Archive for June, 2010

Demonstrating Their Ignorance

Wednesday, June 30th, 2010

 

Imagine if the Ontario unions which demonstrated futilely in Toronto, on the weekend, had put their efforts into fighting the HST. Imagine if they had logically demonstrated in those countries which need “human rights, dignity…and a fair wage.”
 
I’m not surprised to hear that my union dues were spent to bus members to the G8/G20 demonstrations. Nor would I be surprised that few of the riders were clear on the issues they were defending. However, a union spokesman questioned by the local CBC radio station, was sufficiently clear on the issues that supposedly motivated the participants to go to Toronto – “…a living wage, dignity, human rights…”. But above all, the constant threat to relatively wealthy unions, posed by impossibly low-wage competitors.
 
This issue has been at the core of summit protests. Global leaders epitomize global competition and “multinational corporations”. Globalization means having to outbid a competition that is willing to settle for the proverbial bowl-of-rice-a-day. Nothing new here, unions are still fighting the free trade fight, and doing so with a finger in a dam.
 
In the aftermath of enormous turmoil in the bankruptcy of most of the domestic auto industry, one would expect unions to be clearer on the motivations of corporations. The need for lower costs is a more logical explanation for globalization, than just greed and meanness. In fact, the unions play a large part in that need. So when they vilify  impoverished third world workers, who are hungry to accept our jobs for less, how does that square with unions’ stated goals of dignity, human rights, fair wages? Are those things the proprietary goals of only western workers?
 
Let me assure you that I am not anxious to watch my wages fall just to do the world a good turn. There are less futile ways. Low wage countries will be less threatening when we have learned to diminish their advantage difference, rather than shutting our trade walls. One way to ease that difference is by fighting higher taxation so that we can keep what we earn. By having given the HST the reaction it needed. But we have barely heard a peep from unions on that subject. That is so because they are unclear on the concept of wealth creation. There is no tax, unions don’t love, especially public sector unions who depend on them for the gravy train ride McGuinty has given them. It is hard to keep that finger in the dam, while reaching for more.
 
 
 

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Where Chickens Vote for Colonel Sanders

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

 

“Taxpayers voting for Liberals is like chickens voting for Colonel Sanders” – unknown author.
 
I received my provincial bribe cheque yesterday. As I stared at it, I was overcome with anger and helplessness, and insult. Insult because the government’s attempt to dupe us with a handout of our own money, is so goddamn shallow! What a pathetic illustration of the contempt they harbour for the taxpayer! Anger, because I know that this is borrowed money. McGuinty has already spent all the money he robbed from us with his farcical health tax and a thousand other hidden insertions into our pockets. Helpless, also, because I know now that there is no stopping them from robbing us again with the HST. And that will be the biggest robbery of all.
 
But there is something we can do to hurt this harmful administration, and by turning their own tactics against them. Take your bribe money and donate as much as you can spare, to the political opposition. This will, first, strengthen the opposition for the next election, but also, cost McGuinty’s government more money in the form of political income tax credits. Last time I looked, a $500 donation got you back $400.
 
Let me anticipate the argument that as taxpayers, we will ultimately hurt ourselves with this tactic. An awareness of what is to come, argues that the price is worth it to get rid of this disastrous administration. McGuinty is not finished leaving a legacy of destruction, yet, and can cause much more damage before the next election. If we can remove additional funds from his fumbling hands, (so he can’t afford more Samsung surprises) we save in the long run. Also we add to the ammunition required to defeat him.
 
Is there doubt that he will lose? This is Ontario, where taxpayers see nothing wrong with chickens voting for Colonel Sanders. It is also the place where our billions have been spent assuring the support of public employees. A letter from one of Ontario’s teachers’ unions, in today’s Post, calls them, “an enlightened Liberal government…” You do the math.
 

 

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So Many Asses to Kick, So Little Time

Thursday, June 10th, 2010

 

Like some presidential version of Buford Pusser, Obama is “walking tall” with an axe handle clenched in his fist, looking for some “ass to kick”. If you have been catching the news you know that this is not a gratuitous embellishment of what he said. This is almost a direct quote. Unlike Buford Pusser, however, Mr. Obama is not targeting nasties who desperately need a good ass-kicking, but indulging in theatrics. He has as much chance of winning this ass-kicking contest, as a one-legged man.
 
I don’t have the technical expertise to know whether the BP event could have been avoided, or diminished or in any way improved from its current outcome. Even if Obama has access to that expertise, I believe it has nothing to do with his current grandstanding. That is a result of, first, his need to create the illusion of presidential action and control. Secondly, an ideological belief in the green salvation and the concurrent conviction that it is at hand. From that he has concluded that bridges with petroleum can now be burned without consequences.
 
Hence, his decree that offshore drilling is dead, the continued vilification of Canada’s tarsands, (will that change when Florida has their own?), the continued agitation for carbon charges, the hunt for BP heads, and so on. The man in charge of the most economically and militarily powerful nation on earth, - a statement that will cease to be true when the nation loses its reliable energy sources - is playing games with that nation’s energy future and reliability. He is theatrically swinging his stick at those who are responsible for ensuring the continuing ascendance of America.
 
Can he really believe that unproven, costly, unreliable, ephemeral, dreamland, alternative power sources, - whose accompanying unintended consequences, have barely been considered - are going to replace the energy gorilla that holds up the American pillars of support? If he does, conviction alone will not absolve him of the guilt of having destroyed one of the great nations of recorded history. Better that he is grandstanding, than that he actually believes. The former can be fixed with a simple kick in the ass or an election.  

 

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Feeding Your Allies to the Wolf

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

 

Any time Isreal reacts forcefully to whatever threat confronts them, (a reaction that most of us would otherwise consider normal) the world does its best imitation of Lewis Carrol’s works (Alice in Wonderland). White becomes black, up becomes down, common sense becomes exceedingly rare. A world- wide discourse is elevated to a shrill pitch, revealing a great deal more about the screamers than it does about Israel.
 
No one is surprised that Muslims throughout the middle east, would be wailing in the streets. That was precisely the intent of the blockade-running, Gaza flotilla. But, what about the rest of the world? The UN, for one, is demanding an inquest, primarily of Israeli actions, as they customarily do. That an organization which claims to be the conscience of the world, can be so transparently biased against one nation, reveals the UN for the self-serving farce it has become, and Ban Ki-moon for its current head dupe.
 
Also customary are the bleatings from the EU, lead by Germany’s Merkel and French president Sarkozy. In concert, they wasted no time condemning Israeli action, apparently, before they knew the full details. Europe is in a defensive state about the Muslim issue, both in the middle east, and at home, and have never hesitated to cast Israel to the dogs rather than inflame the tensions between two civilizations. Can any nation within this bunch of hypocrites rely on any other as a democratic ally?
 
What about the street scene throughout the western world and the US? Here Muslims are not alone in agitating. The student/left community is predictably there beside them, because it is so left to blame Jews for their problems. Wherever you go in our supposedly enlightened countries, student and left wing are two groups which could be mathematically described as completely congruent. Why are students overwhelmingly leftish? Because their ivory tower professors have long since surrendered their principles and embraced pretzel logic in order to exclude noise and conflict from their comfortable, cloistered world. It takes guts to defend Israel when such a large part of the world’s population is dedicated to its extermination. The students are merely the children of this intellectual collapse, unable to discriminate on their own, between BS and reality.
 
And how can that be otherwise, when the “leader of the western world” is so deeply mired in pools of BS, of his own creation, that he can barely move in any credible direction. He is one of the grown children of the intellectual collapse. The international relations legacy of the Obama administration (aside from the economic rubble it will bequeath to Americans) will be to relearn the lesson about kissing your enemy’s rear. And as well, the lesson that says that feeding you allies to the wolf, will not satisfy his hunger for you.   

 

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