“What is a life worth?”
Month: October 2020
Tomorrow — Monday October 26th, 2020 — is #ElectionDay in two Toronto ridings. Newly elected Green…
Tomorrow — Monday October 26th, 2020 — is #ElectionDay in two Toronto ridings.
Newly elected Green Party of Canada leader Annamie Paul is running to win the Toronto Centre seat vacated by former Liberal Finance Minister Bill Morneau (amidst WE scandal ethics questions) . Annamie is both a brilliant candidate and an excellent choice to represent this, her home riding.
Photographer Sasha Zavarella is running in York Centre, where another Canadian National Party Leader — this time Peoples Party of Canada’s Maxime Bernier.
Neither of these by-Elections will change the balance of power in Ottawa.
That means voters are free to vote for what they want — they don’t have to worry vote splitting will result in the party they fear winning majority power.
Since by-Elections historically have poor attendance at the best of times (and a pandemic is surely not one of those times!) fewer votes cast means these votes will have more weight. This is a brilliant opportunity for voters in these formerly safe seats whose votes never elect anyone to cast a vote that may be heard. Greens across Canada are rooting for Annamie, because the sooner our leader can take her seat in Parliament the better we’ll be able to hold the government to account.
It is important to remember the other big parties “whip” MP votes, which means their MPs represent their party first, because, if they don’t, they can lose party support which invariably means losing their seat. Whipped votes used to be a rarity, but in recent times they have become the default for NDP, Liberal and Conservative MPs.
Green MPs differ from other major party MPs because first and foremost they represent the constituents of their ridings. If there is a conflict between what is best for their riding or what’s best for the party, the best interest of their constiuents come first. Always.
If you live in either of these two ridings, your vote for Annamie or Sasha will mean something. We’ve seen what an impact Mike Schreiner has made as a single Green MPP. Electing another Liberal will just be more of the same old. But Greens will always make a difference.
And we can give our votes more power if we can convince our friends and families to vote too.
Even in our terribly unrepresentative voting system, voting is incredibly important. Even our vote is unlikely to change the outcome, it puts our choice on the record.
If you live in one of these ridings, please vote tomorrow. (And make sure to wear a mask when you do!) It is so important — and perhaps even more important:
VOTE FOR WHAT YOU WANT.
(Even if you don’t want what I want.)
If enough of us vote for what we want, we might just get it. And Annamie has an excellent chance of winning this one.
So get out and Vote!
Hey #BCpoli — VOTE FOR WHAT YOU WANT
Hey #BCpoli —
VOTE FOR WHAT YOU WANT
mintamenapie: Shout out to all your internet friends who are gone. Those messenger screen names that…
Shout out to all your internet friends who are gone.
Those messenger screen names that haven’t logged on in ages, some before detailed profiles were a thing on those services.
Those emails that are long since abandoned, some with domains that no longer exist.
Those online friends you knew years ago and who then helped shaped you in some way, who you just can’t FIND anymore.
Those people who once were, and hopefully still exist IRL, that seem to have no known internet life anymore.
And those who have actually passed on, and their online lives are now a memorial to them.
I miss you all. I hope life is/was kind to you, and maybe one day, we’ll somehow connect again.
“Frodo woke and found himself lying in bed. At first he thought that he had slept late, after a long…”
“
- J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring.
Frodo woke and found himself lying in bed. At first he thought that he had slept late, after a long unpleasant dream… Or perhaps he had been ill? But the ceiling looked strange; it was flat, and it had dark beams richly carved. He lay a little while longer looking at patches of sunlight on the wall, and listening to the sound of a waterfall.
‘Where am I, and what is the time?’ he said aloud to the ceiling.
'In the House of Elrond, and it is ten o'clock in the morning.’ said a voice. 'It is the morning of October the twenty-fourth, if you want to know.’
'Gandalf!’ cried Frodo, sitting up. There was the old wizard, sitting in a chair by the open window.
'Yes,’ he said, 'I am here. And you are lucky to be here, too, after all the absurd things you have done since you left home.’
”- J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring.
laurasimonsdaughter: fictionadventurer: Fairy Tales Involving Fiber Arts: The Wild…
Fairy Tales Involving Fiber Arts:
- The Wild Swans
- Rumpelstiltskin
- Sleeping Beauty
- Clever Anait
- (sort of) The Emperor’s New Clothes
- Vasilisa the Beautiful
- The Tsarevna Frog (Russian)
- Baba Yaga (Russian)
- Spindle, Shuttle, and Needle (German)
- Frau Holle (German)
- The Elves and the Shoemaker (German)
- And Seven! (Italian) and The Three Spinners (German)
- The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl (Chinese)
- Also (sort of), all stories where a daughter asks for three marvellous gowns to stall for time, like All-Kinds-of-Fur (German), Donkeyskin (French), Catskin (English), The King Who Wished to Marry His Daughter (Scottish), Mossycoat (English) and The Princess That Wore a Rabbit-skin Dress (North American).
delta-breezes:Luke Stackpoole
View this post on Instagram A post shared by WSS Greens (@wssgreens) on Oct 20,…
Decades after the Supreme Court of Canada confirmed the inherent right of Indigenous people to hunt and fish, both for sustenance and a #ModerateLivelihood, the Canadian Government has yet to work with the First Nations Peoples signatory to the Peace and Friendship Treaties to establish a reasonable definition of what that means.
Chief Michael Sack said,
“We’ll define our own moderate livelihood. We’re not here to have anybody decide anything for us. We’ll decide as a Mi'kmaq nation and and move forward that way.”
Which is why the Sipekne'katik First Nation decided to establish its own fishery infrastructure, launched exactly 21 years after the SCC’s Marshall decision. Donald Marshall Jr.’s son Randy Sack received the first of the seven moderate livelihood licenses (50 tags each) issued by the Sipekne'katik Fishery to the Indian Brook band on September 17th. To date a total of 10 licenses, each allows the licensee to use a maximum of 50 traps. That is a total of 500 traps. Contrast that with the 900,000 traps used by the Commercial Fisheries.
The reaction by Commercial Fishers has been violent, and Indigenous fishers have faced threats and intimidation, been shot at with flare guns, had their gear stolen or vandalized, trucks and boats destroyed, and since a Lobster Pound that dealt with Commercial and Indigenous fishers was targeted, vandalized and destroyed, others are refusing to do business with them. Today Chief Sack got a Court Injunction to help protect his people and their Moderate Livelihood Fishery.
“Charles: I think a lot of people don’t fully understand what the Indigenous communities’ rights are. They don’t fully understand that the First Nations have rights that are different from the privileges to fish that non-Natives have.” — Hakai Magazine: Mi’kmaw Fishery Dispute Is Not About Conservation, Scientists Say
https://www.hakaimagazine.com/news/mikmaw-fishery-dispute-is-not-about-conservation-scientists-say/
An important Canadian by-election is underway in Toronto Centre. When Liberal finance minister Bill…
An important Canadian by-election is underway in Toronto Centre. When Liberal finance minister Bill Morneau resigned, he left the Liberal stronghold unrepresented. But the reality is this riding has not been very well represented for decades.
Because it has been a safe seat, high profile Liberals (like Mr Morneau) are routinely parachuted in. Because they lack strong community ties, they represent the Liberal Party in Parliament, but don’t do a very good job for most of the people who actually live in Toronto Centre. That’s why all important social issues have run rampant here, despite the powerful MPs who are supposed to represent it.
Annamie Paul just won the Green Party Leadership while beginning her campaign to represent the voters of Toronto Centre. Even if she didn’t have strong ties to this community, Annamie Paul would represent the citizens of Toronto Centre far better than any candidate from the other major parties because Green MPs represent their constituents first.
Mike Schreiner has demonstrated what a single Green MPP can accomplish with a majority PC government. Imagine what Annamie Paul could do for her constituents in a minority Parliament!
I don’t live in Toronto Centre, although I worked there decades ago. It’s where I had my first experience of homeless people. Despite all the powerful MPs Toronto Centre has had since, not only has that problem grown, it’s spread nation wide without any end in sight. Only the Green Party has effective policies to address poverty and homelessness.
I am so impressed with Annamie I want to help. But though I don’t live there, I can lend my grass root support to her campaign by volunteering to make phone calls.
And you can, too. See what you can do to help elect this amazing woman. We need MPs like Annamie in the House of Commons if we are ever going to get our governments to make the changes that need to be made.
That’s why I’ll be making phone calls for Annamie this week. I hope you can help Annamie on some way too.
BE DARING! GO GREEN!
Annamie Paul | Leader of the Green Party
Office CatWe have two cats and three people. Nick seems to have…
Office Cat
We have two cats and three people. Nick seems to have resolved this problem by deciding where he will visit with us. One of the places he visits me is when O’m working at my computer. But he will never sit on my lap downstairs when I’m watching TV.