Advocates of democratic electoral reform are really out of step. Ideas like proportional representation and advertising spending limits are so retro, so 2004.
The fashionable electoral reform idea this year is to give corporations a real say. It’s time for individual citizens to share their electoral democracy with corporations to give meaning to those old legal rulings that said corporations are people too.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVANr9S4m1c
Youth environmentalist and filmmaker Slater Jewell-Kemker speaks out at the Anti-Prorogation Rally at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Canada on January 23rd.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEery7EczUg&feature=related
George Heyman, Executive Director of Sierra Club BC, closes out the Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament rally with a stirring speech on what our democracy really means. Over 1000 people gathered at the Vancouver Art Gallery January 23.
Harper's agenda has a simple goal: destroy the Canadian social safety net.
For the second year in a row, British Columbians have put
the same five issues at the top of the heap in response to the open-ended
question “What is the most important problem facing your community?” Besides
housing and homelessness, British Columbians named crime/safety, transportation,
and healthcare as their top five concerns. To view a presentation of the poll click here.
In 1999 Rocky Anderson was elected mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah, the capital city of America’s most conservative state. Within 8 years he had instituted some of the western world’s most progressive policies on environmental sustainability, social inclusion and youth justice. In the process, he earned a World Leadership Award, exceeded Salt Lake City's Kyoto targets by 150% (7 years ahead of Kyoto target dates), and co-chaired the Sundance Mayors Summit on Climate Protection with Robert Redford, to spread the word on how cities can lead the way to a better planet.
As councillors and
school board trustees strive to create environmentally and socially sustainable
communities, the robustness of local democracies is being threated from several
angles. This handbook contains
information on some of the most urgent challenges being faced in 2007.
Local communities are going all out as they “go for green” from:
• the Capital Regional District’s energy plan, to
• Squamish’s global warming pledge, to
• Ucluelet’s official community plan that took the United
Nations’ top prize, to
