They are all sitting in high paid and soon to be higher paid politician seats. The sale of BC Rail was just made to pad the Liberal Governments pentions and cover their 29% raise. Selling off BC's assets is one of their priority goals. Sure make the budgets look good until there is nothing left to sell.

Said on the news the other night that Liberal popularity is rising.You do have to wonder why?
Seem's so many miss the crap that is going on in the background in regards to the B.C.Rail sale.Maybe they just don't want to see it.
And what is also suprising is the lack of press that the Basi/Virk trial is getting.
What gives?
It will be interesting to see how it all plays out in the end.
My guess is for complete exoneration for Basi and Virk.
If they were to go down,who goes with them?

Now lets see sell BC Rail because government is so bad. Give it to the private sector because it is so good. Well look waht has happened, ripoff, that is what the private sector is so good at. People complain about how big government is, well its that big mainly to keep the private sector in check. Hey gas prices, thats private sector right, so it must be good.

So, if I had a larger operation which was dependent on rail for transportation, I would ideally look for a location which was served by two rail lines. Kamloops would be one such place.

Are the two service providers going head to head in Kamloops? Or do they work like the oil and gas cartel and charge similar rates? If they are competitive, and rates by unit distance are higher here than in Kamloops, then how do we fix that problem and to become an equal player with Kamloops and other similar communities?

I do not know much about transportation rates, so maybe somehow can tell me how much of a problem this is. Not only that, but how they would suggest we fix it, given the situation we find ourselves in after what looks like some bad decisions and possibly even some unethical business practices.

Nationalize the railways

now.

Who was it that saddled the BCR with a 500 or 600 million dollar debt?

If the BCR did indeed during the nineties make hundreds of millions of dollars of net profit annually, who stole the money?

Why wasn't it used to make the railroad debt free?

Shouldn't an investigation be held to find out who ran the BCR as if it was always on its last leg, debt and deficit ridden?

No money to buy new rolling stock and just barely able to make it from one year to the next?

What's the real story on the BCR?

"What's the real story on the BCR?"

I aggree, it would be nice to know. It seems to me we are getting selected slices in time to suit one side of the debate and then the other side.

I suppose it is not the topic of a best seller and for all other purposes, water under the bridge.

Water under the bridge. Good way to look at it, because it won't be undone or reversed or whatever.

Still, it would be great if lessons could be learned.

For instance, why could the provincial treasury raid the crown corporations' profits and force them to assume debts that were unrelated to the business (wrong word?) of the crown corporations?

It is like keeping ICBC rates up and climbing while ICBC profits are skimmed off and used for non-insurance related purposes.

How about letting us know exactly how much of the BCR net profits were siphoned off over let's say the last 25 years and misused for non-railway related purposes while the tracks, bridges, engines and rolling stock were allowed to deteriorate?

The only answer is to now make all the old BC Rail lines an open port rail infrastucture as penalty for past fraudulant involvement in the BCR sale.

This way PG is serviced by not one or two, but rather by four railway operators. Also it makes it far more likely there could then be participation in an Alaska connector from Fort Nelson to Alaska and potentially the Far East. If that happened PG would be the Chicago of the West Coast of North America.

As much as I am not an NDP'er, I am not a Liberal supporter either.

What I am is pro-democracy. Something we don't have now.

Mike Harcourt and his NDP had the chance to make democratic changes that would have prevented this and the fast ferries from ever happening.

But instead of offering recall that was workable, he and his MLA's decided that you shouldn't have such an opportunity.

And Mike also turned the question of initiative into nothing more than a strongly worded suggestion that is not binding on the legislature in any way shape or form. And in fact can be discussed and tossed completely by the legislators if they decided that the poeople of BC are in fact stupid.

Gordon Campbell campaigned on a promise of greater accountability and lied.

He established the citizen's assembly on electoral reform, but cumbered them with ONLY the Westminster model. Nothing else was acceptable. Why? Because the Westminster model does not allow you voters, declared by parties, all of them, that you are totally stupid and unable to make a ration judgement on any issue if debated right in front of you.

None of the political party's in this country want true democratic reforms because you the voter will suddenly control and scrutinize every move those lying S.O.B.'s make. And you will spoil their little thing they have going.

Nice little game they have going. And you are not going to screw with it by looking after the common good of everybody.

Why is it so hard for the voters to understand that the collective wisdom of the voters is always right. ALWAYS!

Voters? Have you had enough of political manipulation? Is it not time to work together, drop the rocks we've hurled at each other, and slap a leash on the politicians?

Mike Summers
Vanderhoof BC
vhoofpreacher@hotmail.com

Democracy can and needs to come...