Ed

I think you meant idiots AND crooks

The Rightwing Bernard Schulmaan..

..Schulmaan on the latest poll.

Bernard Schulmaan theorizes that the BC Liberals have not yet reached rock-bottom, in other words they are still falling in support.

http://bciconcoclast.blogspot.ca/2013/02/latest-angus-reid-survey-of-public.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+BcIconoclast+%28BC+Iconoclast%29

born-again giant subsidies to flash-in-pan industry

same old story, giving our resources away in eternal desperation to win votes and campaign contributions from industry:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/25/canada-lng-britishcolumbia-idUSL1N0BPEQI20130225

more

I am so tired of fiberals brown stuff

Waltz - A Correction

You stated:
"And under the Liberals, BC has been a “have-not” province five times, receiving more than $2.4 billion in federal payments, versus just one time under the BC NDP"

In 1991 we were a very Have province but the NDP managed, after 7 years of terrible economic policies made us a welfare case. ("have not" province) The BC Liberals got us back in the good books after a couple of years in office.

The NDP are likely to put us in the hole again if elected. All one has to do is review its platform and realize that most of it contains policies that will damage the economy as they did in the nineties.
That's a recipe to get us into the "have not" condition.

lying Liberals

Every election the Liberals take liberties with the truth and march out complete lies. This election is no different and anyone who wastes their time debating what they say should save their breath.
Lying works and there are no consequences so they do it over and over again.
They have made a complete dog's breakfast with our finances and we will all be paying for decade's into the future for their dumbass corrupted business dealings.

NDP Record

Employment in B.C. increased 22 per cent during the 1990s -- much faster than the 16 per cent growth for Canada as a whole. Housing starts in B.C. averaged 29,000 per year between 1991 and 2000, a higher rate per capita than the 29,800 annual average during the "boom" period of 2001 to 2007.
What about all those 1990s economic refugees fleeing B.C.?
B.C. gained an average of 14,000 people annually from net interprovincial migration from 1991 to 2000 compared with just 4,300 annually for 2001 to 2007. The BC Liberals inherited a record surplus then ran record deficits.

North of Hope - A reality Check

Dr David Bond, chief economist for the HSBC Bank of Canada in 2002 wrote about the reasons BC became a have not province under the NDP's helm.
In it he offered these facts about the situation in BC during the nineties:

"(1) BC's per capita GDP growth between 1992 and 2000 was the lowest in Canada.
(2) BC's growth in average real disposable income was the lowest in Canada
3)The ratio of employment to population in BC was the lowest in Canada
(4)Total exports per capita and fixed business investment was the lowest in Canada.
(5)For the last five years of the decade the population growth rate declined and net interprovincial migration turned negative
(6)The number of head offices based in Vancouver had steadily gone down"

This David Bond?

"David Bond had his HSBC Bank of Canada contract terminated after he suggested that Campbell could not implement his tax cuts without creating a huge deficit. No one in the business community came to Bond's defence, not then, or even now that his forecast has come to pass.

"I could be tempted to say, 'I told you so,' but I shouldn't," a vindicated but still bitter Bond said after Collins announced the coming cuts. "After all, Mr. Collins, who was saying there wouldn't be a deficit, is a certified flight instructor and all I've got is a PhD in economics."

As for your list North of Hope, all true. Anyone who claims the NDP record was bad is entitled to that opinion but then has to come to terms with the fact that their record was better than the record of the BC Liberals.

So if the NDP record was bad, how bad does that make the BC Liberal record?

And that would be the same HSBC

And that would be the same HSBC which pled guilty to facilitating money laundering for Mexican drug cartels and agreed to a fine of $1.92 billion to keep its executives out of jail.

Maybe you should find another hero John Corman?

A PhD in today's neoclassical

A PhD in today's neoclassical market economics is at around the same intelligence level as it is in various "divinity" studies, or in the memorizing of Stalin's dialectics and Mao's Little Red Book.

Good thing that Harper only made it to Masters as we can just imagine the damage he could do with a phony PhD in imaginary monetary rackets, destroying the world and starving tens of millions to death every year.

In BC, the international corporate mafia was punishing the province for having elected NDP governments.

As they will do it again, if the NDP gets elected, so they can blame the government and ensure the return to "conservative values", meaning the stealing from the public and the environment to increase the obscene profits and powers of a dictatorial, criminal sector, collectivizing the world's economies in cooperation with their communist brothers.

Some of us still believe in the well proven benefits of orderly, private enterprise and mixed economics, human and environmental rights, instead of the criminal activities of ruling classes.

Even if they fraudulently call themselves "free enterpriser conservatives".

The present racket controlled by criminals is going to crash sooner, or later, the main question should be, what will take its place?

Democracy, or more dictatorship under the yoke of imaginary monetary values, controlled by crooks ?

Ed Deak.

John Corman and selective quotes

John Corman either purposely forgets or is thoroughly uneducated to the facts leading to the sluggishness of the 1990s BC economy.

Unlike the rest of Canada's provincial governments, the 80s BC Socred government tied BC's econonmy to the economies of Japan and the Asian Tigers. The Japanese economy "burst" in 1991 and the Tigers "collapsed" in 1997-1998.

The 1990s NDP inherited an economy that was in decline and was bound to have a difficult time for a decade. What the NDP were able to accomplish during that time with the books they had been given was very close to miraculous. Hence, Jimmy Pattison's hiring and keeping of Glen Clark after Clark's crucifiction by the MSM.

The work of the NDP made BC become stronger during difficult times, and the BC Liberals were handed an economy that was in great shape and ready to get stronger. The BC Liberals have squandered what they were given by the NDP, and they have (like their parent party, the 1980s Socreds) foolishly tied the economy to outside forces.

The Liberals' current platform of selling of natural gas through the creation of LNG plants shows how foolish they really are. That natural gas is money in the bank. It is energy that can drive the production of goods that we can sell to ourselves and others. By keeping the gas for ourselves, BC will have heat and energy well into the next century by which time it can have built the infrastructure for the new society that is not carbon-based.

By leaving it in the ground, there is also the possibility that we won't have to scar the land with roads and pipes to draw the stuff out. Perhaps we will develop a new way to heat our homes and drive our cars without resorting to burning carbon.

Japanese Asset Price Bubble burst of 1991
http://wiki.mises.org/wiki/Japanese_asset_price_bubble

1997-1998 Asian Tigers collapse, Read about it in Moneyweek:
http://www.moneyweek.com/investments/stock-markets/can-asian-markets-withstand-a-us-property-crash

The real balance includes hydro

I doubt Clark is including BC Hydro in this budget balance as it is broke under the liberals by giving tax and rate payers dollars to the corporations, must be from Milton Friedman economics. Maybe if Dix get off his high horse and wins, he can have a balanced budget like the NDP left them in 2000, but we won't get our hopes up. We heard all this great budget stuff the last election, only to be burned.

What about the BC Liberal moral deficit?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2013/02/25/bc-pat-bell-bid-complaint.html?cmp=rss

I guess we now know why Pat Bell resigned so suddenly

Sharing

I guess the only way to respond to your post is to suggest, with all due respect, that you are delusional.
To suggest that the worst performing jurisdiction in North America wasn't a result of NDP policies is truly laughable.

Except John...

...your simply saying so without any supporting evidence or comment, doesn't make it so.

John....I've spent 3 years in

John....I've spent 3 years in Austria after WW2 and all I could hear how great Hitler was.

As a Canadian/BC voter since 1956 I would like to hear exactly what were those disastrous NDP policies ? Details, not BS.

I was in the custom furniture business in Vancouver from 1957 to 79. Had nothing to do with politics or governments, when the NDP was in power from 1972 to 75 and business was booming all around. I had to move to a large 150'x35' shop in Richmond, just before Bennett was elected.

McGeer doubled the ICBC premiums and caused a mini depression. Hundreds of small businesses closed, the only way we could survive was to mortgage our new, paid for house. There were abandoned cars all over, with "Stick it in your ear McGeer"

A group of big business figures wrote an open letter to Bennett in all the papers, blaming him for causing a depression. Chunky Woodward was a good customer of mine and as we were having a cup of tea in his den one day, I thanked him for the letter. He blew up and called Bennett some fancy names.

That was the first time Woodward's have lost money and never recovered. Neither have I until I sold out in 1979 to a good "conservative/Socred", who opened another, phony business on paper, was buying the products of my shop at bankruptcy prices and resold them from the same floor at the correct price. It was perfectly legal, good "conservative" policy, as I found out later.

Never got paid for the business and 3 of us had to live without electricity, phone, running water in 3 tiny cabins totaling 300 sq/ft for 8 1/2 years, while building our house from pennies.

The BCLib party was bought by the Socreds to change the name, but they're the same thieving crooks, as we can see it in poverty and selling the province off from under our feet, hoping to pump billions of litres of water into holes in the ground to save their necks, calling it "wealth creation".

This from a real, life long private enterpriser....

Ed Deak.

John Corman

Factually correct. Except No. 2 needs further clarification. Real Disposable Income Per Capita DECLINED from 1991 to 2001. Sucked big time.

Subsequent responses to your statements are expected. Can you imagine that mindset ever forming guvmint? That's why the NDP politically collapses within 1 1/2 years after gaining power in BC. Happens each and every time!

After 1973 there was a cartoon...

...of a volkswagon up on blocks with the wheels removed. It displayed a bumper sticker which read, " I paid for the coquihalla."

Luke

Glad you found a new meme, I was worried about what would happen to your universe in May. Now for the next 8 years you can delcare that "next year" the NDP will self-destruct. Kewl. I look forward to hearing more about that over the next decade.

Do you guys practice stuff like "2% growth is better than 3% growth" at Liberal meetings by the way?

Luke-Cool Hand

Total accumulated provincial debt in 2001:
$33 billion.

2013: Total debt after 12 years of BC Liberals:
$62 billion - plus $90 Billion in contractual obligations to P3s, plus they sold our train and just about everything else they could get their greedy hands on.

The BC Libs have been drunk with power. They have sold the farm so they could play big shot. They have been unethical since before coming to power. They were unethical in the way they allowed Gordon Campbell to force their leader Gordon Wilson out, and they have gone downhill from there. They've run this province into the ground.

Sharing & Others - One more time

In 1991 the BC economy was just fine. We were a very prosperous province gladly contributing to the less fortunate provinces. In about 1998 we were now one of them. A welfare province relying on gifts from other provinces to survive. A Have Not status province.
Since early in the BC Liberals regime we were back into the prosperous category again and have remained there since.
These are all facts whether you guys like it or not.

Keep on dreaming John. I knew

Keep on dreaming John. I knew the faithful under every ideology known, some still dreaming of Stalin and Mao.

By the way, how are child poverty and how long the foodbank lines now, in our present great "prosperity" as opposed to 15 years ago ?

I know. As one of our long gone PC MP's wrote in our local papers at the time: " Children are starving in Africa because their parents are not productive".

Now the same is happening here, according to the faithful believers.

Ed Deak.

John Corman

BC received equalization when Bill Bennett was in power and the BC Libs received 5 payments from Ottawa, the NDP only 1.

We led all provinces in child poverty for almost the entire decade.

There is reams of evidence of rampant corruption involving the ex-premier's brother-in-law to cabinet ministers.

The Liberals have indebted the province beyond our ability to pay and maintain our standard of living.

Real wages fell in BC, while they rose in every other province but one. Economic growth and population growth were higher under the NDP.

The NDp balanced its budget without sky-high MSP premiums and tolls on everything.

A decade of Liberal rule has turned your party into a laughing stock.

Those are indeed the facts.

John

You have to quit drinking the Liberal Kool Hand Aid. Look at the current debt. Look at the BC Hydro contractual obligations look at what has been sold off. Look at everything they cut (education, environmental protection, court assistance and court houses throughout the interior, apprenticeship programs, health workers, in the meantime. Look at all of the mistreatment they have done to their employees and all of the court costs spent to find they were wrong time and again. You are nuts if you think things are better now!

@Corman

Not surprisingly, you're the one who is delusional...either that or you have a very selective memory and you only pay attention to things which reinforce your prejudices - just like our more frequent visitor - little Lukie!

Why not take a moment and see if you can understand this:

http://thetyee.ca/Views/2009/04/23/BCEcon/

And don't forget to click on the links to ACTUAL STATISTICS in the article...it'll help you avoid making such obviously stupid comments in print in the future. Tha kind of thing has a way of coming back to haunt you.

Poor John

Tak'n a shit kick'n here John--I won't add'A glass of water-2 asprins-----go to bed

Sorry

I won't add----should have read--I won't add to it- sorry----cheap coffee

Clark is our Best Option

This election comes down to the tale of two leaders. We must dis-engage from the garbage and noise on budgets, deficits, and Gordon Campbell's jaded history as Premier of BC. Christy Clark offers leadership with a vision for the future that includes plans to offer employment to British Columians first, is engaging in developing skills across the province, and is actually working towards aligning all stakeholders in an effort to provide a future that provides growth and prosperity. Mr. Dix offers little, he does not offer a clear vision nor a roadmap to the future. Clark speaks to all issues and is not afraid to face issues head-on. Dix has said little and is positioning his party to not be held accountable should they be elected. I can see the headlines: Not us, the Liberals did it. It is not our fault, the budget was skewed and we could not invest in the future of our people, so we are in economic ruin. Dix, like Gordon Campbell has proven himself to focus on doing what is necessary to preserve self; falsifying a document for the sake of a political friend. I prefer leadership with a vision and a voice to back it up.

nor-easter

What province have you been living in for the past 12 years?

Apparently the notes on the BC Liberal site where you volunteered to try and spin Miss Christy's record as leader of the 'party' need a little revision. You forget how little time she's actually spent in Victoria and ignore the fact she's governing without the approval of voters anywhere except Point Grey.

If she'd had a vision and a plan she could have offered it to the people of the province a year and a half ago in a general election...instead, all she's done is whine and play the fool - pretty much what she did when she was last employed by Corus on CKNW.

GWest

nor-easter's "bot" like post is nothing more than an example of Liberals being scared and desperate.

And you're right, there's a BC Liberal site where they will provide willing participants talking points to post on forums.

Its amateur hour.

The faithful have their orders.

Suddenly they are all touting the same distortions of reality. In a Globe and Mail article by Ian Bailey on Feb 23rd is this revealing paragraph:

"Behind closed doors, candidates were being tutored throughout Saturday’s one-day assembly in tactics and procedures for the campaign, such as tracking voters and the use of social media. They’re also aiming to compare best practices."

Since people are no longer reading the MSM and the BC Liberals can't rely on getting their lies across they have to flood the social media. Fortunately the social media does not screen the responses that disagree and challenge the distortions as the MSM does all the time.

It is a taste of things to come in the campaign but if the candidates are as capable as Frank, Steve, GWest, Ed, Sharing, missionimpossible and some others (no particular order) the truth will prevail.

Good stuff people.

Señor Franco

Well... after the August, 1972 BC election... the federal NDP vote collapsed to just 2 seats in BC during the 1974 fed election.

After the October, 1991 BC election... the federal NDP in BC collapsed to just 2 seats during the 1993 federal election.

Ditto the federal NDP's 2 seats in BC during the 1997 and 2000 federal elections.

Just a historical pattern. And left-wing Dix ain't no Mike Harcourt or Gary Doer. And neither are most of his looney candidates.

Don't have to be a rocket scientist to logically come to that conclusion.

I hope you don't run your small business like the NDP bro. Again the caveats:

1. The NDP had one of the highest tax regimes in North America - the same tax regime today would result in an additional $3.2 billion in taxation revenue. The NDP won't dare go there. Otherwise, the public and MSM will turn on them big time.

2. Drilling rights/land sales from the Ladyfern ng field in NE BC during 2000 resulted in a huge take for the treasury.

3. BC Hydro selling power to California during the Enron scandal, at prices of $1,300 per MW hour as opposed to today's $30 per MW hour. The matter is still unresolved.

After I have properly qualified the same - now they are!

Just to point out how far your compadres are out there...

Huh? haha. Phase one of the Coquihalla Hwy was opened on Friday morning, May 16, 1986. I passed the opening ceremonies at the new Hwy 5/3 junction one-half hour later on the way to Osoyoos/Penticton for Vic long weekend.

1973? What has he been smokin'?!

GWest

Don't bother linking to a Will McMartin essay. When he speaks of taxation and economic matters he is often quite ignorant. I've had to correct him a few times when he's made statements of matters he knew nothing about.
For example, he argued, foolishly that a reason for capital taxes on banks was to ensure that they paid some taxes to BC. He did not understand a fundamental part of our taxation system that taxes are allocated to the province where the income is earned. One learns that after 1 hour of a taxation course.

I could go on but I think you get the picture.

Luke

You think the NDP shouldn't tax people? The reason the BC Liberals have driven up our debt so much is they spent money but didn't set tax rates to pay for it.

If that's the way you think a government or a business should be run then you need to think about it. You set your spending based on your revenue. When problems occur you think carefully before borrowing, you don't go to your bank manager and declare you're increasing your spending and at the same time slashing your prices because its the bank's money, not yours.

If the NDP set tax rates to cover spending and pay down the Liberal debt, people will support them. There is I assume still some right-wingers out there who don't support massive deficits?

As for your silly history comparing federal and provincial, that would be like me saying the BC Liberals killed the federal Liberals. Its been downhill for the federal party ever since the BC Liberals won in BC, starting shortly after they were elected.

Perhaps that's because most people think revenue and spending should be roughly equal. You don't agree aparently.

John Corman

Since you don't like Will McMartin I assumed you supported Dave Barrett when Will McMartin ran against him in his riding?

By the way Luke

"Left-wing" Dix seems to be leading "Today's BC Liberals" by 16%.

Looks like BC has gone left I guess. Fancy that.

@Corman

Bullshit!
You've been shown up as completely and compressively wrong so many times here at Tyee that you're a joke! To suggest that YOU might have corrected Will McMartin is utter sophistry.

Furthermore, the fact you might have taken a course from H&R Block explains pretty clearly your earlier stumbles and pratfalls on taxation questions.

In fact, you can't marshall the actual statistics to support your prejudices and your delusions when challenged. This is just the latest illustration of your habitual and profound failure.

Like Luke, you're a joke, but not a very funny one! You can't go on because you haven't got a leg to stand on.

GWest

The links to the data you suggested John read were from BMP Capital markets, the Royal Bank, Scotia Bank, StatsCan and BC Stats.

And since John knows stats are for socialists and all those groups are socialist front organizations he sees no reason to read them.

Frank

Sure hardcore NDP'ers will. But not the majority of the populace. In fact, BC'ers view any politician most negatively when it comes to tax increases according to Nanos:

Positive: 15.4%
NEGATIVE: 60.2%

http://www.nanosresearch.com/library/polls/POLNAT-W12-T543E.pdf

In fact, I would LOVE for the BC NDP to include what you have just proposed within their platform. ;)

BTW, Will McMartin did a paper in conjunction CCPA, which was sponsored by the BC Fed showing that the BC guv should increase taxation to 1990 NDP levels. And now McMartin is part of the BC provincial Con brains trust. Funny breed that one. haha

John Corman

Some of these hardcore NDP leftoids are wayyyyyy out there. And quite miserable to boot!

Luke

I'm not surprised you think taxes shouldn't be set to cover spending, the Liberal record shows they agree with you. But I think you're wrong about the number of people who do.

Luke

I think its adorable you stick up for John but his history on here suggests his nurse will be along any minute to guide him back to his room.

GWest - A Clarrification

Am I to understand you to imply that you agree with McMartin when he stated that corporations only pay tax in the province where their headquarter is located and that's a justification for a capital tax?
Also if that's true then you probably agree with him that capital tax is based on asset value.
I could go on and on but I'm probably wasting my time as you don't really have the courage to actually address these questions, do you?

@Corman - wrong again

McMartin was addressing the BCLiberals foolish removal of the provincial corporate capital tax under a foolish minister of finance - who later accepted a position as a member of the board of one of the big five.

This caused a loss in revenue for the province of at least $100 million per annum. All thinking people should be equally concerned

I followed your risible attempt to criticize McMartin's analysis with amusement - the same sort of amusement I feel every time I see one of your posts here at Tyee.

You are wasting your time if you think the point you made above here had any relevance in this discussion. It didn't, just like your mistakes about the rates of provincial corporate tax for business corporations of various sizes at the same time that the BCLiberals are spending taxpayer money to advertise the fact that the province has about the lowest corporate tax rate in North America.

Cry me a river!

GWest

The reason John Corman doesn't like Will McMartin is Will took out to the woodshed 2 years ago on the Tyee.

Will McMartin said :

"John Corman

An organic chicken farm? Really?

You must know (as the article referenced) that B.C.'s corporation capital tax was in effect from the early '70s until Carole Taylor announced its demise three years ago. And yet between 1973 and 2008, the province's population grew by more than 2 million — from 2,367,271 to 4,383,860.

As for your claim that some people "left B.C. in the early '90s ...", the province's population between 1991 and 2001 (when those dreaded New Democrats were in power) grew by more than 702,000 (from 3,373,787 to 4,076,264).

Guess that ol' corporation capital tax wasn't such a deterrent to economic growth after all?

As for your organic chicken farm, you should know that in the early 1990s the NDP set the threshhold for paid-up capital at $1 million (and subsequently raised it to $1.5 million, and later to $3.5 million). Moreover, family farms and co-operatives were specifically exempted from the tax.

So, unless the organic chicken farm actually was a mega-farm with several millions of dollars in assets, and was owned and operated by a for-profit corporation, it wouldn't have paid the corporation capital tax at all.

But here's the nub of the issue (and I raised this in the article). All businesses, even multi-million dollar organic chicken farms, consume public services. Their assets are protected by a publicly-paid police force and a publicly-paid judicial system, and thieves or vandals who wreak damage to the farm go to publicly-funded jails.

The environment at and near the chicken farm (water, air and so on) is protected by public laws enforced by publicly-paid personnel. The roads used to transport feed and other items into the farm, and chicken (ahem) products out of the farm to its markets, are publicly-funded and maintained. The children of those who work at the chicken farm go to publicly-funded schools, and their loved ones use publicly-funded health care. I could go on, but you get my drift.

Even unprofitable chicken farms consume public services ... so why do you believe they should be exempt from paying something towards their provision?"

Yeh, thanks Frank

I had a vague recollection of the time that Will nailed John on his chicken ranch. It is such a pleasant spectacle to watch these characters who thought it was such a great idea to cut tax rates for the rich and increase fees and duties for average workers while they piled up bills for P3s and special deals for their friends...and now the cupboard is bare and there's no magic left in their bag of tricks.

The sad part of it is that most of the pikers who bitch about paying taxes are also the first ones with their hands out for a special deal at the same time as they seem to take a perverse pleasure in kicking dirt in the faces of the people who really need government help.

I hope you're enjoying the meltdown too!

IGWest

I knew you would go off like a little girl and not address my very reasonable questions.

@corman

What the hell are you talking about? You didn't ask a reasonable question - you made an entirely irrelevant point about something McMartin didn't say.

That's the whole point and one you're apparently incapable of grasping. I read through your pathetic comments on the story about the Liberals removal of the capital tax and the subsequent loss of revenue to the provincial treasury. I absolutely agree with what McMartin wrote and I also know it to be true. Period.

I know you neither understand nor like FACTS but I know you're nothing more than a hateful misogynist to boot.

Grow up man!