it will take more than the early bird gets the worm to resolve this provinces political woes Ben,we need to dump the old party loyalty system and bring in a tenure type, so we could get something done that represents the wishes of the people. when did we last use the throw them out system that it saved us from a government out of control? it is time to bring common sense to our present way of southern dictators ruling the peasentry by keeping the party faithful in line,that hasn't happened in b.c. since old WAC-ky bennet in the fiftys ruled and he wasn't a lower mainlander.change the system or at least electa good leader otherwise its more of the same.

Has anyone ever done or seen a cost benefit analysis of the 130 or so km of a 4 lane system from Horseshoe Bay to Pemberton, versus a 500 or so km 4 lane system from PG to Kamloops, with appropriate bypasses for at least Hixon, donwtown Quesnel, Clinton and Cache Creek.

I suspect that the benefit per $1 million of construction would be greater and would affect more people both directly and indirectly for the PG to Kamloops improvement.

BTW, the connector cannot stop at Cache Creek, that is sheer nonsense. It should at worst continue on to Kamloops or Merritt and at best to Hope along the Trans Canada.

owl, if there is even one person here who honestly believes that bringing back the NDP will result in a 500 or so km 4 lane system from PG to Kamloops, with appropriate bypasses for at least Hixon, donwtown Quesnel, Clinton and Cache Creek then that person needs to be given an extensive course of reality therapy.

When last in power then Highways Minister Lois Boone stated in an interview on Cable 10 (when asked about our potholed and cracked highways) that cracks and potholes are not a very high priority of any NDP government, so one better learn to live with that.

We would be lucky to get 4km, never mind 4 lanes.

An NDP gov would be the last nail in the coffin for PG. Most remaining businesses would rather shut down or move than endure 4 years of ndp raping.

As usual, the self appointed wannabee experts on the NDP, who don't know anyone in the NDP, don't want to know anyone in the NDP, have no idea on what the NDP aims are, have no idea on what NDP policy is spout of their ignorance as if the Lord of Heaven had come and told them personally.

If anyone would really like to know what the NDP stand for and what they would do, why not ask someone in the NDP. That way you will get some factual information rather than the self serving, far-right disinformation and outright blatant crap that these pro-Liberals are peddling.

The attacks on the NDP will undoubtedly increase in intensity as the Liberal party collapses on itself and panic sets in by its supporters.

Ok ammonra,fair enough!
And you could very well be right about the Liberal party collapsing in on itself!
Too much,too fast and that will do a government in everytime.
But, you may also recall the NDP also suffered from the same affliction when they were elected back with Dave Barrett at the helm.
And Mike Harcourt and Glen Clarke didn't really do much better.
Unfortunately,what all political parties SAY they are going to do, according to their party platform, and what they actually do if they are elected,are two very different issues!
They all suffer from very short memories.
But when you consider how long it is until the next provincial election,the NDP under Carole James do appear to asleep at the wheel!
Time she got in there and rattled some cages instead of just spouting nasty things about every single thing the Liberals do and say in the house!
Honestly,I would like to see the NDP at least make a damn good showing and shove a little humility down Gordon Campbell's arrogant throat!

I'm no self apponted expert just a regular guy with a memory.

Ammonra: "...why not ask someone in the NDP."

What you stand for and what you promise to do once elected is just one side of the equation! The other side is all about what you actually do do or what you did do once given the chance to *rule.*

Words and promises area a dime a dozen - we all know the track record of politicians and how many (if any) of their promises they actually keep!

This my own opinion and no, the Lord of Heaven did not come and tell me this personally.

No government is more oppressive than one which imposes upon the people detrimental policies which it itself believes are for the benefit of the (defenseless!) people.

Well said diplomat!

I wonder if any NDP boosters are familiar with the Regina Manifesto? I wonder if any of them agree with all or any part of that manifesto. Me? I found it scary.

All political parties have to run on their record. I'm sure that the past will be endlessly dredged up during the coming election. I am sure I will mention some Liberal boondoggles that have happened during the last two terms, as I'm sure others will about the NDP.

That is called democracy, and I object not one whit to it. Ultimately elections are not about us who post on this site, but about the voters selecting the people they wish to govern them after considering their political record. In a choice between the Liberals under Campbell and the NDP under James, I believe the voters will prefer James.

I do not agree with your final paragraph, diplomat. The most oppressive governments are those which don't give a damn about their population and consider them as just slaves to be used for the personal glorification and enrichment of the dictator involved. There are plenty of them around the world, both on the left and on the right, if those terms are applicable. Pseudo intellectual nonsense doesn't become you.

I believe in being fair...I hate them all equally!
;-)

I know about the Regina Manifesto but I have never read it. It is an old document that nobody bothers with any more, except to pay lip service.

Personally I am a Fabianist. Do you know about that? It is far older and has been far more influential than the Regina Manifesto. The Fabian Society has influenced modern political thought far more than many imagine.

It is an interesting phenomenon that many of those on the right accept as very reasonable and desirable many Fabian concepts about society. Even the Liberals and Tories would never argue against many of the programs which arose from Fabian philosophy and are now an integral part of our society. Canadians demand these programs.

Slowly and inexorably society develops as it should. Winning the ruling position is not the be all and end all of politics, although it helps to bring about a better society. Influencing society's development is what is the most important, and the NDP has had a major influence in society.

"Influencing society's development is what is the most important, and the NDP has had a major influence in society."

I think that what influences societal change transcends nations. There is no NDP in any other country other than Canada, and the NDP has had a very short lifetime in Canada.

So, I agree with the notion of Fabianism being on the way to the formation of modern socialist political parties such as the NDP. But we also must remember that Marx predated Fabianism.

As far as the current leadership of the NDP, I think it needs to be changed. Ms James is simply not provincial leadership material from my point of view.

Quckly checked in on the NDP site:

April 25, 2008

NDP Calls for POSITIVE Solutions to Climate Change

VICTORIA -- New Democrat leader Carole James and environment critic Shane Simpson have written to Premier Gordon Campbell, calling on him to bring in POSITIVE solutions to climate change, including the establishment of an all-party committee which would consult with British Columbians and report back to the fall sitting of the Legislature.
-----------------------------------

Gee guys ..... same jargon .... POSITIVE solutions!!!! neato .... does anyone really think they are implementing NEGATIVE solutions? Maybe they are stuck in the same CHANGE rut Obama is in the south.

I would like to see some change. Get rid of stupid redundant and obvious adjectives and put some meaningful ones in if any at all.

And more of the same ... community consultation ..... we absolutely have to have community consultation .... design by committee........ and then, no matter whether green or liberal or ndp or conservative ...... they go ahead and do their own thing anyway!!!!!

As I said in my orignal post about the connector versus the Sea to Sky improvements, has ANYONE done an honest, objective cost benefit analysis?

I really do not care which party did it, is going to do it, or whatever. These should be business and social benefit decisions of what to do with taxpayer moneys in order to benefit the people providing the money, the people of this province.

Marx preached revolutionary communism, whereas the Fabian Society preached gradualist and incremental non-revolutionary development. Also, I remind you that when Lenin took over the Soviet Union one of his first acts was to violently suppress democratic socialists so they would not hinder his revolutionary changes.

Social democracy and communism (revolutionary socialism) are not the same and have little in common.

Although the name NDP (New Democratic Party) is not used in other countries, the philosophy is very much alive in the British Labour Party and many other Labour Parties throughout the world.

The communist manifesto calls for government control of everything accept for the banking system, which they call for being run by private central bankers (makes not sense? you say) they say to limit government control... ya right)). So who really are those communists, but banksters in disguise using fear to rule a fear society.

It is an historical fact that Lenin used fear to implement communism and he was financed by the banksters in New York and London.

Socialism for the most part was those same people using a different tactic for a different people selling them what they want to hear throwing them a few bones and ultimately gaming for the same effect.

Today those same people call themselves conservatives... and half the neo-cons have direct linkage to the old Soviet Union (not by chance IMO) and ultimately they are gaming for the same agenda and the same effect from a different angle telling people what they want to hear and using fear... which is always their method.

The problem is unaccountable taxation.

Government revenue these days is a forced tax on either your income (ie savings tax), or on your home and business (ie land tax), and all of this forced taxation (ie taxation slavery) is then funneled into general revenues where little men and little women with grand ideas and a spin to sell decide how it should be spent to get them elected to the good life of making decisions and retiring with a huge pension.

There is no justice in this system and it is designed to enslave the citizen and the small business person for the benefit of a corpocracy elite.

I think it should be illegal to tax a persons savings (ie income tax) at a time when foreigners are buying up our country and any after tax income savings are being deflated faster than they can accumulate interest because the central bank keeps printing money devaluing the real value of the currency. (Stocking up on food now would be a better investment than saving money IMO... so as to beat the monetary inflation cycle)

I also think it should be illegal to tax a persons home, business, or property without that tax being a direct tax (ie road repairs or specific infrastructure needs) for a direct purpose that is voted on in a referendum at the same time people vote for their politicians that should be putting forward their ideas for a vote and then managing accordingly and not ruling like they are given a blank check to tax as is needed for what ever schemes 'they' approve of.

I think the federal and provincial governments should not be allowed to tax carbon based commodities after the refinery stage (ie at the pump). Feds should tax imports, resource exports, and transactions of commerce. I think only regional districts should be able to tax carbon at the pump and that this CONSUMPTION verses SAVINGS or HOME tax should be the method in which municipal governments are funded... so that every person in the community faces the realities of the municipal governments political decisions every time they consume fuel (political awareness), and so that every visitor to the community doesn't just free load, but pays their fair share as well even if they are just fueling up to pass on through (maybe they just pass through if the city can't manage its finances).

We need a tax revolt, or we will soon find that it is us that are hungry and cold reading in the dark. We have a system that was designed by the banksters for the banksters (over time) as they used things like government bond ratings, lending rates, ect to influence what was acceptable for our governments and what was not (eg ndp wasn't acceptable, liberals were (not that there is any real difference just world commodity prices, luck and what the banksters wanted). They were wrong and we in the coming years will be paying the cost for the banksters subsidized policies and their manipulation of the capitalist model.

I think this world has three types of people:
Greedy - the people out for personal fame and personal glory who see life as but one kick at the can to take as much as they can and usually call one of the ism's their ideological genesis. Usually these people are politicians, lawyers, or in finance.

Fear - the people that use fear for their personal agenda, or on the flip side are motivated by fear themselves in the form of fear of other people, fear of governments, fear of death, fear of the future, fear of religion, or simply fear of what will happen to their employment. These people will follow any agenda that promises to alleviate their fear and are great sheep if you can get them to vote using their fear as a weapon against them.

The two above IMO rule the world to this point in history and account for our slippage (from ignorance) into an economic slavery of dependence on the bankster.

The future IMO will be in the 21st century for those people that are about:

Hope - the people of free enterprise economies where society is seen as the great enabler (genesis) of all its citizens to find their own niche to contribute in their own ways all working together to built a better world than they inherited, benefiting from their efforts along the way, and in the process helping to bring up those that are less fortunate based on ethical morals, justice, and a view of one people with equal rights and equal opportunities. Most often these people are the independents and their system of government is best empowered by the kind of transferable ballot (like the BCSTV proposal) that brought the BC Socred party to power in the early 50's building the inheritance that we have today.

IMO we will need a revolution at some point to bring into check the unaccountable government we now find that we live under. IMO that time will be next year when we can all remember how our government is broken and vote overwhelmingly in favor of the BCSTV process (to start it at a provincial level) so that we the citizens can take back the power from the political parties controlled by greedy and fear people and put back it in the hands of the hope people.

Time Will Tell

All 'socialists' make the mistake of attacking 'profit' as the great evil without understanding what 'profit' really is, or that our modern money system is CREDITARY.

That was Karl Marx's fatal flaw. He assumed that the "poor are poor because the rich are rich". In a closed community, with a fixed, gold-coin based money system it is perfectly true that if one man has too much another man could quite easily have too little. But even in Marx's time that type of community and money system had largely been supplanted.

In a creditary money system the poor are NOT poor because the rich are rich, and the socialist prescription of thinking they can make, and keep, the poor a little richer by making the rich a lot poorer will simply not work. The poor are poor not because money is maldistributed, but because it is chronically collectively INSUFFICIENT IN QUANTITY IN RELATION TO THE 'PRICES'IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO TOTALLY LIQUIDATE!

No redistribution of money through taxation can ever cure this problem. Nor can the complete elimination of 'profit', and the attempted sale of everything produced 'at cost'.

All socialism of either the Marxian or Fabian varieties can ever do is progressively level down. Never up. No system that envisions robbing Peter to pay Paul, while it may be temporarily immensely popular with Paul, can ever be of benefit to either long term. What we need to do is bring Paul 'up', in terms of his access to real wealth, while leaving what Peter has already obtained untouched.

Ammonra in a reply to Diplomat: "Pseudo intellectual nonsense doesn't become you."

It doesn't become you either, but your postings are full of it, now that you mention it.

"No government is more oppressive than one which imposes upon the people detrimental policies which it itself believes are for the benefit of the (defenseless!) people."

Now that you know what my "Pseudo intellectual nonsense" objections to the mostly ill conceived actions of certain political social engineering specialists are (NDP) you can reply (or not) with more below-the-belt catch phrases.

Socredible: "What we need to do is bring Paul 'up', in terms of his access to real wealth, while leaving what Peter has already obtained untouched."

Precisely.

You may be right, Socredible, about leaving Peter alone while bringing Paul up. On the other hand, if Paul doesn't have enough money to pay for food for himself, his wife and three babies, are we to let him and his family starve to death because we have some philosophical hangup about "wealth"? I hope not. I hope we would give him some help by redistributing a little of the wealth to keep him alive.

Clearly, Socredible, you do not really understand the underlying principle of the various types of socalism. It is not about "profit" at all, that is peripheral to the real issue. The real issue is that those who actually produce the wealth should benefit by receiving a fair share of it.

Investment produces absolutely nothing. It may permit an opportunity for those who can work and produce something that can generate a profit to do so, but the profit should be shared between the producer and the investor, not given in its entirety to the investor.

That is the underlying principle behind the trade union movement, to ensure that the wealth producers receive some of it.

Everyone in society should share the wealth. That includes the investor, the producer, including employees in industry, and the resource owners, i.e. citizens in general including those unemployed and in ill health, aboriginal people and all other members of Canadian society.

Peter should not get rich by stealing the wealth that rightfully belongs to Paul.

Much as I dearly love the stimulation of these interchanges, I regret that I cannot continue at present. I am leaving for Australia Wednesday morning and I do not return until May 15. Please take full opportunity of my absence :-)

May you have a very pleasant flight and fall deeply in love with Aussieland!

Cheers!

Ammonra: "Clearly, Socredible, you do not really understand the underlying principle of the various types of socalism."

You escaped relatively unscathed! At least you were not accused of being addicted to pseudo intellectual nonsense...!

Obviously, none of the comments made above pass the stringent scrutiny standards of a fervently dedicated adherent of NDP style socialism.

"Feds should tax imports"

I AGREE ..... they should tax bananas, pineapples, grapefruit, oranges, ratan furniture, trinkets from malaysia, etc. etc.

Husqvarna chain saws, Saab optomizers, Boing jets, etc. etc.

The hell with trade. Why bother taxing the chit .... just close the borders ....

Oh, and BTW, they should not allow people leaving the country to winter in Arizona to take more than $500 with them.

That ought to kill them banksters for good. Right!!??

;-)

"You may be right, Socredible, about leaving Peter alone while bringing Paul up. On the other hand, if Paul doesn't have enough money to pay for food for himself, his wife and three babies, are we to let him and his family starve to death because we have some philosophical hangup about "wealth"? I hope not."

If that is the situation with Paul, then his identity is obviously mistaken. He is actually Peter.

;-)

Now, ammonra, while I, too, wish you a pleasant trip 'down under', (to Australia, that is ~ not the other place!), your use of the sentence opener, "Clearly", reminds me so much of Glenn Clark that I can see where you get some of your ideas from.

To Glenn the benefits of socialism might've been perfectly 'clear', but to the rest of us, well, we we're still completely fogged in.

And by the time Ujjal cam along with his oft repeated favorite opener, "At the end of the day.." , we we're all hoping it soon would be!

But to be honest, for all their failures, I think as far as people go I would have preferred the company of either over the guy who's got the job now, and opens up every utterance with, "Let me tell you..."

Have a good trip, and we'll discuss it further when you're back!

Have fun hanging in the sky ammonra!
I am sure we will have the worlds problems all solved by the time you get back!
;-)

Socredible says: "To Glenn the benefits of socialism might've been perfectly 'clear', but to the rest of us, well, we we're still completely fogged in."

Glenn had a job lined up (just in case the selling of socialism to us didn't work out) with the ultra rich capitalist who owns the SaveOn Foods/Overwaitea chain plus other ventures.

Working for Jim ever since he has been a very successful seller of business signs, it is reported. Thanks are given to private enterprise which needs signs to promote its business to make a profit!

Often enough in the past I had made a vow never to vote in any election again - but, voila, I always had to break my vow and vote yet once more just to help keep the NDP from getting its hand on the steering wheel again!

This is known as the Lesser Evil motivator!

I tried that once, diplomat, (not voting in the election that brought Gordo and his gang to power. First time I've done that since I was old enough to vote.)

I didn't feel the BC Liberals were the 'lesser' of two 'evils', but would be about on a par with what we had. The NDP by then having pretty much morphed into a bunch of capitalists, only ones without any capital. And I couldn't cast my vote for either, nor for any of the other alternatives.

Boy, was I wrong! Gordo & Co. were far, far worse. And IMHO remain so. They will literally destroy this Province in a manner not even the NDP at its worst (under Barrett)could duplicate if we don't get rid of them soon.

Owl, if the import tax is the only thing you could find wrong, than there must not be much wrong with the rest.

Nobody wants food to be taxed... ditto for other things like energy or manufacturing equipment and tools. But I see no reason why we couldn't tax any manufacturing import that comes from a country that does not share our environmental or labor standards.

So on the flip side Owl has declared that he supports subsidizing sweet shops and corporations that generate profits by laying off Canadian workers closing Canadian factories so as to cut costs buy going to the lowest common denominator country of cheep labor and no environmental standards so they can benefit from selling in our markets receiving our capital for extra big profits thereby forcing our labor and environmental standards down to their level to compete.

Owl would gladly shut down Canadian industry so that companies don't have to meet environmental regulations and yet can still sell into our markets, and Owl thinks everyone should be able to compete for the dollar a day salary otherwise they are just lazy.

I don't share the views of Owl where we should enable all free trade so that our jobs can be replaced with dollar a day workers causing the pollution (that knows no international boundary) that we find unacceptable in Canada. This free trade concept of Owl is saying laws and regulations in Canada do not matter as long as you can buy cheep things at Wal-mart and save some money.

I disagree and see free trade as only possible when the trading partner shares the same environmental and labor standards as we require in our own markets. If the trading partner can not meet these standards than yes that needs to be balanced out through import taxes to assess the difference in competitive condition as a result of lax regulations in comparison to the regulations required to be met by Canadian producers competing for sales in the Canadian market.

The free ride has to end otherwise our country is being drained of its potential, of its wealth, and of its future by people that only want cheep things and to be damned with their country. The hypocrisy of these people is rich.

Socred that is the stupidest thing I have ever heard.

"The poor are poor not because money is maldistributed, but because it is chronically collectively INSUFFICIENT IN QUANTITY IN RELATION TO THE 'PRICES'IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO TOTALLY LIQUIDATE!"

Nothing could be further from the truth. It is the manipulation of fake money injected to save the banksters that is precisely why they survive from their schemes of robing paul when the pyramid scheme is up. If they were not bailed out with more fake cash then they would have to respond to real market forces.

So you are saying in effect that we need an inflation tax to pump more capital in the system thereby devaluing the existing capital through dilution and thus inevitable inflation because society should subsidize over production in order to liquidate anything that can be produced? That is pure balderdash and in no way is a responsible model for a stable economy where savings and responsible production would be the central genesis for economic growth.

I ask you in your model... who then is going to pay for all the inefficiencies that result from the over production? Your model is the model of the US Federal Reserve in the last few years that got us to where we are today. It makes no sense.

My ideal regulator of money supply and thus inflation would be to restrict any new money supply to the value of commodity and energy (hydro) exports and the level of labor output regardless of the type of labor or value of labor.

The labor component would have a fixed assessment of the average labor value used as the constant input that with the variable input being the labor hours in the legal economy forming one component of monetary growth and the commodity export values as the other component.

Ideally this would result in zero inflation and thus savings would not be taxed by the hidden tax of inflation. The real people that do real work could then focus on working and not playing the game to protect their wealth from the banksters that would other wise steal it through manufactured asset and commodity bubbles making and then taking away investment dollars from those who will never have the inside scoop on their insider derivative manipulations of the market and such.

This way only real dollars would account for supply and demand and not all those fake dollars you suppose we print for the benefit of production equality.

Socredible: "And I couldn't cast my vote for either, nor for any of the other alternatives."

Yes, sad state of affairs, isn't it? Still, since we are living in a capitalist world, being a capitalist country, surrounded by capitalism I'd rather prefer trying to adjust to the benefits and drawbacks (and we know very well what they are, don't we?) of this system than embark on a *no holds barred, no sacrifice is too great* crusade against it that has its inevitable and predictable results.

International money is invested by the moguls where it is as safe as possible and where it will produce the biggest profits. A local government which ideologically chooses to ignore basic facts like these runs the risk of branding itself as a pariah, internationally.

This does not mean that we should simply roll over and allow ourselves to be raped, but we (and our politicians and business people) must be smart enough to get as many golden eggs from the goose without the goose becoming frustrated enough to simply flap its wings and fly away to greener pastures.

Everyone is wooing international money to PLEASE come and invest in their country, even offering free land, huge financial incentives, tax exemptions and whatever.

So where does that leave us if we are ideologically opposed to businesses making profits and calling corporations the worst evil of this planet?

Eagleone, in respect to much of the above I could repeat your opening sentence back to you, only with your name in it in place of mine! You're going off half-cocked, again.

Your obvious, and not undeserved, detestation of 'banksters' blinds you to seeing where the real problems lie. Removing those currently in control of the world's financial system, without effecting necessary corrective changes to the "accounting" at the macro-economic level within that system itself, will only result in a change of personnel. Nothing more.

The real problems caused by Finance will still be with us, and Finance will still be capable of manipulating "figures" to exert an external control over each of us.

You've completely mis-interpreted what I said. "Inflation" is an increase in the quantity of money in the hands of the public ACCOMPANIED BY A RISE IN PRICES. It is what we have now, and seemingly, what every one of "OUR" governments in the world is trying to induce. Gordon Campbell's certainly is, and has been ever since he took office.

An increase in the quantity of money in the hands of the public WITHOUT a rise in prices, however, is NOT, and can NOT ever, be "inflation". It is, I believe, something which we call PROSPERITY.

Now I don't have time this morning to go into this as I'd like to, but I can assure you that there IS definitely a method of increasing the quantity of money the public receives WITHOUT causing "inflation", and, in fact, inducing "deflation". A fall in prices to CONSUMERS. Only without the deleterious effects that come to producers from that latter.

And there certainly is NOT any necessity for taxing to do it, nor having 'overproduction'. I do have time to metion one recent example similar to what I am talking about, except it does involve money from taxation.

Witness the recent announcement by "OUR" Federal government of $ 50 million subsidy to be paid to hog farmers if they'll slaughter 10% of their breeding stock and keep it off the consumer market.

Thereby raising the price of pork in the supermarket, and presumably back to the producer, to a level high enough to cover his costs of production. Which, at the moment, it isn't.

Now the Federal government could just as easily pay the $ 50 million to the pork producers to cover what they are losing on their costs of production, and either leave the price of pork to consumers right where it is, or even lower it.

One way, $ 50 million borrowed from the Banks, and charged in taxes over time against the public, is being used to make the public pay 'twice', at least, (once in higher pork prices, once more in increased taxes, and probably once more again through interest on the money borrowed) to access 'wealth' (pork) that many are already finding hard to get enough income to access right now.

The same thing could be done to 'save' the pork producing industry, and make the price of pork MORE affordable to the public, instead of less. Only it need not involve taxing at all, but simply through a technique of credit. But to explain it properly takes more time than I've got right now. Later.

I believe that Canadians should get a say on important decisions on all levels of governmemt. We should be able to vote on such things as the Olympics. I am ready to bet money that if it would of been left up to British Columbians, Vancouver would not be spending millions of dollars on something that the average person can not afford to attend. We will be paying for this for many years. Imagine if we could of voted on such things as the new carbon tax! We need to take some of the power away from the mere men we put in office to look after our interests.

Canadians need to speak up soon.

Aren't Fabianists fans of 50's pop star, Fabian?

socredible: "Now the Federal government could just as easily pay the $ 50 million to the pork producers to cover what they are losing on their costs of production, and either leave the price of pork to consumers right where it is, or even lower it."

That would be in contravention of NAFTA which does not allow subsidies of that sort, whereas *compensation* for slaughtering and thereby reducing the stock permanently is not.

Shellshadow, I am a firm supporter of referenda for the kind of huge issues you mentioned. The NDP is apparently dead set against it and I have been told by some ardent NDP supporters that referenda are nothing but *mob rule.*

"Aren't Fabianists fans of 50's pop star, Fabian?"

Yes, of course they are! Ammonra is away on vacation so it is safe mention this!

;-)

Well Diplomat, as Fabian would say, "Turn me loose!"

Actually, ammonra is seriously referring to http://fabians.org.uk/

It exists.

Douglas and Coldwell were founders in Canada, I think.

"Burn me goose."

Diplomat wrote:- "So where does that leave us if we are ideologically opposed to businesses making profits and calling corporations the worst evil of this planet?"

Well, I wouldn't know just where it leaves the people who think that way, Diplomat, because I'm not one of them.

I don't personally see anything wrong with the idea of a 'corporation'. In fact, I don't really see how doing away with the concept of 'limited liability' that is the main purpose of any corporate structure would be of any benefit at all.

Already , in law, the management and directors of corporations can be held personally liable for the corporation's actions under many of our existing regulations and statutes. We certainly wouldn't want to further extend that type of liability to ordinary shareholders who have absolutely no part in the day to day management of a firm, or the whole concept of 'investment'itself would suffer.

Aside from that, a 'corporation' has the kind of unlimited longevity no other form of business structure can offer. Because it is an 'artificial person', it doesn't pass from the scene, or necessarily suffer from the same problems, as when death hits a 'real' person who is the proprietor or a partner in some business.

As for 'profits', well, just show me someone who does anything that is not, in some way, profitable to him. Even a 'socialist' would rebel at the idea of going to work in their ideal, caring and sharing Worker's Paradise if it cost them more do so than they got back from it.

Really, if you want to go back to fundamentals, "profit" exists in nature. It is the excess of energy that is available to the individual after his physical necessities of day-to day living have been met. Without it, we could never progress.

That being said, it most certainly ISN'T necessary for us to engage in a 'race to the bottom' trying to entice the type of international "Capital" we seem to think is going to lift us to the top.

Socred... it is not that I would like to see those that run the global financial system removed (pointless small talk), but rather that I would like to see the system itself removed and replaced with something that is more based on monetary value stability based on real world measures and not models of fractional banking asset collateralization schemes and derivative trading with hidden contracts between shady characters of multinationals and national investment funds that all have their hidden agenda's clouding the transparency that a monetary system by its very nature should be required by moral laws to have.

That was a bit of a run on sentence but I hope you get the point... because it seems obvious you never got my last point as your answer had nothing to do with my accusation of your ideological support for the existing Greenspan theory of monetary inflation.

The question is how do we make the transition... do we wait a few more years until mob riots break out to do it the old fashion way (this is after all the main conflict of the 21st century in its earliest stage) and collateral damage be damned at that point, or can we get our governments to be smart about it and fix things themselves? Likely we will be distracted by a war on terror until only rash actions will save us from the manipulations that we as a society allowed to fool us for so long.

AIMHO

I've been reading about the Iran Contra affair and the Israeli weapons sold to Iran (supplied by US aid to Israel) with the proceeds used to fund the contra rebels in Nicaragua.

Its interesting how the money changed hands and who's hands it went through including the usual suspects in the arms for policy agenda with the Saudis, British, Israeli's, and the American 5th column actors. A little off the top for the arms dealers, and a little off the top to fund the covert operations, and weapons for the drug trade in Central and South America, and a Swiss account for all.

Then one looks to the scandals of today with the BAE $80 Billion dollar Al-Yamamah arms for oil and off the books cash deal (look it up) that is used to fund AlQuada and the other so-called Islamo-fascist covert operations throughout the world today facilitated by HSBC, Shell, Exxon, and BP. Money that finances both our politicians and the boogymen they use to scare us.

The strange thing is in both deals you have similar characters with similar roles for similar covert political agenda's. You could almost say Iran-contra was the birth mother of Al-Yamamah and the one and two are likely of the same still in operation to this day facilitated by the banking elites.

I saw yesterday the US suspended military aid to Israel because American supplied military helicopters where confiscated by Columbian drug cartels, and more then 200 night vision goggles have disappeared from Israeli inventory. I don't think it will be long until this too is found to be a red herring that could potentially bring some new light to its related role in the machinations and devious manipulations of global events taking place and used to distract us while our economy is robbed from us.

Time Will Tell