Talk of “rigged elections” is rife in the United States right now, thanks to one Donald J. Trump, but Susan Dodd, a professor at the University of King’s College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, worries that the shift to electronic voting here in our own province has opened the door toRead More
The Cape Breton Spectator has not failed to notice what is happening in the CBRM this week. Like so many of you, I woke on Tuesday to find the power out. But I was at the bungalow, and when I returned to Sydney, I found the lights at my houseRead More
Last March, a CBRM citizen decided he (or she, I’m not sure, so I’m just going to refer to him/her as “The Citizen”) wanted to know more about the expenses of Mayor Cecil Clarke, Port CEO Marlene Usher, CBRM Chief Administrative Officer Michael Merritt, the mayor’s executive assistant Mark BettensRead More
Why do we allow our politicians and public servants to get away with elevated rhetoric that is not reflected in their actions? (Full disclosure: as a professor, I work in the public sector.) Why, when they are caught in an expense scandal or ignore their own promises, do we letRead More
The roller coaster metaphor so often applied to US presidential campaigns has never been as apt as it is this season—the jerking motions, the nausea, the anxiety, the precarious swings from left to right, the tunnel-vision as one dives into a screaming chasm before lurching back up into the shrillRead More
It’s not surprising that the Archbishops of Alberta and the Northern Territories would take a stand against assisted death, as outlined in Bill C-14, passed by the Canadian House of Commons in June of this year. In so doing, they are upholding Catholic doctrine that life exists from conception toRead More
The Cape Breton Post sure does love a shipyard. And I mean that literally, it loves a shipyard — the one run by Canadian Maritime Engineering (CME) in North Sydney. The one partially located on a former waterfront green space. Our paper of record never tires of visiting that shipyardRead More
“Old age and treachery always overcomes youth and skill.” – Waylon & Willie Dr StrangeJob is no loser, but he does concede he will not win the CBRM mayoralty race. Yes, he is statistically the most favored candidate, not to mention the only mayoralty candidate actually liked by goCapebreton.com. No,Read More
I was going to start this introduction to my interviews with all 10 women running in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality elections this fall by asking the rhetorical question: “Why do we need women on council?” I was then going to answer (I know, I know, you’re not supposed toRead More
District 2 Earlene MacMullin North Sydney resident Earlene MacMullin was an outspoken critic of the process by which Archibald’s Wharf, the town’s waterfront recreation area, was sold in 2015, but her desire to run for council pre-dates that controversial deal. In fact, it stems from a far more positive experienceRead More
