andrewlucking.com » politics

b.c. single transferable vote swf

andrew — Sat, 14 May 2005 00:19:51 +0000

The British Colombia Citizen’s Assembly on Electoral Reform have a well done swf explaining the proposed BC-STV:
http://citizensassembly.bc.ca/flash/bc-stv-full

In Tuesday’s provincial election citizens of BC will cast ballots in a referendum to change the electoral process to a single transferable vote system. Here in the east it seems like STV is getting more mass media coverage than the election itself.

I picked this up from Darren Barefoot in an entry he posted explaining how elections BC has decided that blogs are a form of campaign advertising.

(Re that flash piece – personally I’d have atleast made Danielle Durian my second choice. I mean c’mon, the king of fruits!)

;-)

missile defence shield

andrew — Sat, 11 Dec 2004 18:01:55 +0000

Judging by George Bush’s not so subtle behaviour during his visit to Canada a couple of weeks ago it seems the missile defence squeeze is on. Clearly the Bush administration are very serious about getting a Canadian flag on their missile defence shield. It would appear that they’ve taken a cue from the New Mexico based T-ShirtKing.com who are offering a “go Canadian” disguise for Americans traveling abroad. Canada’s support of, and participation in, the missile shield program would bring it a sense of legitimacy and prevent the United States from appearing to once again be acting unilaterally. Unfortunately for Mr. Bush, I don’t think Canadians are just going to chuckle and crack ‘eh’ jokes about this “disguise”.

Nothing about the program makes much sense. It has little chance of being effective – even its most vocal proponents admit it is a long way from working as designed. And it will not work as a deterrent for rogue states like North Korea or Iran. In fact, Russia has already responded by announcing they are developing (or already have developed) a missile capable of penetrating the shield. Regardless of the accuracy of that claim, its obvious that the sabre rattling has begun and it is this kind of brinkmanship that we would be perpetuating by endorsing a ballistic missile shield.

So the question now becomes how does Canada decline participation in the program without further ostracizing the folks in Washington. Well, I think I’ve found one of those impertinent, face saving deal breakers that politicians tend to latch onto. Should Mr. Martin insist that we spell “missile defence” with a “c” I have a feeling the Americans will withdraw the invitation.

control room

andrew — Sun, 28 Nov 2004 15:41:19 +0000

Yankee Doodle went to town
Arriving on a Sunday
Found some peple living there
Killed them all by Monday

If you’re looking for a film that will start a conversation consider taking a look at
Control Room. Primarily a documentary about Al-Jazeera and it’s coverage of the war in Iraq, this film takes a hard-nosed look at the media in war.

Here’s another quote:

Truth ultimately finds its way to people’s eyes and ears and hearts.
- Donald Rumsfeld

funding wind power r and d

andrew — Mon, 08 Nov 2004 17:50:07 +0000

This thread on slashdot about the America’s Space Prize got me thinking. By all accounts the governemnt of the province of Alberta is rolling in revenues from the oil and gas industry. Parts of the province are also well suited for the generation of wind power. How cool, and responsible, would it be for Ralph Klien, (or, snicker, whoever wins the premiership in the upcoming election) to offer a similar prize for a viable wind power station. On top of the cash prize they would also be smart to offer business incentives (in the form of reduced taxes, wage subsidies…) for companies looking to compete for the prize. A great way to convince them to locate development in the province.

welcome / bienvenue

andrew — Wed, 03 Nov 2004 13:08:28 +0000

To all the Americans who threatened to move to Canada should George Bush be re-elected to the Presidency: if the door is locked you’ll find the key under the mat. Don’t forget your skates.