Reflections, Observations, and Analyses Pertaining to the Canadian Political Scene
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Climate Change Poll

The Disaffected Lib continues to do stellar work on the climate change file. Visiting his site will arm anyone interested with some solid information about what is, in my view, the most dire threat facing humanity today. Yet I can't escape the dispiriting conviction that despite such invaluable efforts and resources, little is going to change.
Today's Toronto Star reports that 53 per cent of Canadians polled July 23 by Forum Research believe that the recent Alberta flooding and the torrential storms in Central Ontario were the result of climate change attributable to human activity. That conclusion in itself is problematic, given that no specific weather event can be attributed to climate change, given the historic natural vagaries of weather. As well, drawing one's belief in human-caused climate change from such spectacular and destructive weather events suggests a very shallow conviction. If, for example, the rest of the summer proceeds in a more conventional way, with no more such storms and no more sustained and debilitating heat waves as afflicted Ontario last week, isn't it most likely that many of the newly converted will just dismiss those events as merely atypical weather and once more put climate change on the back shelves of their thinking? The attention span of our species can, at times, be deplorably short.
Some other interesting numbers emerged from the poll as well:
- A belief in human-caused climate change is more common among women (59 per cent) than men and the least wealthy (63 per cent).
- Conservative voters are least likely to believe human activities are causing climate change (38 per cent), compared with Liberals (66 per cent) and New Democrats (71 per cent.)
- Many Conservatives polled (71 per cent) don’t believe climate change even exists, while New Democrats are the most likely to believe it does (92 per cent.)
With statistics like this, and the fact that none of the three major political parties is led by people with the courage and integrity to confront the dire threat we are all facing, leaves me with the steadily-growing pessimism about the prospects of our long-term survival as a species.
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Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Conservative Hypocrisy
In 2006, Harper and the cons lied about "100s of millions of missing $" Now they're missing $3.1B.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On
More On The E.I Whistleblower

The other day I wrote a post on Sylvie Therrien, the government employee suspended because she leaked documents that revealed federal investigators were told to find $485,000 of Employment Insurance fraud every year.
The “fraud quotas” were just one aspect of an office culture that encouraged cutting benefits from as many people as possible to save money, Therrien said in an interview Monday.
“My values just wouldn’t allow me to do that,” she said. “It was so unfair. These people are like everyone else. They have children, and we send them to the streets.”
Her act of conscience means she will likely be fired (and no doubted added to the ever-growing Harper regime's 'enemies list.')
Steve McCuaig, national executive vice president of the Canada Employment and Immigration Union, promised to defend Therrien if she is wrongly dismissed.
“The message (to whistleblowers) is: ‘Be afraid, be very afraid,’ ” he said. “Employees are asked to do jobs, and they’re asked to never say anything about that job. We wonder why.”
Typical of the soulless and technocratic regime that masquerades as our government, Harper enabler Amélie Maisonneuve, spokesperson for Human Resources and Skills Development Canada, offered the following justification for the harsh measures taken against Therrien:
Civil servants are allowed by law to disclose information to the public only if there is “insufficient time” to contact the integrity commissioner, and it constitutes a serious offence or poses an imminent risk to public health or safety.
Sometimes there are moral imperatives that transcend such narrow allowances, prompted by circumstances that I doubt few supporters of Mr. Harper's cabal could ever understand.
You can read the full story here.
Our Hands Are Not Entirely Clean Either
Reading this story in today's Star, however, made me realize that we still have some distance to go in welcoming the gay community into full society:
Karen Dubinsky was shocked when she opened the mail and found a letter laced with homophobic slurs that said her family was not welcome in the city and they should leave “before it is too late.”
“I just had this chilling, weird sense of the contents,” said the Queen’s University professor who lives in the city with her partner Susan Belyea, 48, and their 13-year-old son.
The letter claimed to be authored by a “small but dedicated group of Kingston residents devoted to removing the scourge of homosexuality in our city.”
While I suspect the claim that the hate mail was authored by a dedicated group of Kingston residents is more the product of the author's diseased imagination, it is nonetheless shocking that such retrograde and twisted perspectives continue today.
The letter's ominous tone continues:
“We will watch and wait, and then strike, at home and office, as need arises,” the letter read.
While the matter is now in the hands of the Kingston police, friends, family and community are rallying:
Dubinsky said her family and friends have taken to sitting on the front porch to “be visible.”
She added that her family is grateful for the community response, which has included flowers delivered to her doorstep, phone calls and support rallies.
“That helps us meet this kind of hatefulness,” she said. “It makes it easy to find courage.”
I suspect that such collective action and support are indeed the most effective responses to such unhinged mentalities.

Monday, July 22, 2013
Privacy Concerns Or Just Plain Secrecy?
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I started working on a post the other day about government and institutions' penchant for claiming 'privacy concerns' as an excuse for withholding the kind of information that true democracies are entitled to. However, I haven't had a lot of energy the past few days, so I think I will let Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian speak for me through a letter that was published in Today's Star.
Re: Unlicensed daycare complaints kept secret in Ontario, July 19
It really disturbs me when people hide behind privacy, using it as a shield to prevent much-needed scrutiny. Accordingly, I take issue with the statement by the Minister of Education that safety-related information of unlicensed daycares cannot be released due to “privacy concerns.” Privacy laws are not meant to protect individuals who break the law, nor to prevent the enforcement of safety requirements.
While I acknowledge there is a wide range of informal unlicensed daycare arrangements, it is the responsibility of the ministry to determine what it can release to parents proactively, according to the principles I have issued on Access by Design or the legislated provisions on disclosing information in compelling circumstances affecting health and safety. Parents should not have to file formal access requests for information the ministry holds that has an impact on the health and safety of children in unlicensed daycares — this should be made freely available. The ministry should not use privacy as a shield.
Ann Cavoukian, Information and Privacy Commissioner, Ontario
You may also find this Star editorial of interest as well.
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Coffee Workers Unionizing
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Many of us are abundantly aware, as both parents and citizens, of how hard it is for young people to establish meaningful career paths these days. Part-time and contract work abounds, as do minimum wage jobs, despite the fact that we have a very educated population. Corporations continue to sit on record profits as they enjoy low corporate tax rates that fail to create jobs.
Many of the lowest-paying positions are in the service sector, especially coffee shops that continue to grow at very healthy rates. Although I am sure the right-wing will be consternated, there is good news out of Halifax. The Globe and Mail has a story detailing a push by those working in coffee emporiums to unionize:
Employees at a Just Us! coffee shop in Halifax successfully joined Local 2 of the Service Employees International Union.
Workers at two Second Cup outlets in the city also recently voted whether to join the same union, though the Labour Board has yet to release their results.
Personally, I think it is long overdue, largely because such jobs, although traditionally part-time positions, are turning into long-term jobs thanks to the dearth of career opportunities today.
Not everyone, however, feels this way:
Labour organizing in the service industry has been traditionally low for both ideological and economic reasons, said David Doorey, a professor of labour and employment law at York University in Toronto.
“It is a highly competitive industry, and employers believe unionization will pose a threat to their profit margins,” he said in an email.
To get a flavour of some Globe reader reactions, take a look at a few of the comments accompanying the story, which range from sarcasm to mockery to outrage fueled by the fear that unionization will lead to higher prices for coffee. To say such blinkered outlooks disgust me would be an understatement.
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Government Suspends Whistleblower For Revealing E.I. Wichhunt
Harper's hypocrisy has no limits:
H/t Glyn Humphries
Friday, July 19, 2013
How Much Do We Really Pay For Those Bargains?
While the claims made by Walker were nonsense in 2003, when the film was made, ten years later workers are experiencing even more exploitation. As reported in today's Star, based on a report published by the Center for American Progress, despite increasing orders from the West, the wages being paid to third-world workers are getting worse, and no one is receiving anything even remotely approaching a living wage.
Amongst the report's highlights:
Garment workers in Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Cambodia saw the largest erosion in wages. Between 2001 and 2011 wages in these countries fell in real terms by 28.9 percent, 23.74 percent, and 19.2 percent, respectively.
In 5 of the top 10 apparel-exporting countries to the United States—Bangladesh, Mexico, Honduras, Cambodia, and El Salvador—wages for garment workers declined in real terms between 2001 and 2011 by an average of 14.6 percent on a per country basis. This means that the gap between prevailing wages and living wages actually grew.
Much more information is available through the above links for those interested, but perhaps one of the most important inferences we in the affluent part of the world can draw is that we really are paying much much more than we think whenever we seize upon 'bargain' garments, and contrary to popular corporate propaganda, the lives of those who help us indulge in our cost-saving passions are not being improved as a consequence.
Tim Speaketh Yet Again

I doubt that Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak has ever met a neoconservative nostrum that he doesn't like. The latest pontification from the lad who would be Premier comes from his 'bold' assertion that Ontario must subsidize electricity costs for manufacturing if the province is to keep and attract jobs.
Claiming his plan would be cost-effective (simply end the 'subsidies' to wind and solar power) the lad is sure that Ontario would thus win at least 300,000 manufacturing jobs from the five million new jobs that the Americans are going to get. (Sorry, Tim didn't deign to explain where either figure comes from, such is the ardent faith of the free market advocate).
Also missing from his strange figures is acknowledgement that Ontario currently offers heavy industrial discounting under its Industrial Incentive Electricity Progrtam. Nor does he explain that despite tax rates that are lower than those of the U.S., business is sitting on its profits instead of creating and retaining jobs.
And how would he deal with pesky unions who have an unseemly habit of wanting living wages and benefits? Well, as he has previously announced, a flourish of the legislative pen would enact right-to-work laws, thinly disguised as 'workplace democracy' that would eventually end unions in the workplace.
A bold man of vision. A leader who is not afraid to make the hard decisions. Neither of those descriptions will ever apply to young Tim.
Thursday, July 18, 2013
The NDP - Just Another Political Machine - UPDATE
Of the NDP in Ontario, the province in which I reside, I am less certain. While leader Andrea Horwath has made noises about doing politics differently, increasingly she and her party appear to represent nothing except the same old backroom machinations aimed at maximizing seats at the expense of principle. A strong case in point is found in today's Star column by Martin Regg Cohn. Entitled NDP fights for its soul in Scarborough civil war, it tells the rather sordid tale of how disgraced former Toronto City Councillor Adam Giambrone, wending his way back from political purgatory, essentially 'muscled out' Amarjeet Kaur Chhabra, the very person he thought best to contest the upcoming Scarborough byelection.
But at the 11th hour, Giambrone had second thoughts — concluding that he was the best choice. He telephoned his fresh recruit, Chhabra, to confess that he would challenge her for the nomination.
In no time, Giambrone rounded up a posse to push him over the top at the weekend nomination meeting.
Unfortunately, these new supporters did not appear on a printed list of members signed up before the 30-day cut-off, and 12 names are being contested. Given that she lost by only two votes, the betrayed candidate, Amarjeet Kaur Chhabra, by all accounts an ideal choice, is prepared to take legal action to invalidate the nomination that Giambrone 'won.'
Party leader Horwath appears to be missing in action on the whole issue.
Unquestionably, when party democracy takes a back seat to political expediency, it cannot bode well for the future.

UPDATE: Amarjeet Kaur Chhabra has announced that she will not be pursuing legal action over the subversion of her bid for the NDP Scarborough nomination. She said that while she remains “disappointed” in the NDP over the debacle, she is letting the matter drop because the Aug. 1 vote is so close.
He Said, She Said ....
It seems the PMO has now moved into high propaganda gear, claiming it has not been asked for any such email:
Contrary to CTV’s reporting, our office has not been asked for this email,” spokesperson Julie Vaux said in an email statement.
“As we have always said, we will assist investigations into this matter.”
However, Vaux refused to say whether the RCMP has asked for other emails or documentation regarding the $90,000 cheque Wright wrote to Duffy or whether the Mounties have interviewed anyone at PMO.
Sounds to me likes its time for a supoena, which apparently would be a first:
Reg Whitaker, University of Victoria professor emeritus who has studied and written about the history of the RCMP .... said he’s unaware of any instance in the history of the RCMP when it had to resort to legal instruments to compel criminal evidence from a sitting prime minister or his office. Nor could he think of any justification the PMO could use for obstructing the investigation.
But then again, many sad precedents have been set by this government, the likes of which Canada has never before seen.

Wednesday, July 17, 2013
A Politician To Respect
Canadians can only wish we had that calibre of politican here in a position to influence public debate. As good as our Eliabeth May may be, I do not see The Green Party rising to prominence in near future.
If the Prime Minister Obstructs Justice, Isn't It Still A Criminal Offence?

CTV reports the following:
The Prime Minister’s Office has been withholding from the RCMP an email about the $90,000 cheque Stephen Harper’s former chief of staff wrote to Sen. Mike Duffy...
RCMP investigators have been trying to obtain the email ever since CTV News first revealed its existence two months ago.
The prime minister’s communications director, Andrew MacDougall, confirmed that the email exists.
The story, with accompanying video, goes on to reveal that one of the key architects behingd the deal to silence Duffy and pay off his debts, Harper’s former legal counsel Benjamin Perrin, has not made himself available to be interviewed by our federal force.
Liberal MP Rodger Cuzner has suggested that the RCMP obtain warrants to get the email, but Robert Fife reports that the Mounties would prefer to see the PMO voluntarily provide all of the relevant information and require anyone with knowledge of the Wright-Duffy deal to come forward.
Fat chance of that happening.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Pat Robertson Offers His 'Expert' Opinion On Trayvon Martin
Monday, July 15, 2013
Separated At Birth?

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Both Richard Nixon and Stephen Harper certainly seem to have been raised with the same bedtime story, and to have taken it at face value.

It's All One Big Coincidence

Glad that Ontario Premiere Kathleen Wynne has put to rest that ugly speculation that the province's change in attitude toward a subway for Scarborough has nothing to do with the upcoming provincial byelections.
The Harper Loyalty Rewards Program: Updated
If the pattern of past autocracies holds true, we can expect those most unflinching in their loyalties, no matter the price they have had to pay in pre-existing integrity (a big assumption, I know) and public disdain, to be amply rewarded. Using that criterion, I can think of no worthier recipients of government elevation than Kellie Leitch and Pierre Poilivre, both of whom I have written about previously in this blog.
Note the deftness with which Leitch avoids giving anything remotely resembling an answer in the following interview, while perfectly extolling party propaganda:
Mind you, not everyone has been impressed by Ms Leitch. Her performance regarding the Wright payoff scandal left some listeners to As It Happens unsatisfied:
It is, however, a toss-up with Pierre Poilievre as to who merits the bigger reward. Note young Pierre's ideological purity:
Or how about this?
Despite his stellar service and loyalty to Dear Leader, there are those who question him:
For any who might have lost sleep pondering the possibilities, we are told that the suspense will end at around 11:00 a.m. today.
UPDATE: Of the two, it appears Kellie Leitch accumulated the most loyalty points, securing the cabinet post of Minister of Labour, while Pierre gets the minor reward of Minister of State for Democratic Reform. (I never heard of that one either, but can't think of a better Orwellian choice.)
I know; I can barely contain my excitement either.
Sunday, July 14, 2013
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Humour Amidst The Darkness
Friday, July 12, 2013
And Speaking Of Walmart ...
P.S. I could only get this video to play in Internet Explorer, not Chrome.
Another Walmart Injustice Story
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Did Someone Say 'Byelection'?

I'm certainly glad that Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne is adhering to her commitment to a new way of doing politics.
I'm sure the Toronto District School Board also appreciates her integrity.
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Star Readers Opine On Harper's Self-Reported Ignorance (I Didn't Do It) And Mike Duffy's Avarice
Harper kept public in dark, July 6
When the stuff hits the fan, “plausible deniability” allows politicians to say, “I didn’t know; no-one told me.” This is what our Prime Minister would have us believe about Mike Duffy’s bailout with Nigel Wright’s cheque.
But now we hear from the RCMP that at least three others in his office, besides Wright, knew about it. This contradicts the Prime Minister’s claim that it was all Wright’s doing.
By all accounts, Stephen Harper is a control freak, so his denials stretch credibility to the breaking point. The real question is not what he did or didn’t know, but rather: how could he not have played a role in this comedy?
Perhaps this is a case of “implausible deniability.”
Salvatore (Sal) Amenta, Stouffville
In the best case scenario — gross negligence and incompetence — Mr. Harper expects us to believe that there is this big conspiracy going on right under his nose and he is wilfully blind to it.
In the worst, he is part of a criminal conspiracy and cover up.
Thomas Wall, Whitby
Senator Mike Duffy’s alleged use of taxpayers money to increase his wealth is only the symptom of a culture of entitlement by politicians of all parties. Politicians use our money as if no one owns it. The average Canadian citizen is becoming more mistrustful of politicians for that very reason. The government wants every penny that they can get from taxpayers of this country and this how they spend it.
It is unfortunate that Senator Duffy appears not to have learned a simple rule: “The pig that remains at the trough longest gets slaughtered first.”
Calvin Lawrence, Ottawa
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
Conservative And F-35 Myths
Although it looks impressive, as the following short video illustrates, the accompanying story quite succinctly inters those two aforementioned falsehoods, along with the big whopper that somehow permeates the brains of the ideologues, i.e. the myth of Harper Conservative fiscal and administrative competence.
Confronting Climate Change/Ignoring Climate Change
Meanwhile, over in Hamilton, city officials are partying as if it were still 1955. They are exultant over the fact that the Ontario Municipal Board has given the final go-ahead to reclassify hundreds of hectares of farmland around the airport for development — the largest urban boundary expansion in Hamilton's history.
The Ontario Municipal Board has agreed with the city's argument that 555 hectares of developable employment land is required for the so-called aerotropolis, dismissing appeals from Environment Hamilton and Hamiltonians for Progressive Development in a decision dated July 3.
The decision to destroy farmland that would undoubtedly be invaluable to our future food supply in favor of pavement that will be unable to help absorb runoff from the next '100-year-storm' once more amply attests to our species' extraordinary myopia.
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Is Shortsightedness Our Tragic Flaw?


Rubber dinghies rescuing flooded train passengers. Cars submerged to their roofs. Raging river torrents. This could easily be a snapshot from India during monsoon season, but no, that was the situation in Toronto last evening as the city received more rain in a short period of time than had been experienced over 50 years ago during Hurricane Hazel.
Even the most obdurate, assuming they haven't completely surrendered their cognitive abilities to ideology, must realize we are in deep climatological trouble. Whether we look to this year's weather events or the increasingly volatile weather over the last decade, an obvious pattern supporting the climate-change models clearly emerges. But our public response remains muted.
Nary a word from any level of government about climate change. Nary a word from any level of government about amelioration and adaptation. Nary a word from the usual suspects on how we are going to pay for these increasingly common and incredibly expensive disasters.
We need definite measures that will force us to pull our collective heads out of the sand. My wife offered me an interesting suggestion. Since tax increases per se are verboten, no matter the party, perhaps it is time to have what could be termed an 'infrastructure renewal levy' that we pay after our income taxes have been calculated. Such a levy, while it would doubtless be decried by the right as 'just another tax grab,' would be designated only for its stated purpose and could very well serve to awaken people to the reality that we all have to pay for our collective folly in ignoring all of the warnings; the resulting anger might very well force government to start confronting the reason for the levy and we can finally get on to the massive job of reducing our emission as the first but absolutely necessary step in ameliorating the even worse consequences of climate change to come.
And of course, it goes without saying, that corporations will also have to pay this levy, since sound infrastructure is crucial both to the economy and their own profits. The threat of relocation will grow increasingly hollow. No part of the world escapes this self-inflicted curse of unscathed, especially those low-tax and low-pay jurisdictions the corporations always hold over our heads.
The hour is late. We are out of options. Concrete action must begin immediately. Taking the long view is long-past due.

Monday, July 8, 2013
Forced Feeding At Guantanimo
A Betrayal Of The World's Food Supplies
Watch the following brief video as two food experts denounce what is surely a gross perversion of the award:
H/t Sandra Harris
Are You Psychologically Fit To Be The Next Parliamentary Budget Officer?*

The Globe and Mail reports that those vying to replace Kevin Page, the man who so distinguished himself as our last Parliamentary Budget Officer, are being asked to undergo psychological testing.
I understand there is also an asterisked portion at the bottom of the application.
* Those with integrity need not apply.
'Tis A Consummation Devoutly To Be Wish'd*

H/t The Toronto Star
* Hamlet - Act 3 Scene 1 - Apologies for the use of literary arcana, but you know what they say: Teachers never retire; they just lose their class.
Sunday, July 7, 2013
The Digital Life

The Disaffected Lib recently wrote a post expressing ambivalence about the ubiquitous role that technology plays in our lives. It is an ambivalence I think many of us, especially those of an older generation raised on typwriters, print and analogue television, feel. On the one hand it has been an undeniable benefit, connecting us with a much wider world than we could ever know without the digital technology we now take for granted. On the other hand, the question arises as to whether or not a generation raised on instant access to information may have missed out on key critical-thinking skills that develop as a result of slow, deliberate and careful contemplation and processing of information.
Personally, I am not sure of the answer to that question. Every generation thinks that upcoming ones are not made of the same solid stuff of their elders. I do know, however, that there is the potential of great distraction thanks to today's technology, distraction to which none of us is really immune.
In today's Star, an opinion piece by Doug Mann entitled It's almost midnight for print culture posits a thesis that can be best reflected in this excerpt:
...the midnight of print is only a symptom of a more sinister cultural darkening brought about by digital media. This is a decline of the complex narrative as the centre of public life, the midnight of depth meaning.
Essentially, he argues that society's boredom threshold has declined as a consequence of the digital age, and that boredom is chiefly reflected in the declining interest in three key components of the examined life: complex arguments in theoretical thinking, extended adult narratives in fiction, and long serious conversations in everyday life.
From my perspective as a person of a certain 'vintage,' complex arguments may take a bit longer to process and grasp, but I am still very much interested in them. Mature fiction still appeals to me, and long serious conversations are an ongoing source of delight for me with certain select individuals. However, Mann's concern is not for my generation, but for the aforementioned young people without the larger context that we older guys and gals have.
Is he correct? I hesitate to embrace his thesis wholeheartedly, and even if my instincts suggest his logic is compelling, I could also argue that the above criteria have never had a wide appeal and may not necessarily be a victim of our current digital age, but rather a function of education and extensive and varied reading. While that observation may sound a bit elitist, I think it is true.
I would be very interested in hearing other people's views on this matter. Feel free, as always, to comment.

Saturday, July 6, 2013
The Globe and Mail: A Study in Vindictiveness

As one well-acquainted with the scourge of depression and the toll it takes on both the sufferer and his/her family, it was with great interest that I recently read Jan Wong's account of her struggle with the disease in Out of the Blue. In what I view as an act of personal courage, the former Globe and Mail reporter whose wide-ranging work certainly enhanced the Globe “brand,” reveals at length the story of her mental descent as a result of toiling in what ultimately became an unsupportive and toxic workplace.
Even those whose lives have not been either directly or indirectly marred by this insidious sickness will doubtless be fascinated by the vindictive, almost Machiavellian machinations of the Globe's upper management once it no longer had any use for Wong, amply illustrating the sad fact that the newspaper business is just that, a business, with no tolerance for anyone who 'rocks the boat' in ways that discomfit 'the bosses.'
In her book, management at The Globe, both present and past, including Sylvia Stead, John Stackhouse and Edward Greenspon, come across as especially venal, petty and cowardly, essentially 'hanging Wong out to dry' after a story she wrote about the 2006 Dawson College shootings included a comment about cultural alienation in Quebec, linking it to two previous tragedies in La Belle Province. Controversy and condemnation of Wong ensued, and the Globe went into full defensive mode, ultimately essentially abandoning Wong to the rabble.
But the Globe wasn't quite through with Wong. Because the paper carries a great deal of clout and has substantial reserves with which to litigate, Wong wound up self-publishing her chronicle after her publisher, Doubleday, ultimately wanted her to censor her story, excising most references to her experiences at The Globe, an impossibility since her depression was caused by workplace stress.
Eventually, Wong won a severance package from The Globe, on the condition that she not discuss the details of it. In her book, after being fired by the Globe for time missed due to her depression, she talked about how she “fought back and won,” that her former employer “had caved” and that she had received “a pile of money.” It would appear that those comments were too much for the Globe, which will now receive back the severance after an arbitrator ruled that by saying those things, she breached her confidentiality agreement with the paper.
The self-proclaimed 'newspaper of record' would have us believe that they took this action based on principle; others could just as cogently argue that it was simply a continuation of the vindicativeness that essentially drove Wong from the Globe.
If you get the chance, I highly recommend the book; not only does it give valuable insight into mental illness, but it will also enable you to decide for yourself who is in the right and who is in the wrong in this matter.