Comments on: The progressive left needs a Manning Centre equivalent.

By: Shiner

Shiner — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 16:32:53 +0000

Yeah I commented on this article too. The lack of any data is certainly curious, I’ve been checking the Manning Centre website over the past few days expecting at least a slide or two, but nuttin. And, as Ti-Guy says above, there’s nothing there that suggests Canadians are conservative at all, unless you actually believe the horse s*it about abortion and gay marriage. It’s a spin job, and a bloody horrible one at that. Why does anyone take Gregg seriously? He’s a hack, and a failed one at that!

By: Excited Delirium » Blog Archive » I want to start a (progressive) party

Sun, 14 Mar 2010 10:00:54 +0000

[...] had these thoughts in draft for some time and then I read “The Progressive Left Needs a Manning Centre Equivalent” by Scott Tribe. He managed to stir quite a debate and discussion with this and has [...]

By: Issachar

Issachar — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 18:19:49 +0000

“My opinion is the Manning Centre [...] given credit for far too much influence on Canadian politics, which I can read in the Sun or National Post every day if I felt like dirtying myself.”

So you’d like to read your views in an echo chamber then? By all means, start a think tank. But only reading things you agree with? Ugh…

By: Green Assassin Brigade

Green Assassin Brigade — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 14:44:56 +0000

With the Manning Center we know where they are comming from and we know which party their papers will either echo or foreshadow. The danger with a Progressive open source think tank is it will quickly fill with partisans flogging and defending the already established ideas of their party rather than breaking new ground. Will these factions try to make the think tank support a party or be neutral idea mills like they should be? Will this make the think tank too unwieldy and disfunctional to opperate?

Then of course you will have those who will reject Liberals and some liberal ideas because they don’t accept Liberals as being truly Progressive.

Open source will also attact some pure loons and some very non progressive types looking for fun. It’s certainly worth a try but it needs stong mechanisms to promote free thinkers and suppress party hacks and loons from sabotaging it, Can you do that within an open source framework?

By: liamyoung

liamyoung — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 11:48:30 +0000

I think the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) and Polaris Institute should be the ‘anchors’ of a group that Skinny Dipper proposes. The key to such a virtual community is that it should be open to anyone that wants to chip in (financially or with content).

Another institution is the CBC. The only problem is that the entire management team needs to be fired and replaced with progressive-minded Canadians that actually care about public broadcasting (as opposed to making deals to prop up the douche bags with the National Post).

I disagree with Mark Francis: open source programs have avoided commercialization (ie. corporate control), much to the chagrin of companies like Microsoft.

By: Jumpin' Joan Flash

Jumpin' Joan Flash — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 07:55:19 +0000

Excellent idea, Skinny Dipper.

Some respected person with leadership skills to head it up: Bill Blaikie, I’m looking at you. Or Michaelle Jean, after her gig as GG ends? Louise Arbour?

Needs money? Money would come with credibility. If Barack Obama could fund a presidential campaign one $25 donation at a time, we could probably find enough people in Canada to fund a virtual think-tank, especially since the usual competitors for political donations are looking rather stale-dated these days.

By: Mark Francis

Mark Francis — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 06:53:25 +0000

The primary purpose of such places is outreach, not policy development. Actually, much of the research they do is bunk. It’s made up hackery designed to get press.

It’s all funded largely by corporate money. Good luck finding corporate money to fund progressive institutions.

By: Skinny Dipper

Skinny Dipper — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 02:02:09 +0000

One problem with these institutes is that they take money to run. This doesn’t mean that progressives need a physical building and paid people to run a think tank. We progressives can always set up a virtual think tank were a group of us can get together on the net (s)elect a peer review committee that will set up a website, and propose questions that people can answer by submitting essays and videos to the peer review committee. That committee can examine whether or not an essay should be published based on prose and factual quality. These can be published on a website.

A progressive virtual think tank could ask monthly questions such as:

How do we improve the governance in Canada?

How do we improve our educational institutions?

What alternatives are there for health care?

How can Canada work better with a new India?

Could Canada ever face emigration problems?

These questions listed above are hypothetical. There are many more questions that we can ask. There are many ways in which a progressive think tank can get responses.

A progressive think tank could still hold a yearly conference somewhere in Canada.

The think tank could have a contest for 100 new parliamentarians–people who are creative in their thinking.

Just my thoughts.

By: stephen elliott-buckley

stephen elliott-buckley — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:45:33 +0000

oh, and turcotte actually RUNS one of the programs at the manning centre. pollster: right.

By: Greg

Greg — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:06:21 +0000

Well, there is always the Polaris Institute.

http://www.polarisinstitute.org/aboutus