A friend asked recently why I had not written about the MLA expenses flap, and I confessed that I have trouble summoning much outrage over the issue. While I admire Brian Flinn's dogged pursuit of the facts in AllNovaScotia.com, I fear that the public and the media are almost as much to blame for the problem as our lawmakers. The public nurses an attitude of begrudgery toward politicians, and the media fans these embers at every opportunity. This is not our most attractive quality, and it makes it almost impossible for MLAs — who by definition must set their own salaries...

15 February, 2010

O'Reilly, the world's largest publisher of tech books, decided in 2008 to remove digital rights management — copy prevention software — from its ebooks. The result? In the 18 months since, ebook sales are up 103%. Long Island's Newsday, the 11th-largest-circulation newspaper in the US, is one of the first non-business newspapers to put its website behind a pay wall — a step The New York Times and all of Rupert Murdoch's papers are said to be considering. The result? In three months, Newsday's $5-a-week website has attracted 35 paying subscribers. Hat tip: SP....

31 January, 2010

The Washington Post looks at what happened to the US economy over the last decade: For the first time since the 1930s, no growth in jobs, a decline in household net worth, and falling middle-class earnings. Moneyquote: There has been zero net job creation since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well. Middle-income households made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 -- and the number is sure to have declined further...

03 January, 2010

Each year, the Province of Nova Scotia provides equalization grants to municipalities with less-than-average fiscal capacity. The unconditional transfer is based on a formula that compares a municipality's needs and ability to pay. In the current fiscal year, the Cape Breton Regional Municipality received $16.7 million, which amounted to 52 percent of all the equalization money given out in the entire province. The next largest recipients were Amherst at $1.2 million, and New Glasgow at $1.0 million. Put another way, CBRM got 14 times as much money as the next largest recipient. The numbers for 2009-2010 are expected to be similar....

18 December, 2009
The Supreme Court of Canada refusal to hear the Cape Breton Regional Municipality's equalization lawsuit was not as predictable as the rising of the sun this morning. But it was close. The lawsuit was cynical ploy by a mayor who likes to posture as a scrapper for the little guy, but refuses to do the hard work needed to reach political solutions to the little guy's problems.
  • Contrary to popular belief, even a total victory for CBRM would not have brought the municipality a single dime. It didn't even ask for money.
  • In any case, the lawsuit had no chance of success. Aside from Mayor John Morgan and his pricey Toronto constitutional lawyer, Contrarian has been unable to find a single lawyer who thought it had any chance of success.
  • Although the case suffered a mercifully early death—it was thrown out before trial—the mayor's insistence on appealing to the highest court in the land frittered away at least $500,000 in legal bills, and wasted three five years that could better have been spent seeking a political solution. During that time, CBRM ran up another $60 million $100 million in debt its citizens cannot afford.
  • The mayor now says he will seek a political solution, but he is playing a weaker hand, having demonstrated that his constitutional claims lack legal validity.
I believe the municipality has a case for greater provincial assistance in meeting basic service needs. I hope the Dexter Government, financially strapped as it is, gives the problem a fair hearing. But the mayor's legal adventure not only delayed a solution, it encouraged the worst impulses of Cape Breton's culture of dependency, and it reinforced the rest of the world's weary stereotype of Cape Bretoners as people with their hands out. In all these respects, it did a disservice to the very citizens Morgan claims to champion. Elaboration after the jump.

18 December, 2009

Contrarian is working his way through the Economic Review Panel's 95-page report. At first blush, it seems a sensible document, offering a balanced approach to navigating the economic mess the MacDonald government left us in. Premier Darrell Dexter choose wisely in selecting Donald Savoie, Elizabeth Beale, Tim O'Neil, and Lars Osberg to carry out the review. All are respected, progressive, and fair-minded. But before we get too deep into discussing the pros and cons of their recommendations, something needs to be said: Darrell Dexter campaigned on a triple-barreled promise: not to run a deficit; not to raise taxes; and not to cut programs....

15 November, 2009

Atlantic Superstore, Quinpool Centre, Halifax, 31 October 2009. Bah!...

31 October, 2009

Extortion. That's how the Liberal Party of Nova Scotia obtained the money it would be blocked from using by a government bill introduced in the legislature Tuesday. Liberal leader Stephen McNeil should think hard before crying victim. Justice Minister Ross Landry, who introduced the bill, suggested the Liberals give the tainted funds to charity. A better idea would be to give it back to the provincial treasury, because that's who they stole it from. McNeil may think voters' memories are too short to remember the details, but a few of us old coots are still around to remind them. The money in question came...

20 October, 2009
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