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Ottawa, Meta escalate schoolyard spat over Bill C-18
The spat between Ottawa and Big Tech went to another level this week after Meta announced it would stop carrying links to Canadian news stories to comply with the Online News Act. With the effort to make Big Tech pay up collapsing, online media face the double whammy of not only losing vital traffic, but also their financial support from Google and Facebook.
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Foreign-influenced corporations must stop meddling in domestic affairs
The Canadian debate on foreign election meddling has focused almost exclusively on China. Some also want to investigate the interventions of other foreign governments. The foreign meddling debate in the United States is broader and encompasses powerful non-state actors, including foreign-influenced corporations. The debate in Canada needs to be broadened too.
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Canada and the new Cold War
As Owen Schalk and Henry Heller explain, given Ottawa’s increasingly belligerent actions in the Pacific, its growing military cooperation with states hostile to Beijing, and the openly antagonistic way Canadian officials discuss China, it seems that Canada wants to delink its economy from China’s in order to prepare for a direct military confrontation.
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Doug Ford’s health care hoodwink
The universal health care system has long been sacred for Canadians of every political stripe. However, the strain placed upon the system during the COVID-19 pandemic has created an opportunity for right-wing governments to challenge this conventional wisdom, seeking to expand private sector involvement in the delivery of health care services.
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The Socialist Register on the state and the transition to socialism
The “in and against the state” view that is promoted by the Socialist Register has considerable support on the socialist left. Given the extraordinary period in the evolution of global capitalism which we are living through, this perspective needs to be carefully considered. The latest volume of the Socialist Register is an excellent basis for moving that process forward.
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The NDP is a spent force in Canadian politics
The New Democratic Party, in both its federal and provincial iterations, has struggled in no small part because of a misguided notion that it should move to the centre to improve its electoral prospects. This has so far proven disastrous for the party. The bulk of the NDP’s success in the last two decades came under the avowedly progressive leadership of Jack Layton.
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Trust us? Whether it’s government or media, you have simply got to be kidding
The shifting sands of the ongoing communication revolution are still settling, but it is abundantly clear so far that digital communication gives government an advantage over journalists. Canadians are right to be increasingly skeptical of its media messages and should under no circumstances simply trust what the government tells them.
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Canadian aid for Cuba? 35 national and regional organizations support it
Cuba desperately needs food and medical aid now. It also deserves an end to the longest-standing embargo in modern times. Canada can play a major role in promoting both outcomes. By doing so it will provide desperately needed humanitarian assistance, but will also enhance its own role in the region where Cuba plays an outsized role. The ball is now in the court of Ministers Joly and Sajjan.
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Understanding the RCMP’s role in residential schooling
On May 23, 2023 the Royal Canadian Mounted Police celebrated its 150th anniversary and kicked off a series of #RCMP150 initiatives. To counter the uncritical mythologizing of the Mounties we are seeing—from the prime minister to the RCMP itself—the National RCMP Research Council has created a new website to share truths about the force.
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Inciting anti-Chinese hatred
We must do all we can to counter the climate of war fervour being incited as rivalry intensifies, writes CD columnist John Clarke. The current anti-Chinese campaign has some very powerful backers and it is being pursued relentlessly. It is ugly, toxic and reactionary to the core and we need to build a united opposition to challenge and defeat it.