The view from Pete

There's always more to the story

Category: Canadian politics

  • I get the antipathy towards fracking; its a drilling technique fraught with risks to carbon pollution; potential groundwater contamination and seismic activity. Its also the exclusive technique used to extract natural gas and shale oil. Now for the sake of this article, I’m not considering the environmental aspect of the Green’s argument – because at…

  • And full disclosure: I’m not a liberal party supporter and likely will not vote for them this time either. The intensely personal nature of the political attacks against Justin Trudeau are turning off folks who the conservatives would need to win. I get it, alright? The Trudeau name is highly unpopular, even hated, by many…

  • * Almost. The hint is #13 of their “Mission Possible” document. Before. After. The point is that in #13, the Green Party, as a government would compel changes that would both end subsidies to fossil fuels while simultaneously investing (taxpayer money) in new and expanded fossil fuel infrastructure in Canada. I may not be an…

  • But this may not play out as you imagine. It’s not a big secret that Warren’s leanings are clearly Liberal; whether he’s a party member or not. He was an able war-room soldier for the Chrétien gov’t and earned the grudging respect of even his opponents while he held the role. But let’s look deeper.…

  • If you’re just tuning in now, you may have been tempted to think the rising star of the conservatives will run to the rescue of beleaguered modest and middle income earners and save Canada from the elitist egg heads of the Liberal Party. There’s a problem with that. Both Liberal and Conservative politicians serve the…

  • The NDP is not going through some existential crisis, the political ground that’s moving is on the right and far right; and this is not a playground the NDP should dabble in. Ever. Its worth reminding folks that Saint Jack Layton was a relative centrist in his overall philosophy; this is why he appealed to…

  • Trickle down economics has never worked. Ever. Yet it was tried again here in BC when the BC Liberals took office in 2001 with results that literally anyone could have predicted. Now a former Gordon Campbell cabinet minister reflects back on the times that were and thinks it wasn’t good times. We could have told…

  • By now, most Canadians have heard the story of the Victoria city councillor who put forward a motion to city hall to ask the Department of National Defence to help defray the policing costs of Remembrance Day and related events. This request originated from the city’s police board as costs predictably increased. So far so…

  • Look, as a straight white guy, I shouldn’t have anything to say about Pride Month, the rainbow flag or the many pride parades and related events happening in June. Except for this: human rights. Once you accept the fact that the state has no business interfering with the private affairs of consenting adults, it’s an…

  • Everyone should be opposed to fascism. I saw on my TV the white supremacist “protests” at Charlottesville from a year ago and the news of the woman their movement murdered in protesting these neo-nazis, but today I learned that this woman and the uppity protesters she was part of are the real enemy. No seriously,…