on television frequently, talking about how he had to 'dial back' our rights; wagging his face in disapproval like some sort of Frank Capra villain; shouting Covid numbers and scolding us for the number of hospital beds in use.
"He’d bought a $6.9 million morgue for all the bodies (later it turned out no bodies were ever stored there; it was used as a warehouse for personal protective equipment). His Twitter account was a constant parade of 'good news' about what food and alcohol we could order online. When teachers refused to go back into the classroom he washed his hands of the school issue — by January 2021, bars and restaurants were again operating at half-capacity but our two largest school districts with the most low-income students were still remote.
"As the year went on I was more and more vocal, speaking out mostly about schools, taking the governor on. He was gearing up for a re-election campaign and because I was asking questions, people working in the statehouse started reaching out with rumors about a mammoth case of fraud. It involved hundreds of millions of federal dollars earmarked for child nutrition being distributed to sham NGOs run by Democrat donors and friends.
"Problem was, none of our trusted news sources would report on the scheme. Only Sahan Journal, a ‘nonprofit newsroom dedicated to telling stories about Minnesota’s immigrants and communities of color,’ was brave enough to out the governor and his department of Education with a July 2021 story titled 'Judge finds Minnesota Department of Education in contempt for go-slow approach to meal program'.... It would take six months for our newspaper of record to cover the story and then, their stories were oddly focused on how other states had allowed fraud in meal programs, or how officials were acting and payments had been halted. The election came and went and Tim Walz won easily.
"It would be nearly a year of wrangling before the trial and actual reporting began. As many as 47 people — mostly Somali and East African; many friends and donors of the Minnesota DFL — had participated in a scheme to steal at least $250 million (some accounts put the figure at $450 million) from a federally-funded child nutrition program administered by the MN Department of Education. Feeding Our Future was one of the largest successful Covid frauds in America. And it had all happened, after multiple warnings, right under Tim Walz’s thumb.
"By the time a June 2024 audit by the Office of the Legislative Auditor found that the Walz administration had 'created opportunities for fraud,' I was no longer expecting leadership or accountability. I’d gone from learning of that original phone call with Donald Trump in 2020 — admiring our governor for being able to work with our crafty, egotistical, mean-tweeting president — to believing that Tim Walz was by far the more dishonest, uncaring, and self-promoting of the two.
"Walz, true to form, shrugged off the massive waste and failure, telling his friends at the Star Tribune, 'We can always do better,' but rejecting responsibility. Six weeks later, Kamala Harris chose him to be her potential vice president.
"Tim Walz has done some good things as governor. He eliminated the arbitrary requirement of a four-year college degree for state jobs, enacted an effective insulin affordability act, and signed a law mandating 'universal free meals' in Minnesota public schools. But the last seems mostly like a smokescreen for the ... Feeding Our Future fraud.
"Since he became the presumptive VP candidate, stories have come out that I never knew — because media in my state has been running cover for Tim Walz for years. I had never heard about his drunken driving charge, speeding 96 mph in a 55-mile-per-hour zone, when he was a 31-year-old high school teacher — nor his campaign’s lies about the arrest when he was running for Congress in 2006. I did not know he had exaggerated his military rank or repeatedly claimed to have served in war when he did not. But after the past four years spent living under the whims and ego-driven decisions of Tim Walz, none of it surprises me. He’s really just a lefty Trump, only with Hollywood and media on his side."
Members of the Amish community in Chatsworth, Ontario (who do not use electricity or smartphones) have been hit with almost $400,000 in fines for not downloading the Canadian government's ArriveCan app.
August 15, 2024 - "In the serene countryside of Chatsworth, a community of Amish farmers lives as if in the 18th century, adhering strictly to their faith and traditions. Their simple way of life — without electricity, telephones, or the internet — sets them apart from the rest of the modern world. Yet, this peaceful community is now grappling with a problem no one would have expected....
"The problem began with the Canadian government's enforcement of the ArriveCan app during the COVID-19 pandemic. This app was mandatory for anyone entering Canada, requiring travellers to submit their health information digitally. The Amish, however, do not use smartphones, let alone apps. They also have religious exemptions from vaccinations, making the use of such technology unnecessary and intrusive for them. Yet, despite these clear exemptions, the government insisted on compliance, leading to severe penalties....
"The Amish community in Chatsworth has been slapped with nearly $400,000 in fines for not using the ArriveCan app. This is a community that doesn’t use electricity, let alone digital applications. The fines were not just a bureaucratic oversight — they were a targeted action. The government even went so far as to place liens on their properties, effectively freezing their ability to obtain loans and transfer land titles within families.
"These punitive measures have left the Amish community in a state of shock and despair. Imagine being a farmer in need of a loan to buy cattle, only to be told that your property has a lien on it because of fines related to an app you cannot even use.
"This situation is not just an attack on the Amish economy; it’s a direct assault on their religious freedoms. The government’s actions have created an uneven playing field, where a community that lives without modern conveniences is being punished for not participating in a digital system....
"Fortunately, The Democracy Fund has stepped in. They’ve begun taking up the cases of these Amish families, working to overturn the unjust fines and remove the liens placed on their properties. However, the road ahead is long and fraught with challenges, especially given the unique nature of the Amish community’s way of life.
"The Amish may not fight back themselves — they are pacifists by nature — but they have welcomed the help of others who see the injustice in what’s happening. This is not just a fight for the Amish; it’s a fight for religious freedom and the right to live according to one’s beliefs without government interference."
"There may be a role for public policy to support local journalism. That’s the subject of a worthy policy debate. But however one comes down on the question the CBC isn’t the answer."
August 10, 2024 - "As the CBC [Canadian Broadcasting Corp.] faces growing scrutiny, including for a new round of executive bonuses in spite of major layoffs, its proponents continue to hang onto the argument that the public broadcaster is still needed to fill the gaps caused by the decline of local news across the country....
"The recent failure of SaltWire in Nova Scotia and the declining value of Corus local radio and television stations reinforce that it’s highly challenging to generate a sustainable return by producing news for local markets. But ... the CBC doesn’t really provide the type of news that most people ostensibly have in mind when they make such an argument. Public interest local journalism would in theory cover basic civic news like city hall, local sports, or community activities. The CBC’s provincial and local coverage is decidedly not focused on these topics.
"A case in point is an article published this week on the CBC Newfoundland webpage about a local trans man who unexpectedly gave birth to a baby. Whatever one thinks about the story it’s hard to argue that it reflects broad public interest journalism. The article itself indicates that the individual’s chance of conceiving a child was 1.8 percent. The nature of their experience — particularly in St. John’s — is even more atypical. It’s highly niche content that is neither representative of the broad-based local experience nor informative of major national or international developments for a local audience....
"The decline in local news isn’t a new issue.... The CBC had plenty of time to reorient itself as a key part of the government’s response to these developments.... In a parallel universe, the public broadcaster could have reconfigured its staff and other resources beyond the 40 or so communities (which mostly comprise provincial capitals and key population centres) in which it’s currently present. It could have gone much further than last year’s addition of 14 journalists in communities like Cranbrook, Lethbridge, and Kingston to establish itself as a major player in secondary and rural communities across the country. It could have dedicated a greater share of its local coverage to public interest journalism and away from its overemphasis on identity politics."
"If the CBC had pursued these changes in the face of the decline of local news, it would have renewed its public broadcasting mission for today’s media environment and made it far more difficult for Pierre Poilievre and the Conservatives to campaign on the pledge to defund it. Its failure to be responsive to the evolving local media landscape has undermined its strongest argument for continuing to exist.
"There may be a role for public policy to support local journalism. That’s the subject of a worthy policy debate. But however one comes down on the question the CBC isn’t the answer. The CBC doesn’t do public interest local journalism anymore. It does identity politics. And that will ultimately be its downfall."
The coverup of Joe Biden's cognitive decline, and the subsequent coronation of Kamala Harris without a vote, should make clear that the Democratic Party has no use for actual democracy.
Photo by Jorge González. Courtesy Flickr, some rights reserved.
August 13, 2024 - "The coverup of President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline and the resulting coronation, absent a primary vote, of Vice President Kamala Harris should make one thing clear to would-be Democratic voters: the party views you with disdain.
"For years, Democratic leadership insisted to their voters that ... [Biden] was fit as a fiddle. His memory was fine. Perhaps he was a 'super-ager.' In any case, he was going to be the party’s champion once again.... As the 2024 presidential primary — nominally the apparatus by which a party’s voters select their candidate — approached, party leadership took pains to limit who could be on the ballot. The choice was preordained. Despite questions about Biden’s fitness for another campaign — to say nothing of four more years as the man with the nuclear codes — the party tried to engineer early voting among his delegates to cement his name on the top of the ticket....
"That was until a team of 'super friends' — Democratic royalty, from Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi to Chuck Schumer and Jim Clyburn — was assembled to tell Biden that his time was up. Alongside private entreaties and anonymous quotes, the effort to compel Biden to step aside was accomplished behind closed doors, far from the prying eyes of voters....
"With Biden out of the way, the next logical step would have been a contested primary, where candidates made their case to the American people, and delegates from their states ... would decide on a nominee at the Democratic National Convention. This would have been the democratic choice: giving the party’s voters a say on their nominee.... Instead, party leadership quickly closed ranks around Harris.... No primary votes were cast for her but she was selected by acclamation by Democratic Party power brokers.... The last time Democratic Party voters had the opportunity to choose Harris, they were uniform in the opposite direction. As a candidate in the 2020 primary, Harris couldn’t crack double-digit support in Iowa despite an all-hands-on-deck effort in the state, leading her to suspend her campaign months before the caucus began.
"The move is emblematic of nearly every recent Democratic Party presidential nomination. The last meaningfully open presidential primary was in 2008, before the Obama re-elect, Hillary Clinton’s Harris-like coronation, and 2020’s anti-Bernie putsch. If Harris wins the presidency in 2024, it could be nearly a quarter-century between primaries where everyday Democrats had a say in their presidential nominee....
"What these events make clear is that, for all of its self-reverential talk of 'defending democracy,' the Democratic Party in fact disdains democracy as the method by which leaders are selected. What lies beneath all the flowery prose is a cold condescension, a conviction that party leadership knows better than voters what they want, and, in any case, what voters will have. Perhaps no issue illustrates the point better than immigration.... Americans of all political persuasions want the open borders policies that Biden and Harris embraced thrown out. So ... the Democratic Party ... nominated the member of Biden’s administration most publicly associated with the border crisis, whom the New York Times described in 2021 as 'in charge of the effort to stem migration from Central America': Kamala Harris....
"This doubling-down on contentious issues is characteristic of the Biden administration’s approach, but ... such an approach alienates voters, particularly independents, who 'on polarizing policies…are 30 points closer to Republicans [than Democrats]'.... Democrats and the Biden White House have sought to insulate themselves from the criticism by playing it safe, turning inward, and attempting to white-knuckle through the criticism. Biden hid from press engagements. Since being named his successor, Harris has done the same, failing to take live questions from the press for her first two-and-a-half weeks (and counting). While this strategy may work, ... it denies voters any insight into what the candidate stands for or plans to do if elected. Regardless of the electoral outcome, a strategy that relies on denying voters the information they need to form an opinion about a candidate is hardly a resounding embrace of democracy....
"Above all, democracy entails that political parties should aspire to be responsive to the wants and desires of the people. How Democrats and Republicans prioritize those wants and desires is a matter of political discretion. But the Democrats have made clear that they simply aren’t interested in the undertaking at all."
Alberta virologist Dr. Roger Hodkinson has been charged with professional misconduct by the provincial regulatory body for giving his medical opinion on the coronavirus during the pandemic.
July 24, 2024 - "The Democracy Fund (TDF) is defending Dr. Roger Hodkinson in his legal fight with respect to several complaints brought against him by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta (CPSA).
Dr, Roger Hodkinson (courtesy TDF).
"The CPSA has charged Dr. Hodkinson with professional misconduct, alleging that he wrongly commented on the efficacy of masks and social distancing in preventing the spread of COVID-19, the usefulness of vitamin D in protecting against COVID-19, the necessity and unqualified safety of COVID-19 vaccines, and the COVID-19 testing protocol.
Dr. Hodkinson's lawyer, Sarah Miller, said: 'The CPSA continues to prosecute Dr. Hodkinson for expressing his opinions on the government's response to COVID-19. We are proceeding to a five-day hearing in November for the CPSA to hear and determine whether Dr. Hodkinson breached his obligations under the Code of Ethics and Professionalism. The hearing represents a considerable use of resources to exercise authority over Dr. Hodkinson's public expression of his closely held beliefs.'
"About The Democracy Fund: Founded in 2021, The Democracy Fund (TDF) is a Canadian charity dedicated to constitutional rights, advancing education, and relieving poverty. TDF promotes constitutional rights through litigation and public education and supports an access to justice initiative for Canadians whose civil liberties have been infringed by government lockdowns and other public policy responses to the pandemic."
Dominic Cardy, former NDP leader in New Brunswick, then PC Education Minister (before being expelled from caucus), and founder of Centre Ice Conservatives (now Centre Ice Canadians), unveils his new "centrist" Canadian federal political party.
August 14, 2024 - "Canada's newest federal political party officially launched in Ottawa on Wednesday. The Canadian Future Party is billing itself as a centrist option for voters unhappy with both the Liberals and Conservatives.... 'Canadians have been asked to play a political shell game," interim leader Dominic Cardy told a press conference in Ottawa. 'Under the shell on the left, the social programs you need. But along with it, too often you have to buy bloated government, ever-increasing spending, divorced from delivering results. Under the shell on the right, we're supposed to find fiscal discipline. But along with it, too often there's a mean-spirited approach that blames the most vulnerable for their plight, selfishness masquerading as liberty'....
"Interim party president Tara McPhail, a former activist with the Conservative Party, joined Cardy at Wednesday's launch. She said the new party is a place for Canadians like her who are 'politically homeless'.... '[Canadians] don't like the options on the left or the right," McPhail said. 'And we've moved away from ... policy and a tone of moderation and civility. And when I speak with Canadians, they say they'd like to see more of that'....
"The Canadian Future Party will put itself to the test right out of the gate by fielding candidates in byelections in LaSalle—Émard—Verdun and Elmwood—Transcona next month. Mark Khoury is on the ballot in the Quebec race, while the party's candidate for the Manitoba race will be announced in the coming days....
"Cardy laid out five policy planks on which he says the new party will be campaigning: reforming government programs, increasing Canada's defence spending to two per cent of its gross domestic product, reforming immigration through 'better gatekeepers,' making life more affordable by 'dismantling protectionism' and increasing competition in the airline, telecommunications and agricultural sectors." Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-future-party-launches-1.7294230
September 20, 2023 - "A new political party aiming to offer a centrist approach to federal politics has officially been launched, with former Higgs government cabinet minister and still-sitting MLA Dominic Cardy as interim leader.... The party will be exclusively federal and headed by a national council with a representative from each province and territory.... What was originally the Centre Ice Conservatives, and then the Centre Ice Canadians, emerged mid-pandemic believing the federal Conservatives had drifted too far right, as Poilievre steamrolled over a more centrist-positioned Jean Charest to grab party leadership....
"Cardy was acclaimed party leader of the New Brunswick New Democrats in 2011 and led the party to a best-ever showing with 12.98 per cent of the popular vote in the 2014 provincial election. But the party didn’t win a single seat. He resigned on election night, later reconsidered, though eventually resigned again in 2017....
"Just weeks later, then opposition Progressive Conservative Leader Blaine Higgs turned heads by appointing Cardy as strategic issues director. Cardy was soon promoted to chief of staff and then eventually ran and won under the Progressive Conservative banner in Fredericton West-Hanwell in the 2018 provincial election. He was then named Education minister, keeping that job for nearly four years, before resigning with an epic public letter that held no punches in slamming Higgs’s leadership style. He was then expelled from caucus and remains a sitting independent MLA.
"Cardy said he will remain as a New Brunswick MLA until the next provincial election, working on the federal party as an unpaid volunteer part time. He said he won’t be seeking reelection.... Cardy said he will run for a federal seat under the new party banner, and suggested he may seek to be the Canadian Future Party’s permanent leader." Read more: https://nationalpost.com/news/new-federal-party-will-have-new-brunswick-politician-as-interim-leader
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