Poll

Dec

Local MP Atamanenko slams Harper's Old Age Security review

Alex Atamanenko, MP for BC Southern Interior, is angered by the Harper government's recent announcement that the Conservatives are looking at making changes to the Old Age Security pension. The government claims that the present system is becoming unsustainable because of the aging demographics of Canadians. Harper's surprise...

CBC programming to highlight “new” standards?

You heard it here first...and hopefully last! I’ve been thinking--always a dangerous and sometimes a quite cheeky intellectual exercise--and I’ve come up with a few new program suggestions for CBC’s next television season … featuring a “Revised”  Program Standards Policy...

Northern gateway pipeline not in anyones best interest says MP B.C. Southern Interior, Alex Atamanenko

Few without ties to oil industry could say with a straight face that the proposal by Enbridge to build the Northern Gateway pipeline over 800 fish-bearing rivers and streams is in the best interests of Canadians or that it meets the criteria of what constitutes sustainable development.  It is impossible to ignore the significant environmental […]

How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the ‘1 Percent’

While many of us are working to ensure that the Occupy movement will have a lasting impact, it’s worthwhile to consider other countries where masses of people succeeded in nonviolently bringing about a high degree of democracy and economic justice. Sweden and Norway, for example, both experienced a major power shift in the ...

Lions Club calls on Chamber of Commerce to explain eviction

Letter to the Editor: Last Thursday, four of the Lions executive waited for our turn to visit the Chamber of Commerce board meeting. In the closed meeting of the chamber board, a discussion of how to proceed with the eviction of the Lions Club. For 41 years, the Castlegar-Selkirk Lions have been involved in Castlegar. Shopping...

CST calls upon medical experts in BC to oppose Smart Meters

Citizens for Safe Technology Society (CST) has launched a Human Rights action against BC Hydro requesting accommodation of individuals refusing a wireless "smart meter" for health reasons. These are persons with a variety of health concerns ranging from cancer to heart problems, from seizures to electrosensitivity, and who ...

Stephen Harper and the Big Oil Party of Canada

Where will you be and what will you be doing when the first giant oil tanker, (there will be two plying the waters every three days) carrying over 200,000 gallons of tar sands goop diluted with solvent, spills its load into the pristine waters of the northern BC coast? We often remember catastrophic events by recalling exactly...

ELECTRIC GRAPEVINE: Movies to remember and some to forget

 Having had three weeks to digest what was 2011 I can begin my annual look at the best and worst films by examining the bookends which are Drive and The Tree Of Life.In the awful words of The Rock in Fast Five, "You know I like my dessert first," so I'll start with Drive. Drive is perhaps one of the best films I have seen...

OUT OF LEFT FIELD: Do you have a right to know if your elected official has a criminal record?

I absolutely applaud a resolution Mayor Lawrence Chernoff announced Monday that he’d be bringing forward to council next meeting to consider bringing to the Association of Kootenay Boundary Local Governments and from there, if it passes, to the Union of BC Municipalities and then to the provincial government. In effect, the resolution will ask that […]

Clark breaks faith with Facebook users

Premier Christy Clark's Facebook page didn't come anywhere close in December to meeting the high expectations that the premier's office set out for the page itself, according to IntegrityBC. Premier Clark's page is being promoted with Facebook ads that promise: “I want to hear from you on how we can keep British Columbia...