local politics
By samanthaorwell on June 18, 2008 - 2:39pm
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/06/3-handsome-possibiliti...
Fabula (Francis Bula) has been doing an “addictively” sensational job covering the municipal elections. Some comments:
I’ve come up with 3 handsome possibilities for November:
Possibility of a Vision-COPE alliance?
I like the sounds of that actually. I would vote for Vision’s playboy-juice man if he were endorsed by my favourite oppositional Santa Claus-looking councilor, David Cadman. As previously discussed, Vision and COPE don’t’ necessarily have to duke it out if both of them can agree to be chummy. As Fabula stated, Gregor Robertson isn’t one of the “traitors” that split COPE and therefore is baggageless.
And there are also talks of David Eby and Andrea Reimer running. I assume Andrea Reimer will be aligned with Vision… David Eby? Where would he be? I think he should be aligned with COPE because everybody would vote for David Eby just because he’s a freaking hero.
COPE runs David Cadman
By samanthaorwell on June 15, 2008 - 9:45pm
FULL POST WITH LINKS AND PICTURES
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/06/juice-man-squeezes-out...
So Gregor Robertson wins on the first ballot. Easily. I must say, I am surprised.
No surprise De Genova didn't have a chance though.
But I'm surprised there was a sorry turnout for Louie. I still think Louie would have been the better candidate against Ladner. Now, come election in November you have pretty much the same people running against eachother. Robertson has been called, "Peter Ladner's younger, taller, more tanned brother". Pretty much the same politics, just different parties.
I still believe Ladner will take it in November. He's got more experience and he's much more competent than our little playboy-juice man Gregor.
But how about the news of a Louie campaigner coming out to tell Francis Bula the they lost. Talk about unprofessional. That campaigner is going to be in trouble, no doubt. You don't admit defeat until it is official. Especially to media.
You can read more from Francis Bula:
[Robertson] defeated two-term city councillor Raymond Louie and park-board commissioner Allan De Genova. The vote drew a record number of voters, almost 7,000 out of 13,000 members, which is almost unheard of for a civic nomination race. He won easily on the first ballot with over 3,400 votes out of 6,771.
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/05/vote-for-me-as-if-voti...
TheVancouverManifesto is on VoterMedia.org: Media for voters, funded by voters. This is a pretty recent invention aimed at democratizing media in a few ways (put the emphasis on the right syllAbles and you'll get it). By viewing a wider range of media (i.e. instead of reading the same newspapers that are all owned by CanWest, or the shit from the "free daily" that depressed middle-aged women hand off to you at the skytrain and UBC) the voter can make a more informed decision thereby electing better leaders and better public policy.
By samanthaorwell on March 27, 2008 - 1:42pm
READ full post HERE:
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/03/peter-ladner-i-like-yo...
The Vancouver Sun columnist and blogger Miro Cernetig wrote a lovely piece that suggested a debate against Coucillor Peter Ladner and Sam Sullivan. I am very much in support of this idea.
TheVancouverManifesto, as you may know, lies pretty liberal when it comes to politics. But I’m just going to put it out there: If Peter Ladner represented the NPA against Vision and COPE candidates I would vote for him. In struggling to explain myself to my lefty friends, Miro Cernetig explains it beautifully
After years in the game, Peter Ladner is learning something new about himself and politics.
He's an ideas guy at heart, an introspective sort. He likes the thinking part of city politics, the mulling over of policy -- whether it's the big stuff, such as making Vancouver a high-tech city, or the small, smart stuff, say putting a better bicycle lane over a bridge to downtown.
Here's the problem. As he challenges Mayor Sam Sullivan for their civic party's nomination, Ladner's now caught in the nasty grind of machine politics.
I have seen enough of Ladner to know he is a stand up guy. He is engaged in the community and often shows his face on panel presentations on city ideas. Out of city hall he has proven himself an intelligent, engaged and concerned citizen.
By samanthaorwell on March 22, 2008 - 3:29pm
READ IN FULL HERE:
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/03/front-page-news-points...
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/03/front-page-news-points...
http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/03/front-page-news-points...
The front page of The Vancouver Sun posted a story entitled, “The cost of homelessness”. (Note that the online equivalent reads, “The high cost of homelessness”- which was published earlier on Friday, March 21, 2008- the word "high" a bit much for the front page?).
The Vancouver Sun, Saturday, March 22, 2008.
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=11fdf74c-9130-41b3...
"Every homeless person costs system $55,000, an amount that could buy supported
housing for each of them…annual total of $644.3 million in health,
corrections and social services spending for all the homeless in B.C."
By samanthaorwell on March 4, 2008 - 7:28pm
See whole post: http://thevancouvermanifesto.blogspot.com/2008/03/i-want-last-four-hours...
Monday nights EcoDensity public hearing event started at 6 and ended just past 10. It didn’t help that the last speaker from SmartGrowth BC was a horrid speaker that stumbled and stuttered his way into saying absolutely nothing. This post will be equally as boring so I don’t blame you if you want to close the window now. But just in case you were wondering what went on in Part III I’ll give you the 10 highlights of the evening (highlights being a very generous word for what transpired).
1)Patrick Condon- (always fun to see in person somebody you quote a lot. ) Had discussion with Toderian about the hateration with developers. I don’t know if Cadman is right, or if he’s just milking the tension for all its worth but it seems like people are more in hate with developers than ever before. See http://www.ctvbc.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20080227/BC_Cadman_Candidat...
Discussion a) Allocating 20% to affordable/social housing does not guarantee the construction. Buying land and construction are two separate entities and processes.
Discussion b) Tradeoff between affordable/social housing and public amenities?
By samanthaorwell on January 18, 2008 - 5:27pm
New to local politics (and I mean really new to local politics, I've been digesting both COPE and Visions platforms to decide which party I'd like to officially support. After looking at their respective websites I still couldn't really say for sure. Both have their appeal in completely different ways. In the sure-fire working-class corner there's COPE which champions for the poor and working poor. They appeal to people who know that they are working class, or to those who take Marxist ideals personally. Vision, on the other hand, appeals to the "socially conscious" middle class. In other words (or at least in my opinion), it appeals to those who don't know they are working class or would rather not think about themselves in such a way (myself included). My personal conflict choosing between the two parties involves both my deep intellectual belief in Marxism coupled with my personal dislike of understanding my stance as working-class- factors I'll need to reconcile if I'm to choose either way. But first a little backgrounder-
A little history on the COPE-Vision split care of Wikipedia:
Vision Vancouver is one of three parties represented on Vancouver City Council in Vancouver, Canada. Vision was formed in the months leading up to the 2005 municipal election.
