Ask Questions First, Shoot Never
Blood Tribe Police Chief Kyle Melting Tallow is growing his hair out. When I visited the police station in Standoff on the Blood Reserve in late September, his face was framed by a wave of black [...]
By Doug Horner
Social Issues
Social Issues
The Orange Tent
As I back my minivan out of the garage, I roll down the window. My husband, post-call after a night of anaesthetizing patients for emergency surgeries, is blowing leaves around in the yard with [...]
Suddenly There’s Room at the Inn
On a recent Thursday outside the Coliseum Inn, a woman in wrinkled clothes balances a large blue sleeping bag atop her shoulder. In the parking lot a man pushes a shopping cart overflowing with [...]
Adam’s Choice
To understand why he told the press, in April 2018, that Alberta First Nations “want to be owners of a pipeline,” specifically the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion (TMX), Chief Allan Adam of the [...]
Changing the Culture of Canadian Policing
Printed on yellow cardstock and taped to the wall next to the two computer monitors on Terry Coleman’s desk, the quote from Aristotle outlines a formula for success: First, have a definite, [...]
By Doug Horner
Is Poverty the Individual’s Fault?
CHRIS SARLO The economics professor at Nipissing University and senior fellow at the Fraser Institute SAYS YES I’ll answer yes—with two qualifications. First, the setting in which I believe [...]
Where Social Assistance Falls Short
Our society helps individuals and families in need through income support, part of a larger system of social assistance. The program was in the past sometimes referred to as “welfare.” “Welfare” [...]
Trauma Repair
We were seeing people come back or simply not get better,” says Robert Perry. “And then along comes the brain science and it was like holy-oley! This seems to explain it. It’s not just poverty, [...]
Big Muddy
I found him asleep at Wendy’s on a scuzzy patch of 17th Avenue, his forehead resting on the makeshift pillow he’d created from one arm. I couldn’t see his face, but I knew it was my brother: the [...]
Retrospective: A Trip Around the Bus Loop
In Grade 6, Lois told me her mother lay on the couch all day, eating chocolates and crying. Astonishing. But not entirely. I believe I knew, deep down, that the place was filled with unhappy [...]
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Pension Folly
In 1965, Quebec, eager to be master in its own house, decided it wanted to have its own pension plan and not be part of the new Canada Pension Plan. Quebec’s population was younger than the Canadian average, and the province had a high birth rate. The province believed its ...
Rural Resentment
The rise of the right-wing, authoritarian populist movements across the Western world owes much to the support of rural citizens who are increasingly feeling left behind economically and culturally and are eager to overturn the status quo. I’ve been thinking about the plight of rural Alberta in this context, partly ...
Should Churches be Tax Exempt?
Karen Kerr, the president of Edmonton Atheists and co-founder of Alberta Secular Conference says no.
In Canada many charities and other non-profits, including churches and religious groups, are tax-exempt if they are deemed to create public benefit. The exemption is premised on the idea that they provide a public good. However ...