The Shotgun Blog
Thursday, April 08, 2004
Stuck
All right. New blog is up... obviously. Looks great. Kudos Webmaster John. We'll be sending out invites again shortly once I get an approval on the guidelines from the town council that I, the new sheriff, have drafted. Now, cue the theme from "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." [do-da-lee-da-doooo, wah wah waaaah]. Let's go riding in, try this thing out.
Statistics Canada yesterday released a Daily on "Low income in census metropolitan areas." They examine two decades, from 1980 to 2000. You'll find a Canadian Press story, heavy with human drama, here. Way down at the very bottom of the Statscan release you will find this:
In 2000, people in low income who lived in metropolitan areas received a smaller share of their income from earnings, and more from government transfers than their counterparts two decades earlier.Among individuals in low income in 2000, 51.1% of their income came from transfers, compared with only 42.7% in 1980. This indicates an important change in the source of income for low-income persons.
So the gap between rich and poor is widening, and the poor are receiving more of their income from government benefits. Discuss. Note the CP story mentioned the gap part, referring to the poor as "mired in low-income living," but not the part about the rise in government benefits. Perhaps we should look at this mire, this bog, this swamp.
Posted by Kevin Steel on April 8, 2004 | Permalink
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Comments
Congratulations, both on the new Western Standard magazine and the new blog. The magazine looks great, and as for the blog, should be interesting times ahead judging by yesterdays debate on here. I look forward to it.
Posted by: Mike P | 2004-04-08 8:54:47 AM
Where would one find "yesterday's debate"?
Posted by: Mark | 2004-04-08 10:43:05 AM
Looking good!
Of course, libertatian that I am, rules? regulations? Sheriff??
Posted by: Jay Currie | 2004-04-08 10:49:43 AM
I keep a file of The Shotgun Mk. 1 and can send it along if that is useful, Mark.
And Jay, I can only paraphrase Ash from Army of Darkness: Good. Bad. He's the one with the gun.
Posted by: Ghost of a flea | 2004-04-08 11:33:38 AM
Gun?? I was hoping for a spell checker.
Posted by: Jay Currie | 2004-04-08 11:53:16 AM
That mire would be a dependency trap. If low-income people ever managed to get out of it then all of those who make their living from dealing with low-income fallout would be out of a job. Don't expect things to change anytime soon.
Posted by: Sean | 2004-04-08 3:16:41 PM
Quite a lively and stimulating exchange of ideas at the Shotgun thus far (esp. in the first edition), but where are the Westerners? Other than Kate McMillan and Jay Currie, the rest of the main participants so far (Nicholas Packwood, Paul Tuns, Kathy Shaidle, David Mader) are all Easterners. And I see, both from my copy of the first edition of the print version of the Western Standard, and from the website's list of columnists, quite a few voices from the East (Frum, Steyn, Coren, Selick, Warren, de Souza, Lemieux), and a few from the U.S. (Coulter, Malkin, and Williams).
Thus far, is the Western Standard a voice for Canadian conservatism? Certainly, notwithstanding some American content in the print mag. But is it "the Independent Voice of the New West"? I'm waiting to see more Western columnists and bloggers on board, before I'd agree that WS has demonstrated a distinctly Western sensibility. (Are you listening, Mr. Levant and Mr. Steel?)
Posted by: Grumbling Westerner | 2004-04-09 1:51:58 AM
GW, but I'm blogging from Galiano which pulls the center of gravity at least a couple of blocks west of Spadina...
Posted by: Jay Currie | 2004-04-09 3:37:04 AM
:) {re: Jay Currie's comment}
Don't get me wrong; I'm not, by any means, looking to exclude Easterners and Americans from either the print mag or blogging; I'd just like to also see more Western voices added to everyone who's already here. (There are a number of conservatives and libertarians at the Calgary Sun and at the Edmonton Sun; maybe Mr. Levant could persuade some of his Albertan Sun Media colleagues to join him in this venture, too... Just a thought...)
Posted by: Grumbling Westerner | 2004-04-09 10:09:12 PM
I see that Sun Media columnist Dave Ryan is now writing for WS; that's a start...
Posted by: Grumbling Westerner | 2004-04-12 10:27:54 PM
Well, I'm a Vancouver so-con. Will that do? :)
Too playful though just far...
Posted by: Rick Hiebert | 2004-04-13 11:48:02 PM
... that's *thus* far, of course, in the last comment.
Shouldn't type while sleepy...
Posted by: Rick Hiebert | 2004-04-13 11:56:50 PM
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