The 2008 Spike awards for the good, the bad and the very, very ugly
Columnist Jon Marsh on a year in which the famous, the infamous and the truly revolting excelled themselves, mostly for the wrong reasons. I'm sure all right-minded members of society will join me in decrying the age-old practice of compiling a list of highly contrived year-end awards. So here goes with Spike's offering for 2008: Most laughable statement by a Hong Kong government official - "Improving air quality and reducing greenhouse gas emissions are among the government's top priorities." Chief Executive Donald Tsang in... Read More

Op-Ed of the Year: A coup d'etat in slow motion
From the hundreds of opinion pieces we ran in 2008, I've chosen an article by Pulitzer prize-winning reporter Chris Hedges as our Op-Ed of the year. Many have warned that we were putting ourselves on a collision course with disaster because of corruption, increasing influence of global corporations & the concentration of media in the hands of few. And so we enter the new year facing economic calamity, pinning our hopes on a new leader. As the author points out, what we are facing a symptoms of much bigger problems.