Download CPAC footage of Green Party convention (BitTorrent)

Here it is, folks! Downloadable video of the entire GPC convention's CPAC coverage, in its entirety:

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Green Party of Canada 2006 Convention
The Green Party of Canada's 2006 leadership, council and policy convention. Complete video footage of all four days (Thurs 24 Aug - Sun 27 Aug 2006) from CPAC - Canada's Cable Public Affairs Channel.

DOWNLOAD HERE (via a BitTorrent client) - http://www.mininova.org/get/409981

total size (all files) - 1.26 GB

The files can ONLY be downloaded with a BitTorrent client. For information and a FAQ on BitTorrent, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent

Two of the more popular (and free) BitTorrent clients are:
* Azureus (java-based) - http://azureus.sourceforge.net/
* BitComet - http://www.bitcomet.com/

To play the file, use either Windows Media Player, or VLC Media Player (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/). If you're on a Mac or Linux/Unix... well... whatever. ;)

Please don't panic if the download doesn't start right away... due to my funny connection, it may take several people connected until data starts to send.

Cheers!

Elizabeth May on CBC TV and Radio tonight

New Green Party of Canada leader Elizabeth May will be a guest on CBC Radio One's As It Happens, tonight at 6:30pm (7:00pm NT).

For those of you in Saskatchewan, she will also be on tonight's CBC TV evening news in the wheat province.

Photo courtesy of Grant Neufeld.

GPO leader Frank de Jong to run in Toronto byelection

The Green Party of Ontario have announced that leader Frank de Jong will be running in the upcoming Ontario provincial byelection for Parkdale-High Park (Toronto), which was vacated when Gerard Kennedy left to run for the federal Liberal leadership.

Here is the official press release:

TORONTO, August 20, 2006 – Highlight Thursday September 14, 2006 in your calendars. The Green Party in Parkdale-High Park is gearing up for its most exciting and successful election yet!

Frank de Jong, leader of the Green Party of Ontario will represent your party in this by-election. Frank is a long time resident of West Toronto, and has been a teacher at Fern Avenue Public School for six years. He has been a federal and provincial candidate on numerous occasions, including in our riding in 1999.

The Parkdale-High Park Green Party of Ontario Association will hold a nomination and planning meeting this Thursday, August 24, 2006 at 7pm – venue to be confirmed via email, on our website (www.parkdalehighparkgreens.ca) or by calling (416) 533-2030.

Once again, your financial and volunteer contributions will be vital to our success! We have openings for the following positions on the campaign:

- Paid Office Manager (30 hrs per week, Aug 28 – September 16)
- Office Volunteers
- Volunteer Coordinator (1)
- Sign Manager (1)
- Neighbourhood Sign Captains (8)
- Poll Canvassers
- Subway Canvassers

The local Greens ran a balanced budget in the January 2006 federal election campaign, and will do the same in this election. Our fundraising goal is $13,000. You may make maximum donations of $1,120 to our constituency association. Ontario tax credits are granted for political contributions on the following basis:

Total Contributions: Up to $336
Credit Calculation: 75% of contribution
Maximum Credit: $252

Total Contributions: $336 to $1,120
Credit Calculation: $252 plus 50% of the amount over $336
Maximum Credit: $644

Total Contributions: More than $1,120 (total)
Credit Calculation: $644 plus 33 1/3% of the amount over $1,120
Maximum Credit: Up to $1,120

We need to send a strong message to Dalton McGuinty, John Tory and Howard Hampton that their parties do not represent a viable, long term vision for our province. The Green Party is socially progressive, fiscally responsible and environmentally sustainable. We are the future of politics in Canada . . . today!

Contact: Robert Rishchynski
President, Parkdale-High Park Green Party of Ontario Constituency Association
Phone: (416) 533-2030
Email: contact@parkdalehighparkgreens.ca

Why the Green Party should support the seal hunt

Apologies up front - a bit of a controversial headline to grab your attention. But conditional support is what I propose. And here is my argument why: if we support the chicken hunt, we should also support the seal hunt!

If we as a society not only permit the eating of animals (chicken, cows, pigs, sheep, goat, lamb, fish, etc), but also permit the large-scale breeding of such animals for the sole purpose to become food for us, then why should seals be any different?

I agree that slaughterhouses are often quite rightly named - many put animals through barbaric cruelty and needless suffering, in the name of efficiency and mass production. Animals are often subjected to horrible conditions, as if they were plants rather than animals that feel pain.

But if we can conveniently ignore such details for a moment, my point is that we as a society permit the large-scale breeding and consumption of animals as an acceptable practice. And if a chicken can be conceived for the sole purpose of ultimately becoming breaded chicken fingers in the frozen foods section of a supermarket, then why differentiate between chicken and seals?

Consider these points:

• Argument - Seals are particularly cute (especially the pups), therefore should not be killed.
  
• Reality - The babies of all animals are cute - chicken, pigs, and even cows.
  
  
• Argument - Seals are defenceless, they have never hurt humans, and thus killing them is barbaric.
  
• Reality - When was the last time a chicken went on a rampage and killed dozens of humans? They're equally defenceless. They're just as (if not even more) frail.
  
  
• Argument - The method used to kill seals during the seal hunt (i.e. clubbing a seal to death) is a lengthy process which causes severe pain and trauma - to a fellow mammal, no less!
  
• Reality - Have you ever seen the conditions and practices that take place in the average slaughterhouse? Such an experience would likely put you off conventional meat for a long, long time. And cows, pigs, goat and lamb are all fellow mammals - yet we happily put them through such conditions in order to consume them.

I hope you can see where my argument is going. I'm not necessarily in favour of the seal hunt - instead, what makes me mad is the hypocrisy of those who decry the seal hunt, but then head to their local fast food outlet to tuck into the flesh of an animal that arguably went through much less humane conditions than any hunted seal.

Having said that, I will admit that I am not a vegetarian - nor is the majority of society.

I can fully appreciate if a protest group (such as Greenpeace) or an advocacy group (such as the Sierra Club) cries out while our televisions relay images of seals being bludgeoned to death, their warm blood steaming in contact with the ice.

But the Green Party of Canada is not a protest group, nor an advocacy group. We're a political party. And as such, we should be differentiating ourselves from the others. Not because we're better than them, but because we're different. If protest groups, advocacy groups and political parties all share the same opposition to something, they should each oppose it by their own unique methods. Such would be much more effective than if protest groups and political parties were to behave in identical ways.

We as Greens should not be protesting the seal hunt. Instead, we should be making coherent and over-arching policies that relate to the cruelty and suffering that humans inflict upon animals - not just seals, but all animals that we consume.

So my point is - why all the outrage against the seal hunt? Surely those who condemn cruelty to seals but permit the same practices against other animals (even fellow mammals) are hypocrites.

The Green Party of Canada should either adopt policies relating to the humane practice and treatment of all animals, or we should keep our noses out of this area altogether. But to single out a single species for special consideration smacks not only of hypocrisy, but of merely adopting policies to suit the demands of trendy and celebrity-endorsed causes.

No coherent government would operate in such a manner - so why should the Green Party of Canada? We're a political party, and as such, we need to be presenting a different and thorough vision of how we would operate the country if we were to assume government. Basing our policies around single causes isn't going to win us Greens many recruits come the next election.

If we're going to support the chicken hunt, then surely we should also support the seal hunt.

(N.B. Please note that this post does not mean to deride such protest groups nor advocacy groups. Instead, I feel that they and political parties each have their own unique niche roles to play, and should work in unison to form a more coherent and resounding umbrella network of opinion, which both society and the media would give more attention to, and thus would cause greater practical change.)

Don't fall silent, NS Greens!

Everything considered, the Green Party of Nova Scotia did a remarkable job over the past few months.

The list includes:

• establishing the party from scratch


• officially registering it with the province's electoral body


• selecting a leader and executive membership


• declaring intent to run for the June 2006 provincial election


• fielding a full slate of candidates (in all 52 ridings)


• writing a platform (albeit a rather slim one)


• and receiving 2.28% of the popular vote.

Achieving all of these steps in a very short timeframe speaks volumes about the energy, enthusiasm, and passion behind Nova Scotia's newest political party.

The young party has operated in a very "professional" manner - trumpeting the "triple bottom-line" approach by including the environment, society, and the economy into its policy outlook. Press releases were timely, succinct, and delivered messages effectively.

All in all, a very promising preview of things to come in the immediate years ahead for Nova Scotian politics.

But the real challenge to the Green Party of Nova Scotia's growth begins now. After the election.

The media often complain that the Greens across Canada are very active during elections, but seem to become dormant while governments are in session. In a blog piece that I wrote two months ago, I gave two concrete examples of the media making this point, noting that they used such reasoning to justify giving relatively little coverage to the Greens during elections.

It's up to the Green Party of Nova Scotia to remain active and insightful throughout the legislative cycle, and to respond to pressing issues in a timely manner. This will mean creating statements that express the GPNS' policy stances, and ensuring they're distributed to the press while issues are still relevant and being debated by the media. Putting a press release together two or three weeks after an event occurs just won't cut it.

Doing this will prove a massive hurdle - even the Green Party of Canada struggle with this task, and they receive federal funding in the seven figures. But if the Greens in Nova Scotia make it a priority, it is something that they could do successfully, and use as a beacon for the other Green parties here in Canada (including the national party) to follow.

The Green Party of Nova Scotia continue to show post-election signs of life: they have appointed a female deputy leader, have chastized the other parties for lack of gender balance from their candidate slates, and have recently held a party retreat. But when the NS Tories spring into action and make controversial decisions in the coming months, the Greens need to be there. It's fine to look inward and spend the majority of time and resources building up a young party, but the GPNS needs to balance its internal growth and development with external work (i.e. timely press releases) - ensuring that the momentum of the June election is built upon, rather than let to drift away.

It will take the months, if not years, to work out a system that keeps the party energized and fully functional at all times. But it's a hurdle that can - and must - be overcome.