Worth Reading – October 3, 2013

Now that I am living a grown-up life I find it much tougher to keep up with the news. I monitor the news for my job, but that most means northern papers and education stories I dig up. Regardless, I end up with a giant pile of links, and not much time to read them.

Speaking of work, the school board I work for worked with the Government of NWT and Aurora College to host the annual Trades Awareness Program. Here is a newspaper piece on it.

Grand Theft Auto 5 is one of the biggest video games. It has a reach into popular culture more than the vast majority of its peers in the media. The New Yorker asked how evil games should allow us to be in response from some of the content from GTA V. It’s an interesting question given the interactive nature of video games as opposed to say film.

Stats can announced that Canadian population has exceeded 35 million people. 

Here is some Northwest Territories content. The GNWT has to wrestle with a big budget question. It is a problem few places on the continent have to deal with.

Former federal Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff has a book about his experiences in democracy, in particular losing in politics. TheToronto Star ran an excerpt of his work. It appears to be a highly sincere and emotional examination of politics and political life in this country. I’ll probably end up putting it on my Christmas list.

Infrastructure may be one of our most important public policy areas that you cannot get anyone excited about. The Globe and Mail offers four ideas to make Canada a better place through infrastructure. 

Despite all the talk about the Scarborough subway the National Post says that the real issue is Toronto’s Downtown Relief Line. This is particularly true given that the Scarborough extension will likely add to the burden on the Yonge line.

Back home in Brampton, Ontario the construction/renovation of city hall is causing quite a bit of controversy. This has led to one city councillor to refer to the project as a “fiasco”. I’m glad to see my home hasn’t changed much in the intervening weeks.

As was true with the Dalton McGuinty’s prorogation of the legislature and scandalous avoidance of accountability, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s (CPC – Calgary Southwest, AB) style of governing has also spread to Quebec. I appreciate a modest amount of irony in all of this.

I’m not sure how far to trust this, but apparently the Scarborough subway plan will be determined by the City of Toronto after securing funding from the federal and provincial governments.  If this actually an intended, coordinated strategy it would have been quite  a coup for Ford and his allies.

Greg Weston of CBC asks incredulously whether or not it is believable that the ever evolving Senate scandal left no paper trail.