August 28th marked the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, when 250,000 people gathered to hear Martin Luther King Jr. give his historic “I have a dream” speech. This event was a turning point in the long struggle for civil rights for Afro-Americans who grew up in the aftermath of slavery. And it marked a turning point in politics both in Canada and abroad.
The Harper-run Conservatives combined their revisioning of conservatism and economism into a winning strategy. With significant vote-splitting in the existing first-past-the-post system, a minority won a majority of seats in 2011. The broad Canadian public now seems to be looking more deeply at the rhetoric and the realities of Harper’s political brand. It’s about time.
Violence is always unsettling and with global communications we can be unsettled by the constant replay of images of violence that probably have nothing to do with any threat we actually face.
