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Erik Eriksson announces bid for mayor of Courtenay
The 2018 municipal election campaign got a jump start this week when Courtenay Councillor Erik Eriksson told Decafnation that he’s running for mayor. Eriksson is the first Comox Valley candidate to formally announce his campaign. While most incumbents and potential...
Here’s a novel idea: politicians working together
I'm amused and somewhat disappointed at all the hand-wringing about the imminent British Columbia minority government. Since the May 9 election that gave no single party a majority of seats in the B.C. Legislature, political pundits, former elected officials and...
Courtenay-Comox: It’s still a swing riding
The newly reconfigured Courtenay-Comox riding dispensed a few surprises for the political experts this year. The biggest one: it’s still a swing riding. With control of the B.C. Legislature hanging on the outcome of a recount and some 2,000 absentee ballots, the...
It’s the party that matters most, not the candidate
People often ask me about the differences between the U.S. and Canadian electoral systems. There are many, but one stands out as the most important. Individual candidates hardly matter in British Columbia elections. Canadians vote first of all for the party, its...
I’m running on May 9, and I’m no GOOBER, by golly
Those of us who study elections seriously have stumbled upon an alarming discovery about British Columbia politics: spending too much time in Victoria reduces your intelligence to the rough equivalent of a kumquat. You’ve probably noticed this, too. A candidate...
On electoral reform, Trudeau disappoints us, once again
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau scuffed his once-shiny political image again yesterday by discarding yet another campaign promise. In his first throne speech after the 2015 federal election, Trudeau boasted triumphantly that Canada had seen the last of its...
The mistrust of government begins at home
The strong undercurrent of government mistrust that shades the American landscape is something relatively new to Canadians. But the recent Comox Valley Regional District open house on the HMCS Quadra sewer line replacement shows how and why that mood is changing. The...
At the end of America, Trump
For as far back as I can remember, people have warned me about the certain implosion of America. They made comparisons to fall of the Roman Empire and Sodom and Gomorrah. The unmistakable signs were everywhere, they said. As a teenager coming of age in the midwest...
Trump fact-less claims cause problems for journalists
In the era of modern journalism, reporters have operated on a few professional standards -- like detachment and objectivity -- and some ethical values -- like fairness and balance. But what’s a reporter to do when she’s assigned to cover a potentially dangerous...