Earth Hour Fraud Round 2

It's time for Earth Hour once again, the publicity stunt created by the World Wildlife Fund to jump on the anthropogenic global warming bandwagon. You can refer to my post on it from last march. Once again I encourage readers to leave their lights on. Keep in mind that Ontarians already get their power from carbon-free sources such as nuclear and hydro-electric. Don't encourage organization that put forth fraudulent claims for money and publicity.

Earth Hour a Publicity Stunt - MMN March 2008

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Top Ten Failures In McGuinty's Tainted Legacy

How do you write yourself into the history books as one of the worst leaders a province has ever had in its history. Simple, just follow Dalton McGuinty's legacy and you'll do fine. Here's a list I've compiled of some of the more notable events of the last five years.

1. Implemented the Largest Tax in Ontario History
McGuinty ran on a campaign promise that he would not raise taxes, even solidifying it in writing by signing an agreement with the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation. In his first budget, he implemented the "Health Care Premium" so that all Ontarians would pay their "fair share" to hire more doctors and nurses due to a shortfall caused apparently by Mike Harris's cuts. The premium is roughly $900 per person per year and appears within your income tax. It goes into general revenue rather than a specific fund for health care. Health care services have arguably have seen little to no improvement despite the massive funding increase.

2. Put the Province in an Energy Shortage
Get rid of your old fridge, caulk your windows, replace light bulbs with the crappy twisty ones as stated by David Suzuki in the Powerwise commercials for the Ontario Government. When McGuinty was elected in 2003, he promised to close all of Ontario's coal fired generating stations by 2007 to reduce carbon emissions. However, there were no plans to build new power plants to replace them. It turns out that closing down just one major coal station, the Lakeview Generating Station, sparked a massive power shortage in the province. Ontarians were forced to put in "Smart Meters" as an excuse to charge you more for electricity and force you to conserve. (As a side note, the debt retirement charge on your hydro bill is actually a tax that goes into the province's general revenue. It is not used to pay down the debt of the former Ontario Hydro as claimed. This tidbit was obtained from publically available budget documents which provide a breakdown of tax revenue streams going into general revenue.) Large sums of money were wasted on conservation programs and buying power from out of province. Money which could have been put to retrofit existing power plants with clean coal technology. The rest of the coal generators are still open as of 2009. It would take more than a decade to replace the plants with nuclear power, a plan that was hacked out just last year, long after the coal closure deadline had passed.

3. Destroyed the Environment
McGuinty had a lot of egg on his face after the Oakridges fiasco. For a refresher, McGuinty had promised during the election to shut down a major housing development along the environmentally sensitive wetlands known as the Oakridges Moraine, near Holland Marsh. Unfortunately doing so was technically illegal since the contracts allowing them to build had been in place since well before he was elected. Being a lawyer, he should have known this. However, I suspect he knew all along and it was said simply for token populist purposes. However, it backfired and went down as his first broken promise; first of many. In 2005, the McGuinty Government passed the Places to Grow Act and the Greenbelt Act, apparently in order to prevent urban sprawl. In reality, the Places to Grow Act has accelerated it to the point of being out of control. Outlying GTA communities have been swallowed up by massive unchecked growth, putting huge tolls on their original residents and the surrounding environment. The Greenbelt Act is impotent at best and has led to housing developments almost up to the base of the Niagara Escarpment, a UNESCO biosphere reserve. Plans even called for putting a highway on top of the environmentally sensitive cliffs at one point. Even Toronto is not immune. The city now has a street literally named "OMB Folly" as a monument to these laws. Environmentalism is only chique when it deals with fake issues like global warming and federally regulated safe pesticides. If McGuinty and the OMB had their way, they'd turn Ontario into ecumenopolis of cookie cutter houses.

4. Caught Buying Votes
An Indian-Canadian cricket club that had asked the province for $100,000 in taxpayer funding to establish their team. They surprisingly found themselves with a $1 million cheque mailed to them, authorized by the premier's staff. That's more than a little suspicious and not the first or only incident. $250,000 was given to build a massive Sikh temple in Mississauga. The owners of the Khalsa Darbar had lost their charitable organization status shortly before that, and had been linked to a radical Sikh separatist group in India. This was all part of an odd $32 million fund set aside for ethnic minority groups. A fund which had little to no fiscal transparency or accountability. Targeting specific ethnic groups, namely new Canadians citizens with free money, well, let's just say it's a little less than ethical. I wonder what the going rate for my vote is. I'm a little short on cash right now. See below for the reason why. The slush fund fiasco would have destroyed his hope of reelection if it wasn't for the incompetence of John Tory. Tory may be a nice guy, as people keep saying, but he wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. More like a spoon.

5. Let People Go Blind but Put Breast Implants in a Guy
One of the first things the McGuinty government did was take away eye exams from OHIP coverage. These didn't cost the government much (a pittance of $80 a pop) but it has taken a toll on low income earners with eye troubles. I guess poor people don't need to see. Chiropractics were also delisted so I guess it's ok for poor people to be blind and have a bad back too. However, the government thought it was ok to allow sex change operations to be covered. So it's ok for poor people to be blind and have a bad back but at least they can go from male to female on the taxpayer's dime, and vice versa. Joy!

6. Nanny Statism
The McGuinty government has spent much of its time in office on developing petty bans. You can't put pesticide on your lawns, you can't smoke in the car, you can't own a pitbull, etc. Nanny statism is a tactic used to distract the public from real issues by creating issues out of non-issues. Did you get that? Good. Oh on the pesticides; what happens to all those people who do that for a living now that they're banned? I personally think we should have Liberals banned while we're at it.

7. From Have to Have Not
Ontario went into the McGuinty leadership term as the economic engine of Canada. Now the largest province by populaton is considered to fall under "have not" status and requires equalization payments for the first time in the history of the federal program. McGuinty actually positioned this as a good thing, because the government would now get the money from the feds "it deserves." I guess people loosing their jobs and recent university/high school grads not being able to find work is a small price to pay for "fairness". We're now below Newfoundland in terms of economic performance for God's sake. Ey's the by who built the ship, McGuinty's the by that sank 'er.

8. Created an Unfriendly Environment for Business
The federal government warned McGuinty to cut business taxes to encourage companies to stay. Everybody knew a recession at the time, except McGuinty. It was just like how he didn't know about the deficit in 2003 that everybody else knew about. There must be so sort of massive conspiracy afoot, that's the only explanation! Now many big corporations, such as Daimler Chrysler, and threatening to pull out of the province all together due to the high cost of doing business here. The government is now scrambling to throw money at them with no guarantees they'll remain in Ontario. This economic plan would be akin to me emptying my wallent into the toilet, fushing it, and expecting to retrive its contents from the sludge at the sewage plant a week later.

9. Raising Taxes During a Recession
According to Keynesian economics, which plays a big role in liberal theory, governments have two duties in regards to the economy. Raise taxes and save during good times, cut taxes and spend during bad times. The Ontario Liberals raised taxes and spent during good times, and raised taxes and spent during the bad times. Ontarians got a nasty surprise in the 2009 budget when they found out many staple goods would now be subject to an 8% sales tax due to harmonization. "Gee, nobody's buying anything because they have no money so you know what we'll do to fix that? We'll increase the sales tax and make them pay more!" This is just incredibly asinine.

10. Making Rae Look Fiscally Responsible
During McGuinty's years in office, annual government spending has tipped the scales at $18 billion. Rae's biggest budgets only managed to top $9 billion in the early 90s. When adjusted for inflation, McGuinty's budget is still $6 billion more than Bob Rae's! Once again this goes against Keynesian economics. McGuinty is trying to spend his way out of a recession but spent to much when times were good, so there's no money left. The province will be in deficit for six years, compared to the one year it was under Eves due to the Dot Com Burst and 9/11 crashes. It will take decades to repay that level of debt, and more government belt tightening if we manage to get someone with half a brain running the province again. Civil servants better start making their strike signs now before they're taxes so much, they can't afford coroplast and 2x4s.

Now for the top ten successes of the McGuinty Government.

1. ...........
I'd better get back to you guys on this one. I'm head first in the barrel as we speak, spatula in hand.

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The Foolishness of Tax Harmonization

Ontario plans to unveil in it's budget today a proposed plan to harmonize the PST and GST. I've talked about this issue before when Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty originally proposed the ideal. At first I just focused on those shopping out of province but the fact that many staple items would now be subject to sales tax did not occur to me at first. I make the food, I don't buy it. I guess I'd better start doing the grocery shopping to. The harmonized tax is now threatening to raise the price of staple items over $4. This would include things such as feminine products, housing, diapers, and many food products that were not subject to the provincial sales tax before. The prices of these basic items would essentially jump 8% overnight. To counter this, the government is proposing a $1000 grant to all families making under $160,000 combined income. Then why raise the tax if you're just going to givethe money back? I seriously doubt that most people are going to see this money.

It is incredably foolish for any government to be raising taxes during a recession, especially sales taxes. Large businesses argue that harmonizing the tax will save them money but ultimately it harms consumers in the long run. Lower income earners will now suddenly be forking out more and will likely get hurt the most. I can't help but feel that's a little bit ironic when Liberal governments repeatedly say they are out to help these people. A tax increase at this time makes little economic sense as it will discourage people from purchasing certain things, particularly housing which will now be taxed. For example, the price of an average house would increase $28,000, putting it beyond the reach of people who may have been able to afford it before. You cannot seriously expect people who are tightening their belts during a recession will keep buying things that suddenly cost a significant amount more.

Is anybody really surprised by how dumb this is? This is the same government that levied the largest tax increase in Ontario history when it slapped a $900 "Health Care Premium" on residents in 2004; after promising in writing not to raise taxes during the election. Spending has gone up to $18 billion per year and yet Ontarians have seen vary little improvement in services. Most of it goes to lucrative pay hikes for teachers and civil servants. Back in 2005, it was agreed that Ontarians are rapidly reaching their taxation limits. Cities are asking for more, the province is asking for more, and we have no more money to give them. Ontarians need an election sooner than later. Hopefully the Conservatives will elect someone with half a brain as their leader this time. Going up against the worst premier in history and his long record of destruction sould be a cake walk.

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The Winds of Truth Start to "Blow"

For years, we've heard people on the left proclaiming that drug abuse is a victimless crime. US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton echoed my own statements by saying that Americans' "insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade." Illegal weapons coming across the US border are also an issue for Mexico, who like Canada has strict gun laws. Often, drug lords out-gun police and army troops, resorting to high powered assault weapons such as the infamous AK-47, which cannot be legally obtained in Mexico. Clinton noted that she feels the US attempt to ban narcotics has been unsuccessful. The Obama administration is pledging $80 million to help the Mexican government buy Blackhawk helicopters to assist them in their war against the drug cartels. Many believe Mexico is at risk of becoming a failed state due to this narco-war. 8000 people have died in the part two years, more than all the coalition troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

This begs the question as to what America's next move is. If the Democrats are even considering legalizing it, they would be fools. Cocaine is not like marijuana. It is highly addictive and toxic. It would be too dangerous and irresponsible to allow people to freely and legally use it. Many former coke addicts would probably agree with this. The war on drugs should not be abandoned but it has to take a domestic approach and has to focus on new tactics. The way drug education is handled needs to change to dispel the commonly held belief that narcotics abuse only harms the user. I remember the anti-drug programs in the schools and most of the information given only delt with consequences to the user. Teenagers of course think of themselves as invincible so this means little to them. Abuse of hard drugs can be directly linked to a huge number of societal problems we are facing today. I would conservatively estimate that 90% of crimes committed within the US and Canada are drug related. Most of the income made from organized crime groups, such as the Crips and Bloods, comes from dealing drugs. When someone does a hard drug like cocaine, they are not only hurting themselves but their family, those involved in dealing it, those who produce it, and those who get in the way of the cartels who ship it from them to your powdered nose. On the legal side, governments need to take a no-nonsenes approach to drug trafficking by making it an offense punishable by 25 years in prison. Furthermore, perhaps increased jail time is needed for those caught in possession of hard narcotics such as cocaine and haroine. It would get them away from the junk and would open up access to rehabilitation programs. It seems harsh to jail junkies but most drug addicts admit they're the last to know they're addicts. Serious jail time may just be the tough love they need to encourage them to seek help. Lastly, drug rehab programs need more funding and need to be expanded to make them more accessable. Combined with education, users must be encouraged to try and seek a way out of their addiction.

Source: BBC News

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Captain Planet's Secret Identity Revealed! It's David Miller

With the power of fire, earth, water, wind, and heart, the Toronto Councilteers put their rings together and summon the ultimate protector of Mother Gaia: Captain Planet, er... David Miller. The Toronto Environmentalist Alliance (as a side note, what is the left wing obsession with using the word "alliance" in the names of their organizations) released it's report dubbing Toronto to be the greenest city in the country. They took the time to rank each councillors actions on the environment. Not surprisingly, David "Captain Planet" Miller got an A+ for his eco work. So did the rest of his inner circle of cronies such as Joe Pantalone, Carol Shelly, and Adam Vaughn. The lowest ranked councillors, all with an F grade include Rob Ford, Case Ootes, Doug Holyday, Denzel Minnan-Wong. Ironically, these men are the conservative members of the council so there's obviously no partisan politics behind this report. Well, it's good to know that Miller has some supporters. The TEA is applauding the mayor's non-working hybrid buses and it's project to have 25% of city facilities powered by renewable resources. The group though complains there is too much red tape for green programs to get through. I find that odd considering the council had no problem handing the mayor $125,000 for his London, UK climate office. I guess the environmentalists have no problem spending tax dollars of a cash strapped city on ineffective $10,000 a peice solar panels. These people have their heads so far up their backsides, they can see the organic tofu they just ate.

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FOX Makes Jackass of Self.... Again

FOX News is controversial to put it lightly. It is currently the only major conservative TV news station within the United States. The network has come under fire once again, this time for insensitive remarks about Canadians in Afghanistan made on program Red Eye. According to Wikipedia, Red Eye, hosted by Greg Gutfeld, is a late night comedy show that airs on the 24-hour news channel. Gutfeld blasted Canada for saying it wanted to take a break from Afghanistan after its mission was over in 2011. Well, it's hard to put into text exactly what he said so I'll let Mr. Gutfeld speak for himself.


Now it's easy to get outraged by this, especially since it was aired just after four brave Canadians lost their lives when a roadside bomb exploded in Kandahar. The statement is insensitive at best and ignorant at worst. However, I really can't get too upset by this. Red Eye is a comedy show primarily, not a news program. Plus it airs at 3 AM. In all likelyhood, vary few Americans watched this broadcast. It only came to the attention of us here north of 40 when the clip, aired last week, appeared on Youtube. The question is whether Gutfeld is alone among Americans. Do they even realize how much Canada is contributing to the war effort over there? A hell of a lot more than they are. Canada was essentially left holding the bag while the US went off to fight Iraq. Afghanistan went from hunting Osama Bin Landen and bringing him to justice to some hack kneed nation building exercise. Most of our boys have been killed by these IEDs rather than in actual battle. Little progress is being made to fix this backwards country and war supporters, including Steven Harper, admit that it is unwinnable in the conventional sense. I think we need to take a long, hard look not at why we went there to begin with (which in my opinion was a just cause) but why we are still there now. It's starting to look like we're wasting our time. Our military is still badly underfunded and under-equipped so we do indeed need a break from the fight to reorganize ourselves. If the United States wants Canada to keep involved in Afghanistan, they're going to have to start pulling their weight there.

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No RESPECT For Galloway

Under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, you're guaranteed freedom of expression and freedom of association. However, someone needs to tell British MP George Galloway's supporters that this only applies to Canadian citizens and landed immigrants. The controversial UK politician has been denied access to Canada on grounds of him being a risk to national security. Galloway had planned to speak at several events in Toronto, Mississauga, and Montreal; having been invited by the Toronto Coalition to Stop the War. The theme of the conference was "Resisting War: From Gaza to Kandahar." First, I think we need a little back story to explain why this man was denied access by the Ministry of Immigration in the first place. Mr. Galloway, from Scotland, was originally a member of parliament under the Labour Party. Back in 2003, he was strongly opposed Tony Blair's proposed invasion of Iraq. Galloway was expelled from the party for insubordination after calling Blair's government "a lie machine". Remember that he was a member of Blair's caucus at the time. Galloway went on to be the first sitting MP of the newly created RESPECT party in 2004. RESPECT is an acronym for Respect, Equality, Socialism, Peace, Environmentalism, Community, and Trade Unionism. It is a party situated on the far left and from what I've read on Wikipedia, it takes a vary radical stance. It is not a social democratic party like the NDP. It is allied with Britain's communist parties and take a strong anti-capitalist/anti-imperialist stance. In short, Galloway himself is a communist and proudly so.

So Galloway may be a radical member of a radical party who is against a war that Canada is not involved in. That is hardly a qulification to bar him from the country. However, Galloway is known to be familiar with some seedy characters in the "anti-war" movement. In 2005, he was accused by the United States of personally profiting from the UN oil-for-food scandal in Iraq, among other allegations of corruption. In 2007, he was censured from the House of Commons for failing to cooperate with investigations into his political integrity. It was recommended he be suspended for eighteen months though I could not find any information as to whether this threat was carried out. Furthermore, Galloway has openly admitted to giving aid to infamous Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas during their 2008-2009 war with Israel. This last bit is why he cannot enter the country. He is known to fund of a group on Canada's terror watch list.

I find it ironic that he does not support one group's war but supports the war of another. Both are arguably guilty of war crimes and nine times out of ten, it has been Hamas that has violated UN backed cease fire agreements. They are the aggressors. Little of what the radical left does makes sense though, or ever made sense. One needs to delve deep into the minds of people like Galloway to get a true understanding of why the war on terror is rapidly becoming unwinnable. People on the left are always inclined to support the underdog. However, the vast majority of anti-war protesters who defend these groups are ignorant of what actually goes on. They soak up Hamas propaganda as if it were going out of style. That's how you get people to support you these days, pretend to be the victim even while you continue to lob rockets at civilians. Groups like Fatah, who have brokered successful peace deals, are largely ignored. However, Galloway is different from your typical university student protester who falls for these traps. He harbours a great deal of hatred for Israel and Western democracies, despite being part of the latter. Such a deep seeded hatred of another country and it's people cannot stem from actions alone. I don't approve of what China or Venezuela does but I certainly would not give a cent to any group who's mission statement is to wipe out the Chinese or Latino people. (Didn't we fight a war agaisnt that some 65 years ago?) There is a vary clear racial element present for somebody to hate a country so much when said nation has posed no personal threat to them or their home land. Antisemitism on the radical left is a disturbing and growing problem. When it comes to Israel, I'm neutral on the subject. It's another country in a far corner of the world. It's not a trade partner with Canada or part of any strategic alliances with us. Their war with Hamas does not effect us and up until recently has been contained. Israel is a democratic country and does not engage in violating the rights of its own citizens, unlike Sudan. Nor are they trying to commit genocide as some have claimed. I don't take issue with how they chose to solve their problems as long as they follow the rules of war. I do have a problem when people like Galloway hold violent marches against the actions of these countries, similar to the riots that happened in Montreal a decade ago. I do have a problem when Canadian universities openly allow their students to target a specific ethnic group for harassment, or refuse to hire professors from said group. These sort of actions are highly un-Canadian. What these protesters supporting Galloway need to get into their thick skulls is that it is a privilege, not a right, to come to Canada. He is a terror threat, a racist, and would be an affront to Canadian values. This is why I believe he should not be allowed into this country. Canada is under absolutely no obligation to let him in.

Update: Bill Ayres is now blasting Canada for not letting Galloway into the country. For those who don't know, Ayres headed the Weather Underground (aka the Weathermen, not related to actual weather site wunderground.com), a home grown pro-communist terror organization within the United States during the 1970s. The WU comitted several arsons in NYC, and detonated bombs in Greenwich Village NYC and at the Pentagon in 1972. Ayres quite proudly admits he was involved in the attacks. He is currently a university professor and friends with Barack Obama. The latter ignited controversey during the 2008 POTUS election. Well, I guess if you're a radical who supports terrorists, it's good to have a radical that is a terrorist in your corner.

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No Sir, I don't Like It

Classic Ren & Stimpy moment that pretty much sums up politics today.

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Is Oz Becoming an Online Police State?

I don't really talk about the politics of other nations that often beyond the Americas. However, I can't help but find myself asking what the heck is going on with Australia. In 2007, the centre right Liberal Party of Australia was replaced with the left wing social democratic Labour Party. Since Kevin Rudd was elected Prime Minister, the country has started taking a disturbingly authoritarian turn. I've been closely following the continuing saga on Internet censorship within the country. For years, conservatives have been warning people about the dangers of left wing nanny statism. Banning smoking in cars with kids, or banning pesticides and coffee cups to keep people politically correct might seem pretty harmless but it is, to use an oft complained about term, a slippery slope. Australia has been doing what many other left leaning democracies in the west have been regarding the Internet. The basic idea was to enact a law and bureaucratic body which would blacklist websites dealing in child pornography. Internet service providers would be required to block these sites or face a fine. Those linking to those sites would also face an $11,000 fine. The concept is noble enough and I don't dispute that child pornography on the web is a vary serious issue. However, problems occur when there are no checks placed on the bureaucracy in control of what should and should not be censored. The biggest danger is when governments keep information on what is censored censored. This is the case within countries such as Australia and Denmark.

Whistle blower website Wikileaks had obtained a copy of a censored web sites list being used by the Danish government. The site soon found itself blocked by Australia. The same site managed to obtain a copy of Australia's secret list of blocked sites. On it included an American anti-abortion website as well as the innocent websites of a dentist and a tuckshop owner. Online gambling sites, Youtube links, Wikipedia entries, sites on euthanasia, legal pornography, fringe religions, fetishes, Christianity, and that of a tour operator were also blacklisted. The Australian government claims that the list is not genuine. However, media investigations seem to indicate otherwise. Reports have also come out regarding the censorship of adult content on the Internet (R and X rated) to protect children. I took a quick look through the list and discovered several legitimate porn and gambling sites including Milkmanbook (legal erotic art) and Pokerstars. This is the vary slippery slope I talked about. A tool originally just intended to filter out child porn websites is being cast wider to get rid of things the government does not approve of. Right now it may seem alright to get rid of what are widely considered social vices such as gambling and legal porn but the blocking of the anti-abortion website and particularly of Wikileaks is cause for great concern. Wikileaks has been highly critical of the Great Firewall of Australia.

Currently, most of what is on the list legitimately deserves to be there, but how far is it until the government starts manipulating bureaucrats into blocking website belonging to their critics and political opposition. This would make Australia no better than the People's Republic of China or Chavez's Venezuela. Simply put, these blacklists don't work because they are too easy to abuse. The great danger to us Canadians is that a similar firewall could easily be implemented here. Once we start restricting people from certain types of information, and more importantly restricting people from knowing what is restricted, we loose our democracy; even if the original intention was to protect the greater good.

You can visit Wikileaks for more information on this issue, including the list. I warn you not to view any of the links it contains. UK based technology site The Register has also been following the story closely.

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David Dodge Living in a Technicolor Dream World

This says it all. Just going to do a direct copy & paste this story. The statistics don't support what people like Buffet and Dodge are saying.

OTTAWA — Retail sales in Canada rose unexpectedly in January by 1.9 per cent to $33.7 billion after three months of declines thanks largely to a rise in the auto sector, Statistics Canada reported Friday.

Automobiles sales jumped 6.4 per cent in January following a 15.1 per cent decline the month before, the federal agency reported.

Analysts polled by Bloomberg had been calling for a one per cent rise in retail sales.

The gain in January reverses a 5.2 per cent slide in December, the largest monthly drop in more than 15 years and the third consecutive month of declines.

Source: Canada.com

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Seeking Peace: Musings on the Environment, Places to Grow and Urban Sprawl

I've spent a lot of time here taking pot shots at the environmental movement and I still stand firmly by everything I've said in the past. Global warming is a constructed phony disaster in my mind and I think it distracts people from more important issues, both in general and regarding our environment. Governments are more interested in how they can make money of "climate change" and mostly make token gestures, such as banning pesticides and bottled water, which does nothing more than to irk ordinary people. One of the most painful things about growing up and growing older is seeing a lot of the things you treasured as a child melt away. Long walks on peaceful summer days, nothing but the sound of a light breeze, robins singing, and distant wind chimes. Sitting by the pond or lying in the grass watching the world lazily go by in a small town. Trips to the lake, playing in the park, long bike rides; all things that make young lives worth living. I sometimes wonder whether this stuff will be around for future generations to enjoy. As it stands now, much of this is already gone. Startlingly, this has only happened in perhaps the last 10 years. Urban sprawl is probably one of the biggest threats to the environment, or at least the biggest threat that effects us directly.

So here we've come full circle to where we began nearly four years ago when I first started this blog. It was the same year that the Places to Grow Act went into force. The law passed by the McGuinty Government combined with the Green Belt act originally sought to increase urban density while protecting outlying areas and the countryside. The reality of the act has become painfully apparent as it has only encouraged massive urban sprawl, destroying the countryside and ruining small, outlying communities in the GTA. Quiet summer days have been replaced by the constant beeping of backup alarms from construction vehicles, flying dirt, and endless traffic. Wildlife has fled these communities en mass and those that remain often become pancakes on the road. For me personally, this change has taken a huge toll on my well being as Escarpment Country is turned into another Oakridges Moraine. Even now all I can hear is construction machinery and traffic and I have lost my escarpment view, decreasing my property value and ending the charm the Milton community once had. Houses are now at the base of the Escarpment, which is supposedly part of the Green Belt. The town can barely sustain the population growth, which has more than doubled within the last five years. The problem has largely been caused by large developers who have taken over communities due to naive municipal councilors and workers but it all can be routed back to 2005 and Dalton McGuinty. Here is a man who jumped on the eco-bandwagon early but each plan he and his government have come up with has failed. Oakridges was just the beginning, where in 2003 he promised he would stop development on environmentally sensitive land. It was the first promise he broke.

The laws are impotent when it comes to stopping any kind of development. Even if a munipality manages to vote down a proposal, developers head to the Ontario Municipal Board where their plans get rubber stamped. People who do not know the community are making decisions that effect citizens, without said citizens having any say. Even Toronto is not immune after an unwanted condo development in an old neighbourhood was forced through by the board. The City named the street the condos were on as OMB Folly to take a swipe at the faceless board. Everybody knows OMB members are getting paid off by developers. Everybody knows corruption is ripe in that industry. However, they're vary good at covering their tracks and it's impossible to prove. It's hard to fight this kind of environmental destruction when absolutely nobody is on your side.

There needs to be a complete freeze on development projects until the situation can be properly assessed. The Places to Grow Act also has to be immediately repealed. If McGuinty et al supposedly care about the environment, they'll act to actually do something to protect what we have, rather than just implementing token anti-climate change schemes.

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More Economic Fear Mongering

Ex-Bank of Canada governor David Dodge thinks that anyone who thinks the economy isn't in a deep depression is "living in a technocolour dream world". Where do they find these retards? I've already commented on this topic but I thought the Dodge comments are worth mentioning. Something else struck to me while I was thinking about this today that's so obvious I'm not sure why I didn't think about it before. There's a lot of money to be made from these statements. Spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt about the economy, stocks go down, buy premium shares cheap, make a fortune when they go back up. No conflict of interest here. I'm sure everybody else has probably figured this out already; I'm a bit slow at times. Then again, I already knew the high rollers were playing these games, this is just a new tactic. The media is a bit slow too for not realizing this or any of the other games being played with our lives. How do you stop this? Government regulation? No, it's time to start exposing these idiots for the idiots that they are.

Anyway, here's the story on CNEWS.

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Is the Economy Really That Bad?

I'm not an economist but I do have to know some things about the economy. I cannot help but wonder if things are really as bad as we're being told. The mortgage industry in the US collapsed and the auto industry has been hit hard, but that's it. Granted, they are vary big but they still don't make up the bulk of GDP in North America by themselves. A lot of the problem businesses out there; notable failures like US electronics chain Circuit City and Canadian telecom firm Nortel have been circling the drain for years. However, every day we keep hearing about companies who were doing just fine just a few months ago now "tightening their belts". Is this really warranted? Are people loosing their jobs needlessly? I say yes. Two things rule the markets: greed and fear. I think a lot of the current crisis is being driven by fear alone rather than actual numbers. There is a reason people used to call economic downturns "panics" before the Great Depression.

The markets are down because people panicked and pulled all their money out, allowing the high rollers to play games with your money, as they still are. Billionaire Warren Buffet has proven that you can be one of the world's richest men but still be a complete and total idiot. Each time he panics and shoots his mouth off, it makes things worse. Of course the bigger dummies are the ones that listen to him. A lot of it is poor management by people with the same mentality as Buffet who are simply too lazy to search for the root causes of their problems and instead just lay people off. The real victims are those who have just left school who cannot find work because these idiots keep playing games over who can get needlessly scared the most. These youths just starting to enter the workforce are not eligible to collect EI and if they can't find jobs, they're essentially screwed. Just stop, this is not another Great Depression, far from it. The economy is not as bad as they keep saying. People are still buying, trade is still going. The truth is, that if you have a job, you have nothing to worry about. This whole recession has been artificially created by fear and it needs to stop.

Now, I'm not a fan of government intervention in the economy but something needs to be done to stop these needless layoffs and to ensure those entering the workforce can obtain work. A solution would be to offer tax incentives to companies who hire, especially those who hire recent highschool and university graduates. If things are tight, there should also be tax incentives offered that encourages employees and employers to adopt programs such as job sharing to ensure people can at the vary least keep working and keep earning an income. While Liberals have balked at how much such incentives would cost, it would save a significant amount of money in the long run by keeping people paying taxes and not collecting EI and welfare. If that fails, governments should consider imposing tax penalties on companies laying off large numbers of non-seasonal workers unless they can prove it is absolutely necessary to ensure the business's survival. It's not a step I would want to take but it may be necessary to stem the panic. Sometimes we all need a little tough love.

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Is the CBC Still Relevant?

The National Post had an article today about troubles at the CBC. I mentioned it in my article on the CRTC. As I noted, it was originally created as a counter to "low brow" American radio content, which during the 1930s was all that was available to Canadians. In fact, up until about the 70s, it was the only truly nation wide network available to the majority of Canadians. However, technology marches on and when it evolves, many get left in the dust, obsolete and destined for obscurity. The change that marked the slow demise for the CBC was the advent of cable and satellite television. Hundreds of stations from all over Canada, the US, and the world were now available to Canadians. Around the same time, Pierre Trudeau gave the CRTC the mandate to control the minimum amount of Canadian content the new mediums had to broadcast. When that happened, the CBC was officially put on life support. The next blow was the growth of Web 2.0, which allowed a previously unimaginable amount Canadian content to be broadcast world wide at very little cost. Thanks to YouTube and better, cheaper camcorders, anybody can make their own TV show or movie and upload it to the Internet. Despite a massive number of Canadians logging on and producing content for the web, the CRTC is mulling over whether it needs to be regulated as part of Trudeau's Canadian content mandate. What is the CRTC protecting though? As they did with cable, satellite TV, and satellite radio, the sole reason for trying to regulate the Internet is, once again, to keep the CBC on life support.

How much trouble is the CBC in anyway. Without even reading into it too much, you can gauge it by just asking ordinary Canadians what they watch on the network. The vast majority will say Hockey Night in Canada, but nothing else. That's not to say the CBC hasn't produced some good shows. Obviously This Hour Has 22 Minutes must have something to it regardless of it's recent gaffes. After all, John Stewart thought it was good enough to rip off. The now cancelled Red Green Show is a cult classic in the US, though it's important to note it started life on Global. Other shows were allowed to go from Canadian classics to downright embarrassments, such as Air Farce. After John Morgan died, the show should have ended. However, the CBC let it keep going to preserve Canadian content, even after it devolved to a half hour of Bush bashing ever Friday, and it's cast ballooned to a whole host of unfunny actors. Shows like jPod were quickly cancelled and nobody stands around the water cooler discussing what happened on Being Erika, Heartland, or Little Mosque on the Prairie. By contrast, both CTV and Global recently scored huge US deals with CBS and NBC to air all-Canadian shows Flashpoint and Howie Do It respectively. If CBC shows do end up shown in the US, it's usually on backwater PBS affiliates. In an ironic twist, the CBC seems to air an awful lot of American content, such as Martha Steward, Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, and The Simpsons. Irritating British soap Coronation Street also airs on the network.

The debate regarding the relevance of the CBC has been going on for as long as I can remember. The problem is that the network receives tax dollars from the government to fund it. People are upset due to this because it does air American content, while others see the supposedly neutral network as having a pro-Liberal bias. The CBC has now come to describe itself as a government subsidized commercial network. Indeed, that is what it has always been. The CBC was never a public broadcaster. It continued to receive most of it's revenue from advertising, just as all other commercial networks do. It is also the quintessential example of what goes wrong when governments subsidize "critical" private enterprises. Take the Hockey Night in Canada fiasco for example. It's the most popular show by far on the network. Last year, the CBC dumped it's world famous theme song, often jokingly called Canada's second national anthem, because it didn't want to pay $500 in royalties to its composer each time it was played. The cost spent on that probably works out to around $100,000 per year, which is peanuts relatively speaking for such a big organization. Loud mouthed hockey twit Don Cherry makes several times that in salary. Then they ran a contest to find a new theme song, where the winner would get something like $10,000. I'm curious how much they spent on running the contest, because I can guarantee it was a lot more than they were paying to use the Hockey Night theme. What about the money wasted on unpopular shows, such as Air Farce, that ran well past their best before date. This is the same network that gave David Suzuki a job, and a soap box for his eco-fascism, so should we really be surprised by this idiocy? The CBC knows if it screws up, the government will just rescue it. Insert tongue-in-cheek reference to General Motors and Chrysler here.

However, the National Post claims the CBC's national per capita subsidy is actually quite low. Just $33 per person compared to $77 average in France for it's counterpart broadcaster. The BBC by contrast uses a TV licensing scheme. I have always thought this to be unfair though. While the BBC does provide high quality, commerical free programming, I don't like the idea of being forced to pay for services you don't use or approve of. The BBC is hardly the politically unbiased entity it claims to be. Just type "Global Warming" on the BBC News Online search box to find out why. The question still is whether the CBC should get any government funding at all. I say no. The network has outlived it's original purpose and has actually gotten to the point where it has betrayed it. If the CBC is to survive in the digital age without Canadian content intrusion from the CRTC, it needs to start producing higher quality programming that people actually want to watch, not what they think people should watch. CTV has done vary well for itself after recent changes and has proven it can viably go up against the big American networks. Canada should follow a US model when it comes to public TV. The vary same model that networks such as PBS and TVO follow. Privately owned and funded entirely by donations. This model maximizes consumer choice, rather than forcing things nobody wants down people's throats. The CBC is not needed to preserve Canadian content anymore. Right now, most TV networks are deep in the red due to the recession. The CBC is currently at an unfair advantage when it should not be. If the CBC can't survive, innovate, and thrive under this proposed system, then it should be allowed to fail.

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I'd Rather Take the Mercedes

Now here's a classic example of the McGuinty Liberals once again making it seem like they're doing something when they actually aren't. Yesterday, Minister George Smitherman blasted the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) for giving away a Mercedes Benz in one of its up coming lotteries. According to Smitherman, with the current downturn in the economy, the lottery should be showcasing Canadian built cars as prizes rather then ones built in Europe. At first this seems to make sense until you realize nobody wants a Chevy. OLG claims the deal was made ten months ago and they're in a contract with Daimler Crysler for the car. That's right, Mercedes is owned by Crysler, one of the two companies looking for a $10 billion bailout from the Feds. At first it seems to make sense and I can't see why OLG couldn't just make a deal to swap the Marcedes for say a fully loader Challenger, which is made in Brampton ON. However, this is really just nitpicking on the Liberals part. It's one $80,000 car that is being given as a prize in one lottery. It's not like OLG is giving out thousands of foreign made cars left, right, and centre on a daily basis. They do offer Canadian built cars in their lotteries as is, as do many other car lotteries in Ontario. This outcry by Smitherman is a political gesture mostly to appease the CAW. "Fake outrage and the idiots will keep voting for us because they think we're on their side."

Switching gears here, no pun intended, I think it's worth while to examine the whole bailout issue. Out of the Big Three US automakers, Ford is the only company that is not seeking a bailout from either the US or Canada. Ford Canada's CEO put an interesting offer on the table. What if instead of a direct bailout, the government increases the scrapping fee for cars over 10 years old to $3500. That would mean that when you trade in your old car, you get $3500 tax rebate towards a new vehicle. Both Honda and Toyota's Canadian divisions are backing Ford on this idea. Ford reasons that there is no sense in giving these companies money if people still are not buying cars. It is currently a vary good time to purchase a new vehicle but with the way the economy is, that little extra nudge may be what's needed to get people to take the plunge. I for one think this is an excellent idea and it's likely one the Conservatives will endorse. Liberals have already started bashing it though, considering it a waste of tax payer dollars. From my experience, Liberals tend to prefer more immediate, short-term results. The problem is that short-term thinking just doesn't work here. You could bail out GM now and maybe save some jobs for a year or two but what happens after? GM has shown little to no interest in meaningful restructuring and the CAW has been highly resistant to concessions. So if you bail them out now, you'll likely have to bail them out again five years down the road. Additionally, you'll still have thousands of vehicles rusting on car lots, not generating revenue. This doesn't create a sustainable economy or job security. With Ford's plan, you're taking the money that you would have spent on the bailout anyway and giving it back to consumers for the explicit purpose of buying a new, Canadian made car. This jump starts market and creates a more sustainable environment to sell new vehicles. Hey, it's the best plan we've heard so far and we've pretty much exhausted all other alternatives. The least we could do is try it rather than throwing more tax dollars down a hole.

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Global Warming: We Hardly Knew Ye

Well, that's it, Anthropogenic Global Warming is officially dead. Well, that's what anybody with half a brain wants to here. Well, it's not completely gone away but the theory has been dealt a major blow in recent months. Fellow Canadian conservative blogger Steven Janke, now writing for the National Post, refers to an article that states global warming has stopped dead in its tracks. According to Discovery News (US equivalent to Daily Planet. Jay Ingram is a huge advocate of the AGW theory incidentally), a new study in Geophysics Research Letters notes that global warming has stopped and that the Earth is actually cooling. Following a 30-year warming trend, global temperatures have remained stable since 2001 despite rising greenhouse gasses and "a heat surplus that should have cranked up the planetary thermostat."

Scientists are suggesting that the Earth may not warm again for another 30 years but are warning people that the temperature may "explode" in the decades following due to our polluting ways. They're calling the three decade pause just a hiccup. Aside from this prediction defying physics, it opens the window into the thought process of the pro-AGW camp. 30 years of warming represents a calamity and a solid, undisputable trend, where as 30 years of cooling is just an anomaly. Give it up people, you were wrong. Just admit it. This is what happens when politics rules over science. You get lots of money shoved in the face of a chic theory and of course people are going to start fudging the data and using inaccurate modeling in order to ensure that money keeps coming. I conservatively estimate that at least half a trillion dollars has been flushed down the drain on global warming in this decade alone. It's ironic that people bawk at spending that kind of money to save their jobs but they don't blink at spending it on a false theory.

Source: National Post

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Racism on the Left Part 2: Antisemitism

Jewish groups around the world are claiming instances of antisemitism are on the rise. Traditionally, this sort of behaviour was restricted to neo-Nazis, skin heads, Ku Klux Klansmen, and other white supremacists. Recently, pro-Jew, pro-Israel has moved to a right wing dominant ideology. Liberals style themselves as being tolerant of other religions and ethnicities yet we've seen an increasing number of attacks against Jews by left wing groups. No more has this been seen than in the halls of university and within labour unions. Currently, many universities in Canada are preparing to hold their Israeli Apartheid Weeks, in an effort to compare Israel's treatment of Palestine to blacks in South Africa. The description is incredibly inaccurate but still holds a powerful symbolism for those who participate in such events. However, such events mask strong underlying antisemitism.

Perhaps the most infamous example in recent years has been at York University. Jewish students often complain of harassment and assault on campus by Muslim and left wing students. It's one thing to oppose what a country does but to demonize its citizens to the point of forcing them to hole up in their student office is a blatant hate crime. However, where are the outcries? Where are the students union and Muslim campus club leaders being hauled in front of the human rights commission? There is an incredable double standard when it comes to hate speech in this country that the left openly endorses. Take Mark Styne for example, a Jew, who was forced in front of the kangaroo courts because some Muslims deemed his work to be offensive to their culture. Eventually he was deemed not guilty of anything yet he still spent years defending himself. We have the same Muslim groups crying from the mosque pulpits and university campuses proclaiming that Israel should not exist and that Hitler was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Nobody does anything. Another example was when Ontario CUPE leader Syd Ryan attempted to black list Jewish-Israeli professors from the province's universities over Israels Gaza action in late December. After what I would describe as mild public outcry, his proposal was eventually toned down to those who work with Israeli military institutions. Ryan is a long time provincial NDP and federal Liberal supporter and as left wing as they come. He received wide support for his backlist idea within the union itself until he was told to back off by the national heads of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. Ryan did not loose his job as CUPE Ontario president though, nor was he reprimanded in any serious way. If I was running a university and had said that I would not hire Chinese professors because of the PRC's rights record, I would most certainly be called a racist. They would throw me to the dogs and I most certainly would loose my job faster than you can blink an eye. Maybe you could turn a blind eye to Ryan if this was the first time he had done such a thing, but he has a long record of similar slurs.

Of course this is not to say that all left wingers are antisemitic. Within the United States, the Jewish community almost exclusively supports the Democratic Party and Barack Obama has publicly supported Israel. However, there is a rather large faction within predominantly left wing universities and labour unions that are antisemites. They say it takes three people to bully someone. The bully (labour unions, university groups), the victim (Jews), and those who stand idly by while the bully assaults the victim. That last group happens to be mainstream Liberals who let members of their parties and their supporters get away with these actions without saying anything. By creating a double standard, liberals have bred a culture of racism within their own halls. It's time for mainstream liberals to take a long hard look in the mirror if they want to proclaim they are the ones for tolerance of all races and ethnicities. People like Syd Ryan need to be publicly denounced by their mainstream liberal colleagues, followed by having people like him immediately sacked from power.

Update 03/05/09: Michael Ignatiff's guest column in the National Post today echoes what I've said here. So maybe some mainstream liberals are starting to stand up against their far left colleagues.

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