Bill Longstaff

California is in deep financial trouble. Like many states across the U.S., its coffers are almost empty. State Assemblyman Tom Ammiano has a...

Let's face it. The world's financial system is a mess. Unencumbered by appropriate regulation it has run amok for years. It has fina...

"[The oil sands] massively increases Canada's geopolitical importance, above all, to the United States. ... This is a very importan...

I hate to wish anyone bad luck, but I'll make an exception for media giant CanWest as it plunges into a debt crisis. CEO Leonard Asper i...

With the recent spate of gang shootings in Vancouver, the hue and cry for tough measures is in full force. One is hard pressed not to join t...

The battle about the battle is over. The plan to reenact the battle of the Plains of Abraham has been canceled, announced Andre Juneau, head...

John Maynard Keynes, commenting on internationalism, once said, “Ideas, knowledge, art, hospitality, travel — these are the things which sho...

As the economy worsens and unemployment increases, it is time to take yet another look at an overlooked approach to work that will maintain ...

While cruising the Web, I stumbled across a BBC article from December, 1997, that nicely illustrated what a fast-moving world we live in. Th...

Michael Ignatieff is being criticized because he "allowed" his Newfoundland MPs to vote against the federal budget. "Allowed....

The Baghdad Clogger, Muntazer al-Zaidi, is being honoured for his famous shoe-hurling of George W. Bush. A statue of a giant shoe, complete...

When the conversation turns to nuclear weapons these days, the focus is almost entirely on Iran. The rumour is the Iranians may be developin...

I have always been something less than a fan of organized religion. Observing the hostility and violence the world suffers because of faith-...

Fifty years ago, Bolivia's native people were banned from the presidential palace in La Paz. Last week, their leaders met in the palace ...

In his inaugural address, President Obama laid out a powerful warning for certain types of evil-doers: "And for those who seek to advan...

"Obama is Lyndon Johnson." This rain on the Obama parade comes from Glen Ford, executive editor of Black Agenda Report , in an art...

Since the advent of agreements such as NAFTA and the WTO, and the rush to "free" trade generally, Canadian workers have worried ab...

Wanna get rich quick? Head for Zimbabwe. For a mere forty bucks you can get a 100-trillion Zimbabwe-dollar banknote. That's right, one h...

I seem to remember that Canada was once a world leader, but the memory is fading. More and more these days we seem to be a follower. Take fo...

At her Senate confirmation hearing, Hillary Clinton claimed she wants to shift American foreign policy toward the use of "smart power,...

I confess, I'm addicted. Not to anything that has me sweating and trembling if I don't get my daily fix, but addicted, nonetheless. ...

The Isreali assault on Gaza is unequivocally a criminal act. To cite only one item of international law Israel has violated, I offer Article...

The tolerance of Western politicians and media for Israel's crimes in Gaza is remarkable. The inmates of Gaza include almost a million U...

While Canadians continue to debate what the North American Free Trade Agreement has done for us -- or to us -- we pay rather little attentio...

The consensus of economists, business leaders and politicians seems to be that the solution to the current economic mess is for everyone to ...

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's newly-appointed Economic Advisory Council looks at first glance like, as Chairwoman Carole Taylor puts i...

Once again, Jean Charest has set the standard. Acting on the precedent he set in his last cabinet, half of the 26-member cabinet forming his...

As an atheist I've never felt much inclination to proselytize. It has simply never mattered much to me what people's spiritual belie...

Judging by the tortuous arguments being raised against the NDP/Liberal agreement, many Canadians seem to be suffering from coalition shock. ...

One thing that has particularly upset Canadians most about the Liberal/NDP coalition, is the arrangement with the Bloc Quebecois. This is du...

So ... did our Governor General do the right thing? The optics, as they say, are not good. To begin with, a democrat might cringe at the ver...

Stephen Harper had a chance to be a statesman. He indicated he would be. After the election, he told Canadians he would work with the opposi...

Oh my. Here in the pollution province we have enough trouble convincing the "others" that we are a modern society with a modicum o...