If the NDP wins the provincial election expected this spring, Nova Scotians may finally get something they badly need—public auto insurance. Let’s hope so because the present privately run system is the shits. Nova Scotians pay among the highest insurance rates in the country, but get the lowest accident benefits. And as car crash victims […]
Bruce Wark
Posted inNews + Opinion
Nova Scotia’s missing insurance consumer advocate
Having problems with your car insurance company? Well, don’t bother calling Nova Scotia’s insurance consumer advocate. George Jordan’s number is no longer in service. His job was eliminated last summer. The Tory government of John Hamm appointed Jordan in April 2003 when public anger at the government and the big insurance companies was reaching the […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
HRM’s missteps with parking enforcement officers
A former training officer with Halifax parking enforcement is speaking out publicly about the starvation wages being paid to the 10 officers who patrol downtown streets in Halifax and Dartmouth. Forty-seven-year-old Paul Keast says Securitas, the company which took over parking enforcement last September 1st, is forcing out officers earning $11 an hour and replacing […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Tar struck
Were those really beads of sweat glistening on Pete Mansbridge’s polished pate last Wednesday? The CBC TV anchor had worked himself into a lather on the eve of a presidential stopover in Ottawa. “What’s at stake when Barack Obama knocks on Stephen Harper’s door?” Mansbridge bellowed. “This meeting is unlike any other in recent memory […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
No local news is bad news
When I was young and easy under the apple boughs, I sang out merrily, “Chase away the blues with the local news.” In those carefree days before internet and email, I frolicked in the cellphone and Blackberry-free air. Dad chased his blues by poring over the gloriously Liberal Chronicle. Our neighbour cheerfully devoured the competing […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
This budget is not stimulating
Last week’s federal budget reminded me of the forlorn tramps in Sam Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, especially when Estragon says to Vladimir, “Don’t let’s do anything. It’s safer.” I’m sure those forlorn federal comedians Steve H. and Jim F. spoke words like those in private, but publicly they’re trying to stay in power by pretending […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Painful insurance rulings
First the good news: Nova Scotia’s car insurance companies are making bags of money thanks to provincial Tories and Liberals. Now the not-so-good news: Nova Scotia drivers are paying hundreds of millions too much for coverage that sucks. Just ask Melissa Gionet. After her car got sideswiped in December 2003, Gionet suffered a banged-up knee […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
War crimes
About 150 demonstrators gathered at the foot of the Robbie Burns statue in downtown Halifax last Saturday to protest against the Israeli slaughter of hundreds of Palestinians in Gaza. “I know it’s a cold day,” Ismail Zayid, a retired Dal professor told the shivering crowd, “but there are people in Gaza being subjected to bombardment […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Year of the shoe
Time to bid farewell to 2008, Year of the Flying Shoe. “This is a gift from the Iraqis; this is the farewell kiss, you dog!” Iraqi TV reporter, Muntader al-Zaidi shouted at George W. Bush during a recent Baghdad news conference. He then hurled a shoe that narrowly missed the US president’s noggin. Bush was […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Telling tales
At last, The Coast’s annual fiction issue, a chance to analyze news, that breezy blend of fact and fiction that is a literary form all on its own. OK, maybe the word “literary” is a bit fancy. After all, news prose is studded with cliches, stock phrases and stale figures of speech. “Northern Saskatchewan villages […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Iggy pops up
Oh my god, here comes Iggy. The beetle-browed brainiac suddenly had the Liberal leadership crown plunked on his pointy head last week. Now it’s official. Michael Ignatieff is prime-minister-in-waiting. Yes, Ignatieff, champion of American Empire, cheerleader for Bush’s invasion of Iraq, booster of the war in Afghanistan and, although he denies it, intellectual justifier of […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Shopped to death
The New York Times described Jdimytai Damour as “a gentle giant…known to his friends as Jimbo, or Jdidread because of his dreadlocks.” He loved to talk about movies, Japanese anime and politics. The 34-year-old temporary maintenance worker at a Long Island Wal-Mart was trampled to death last month by rampaging shoppers rushing to get bargains […]
