Monthly Archives: March 2021

While I wholeheartedly agree that homelessness is a significant problem in Asheville, as a garden educator and community herbalist, I have to take issue with the notion that urban gardening spaces are contributing [The Problem with Urban Food Gardening, Feb. 17, Xpress].

I can assure you, working in a public school, Im not part of the liberal bourgeoisie, but I have seen the neighborhood change drastically in recent years with rapid gentrification. I, like you, worry about the sharp rise in homelessness, but urban gardens are not to blame in the least. They are often located on land not suitable for residential construction and are one of the few places where unhoused folks can simply exist for free.

In fact, they not only provide a relaxing respite from the streets, but community gardens also act as a source of free fresh produce, a precious commodity.

Furthermore, if we look at the land use in a historical context, we see that before urban renewal snatched large swatches of land from low-income neighborhoods, these gardens served as a critical piece of the communities food security.

Urban gardens are desperately needed to capture carbon, a benefit for all residents of the city regardless of income, and they provide a critical oasis for the pollinators that our larger food systems rely on. And, to your point, there is no better way to cut down your commute than walking down the road to pick your produce rather than having it trucked in from all reaches of the land. There is such joy in finding my students walking home through the garden, leisurely picking an after-school snack as they go.

I promise you that urban agriculture isnt a fantasy; its a real mutual aid practice already in action that strengthens communities, improves health outcomes and ensures there will always be a place in town to rest in the shade of a tree and enjoy the fruits that Mother Earth provides for all of her residents, regardless of their ability to pay.

Summer WheldenAsheville

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Letter: The many benefits of urban food gardens - Mountain Xpress

I am writing as a result of Ms. Diamonds excellent letter on land protection (Lack of political will continues to plague land policy in P.E.I., Feb. 24, Journal Pioneer) and subsequently P.E.I. Environment Minister Steven Myers's willingness to push through the Water Act with no regard for public input and the long-term welfare of all people residing on Prince Edward Island.

Islanders are frustrated to no end with successive provincial governments' attempts to give our most precious resources to corporate P.E.I.

In fact, taxpayers have already funded, in large part, the endless studies of the relationship between the people, the Water Act and the Lands Protection Act, and the corporations, to no avail.

Successive provincial administrations (Liberal and Conservative) have waffled relentlessly in a concentrated effort to please corporate P.E.I., even though the outcome will be to the detriment of Island residents.

It is time for Islanders to hold a referendum on both the Water Act and the Lands Protection Act. The legislative assembly is in session and it is incumbent upon the opposition to introduce motions to that effect. Lets get this done.

If the Irvings leave, so be it, we will not only survive but most likely thrive. The hundreds of millions in profits that leave the Island would be welcome here.

And if our politicians are worth their salt, they will not allow off-Island interests to have such crippling control of our economy ever again.

It is time to remind our political masters who really matters. Our political system is not working for the people.

Our politicians are destroying the citizens' faith in the political process by bending to the pressure of the almighty dollar; the benefit of which has little to do with society at large.

Time for electoral reform and tools such as recall and termination of engagement when members of the legislative assembly go rogue supporting executive approved legislation detrimental to the greater public good.

Wayne Carver,

Longcreek

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LETTER: P.E.I. government showing no regard for public input on land protection issue - The Journal Pioneer

The Liberal government introduced legislation Tuesday to speed up settlements of land claims and to address land ownership inequities in five historic African Nova Scotian communities.

For more than 300 years, many African Nova Scotians have been living on land passed down by their ancestors without clear title, Justice Minister Randy Delorey said at a bill briefing.

Without legal certainty of ownership, many residents in these communities are unable to exercise all of the benefits of land ownership that the rest of us take for granted, such as obtaining a mortgage, dividing or selling their land, accessing housing grants or building equity in their homes, Delorey said.

This is unacceptable.

The Land Titles Initiative was launched in 2017 to help residents get clear title to land in East Preston, North Preston, Cherry Brook/Lake Loon, Lincolnville and Sunnyville.

Delorey said the initiative was intended to address a "long-standing, systemic racism, by assisting residents in those communities secure clear title to their land and righting the wrongs of the past.

The legislation introduced Tuesday is an amendment to the Land Titles Clarification Act, outlining its purpose and scope and creating an expanded role for commissioners that allow for negotiation, mediation and voluntary arbitration of claims, and to create broader authority to administer the initiative.

The amendment also formally establishes the new $3-million compensation fund, announced on March 5, to support negotiated, mediated and arbitrated resolutions of claims involving parties with competing interests.

A dedicated executive director and two commissioners were also named to help accelerate the title claims.

Under the initiative, all legal and surveyor fees are covered at no cost to the applicant, Deloreysaid.

The minister said 200 parcels of land in those five communities have already been cleared among 527 applications received. More than 850 parcels of land in those communities are eligible for land claims. The program is expected to push out to other communities in the future.

These amendments to the Land Titles Clarification Act will provide greater clarity, solidify processes and bridge gaps that will allow us to better serve the needs of our clients and communities, said Lauren Grant, manager of the land titles initiative at Communities, Culture and Heritage.

Revising the municipal subdivision requirements will help address many of our clients unique circumstances, Grant said.

I am confident that this amendment will accelerate the work and help to clear many land titles in our historical African Nova Scotian communities.

Tony Ince, minister of African Nova Scotian Affairs, said community work done in the past two years has been a teaching tool.

My government colleagues and I will continue to work with residents in these communities to identify solutions that remove barriers and support residents to achieve title to their families' lands, Ince said.

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Legislation will speed up land claims in historic African Nova Scotian communities - TheChronicleHerald.ca

Jacob Fillmore is fed up with the Liberal government ignoring him and his call for a moratorium on clearcutting on Crown land.

I was lied to, that much is quite obvious Fillmore, who was on Day 17 of his hunger strike Wednesday, said of a promised then aborted meeting with Chuck Porter, minister of lands and forestry.

I am a little disappointed that it didnt turn out as well as I thought it was going to," Fillmore said.

Fillmore has been on a hunger strike to back his demand for a moratorium on clearcutting on Crown land until the long-promised forestry reforms recommended in the Lahey report are implemented.

I would have asked him what the holdup is on declaring a moratorium and asked him if that is not something he could do, then what is, Fillmore, a 25-year-old Haligonian, said of what he would have asked the minister if the meeting promise had been fulfilled.

Does he not feel that the forests need more sufficient protection immediately.

Fillmore, buoyed by an hour-long rally that drew about a hundred people to the front gate of Province House on Tuesday, said he had intended to move his protest from Province House to the lands and forestry office but was told when he got there by the deputy minister that Porter would meet with him Wednesday.

Yesterday was great with the crowd and with what I thought was a promise to meet, said Fillmore, who has been spending his days for the last couple of weeks in front of Province House.

I showed up here (Province House) around 9:30 and waited around, Fillmore said of having been told that Porter would meet him after he finished an earlier morning engagement.

Porter got out of his engagement, got into his car and didnt bother looking too hard to try to find me, Fillmore said.

Fillmore, who had hand delivered a letter requesting a meeting to Porters office on Friday, said he was told later in the day Wednesday by a person in Porters office that he would have to send a formal email in order to arrange a meeting with the minister.

Hand-delivered letters and promises from the deputy minister and even from Porter himself none of that is actually an official promise that he will meet with me, Fillmore said.

Fillmore said that Porter told a gathering in Windsor in his riding of West Hants on Tuesday that he would meet with Fillmore the next day.

Surviving primarily on soup broth and water, Fillmore said the plan for what he might do next is still coming together.

Ill make it until at least next Tuesday, Fillmore said of continuing his hunger strike until the day another rally is planned in front of Province House.

Lisa Roberts, the New Democrat representative for Halifax Needham, raised Fillmores epic protest during the legislative session Wednesday.

Yesterday, amidst many concerns of where we are going as a province, there was one bit of hope which was that the minister of lands and forestry was to meet with Mr. Fillmore today, Roberts said. Unfortunately, and to my great disappointment and his (Fillmores), the minister did not attend that meeting. This is one of many reasons why we ought to be concerned about the leadership of this government on the file of lands and forestry.

In the traditional mandate letters from the premier to appointed ministers that the government made available Wednesday, Premier Iain Rankin said the choices of the past in forestry that led to degradation of the provinces woods have to give way to new ecological forestry choices.

Rankins first directive to Porter as minister of lands and forestry is to implement the Lahey report.

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Hunger striker says lands and forestry minister reneged on promise to meet him - TheChronicleHerald.ca

As our job search narrowed to a handful of candidates, we began the process of in-person interviews. On paper and in their initial presentations, one candidate stood out to me more than the others: more confidence, more poise, and a veteran resume that put him head and shoulders above the crowd. We had also recently served in the same organizationalthough in different brigadesand likely shared some common connections. These were the interviews I relished because they allowed for a more relaxed conversation rather than a by-the-numbers back-and-forth.

After exchanging introduction and a few perfunctory questions, we settled into my preferred interview battle rhythm. I saw on your resume that you were on 3rd Brigade staff during the initial invasion. Do you stay in touch with any of the rest of the team? I asked. No, not really, he answered. We kind of drifted apart. Fair enough, I thought. It happens. The others on the search panel followed with a couple of innocuous questions before it was my turn again. Tell me about the writing award you won in the Command and General Staff College. What did you write about? To me, this seemed like a good question to get him comfortable and talking. It wasnt a big deal, he replied. When it was clear he wasnt going to elaborate, I added, What was your subject? Leadership, he answered curtly while shifting a bit uncomfortably. This was going nowhere.

Follow up questions were asked and answered in brief bursts with little or no elaboration. Either hes really uncomfortable or somethings not right, I remember thinking. I want to ask you about your last job, I said to him. How would you describe your interactions with your supervisor? His former boss was an old friend and one of the most well-liked leaders I know. We got along okay, I guess. Thats it? Just okay? He had nothing else to add. The interview continued that way until we finished. Short answers. Curt responses. No real engagement with the committee members.

After he departed the conference room where we staged the interview, I looked at the others and said, Was it just me or was something off about that interview? We all agreed that this wasnt just a case of nerves. The candidate wed seen on paper and presenting to us in a group setting was not the same person who arrived for the in-person interview. For him, it would have been a dream job. But it didnt happen. Our unease was enough to scratch him from the list. It was a gut call, but one of the smartest ones we made that day.

Unfortunately, this experience is not at all unique. The situation itself might change from person to person, but Ive heard more than my share of similar stories where someone walked into an interview as the ideal candidate and left without a job offer. It happens for different reasons, but it happens. And its often our own fault. Its not particularly complicated, either.

The longer you remain in uniform, the more experience you build. Its a safe bet that you have more leadership experience and have managed larger budgets than the company considering your application. Dont rub their noses in it. Keep your resume short and focused, emphasizing what you bring to the table as a TEAM member. Hint: Have someone proofread your resume; theres nothing worse than resume riddled with mistakes.

Stick to the facts. While you might think you are strengthening your resume with a bit of creative imagination, its not all that difficult for someone to fact check your resume. And when the facts dont line up, neither do the job offers. Hint: Despite the size of your office, a company commander is not a strategic-level leader.

Face it, no matter what you do or where you go, its very likely youll be the FNG. You might even (shudder) end up working for someone who is the age of your children. Get over it. Starting over is a humbling experience and interviewers can tell when youre lacking in that department. Hint: Avoid offering combatives lessons to those who annoy you; it might be entertaining but can lead to complaints.

You are. So are the 500 servicemembers who transitioned from the military yesterday. And the 500 leaving tomorrow. Dont let that attitude bleed into an interview. You want a potential employee to likenot loatheyou. Were all unique in our own special ways; that doesnt mean everyone else lives on a lower plane than you. Hint: Be genuine. As long as your genuine doesnt make the people around you sick.

You dont have a career focused online profile (or you have a crappy one). You think Twitter is a liberal conspiracy. You quit Facebook because they locked your profile for posting disinformation. Fun fact: 70% of employers screen candidates through social media. As a result, the absence of a social media presence (or a really bad one) is a pretty fast way to self-select out of a job interview. Hint: Find a millennial to help you with social media.

That dream job is waiting for you. Just be sure that your future employer sees you as the dream candidate for that job.

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Unemployment Blues: 5 Reasons You're the Ideal Candidate Who Can't Land the Dream Job - ClearanceJobs

For how many generations will reservations continue?

The five-judge bench that is meant to examine whether the 13% Maratha reservation is valid or not, will also examine the 50% cap on reservations the Mandal Commission judgment.

This question only indicates that the Indian judiciary in its present mode of thinking is suspicious of the positive role of reservations in changing the caste-cultural inequality.

But so far, no Supreme Court judge has asked, For how many generations will caste inequality continue? from a sitting bench.

Let us see the conditions of Shudras or OBCs in places where reservations were treated as anti-meritocracy and also as going against socialist equality, for instance in Bengal.

Bengal in general and West Bengal after Partition, in particular, produced several leading intellectuals of India. Three castes Brahmins, Kayasthas and Baidyas were the most educated, giving rise to what is known as the Bengal Renaissance.

In the process of their nationalist renaissance, they designated themselves as bhadralok (great and gentle people). The rest of the Shudras and Nama Shudras were designated chotolok (or chotalok, small or low people, meaning lower or mean castes). This division of bhadra and choto further adds to the humiliation and oppression of the caste system, but the Bengal Brahminic renaissance accepted it as normal.

When Tamil Nadu initiated the reservation battle, the Bengali bhadralok intellectuals saw that as anti-modernist and anti-merit. No anti-Brahmin consciousness was allowed to emerge from Bengal. The Bengali bhadralok of all ideologies (that state was mainly divided into liberal and communist) hated the reservation ideology coming from the South.

Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty

The chotolok never told the bhadralok that they, who were historically assigned the job of doing agriculture and artisanal tasks needed reservation in education and employment. The bhadralok, even now, does not put a hand to the plough. The bhadraloks socialist and liberal ideologies did not change the caste-based work division.

The Bengali bhadralok was among the most educated in Sanskrit and Persian (during the Muslim rule) by the time British arrived in India. After the Raj was established by the English, they were the earliest English-educated Indians, starting with Raja Rammohan Roy. They were also first to cross the seas violating the Brahmin dictum never to doit. Roy was perhaps the first modern Brahmin to die in England.

Also read: West Bengals Landscape Is Shifting from Party Society to Caste Politics

No chotolok man or woman could become the chief minister of Bengal so far.

Bengal is the state which has given the least number of reserved jobs to Shudras, OBCs, SCs, STs following its own cardinal principle that reservations will destroy the sacrosanct Bengali merit.

The Mahishya community, which is the largest Shudra agrarian group, is for reservations and is tilting towards the BJP. The party has made a Shudra, Dilip Ghosh, the state party president and chief ministerial candidate.

Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu

Against Bengal, the Maharashtra experiment shows a different way. In that too the Brahmins, Banias but also Shudras and Ati-Shudras got early English education and produced the likes of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, V.D. Savarkar and also Mahatma Jyothirao and Savitribai Phule.

Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

There was also an early reservation and preferential treatment demand for Shudras and Ati-Shudras.

Chattrapati Shahu Maharaj, the ruler of Kolhapur, initiated the early reservation process which helped B.R. Ambedkar emerged from the Dalit community to give voice to multi-caste ambition. Today, the Marathas who were not for reservation in 1990 see the need for it. Now even Shahu Maharajs grandchildren are demanding it. A strong middle class and educationally ambitious social force has risen from all castes in Maharashtra because of reservation and others want to be part of it.

Similarly the Tamil Nadu experiment with reservations has improved the conditions of all castes. The Brahmins and Chettiars who are outside the reservation ambit did not get pushed down to the labour markets. They invented new ways of living a better life.

The Indian judiciary must see reservation in the light of the successful Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu mode of accommodation and diversification in every field of life by all castes and communities. On the other hand, West Bengal is a negative example of social stagnation because of lack of a drive towards reservation and educational motivation.

In a stagnant state, without much middle class formation among Nama Shudras and Shudras, the BJP seems to be attracting the Shudras and OBCs. The left-liberal no caste in Bengal theory is seen as a most regressive ideological step.

BJP supporters during Prime Minister Narendra Modis public meeting ahead of West Bengal Assembly Polls, at Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata, Sunday, March 7, 2021. Photo: PTI/Swapan Mahapatra

The anti-identity politics of this bhadralok stream of thought is now paying a heavy price. Reserved candidates in every institution have brought the identity of community and its social status into focus and that played a transforming role. But the left-liberals of Bengal missed Ambedkars bus and were busy studying Marx and Tagore.

The left bhadralok intellectuals held a strong view that reservations will undo socialist and democratic equal opportunities for all.

But no chotolok was allowed to think about the very fact that they were called chotolok which is insulting and dehumanising. Such a status does not allow the chotolok to sit with the bhadralok in any institution. The English-educated chotolok men and women less in number compared to Bengali bhadralok intellectual in any major central university or IIT and IIM.

Jyoti Basu famously said, There is no caste in Bengal when the question of implementation of the Mandal reservation arose. We do not see a single visible OBC leader or intellectual on the national map from that state.

Bengal hardly has an equal, competing, educated middle class that could emerge from the chotolok. By and large, Shudra Indians still need reservations across the country.

Now the rightwing bhadralok of India joins the chorus of the left bhadralok and asks for how many generations the chotolok of India will enjoy reservations.

Also read: At IITs, PhD Applicants from Marginalised Communities Have Much Lower Acceptance Rate

But they do not ask for how many generations the chotolok should till the land and feed the bhadralok without being equal in any field of modern, capitalist India. They do not ask for how long the bhadralok will keep away from production of food and teach theories of merit outside that domain. Or why colleges and universities do not talk about the merit of production, and just marks in the exam.

The Indian judiciarys mindset comes from this bhadralok view of education, employment and caste blindness.

A view of the School of Physical Sciences building, JNU. Photo: JNU

The Indian Supreme Court never asks how many Jats, Kurmis and Yadavs, leave alone the artisanal listed OBC communities, who till the lands around Delhi, have became professors in JNU, Delhi University, the IITs, and IIMs. How many top bureaucrats from those communities are sitting in the central secretariat?

It is on the Jat lands of Haryana that the top private universities like Ashoka, Amity and OP Jindal exist. How many of their children are sitting in the classrooms of those universities?

In fact their youth, for many generations, were driving bullock ploughs and tractors. How many bhadralok children in and around Delhi till the land for food production?

This is where the social justice angle in judiciary matters.

If bhadralok judges do not feel for the chotolok as much as the white judges in America feel for the blacks, India will crack. The questions that the judiciary asks plays a very critical role in shaping the consciousness of educated Indians. An anti-social justice question from a court bench will be perceived as the eventual judgment in the making.

The question for how many generations will reservations continue is exactly like the question, for how many years will Muslim appeasement continue. The merit theory of the bhadralok does not appear to treat the Shudra, Dalit and Adivasi as an Indian. And this despite their deep roots in this soil which date back to ancient times.

Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd is political theorist, social activist. His latest book is The Shudras: Vision For a New Path, co-edited with Karthik Raja Karuppusamy.

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The Supreme Court's Question About Reservations Is the Wrong One to Ask - The Wire

The Canadian Press

OTTAWA In the last four years, Health Canada has approved more than 1,500 new or updated pharmaceuticals. Ten of them are vaccines. Five of those are for COVID-19. Dr. Supriya Sharma, the chief medical adviser at Health Canada helping oversee the review process, has never seen anything like the speed with which the COVID-19 vaccines got approved. "I mean, unprecedented is the one word that we've been overusing, but there's nothing even close to comparable to this," she said in an interview. The five non-COVID vaccines approved, four for influenza and one for shingles, took an average of 397 days from the day the company applied for approval in Canada, until that approval was granted. The average time for COVID-19 vaccines? 82 days. That includes 61 days for Pfizer-BioNTech, 72 days for Moderna, 95 days for Johnson & Johnson, 148 days for Oxford-AstraZeneca and 34 days for Covishield, the AstraZeneca vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India. Covishield is a slight outlier because Health Canada mostly just needed to review the manufacturing process, as the vaccine is the same formula as the AstraZeneca doses made elsewhere. Sharma likens it to the same recipe made in a different kitchen, but the kitchen still needs to be up to snuff. A sixth vaccine from Novavax is still under review, with the results from its big clinical trial not expected until next month. It has been under review by Health Canada for 58 days at this point. The speed has raised fears among Canadians that everything moved too quickly. Many medical experts worry it is contributing to hesitancy to get the vaccines. But Sharma says speed did not come at the expense of safety. "That's the only priority, the only thought, is what's best for Canadians," she said. "There's no other motivation anywhere." Lack of research funds can slow down new drug development, but in this case, as lockdowns shuttered economies worldwide and death tolls mounted, countries poured billions of dollars into getting a vaccine to get us out of the pandemic. Most of the successful vaccines for COVID-19 so far use existing vaccine technology that was adjusted for the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19. They start with lab studies to check for safety on animals and see how the vaccine works in a lab setting on blood samples and on samples of the virus. Then it is tested on a very small number of humans to look for any glaring safety concerns. Then they test it on a slightly larger number of people usually fewer than 100 to look for safety and the development of antibodies. If that goes well, the trial is expanded to thousands of volunteers, some of whom get the vaccine and some of whom don't. Then they wait to see how many in each group get infected. Phase 3 trials usually take between one and four years. For the vaccines approved in Canada so far, phase three trials took about three months. Sharma said the time a trial takes depends on finding enough patients to participate, and then having enough of their trial participants get sick to know how well the vaccine is or isn't working. Fortunately and unfortunately, COVID-19 was spreading so rampantly in so many places, getting enough people exposed did not take very long. Canada has seen very few vaccines tested here so far, mainly because our infection rates weren't high enough. While the drug makers were busy getting the trials going, Health Canada was getting ready for their submissions. Sharma said discussions about COVID-19 vaccines began in earnest with international bodies in mid-January 2020, before Canada had even had a single confirmed case. "I think we knew that ... we had a virus that was going to be transmissible, that could be causing significant respiratory disease, and that there would be an interest in therapies and vaccines definitely, very early on," said Sharma. It was determined quickly that this virus was so new there was no existing vaccine that could be adjusted quickly, as had happened with the H1N1 pandemic in 2009. By March, Health Canada had started putting teams in place to review new therapies and vaccines for COVID-19 as soon as they were ready. Each team was made up of 12 to 15 people, with varying specialties. There was some overlap between the teams but not a lot because many vaccines were being reviewed at the same time. The experts on the file included infectious disease specialists, pharmacologists, biostatisticians, and epidemiologists. Separate from that were teams of people looking at manufacturing facilities. Approving a vaccine isn't just about making sure the clinical data shows it to be safe and effective, but also about making sure the place it is to be made follows the required safety standards. They needed an emergency order from Health Minister Patty Hajdu to do a rolling review. Normally drug makers can't apply until they have every piece of data ready but with a rolling review Health Canada scientists can start reviewing the data as it becomes available. Hajdu granted that on Sept. 16. Then the vaccine submissions began pouring in AstraZeneca applied Oct. 1, Pfizer Oct. 9, Moderna on Oct. 12, and J&J on Nov. 30. The Covishield application came Jan. 23 and Novavax submitted on Jan. 29. Sharma says the teams were working 15 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, reviewing data, asking the companies questions, requesting more information or new analyses. Sometimes they were doing it in the middle of the night. Collaborations with international partners in very different time zones, meant 2 a.m. or 4 a.m. video conference calls were not unusual. When Pfizer and Moderna were reviewed, it was entirely based on clinical trail and pre-market data because the vaccines hadn't been approved anywhere else. Canada was the third in the world to authorize Pfizer on Dec. 14th, and second to approve Moderna Dec. 23. By the time Health Canada authorized AstraZeneca a review process complicated by some mistakes during the clinical trial in dosing and the number of seniors among its volunteer patients it was also able to pull data from real-world use of the vaccine in the United Kingdom. The regulatory work doesn't end when the authorization is announced. The post-market surveillance data is still non-stop. The recent blood clot concern with the AstraZeneca vaccine took a lot of time, but just monitoring the data submitted by the vaccine makers on adverse events overall is still critical. To date, the adverse event reports in Canada have not been different than what was seen in clinical trials. Companies also adjust their submissions requiring further review. Pfizer has so far asked for two changes, one to the number of doses per vial and another for the temperature at which the vaccine has to be kept. If anything changes on safety, or if the efficacy seen in a clinical trial doesn't play out in the real world, Sharma says Canada will not hesitate to make adjustments. But those decisions will be made by Canadian experts, said Sharma, the same ones who have been on the files all along. "It's important that if anything comes up, we have people that have reviewed it, have gone through every piece of paper, the 2,000 hours, the hundreds of thousands of pages, and that if anything comes up, it's like they've got a really strong science base, and they can put that stuff in context and we can make decisions really quickly." This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 28, 2021. Mia Rabson, The Canadian Press

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Newsroom Ready: Federal budget to land April 19 - Yahoo News Canada

CORPORATE TOTALITARIANISM

I have almost come to believe in the myth of corporate liberalism. And then comes Prof. Mehtas resignation to remind us of the lurking reality of corporate totalitarianism. It seems it never went anywhere. It just dons liberal attire occasionally to brand its products. When it comes to the university, once the educational market is secured, it resumes its predatory habits and a high-cost model of learning is confidently installed in a poor country.

It is possible that my contract may not be renewed at some point in the future. Regardless, my pedagogy is inert to such unannounced threats. Long have I known the nature of institutional cowardice. This is what I expect in the normal course of things, for organised avarice and structural cowardice are ancient cousins.

What has happened does not surprise me in the least. In my Ecosophy classes, we learn that the globalised corporate market, with the devastating technologies at its disposal, is the most acute threat to the health and survival of humanity on earth.

The economic anthropologist Karl Polanyi wrote three generations ago that markets traditionally embedded in human cultures are healthy. But disembedded markets cause pathological mayhem and will ultimately demolish the very substance of human society and nature. Markets in our world today are not merely disembedded; they are controlled almost entirely by insatiable corporations, padlocked in a global system of compulsive structural avarice.

The greatest lie of our time is the myth of consumer sovereignty that is taught to innocent economics undergraduates from the first day at college. The thinly disguised reality of the world is what I like to call investor sovereignty. Ignore the economists. Think Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. Not the small thela-wallahs wife managing a shoestring family budget.

In such a global environment, the university, like much else, is today under siege from corporations the world over. The viral spread of the internet - especially booming in the pandemic-afflicted age of zoom - may actually put an end to it altogether in some not-so-distant future. Or transform its character to such a degree that only the servile arts of technical training (in engineering or medicine, for instance) will be taught, not the pretentious liberal arts. It would be in the fitness of things for the death of the humanities to presage the end of humanity itself.

With the Bengal elections looming, it is perhaps appropriate to remember Tagore, especially since he is being invoked by all the political parties in the fray. We also study him closely in Ecosophy, especially his interpretation of the ancient Upanishads. While setting up Vishwabharati University a century ago in the hope of reviving Indian and Asian cultures, he said:

Before Asia is in a position to co-operate with the culture of Europe, she must base her own structure on a synthesis of all the different cultures which she has. When, taking her stand on such a culture, she turns toward the West, she will take, with a confident sense of mental freedom, her own view of truth, from her own vantage-ground, and open a new vista of thought to the world. Otherwise, she will allow her priceless inheritance to crumble into dust, and, trying to replace it clumsily with feeble imitations of the West, make herself superfluous, cheap and ludicrous. If she thus loses her individuality and her specific power to exist, will it in the least help the rest of the world? Will not her terrible bankruptcy involve also the Western mind? If the whole world grows at last into an exaggerated West, then such an illimitable parody of the modern age will die, crushed beneath its own absurdity.

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Ashoka University, a despotic democracy and servitude of the quiet kind - National Herald

Environmental collapse

Weve been wondering if Iain Rankin is serious about the environment. Is he really going to drag Nova Scotia into the contemporary world? Will he help us break our provinces embarrassing addictions to 20th-century anachronisms, like filthy coal, clearcuts and forest monoculture? Will he start making the things of the future, or will we continue to throw bad money and good public land at billionaires, who will continue to build elite golf courses and ant-farm housing developments for the dying society that loves them?

It didnt take long and it didnt take much to find out. Just some ignorant words about environmental legislation, bad old Halifax, and the evil of protecting nature all published in the form of an ad in this newspaper on March 20.

Rankins Astroturf environmentalism, a faux-green substitute for the real thing, was too puny to withstand a single rhetorical challenge, and so he gutted his own Biodiversity Act.

So here we are again, pre-modernitys last holdouts, pathetically pretending that we belong within the Western democratic community, when actually we deserve our laggard reputation as North American sub-hillbillies, in the recent words of columnist Ralph Surette.

Joe Tucker, Musquodoboit Harbour

First, it was the announcement of the Biodiversity Act which caught my attention. It seemed like a long-awaited and reasonable bill to introduce when there is so much concern about the health of our forests and the wildlife and plant species that inhabit them. A good starting point for discussion, especially as Iain Rankin based his Liberal leadership campaign on protecting the environment.

I delved into the act a little more and found that it did allow for public discussion before it was to be made law, especially for affected stakeholders i.e., landowners and the general public.

On March 20, I read on back-to-back pages of The Chronicle two paid ads, one promoting the wisdom and benefits of the act, the other forecasting a catastrophe for private landowners if the government got its way. Confusing, indeed.

I was disturbed after finding out that the Concerned Private Landowners Coalition (CPLC), whose website I also delved into perhaps with forest industry priorities at the forefront? received such a massive response to their ad. It was a revelation to read the comments from concerned private landowners who were probably angered and riled up about the government telling them what they could or couldn't do on their properties. I would be interested to know how many of those landowners had actually read the content of the act, as opposed to those whod been completely overwhelmed with concern because of the information and some misinformation presented to them by CPLC.

Then, I heard the act is going to be severely amended. Did I miss the public consultation process, where voices of concern on both sides of the argument could be heard in a more rational and informed way before going forward? Where in the equation stands the Law Amendments Committee, which deals with such issues?

My husband and I own property in HRM and Lunenburg County. We treasure both pieces of land equally, perhaps our Lunenburg property more. We recognize that climate change, invasive species, endangered flora and fauna are real issues. No matter where a Nova Scotian chooses to live, the health of our forests, our lakes and our coastlines are the legacy we leave to future generations.

Perhaps the Biodiversity Act is not perfect, but to hijack it before it has left the starting gate is a travesty. Can we not come together, support its goals, and reach an outcome that our grandchildren might thank us for?

Premier Rankin: listen to all the stakeholders, but dont buckle at the first sign of dissent, especially when it appears to be a knee-jerk reaction to what could be interpreted as a fear-mongering tactic engineered by one lobby group. Its a worrisome sign when we havent even got around to implementing the Lahey report yet.

P.S. I am a member of the Liberal Party of Nova Scotia.

Vivien Blamire, Dartmouth

The recent outrage and shock over the watering down of the revised Biodiversity Act highlights an ongoing reality that has informed resource policy in Canada since the country's inception. We think that because we live in a democracy that in some vague way, resource policy is open to democratic input. This has never been the case.

Resource policy is controlled by a tight network of industrial interests and their representatives in government departments who exercise jurisdictional control over the policy-making process. Any new policy must take into account past agreements, and therefore resource decision-making has been as seen as reactive and incremental.

For there to be any radical shift in policy direction, as the Lahey report calls for in forestry practices, it is necessary to change the makeup of these networks. Over the last 50 years, environmental groups have tried to break open these networks by demanding citizen input into the policy process, but as we have seen on so many occasions, this input is largely ignored in the final policy outcomes, although court-imposed duty to consult requirements have led to some successes for Indigenous groups, as well as court decisions regarding an Aboriginal moderate livelihood in the fishery.

As political economy professorHarold Innis made clear, the staples economy has shaped the very structure of Canada. The conversion of resources into products that create wealth is the reason government departments exist. This was seen to serve Canada well until environmental problems generated increased concern over a range of issues.

So we are in a moment now where citizens no longer trust the government to make decisions behind closed doors because there is the perception that they have fled into the arms of large corporate interests.

What is also clear is that this democratic input into policy-making is largely ignored. For there to be real change in forestry management practices in Nova Scotia, there needs to be a radical restructuring of who is at the table when the real decisions get made. The voices that had to resort to a logging road blockade in Digby County need to enter the halls of power if there is to be significant change in how decisions get made.

Ray Rogers, Sable River

Times are changing. It used to be that the scariest thing progressives could be called was tree huggers. The prevailing sentiment was to never, ever let tree huggers stop economic progress at any cost. Now the net is widening. In their opposition to Bill 4, the Biodiversity Act, the Concerned Private Landowner Coalition warns that this legislation puts control of private lands in the hands of Halifax activists and politicians. Its bad enough to have to cope with rural activists, but those from Halifax? Apparently, those are scary folks, indeed.

One wonders. Would those activists be the same ones who have private woodlots of their own in many instances? The same ones who voted for newly selected Premier Iain Rankin because he promised to be much more environmentally sensitive than recent governments of all stripes? Would these be the same activists who recognize that Nova Scotias best hope by far is to develop a niche green economy, for the first time ever utilizing our natural resources and natural advantages in a sustainable model for this underperforming coastal province?

If those are the activists we are talking about, perhaps its time we listened to them before it is too late .

Stewart Lamont, Tangier

Re: N.S. Liberals fold under pressure, gut their own biodiversity bill.

Jim Viberts March 25 column comes right out of the environmentalists handbook. Talk about misinformation!

If you go on these environmentalists websites, you see where he got his information. The Biodiversity Act is unnecessary and will be used by the anti-forestry, anti-mining and anti-jobs groups for years to come. The propaganda comes from these well-funded environmental groups and yes, they have been trying to turn Nova Scotia into one big park for decades. One of these groups has 29 full-time paid employees. Their ad on March 20 took up a full page. They are not poor.

Ken Mallett, Wellington (president, Nova Scotia Prospectors Association)

Contrary to the propaganda put out by industrial forestry outfits, rural Nova Scotia is full of people who dont appreciate the pillage of our forests for the profit of a few mills. We know from our neighbours that contractors working in the woods are kept on such razor-thin margins by those mills that clearcutting is the only way they can make money. High volume/low value harvesting is a race to the bottom. We are almost there.

A few of us rural activists, sickened by the planned destruction of forests in habitat necessary to the endangered mainland moose, chose to block some logging roads in Digby County last fall.

Not one of the nine people arrested for refusing to lift our blockade is from Halifax. We live and own land in Yarmouth, Digby, Annapolis and Kings counties.

Furthermore, none of the people who found their way on bumpy logging roads to our encampment to express their support on Nov. 29 came from Halifax. Not one. How do we know? Because COVID regulations at that time restricted people from travelling from the Central Zone. The 50-plus people who joined us that day all came from the Western Zone.

Over the eight weeks that we maintained those blockades, numerous hunters and guides stopped by. We drank coffee and chatted. Conversation would turn to how much they hated all the clearcutting that was driving out wildlife and ruining places they had loved from childhood. At some point, every one of them said: I 100 per cent support you. So much for Halifax activists being the only ones who care about biodiversity.

Nina Newington, Mount Hanley

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VOICE OF THE PEOPLE March 27, 2021 - TheChronicleHerald.ca

The Whitehorse Centre riding encompasses downtown, from the dam on the Yukon River in the south to the edges of the industrial district in the north. About 3,000 people live downtown, according to the Yukon Bureau of Statistics 2020 population report.

Downtowns residential district contains a combination of old and new homes, with few higher-density apartment buildings. The majority of the citys hotels and restaurants are in the downtown core, as well as the Whitehorse Emergency Shelter.

The riding has been represented by an NDP MLA since its inception in 1992. Liz Hanson, MLA and former NDP leader, has been the Whitehorse Centre MLA since 2010.

She won her seat with 44, 62 and 51 per cent of the vote in the last three elections. Hanson retired from politics this year. Three new candidates are running in the 2021 election. They have been profiled here in alphabetical order.

Dan Curtis Yukon Liberal Party

Dan Curtis has been the mayor of Whitehorse since 2012, during which time he prioritized collaboration with First Nations, as well as the territorial and federal governments.

He hopes to bring that collaborative spirit into a new position as the Liberal MLA for Whitehorse Centre.

Something that I want to bring to the table is, really, a good working relationship with everyone, Curtis said. I have a good track record of that team-building, and working together, and having that one-government approach of respectful dialogue and compromise.

Curtis platform focuses on climate change and affordable housing as key priorities for the downtown community.

I think everyone is concerned about the environment, everyone is concerned about vulnerable people, everyone is concerned about safety, Curtis said.

Curtis worked with both Liberal and Yukon Party governments during his term as mayor, and says the contrast between the two pushed him to join the red team in this election.

I see such a stark contrast of values and the ability to really pull everyone together, Curtis said. I didnt have the same experience in my first four years as mayor, compared to my next four years, so it wasnt very difficult to see that my values line up with the Liberal Party.

Curtis said he wants to utilize territorial and federal funds to update some of downtowns aging infrastructure, and develop better plans for safety at the Whitehorse Emergency Shelter.

I think its a wonderful opportunity to use the skills and knowledge that Ive been afforded during my time as mayor, and Im looking to put some of that into practice, Curtis said.

Eileen Melnychuk Yukon Party

Eileen Melnychuk is an educational assistant and president of the Victoria Faulkner Womens Centre. She also serves on the board of the Whitehorse Community Thrift Store and Volunteer Benevoles Yukon. She has been nominated twice for the citys Volunteer of the Year award.

The fact that Im a born-and-raised Yukoner, I have a really strong, vested interest in the future of Whitehorse and the Yukon, Melnychuk said.

Melnychuk is running on a platform focused on tackling the cost of living, electrical rates, housing and education.

The Yukon Party has some really strong plans to bring affordable land to market, by working hand-in-hand with Yukon First Nations and municipalities, Melnychuk said.

As an educational assistant, Melnychuk is an advocate for better supports in the public school system.

I see, on a daily basis, the needs of our students, and I see that those needs are not being met, Melnychuk said. Melnychuk wants to see stronger mental health support for students and teachers, and a reversal of the recent decision to move special needs students off IEPs.

The Yukon Party candidate is also prioritizing economic diversification, which she says is a strong aspect of the partys platform that will lead the territory out of the pandemic with support for the private sector.

I have seen first-hand the boom-and-bust economy that we have had forever, she said. I think that the Yukon Party has some really solid plans to explore initiatives putting the focus on local technology and local talent With the creativity of Yukoners, theres a real opportunity here to explore.

Emily Tredger Yukon New Democractic Party

Emily Tredger is a speech-language pathologist and the executive director at TeegathaOh Zheh, which supports Yukon residents with disabilities. She is also the president of Queer Yukon. She said that in her work, she often hears of the problems Yukon families face, and that inspired her to run for office.

I really love doing that work, but it was not uncommon for me to call a family and say, Do you want to do some speech therapy? and they would say, Yes, but what we really need is a place to live, Tredger said. As a speech therapist, I couldnt help them with those things like housing and food security.

Tredger hopes to tackle those issues as an elected official. Her platform focuses on housing and mental health support.

Having more affordable housing and better protections for tenants is a really big priority for me, she said, noting the NDPs plan to cap rent increases.

Im also really proud of our plan to have a walk-in mental health clinic I think when youre in crisis, its not a good time to be trying to navigate systems. There are so many barriers to accessing health care, and this is a way that we could really reduce them.

Tredger said the NDPs inclusive mandate inspired her to run for that party.

I knew right away I wanted to be on Kate (White)s team, I have so much faith in her as a leader, and I think a lot of people in the Yukon really connect to her, she said.

I really think that NDP values are what will make the Yukon the best place it can be, for everybody.

Contact Gabrielle Plonka at gabrielle.plonka@yukon-news.com

Election 2021

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Getting to know the candidates in Whitehorse Centre - Yukon News