Count Roland posted:

I don't see the disadvantage to labeling them. I don't think the stuff will cause me harm but I don't much like the practice, so I'll buy non-GMO when convenient. More info = good? Especially if this is information plenty of consumers want, regardless of their motives.

vyelkin posted:

GMO labeling is a bad policy and a perfect example of how too much information and too much choice can be a bad thing in consumer markets, because most consumers don't know enough to make use of such additional information.

Count Roland posted:

I don't see the disadvantage to labeling them. I don't think the stuff will cause me harm but I don't much like the practice, so I'll buy non-GMO when convenient. More info = good? Especially if this is information plenty of consumers want, regardless of their motives.

sund posted:

I've seen gluten free shampoo, should GF labelling be mandatory? "Suitable for vegetarians" labels? You're perfectly free to add labelling to your products as you like, as long as it's truthful.

Helsing posted:

I kind of like the idea of making a label for "GMOs" but then putting it on literally everything. Let's get these people on the sunlight diet.

Helsing posted:

A living income is a lot more expensive than most people seem to realize. It would involve a massive reworking of the government's fiscal framework to actually implement it, and most of the savings are based on the assumption that you'd eliminate other government programs. On its own the living income also doesn't protect against price increases that could rapidly eat into the gains of a living income.

Obviously on the most simplistic level it makes intuitive sense to fight poverty by giving people money. But it's a policy that seems to ignore political reality by trying to enact massive redistribution without changing the underlying power relations of the economy.

In the mid 20th century the labour movement and various organized groups of citizens were bulwarks supporting the creation and maintenance of the welfare state. Who is going to play that role if we implement a basic income? What constituency is going to exist to ensure that landlords don't gobble up all the extra money in the form of higher rents? What consituency is going to stop the next government from slashing the basic income (wouldn't that be a neat trick, Party A implements basic income and removes welfare, Party B gets elected five years later and cuts basic income in half without restoring welfare. A progressive policy just directly lead to the halving of a vulnerable population's income).

To be clear I've got nothing against a basic income in principle but I think it's been turned into something of a false idol for the left. The basic problem is that working people lack political power, and a narrow band of elites have way too much power. I don't believe you can solve anything without addressing that imbalance.

Helsing posted:

I kind of like the idea of making a label for "GMOs" but then putting it on literally everything. Let's get these people on the sunlight diet.

PT6A posted:

And yet I'm the bad guy for going half a step further by suggesting we save some time and just kill these morons. Sad!

vyelkin posted:

This is a very good impression of a Donald Trump tweet

PT6A posted:

Thank you, that was my goal.

Edit: I'm gonna be the best poster for impersonating Donald Trump. So simple!

Ikantski posted:

Not maple syrup or venison.

jm20 posted:

Everything you've eaten your entire life is GMO.

BattleMaster posted:

Why don't you like the practice?

I'm not going to turn this into an argument, but I am curious because I'm not sure what reason there could be if you don't think it's harmful to you because that's the main argument against it by opponents.

quote:

More than 1,000 people arrested in large groups and held in "inhumane conditions" at a makeshift detention centre during the 2010 G20 summit in Toronto won the right to proceed with two class-action lawsuits against police authorities Wednesday.

The Ontario Court of Appeal approved the two class actions over "kettling" — confining scores of people at downtown Toronto intersections for several hours — and alleged civil rights abuses that occurred nearly six years ago during the three-day global summit.

The court's decision emphasizes that police cannot arrest a group of civilians "as a way of 'fishing' for particular individuals." It also highlights the role these class actions would play in forcing police behaviour to change.

"There have been non-binding recommendations before but now we have binding legal process, which can actually make changes happen," counsel Kent Elson told CBC News.

The lawsuits allege people were mass-arrested indiscriminately and held in "inhumane conditions" at a detention centre located inside an unused film studio on Eastern Avenue.

"What happened to them was terrible. They were arrested without cause," Elson said. "That shouldn't happen in a democratic country like ours."

These are the first class actions involving group arrests to be certified in the province.

Lawyer Eric Gillespie said the "groundbreaking" decision could help guard the basic freedoms of all Canadians.

He noted that in the wake of the event many of the reforms recommended have not been implemented.

"This decision may help move in that direction," he said.

Elson said it could lead to the disclosure of confidential police documents and tapes about what happened during that weekend, as well as "positive reforms about policing."

"What we're trying to do is make sure the spread of [kettling] is stopped," he said.

Following the decision, lead plaintiff Sherry Good said she was delighted and called on police to make changes and "prove to us that this will never happen again."

Good was among dozens of people "kettled" at Queen Street and Spadina Avenue for 4½ hours in torrential rain.

"It was extremely scary."

"I lost faith in the police. I lost faith in our charter."

Good said she wants to see consequences for those responsible and police reforms.

Tommy Taylor, the other lead plaintiff representing those sent to the east-end Toronto detention centre, likened the arrests and conditions as being "treated worse than animals in a zoo."

"We want justice to be served. We don't want this to happen to any other Canadian, ever again," he said.

Taylor was held for 24 hours and released without charge.

"I actually passed out begging for water," he said.

"For Canada, it was a pretty big failure, pretty dehumanizing experience."

The Toronto police board wanted the Appeal Court to quash the class proceedings, which had already been subject to two lower court rulings.

A judge had originally ruled against certifying a class action, but that was overturned on an initial appeal to Ontario's Divisional Court, which instead split the action in two.

In August, Supt. Mark Fenton was found guilty of discreditable conduct and unnecessary exercise of authority in connection with ordering two mass arrests during that weekend.

In a statement Wednesday, Andy Pringle, the chair of the Toronto police board, said the board will review the decision and consider its options.

"We are committed to continuing to participate in this legal process as it moves forward."

THC posted:

Periodic reminder that the liberals invited Bill Blair into their ranks

PT6A posted:

Let's all take some time out to laugh at this moron's misfortune and utter stupidity:

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/calgary/dana-larsen-custody-pot-seed-handout-tour-1.3524504

THC posted:

Periodic reminder that the liberals invited Bill Blair into their ranks and put him in charge of legalizing pot

HappyHippo posted:

1) You want a left that is organized and supports the creation and maintenance of the welfare state, yet I see you repeatedly belittle a progressive policy that they could rally around. If you want people to organize for a cause you need objectives they can push for. Fixing power structures is too abstract a goal, and it's a means to an end anyway. People need to see that end. If you think there is something better to work on than basic income then tell us about it, but abstractions like "addressing power imbalances" aren't going to work. You address power imbalances with concrete, actionable goals. What are they?

quote:

2) Implementing policy goals is a win. It motivates people to defend what they've accomplished and push for more. It shifts the Overton window in your direction. And it's more difficult to undo policies that have been implemented than it is to block them in the first place (healthcare for example). There's nothing stopping Party B from cutting welfare right now, besides the political consequences. Why would that be different in a world where basic income was implemented?

quote:

You're starting to sound like the type of person who scoffs at working towards meaningful policy because you can't make progress until capitalism is overthrown man. When people go down that road they essentially remove themselves from anything resembling mainstream politics and ensure their own irrelevance.

Hexigrammus posted:

'sup, rural buddy?

It's more common in wild fish populations, but hunting/harvesting pressures can cause size selection so you inadvertently breed smaller animals. I can see this happening in areas where hunter = big swinging dick who always has to shoot the biggest animal in the neighbourhood. Hunters are probably breeding small, paranoid deer.

Wouldn't surprise me if syrup producers are selecting for trees with robust immune systems that can withstand bleeding profusely once a year and not succumb to disease. Winners reproduce, losers end up in the stove.

quote:

Postmedia Network Canada Corp. has struck a special board committee to oversee a review of its struggling business, as management considers a wide range of options to improve its “capital structure and liquidity.”

The move comes as Postmedia reported a second-quarter loss of $225-million on Thursday, due in large part to a $187-million non-cash impairment to the value of its titles and the company’s goodwill.

[...]

Postmedia’s future looks cloudy. With GoldenTree seeking to unload its stake, which includes 52 per cent of the company’s class B shares and a portion of its debt, speculation has been swirling that the company could be heading for a restructuring. Its debt now trades at a deep discount, while its shares hover around 6 cents on the Toronto Stock Exchange, and rarely trade.

The company’s loss of $225.1-million or 80 cents per share compares with a loss of $58.2-million or $1.45 in the same quarter a year earlier, due mostly to writedown.

Revenue for the second quarter, which ended Feb. 29, was $209.1-million, up from $145.4-million a year earlier thanks to Postmedia’s acquisition of Sun Media newspapers and digital assets in April, 2015. Excluding the Sun results, revenue was down 13.1 per cent for the second quarter.

Print advertising revenue fell 18.3 per cent year-over-year, while print circulation revenue dipped 8 per cent and digital revenue fell 4.2 per cent.

quote:

“They feel the [labour] movement has to pull itself together and start to push back,” Mr. Yussuff said in an interview. “There’s a sense among the whole membership, including the private sector, that you’ve got to collectively start pushing back to change the direction, otherwise this movement is going to be in peril.”

He said union leaders have long worked at the bargaining table to help solve problems, but they feel they have been too co-operative while watching their gains and legal rights be eroded.

“It’s not going to get better if we don’t start fighting back,” he said.

quote:

Like a broken record, the usual suspects have come out of the woodwork, demanding Tom Mulcair resign as leader of the New Democratic Party. Those on the left who spent the entire 2015 federal election campaign promoting strategic voting are simply trying to shift any responsibility away from their own culpability.

Some say Tom's balanced budget issue did us in. But imagine what the reaction would have been had the NDP campaigned for any deficit, let alone one that looks like it will be $30 billion when the books close.

While there are many other "should haves" and "would haves" related to the campaign, they are not the real issue for the upcoming NDP convention. Too many prominent New Democrats and affiliated organizations in the election, through their actions and words, told voters "this time it's OK to vote Liberal." I saw as many if not more "Stop Harper" signs as I did "Vote NDP" signs.

It was a tragic mistake for our party and its supporters, and it became the dominant theme in the election. The result? Both the soft right and the "anybody-but-Harper" soft New Democrats voted Liberal.

Were Liberals strategic?

You need only take a look at Quebec, Atlantic Canada and Toronto to see the effect of these voting patterns. They didn't happen because of a balanced budget promise, or the niqab, or even sunny ways.

They happened because the soft votes on both sides went Liberal, aided and abetted by the strategic voting crowd. As an aside, I don't recall hearing any Liberals advocating "strategic" voting for New Democrats, but I digress.

It's quite entertaining to watch these so-called New Democrats patting themselves on the back, taking credit for getting rid of the Harper Conservatives while in the same breath solely blaming the leader for the NDP's poor showing.

These same folks did the same thing in Ontario in 2014 -- loudly boasting about their success in stopping Conservative Tim Hudak, while simultaneously leveling at Andrea Horvath the same criticism they now level at Tom Mulcair.

With part-time friends and sometime supporters like these, the NDP needs no enemies. Telling NDP members to vote for other parties will never make a solid roadbed we can pave to power.

Perhaps Mulcair in Edmonton this week ought to quote Julius Caesar to all those advocates of this "strategic" part-time loyalty to our party, calling for his head: "Et tu, Brute?" [Tyee]

sliderule posted:

If you ever go from poverty to "middle-class" income, you could reduce your tax burden significantly for the first few years.

odiv posted:

That's not really how TFSA works though, is it? The money you put in the account is all post-tax. The "tax free" refers to any interest you make on that.

Zeond posted:

You're correct on TFSAs but perhaps sliderude was thinking about RRSPs which do work the way he's thinking about.

quote:

Dominic Cardy refuses to endorse Tom Mulcair, skips party convention

New Brunswick NDP Leader Dominic Cardy is skipping the federal party's weekend convention that will be voting on Tom Mulcair's future as leader and he is raising concerns about the direction the party is taking on key issues.

Cardy would not say whether he supports Mulcair continuing on at the helm of the federal party. He said he has an opinion but will leave it to the New Democrats heading to the Edmonton convention to decide on the federal leader's fate.

"With the way the federal NDP campaign rolled out last year, from around halfway through the campaign, there were a lot of positions that I didn't feel particularly comfortable with," he said.

"I'm not particularly interested in spending my weekend talking with the party as they decide which of the positions they are going to take going into the future because I don't have any real confidence that they will be kept to."

In particular, Cardy said he was frustrated by Mulcair's decision to come out against the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal during the campaign even though he hadn't read the text. The provincial leader said losing free trade agreements would hurt New Brunswick industries.

Cardy also said he was "very disheartened" by the NDP's position on the war in Syria.

"The NDP federally took a position saying that we would disengage completely from all military action in the Middle East, something I thought was both not responsible and not something that the party agreed to, which is my core concern," he said.

Subjunctive posted:

But RRSP allowances are based on income, so if you're poor you're not going to be carrying much forward.

Pinterest Mom posted:

Hey guess who's still a gigantic piece of poo poo

Helsing posted:

Helsing posted:

The Overton window doesn't just automatically shift when a new policy gets implemented. The actual process is a bit more muddled and confused in practice. For instance, support among American voters for social security or medicare is extremely high but many of these same voters have strongly anti-government views. They unironically declare "government hands off my medicare" and see no contradiction in demanding more government support for themselves despite bemoaning the welfare bums who continue to suck on the government's teat. Similarly I know guys in Canada who rant endlessly about overly generous government pensions but who love Canadian healthcare.
...
What I believe this thought exercise demonstrates is that developing, implementing and then defending a public policy is a really complicated endeavor. Yes, we need concrete and actionable goals, but we also need a theory of social change that will give us the strategic insight and tactical flexibility to actually win the inevitable political battles. It's not enough to have a policy that, in theory, solves the problem.

The implication of all this, in my mind, is not that basic income is a bad idea or an unworthy idea, but rather that in its current form it's an incomplete one. It's all well and good to say that it would be better if the government distributed wealth more evenly. What I'm saying is that actually implementing and defending a policy will be hard work.
...

This has been a long post so I'll wrap up here, but I have one final thought to add: history can be a helpful guide here. And my interpretation of history (which you're welcome to challenge if you've got some good counter examples) is that successful reforms come from the demands of social movements, typically demands that take decades to formulate and implement.

So, having typed that mountain of words, I'll just conclude by saying that basic income could be a good plank within a larger platform, but if its just a one-shot change to the current system that leaves the power relations of society untouched then I'm skeptical that it could 1) be implemented, 2) be maintained and 3) be at an adequate level to actually address the underlying problems.

quote:

I am broadly supportive of the concept of a basic income but I see it more as a starting point for a debate. In my opinion the left has been much too quick to sacrifice any kind of broadly based theoretical understanding of society or of how power operates in society. Ever since the intellectual and material collapse of Marxism the left has been really gunshy about actually theorizing society.

quote:

This is pretty ironic because if you look at the Democratic primary in the USA it seems like a big part of Bernie Sanders appeal is that he's offering a generalized critique of how money has corrupted politics rather than just proposing a list of reforms he'd implement.

sliderule posted:

If that's the case, consider me misinformed.