"If only these soulless assholes could realise what they have done just to make themselves rich."That comment, about BC Liberal insiders, comes after reading an old piece: Perception supercedes reality Recommend this post
Former auditor general George Morfitt has picked up some contract work as a result of being a member of the provincial government's B.C. horse racing industry management committee. That six-person committee was launched in January to help "restore the the industry's financial strength." And now Mr. Morfitt has been hired by the government's gaming policy and enforcement branch to "offer advice from a point of view independent of the horse racing industry." This, according to a government spokesperson. The notice of intent to award that contract - which is worth up to $25,000 - was rolled out last Wednesday. Mr. Morfitt will also preside over administrative review hearings concerning issues such as the revocation of horse racing registration or a gaming license.Morfitt is obviously a man of talent with expertise ranging from accounting and finance to public policy, horse racing, gambling, ferry operations, car sales, education, pharmaceuticals and public safety including installations involving electrical, gas, pressure vessels, elevating and amusement devices, railroads, etc. That he chooses to practice as a consultant in the public sector arises from his record of success. Success well earned, no doubt.
. A few quotes:"In the last ten years, I have probably paid taxes, counting payroll taxes, at a lower rate than Carol has. It's wrong."Jon Stewart:
"Twenty years ago, the Forbes 400 had an aggregate wealth of $300 billion. Now, it's more than quintupled. That has not happened in the middle class."
"Productivity of workers has doubled yet median income has stayed static."Warren Buffett:
"Of the 400 highest incomes in the United States in 2009, the most recent year we have figures for, a quarter of the people paid taxes at a rate less than 15%... And six of them paid nothing at all. They were part of the 47%."In “Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2012,” Loomis collects Fortune's coverage of the influential business magnate's singular worldview. Excerpts can be found HERE. Recommend this post
Contractors are doing demolition of our our one story garage and family room, preparing to extend the existing second floor, to add sleeping and play space for three grandchildren now living here. |
| Box of secrets revealed to Mike de Jong |
"BC is stable and growing. We`re balancing budget by controlling spending..."Global News Headline:
"A look at the books for the second quarter reveals a less than rosy picture..."Global News Top Story
"BC`s projected deficit is close to $1.5 billion and growing..."Watch for a continuing round of substantial salary increases among senior bureaucrats in the next few months. Additionally, government is preparing large severance agreements for top paid employees and Order-in-Council appointments. Regular government programs may be subject to restraints but that policy does not affect the executive suites. Recommend this post
BC Investment Management Corporation may come to regret its rush to invest in big tobacco firms. After adding shares in eight of nine tobacco stocks in fiscal 2012, bcIMC had $237 million more invested in cigarette manufacturers. I can`t determine if they are still buying but eight of the nine companies in the portfolio have been less than smoking hot. Each of those lost per share value or stayed flat in the first six months of the current fiscal year. Those results may soon worsen."Major tobacco companies who spent decades denying they lied to the US public about the dangers of cigarettes must spend their own money on a public advertising campaign saying they did lie, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday.
"The ruling sets out what might be the harshest sanction to come out of a historic case that the Justice Department brought in 1999 accusing the tobacco companies of racketeering.
"US District judge Gladys Kessler wrote that the new advertising campaign would be an appropriate counterweight to the companies' "past deception" dating to at least 1964.
"The advertisements are to be published in various media for as long as two years..."
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| Note: value increases in fiscal 2012 result primarily from purchases of additional shares in the companies |
"what the public accounts inadvertently characterized as 'B.C. Jobs Plan Campain Funding.'In another column, Palmer lays out behaviour that displays entrenched contempt for ethics and political morality:
"Yes, 'campain.' A typographical error, presumably. Or maybe a Freudian slip given all the agony this program is causing the Liberals."
"While the B.C. Liberals plead poverty on any number of spending priorities, they’ve not exercised restraint on a government advertising budget that is poised to hit $64 million over Premier Christy Clark’s two years in office.Remember the government claim that "jobs strategy" advertising included an important international segment aimed at foreign investors? That was immediately suspect because even Jobs Minister Pat Bell had no idea of what advertising was underway beyond provincial borders, an indicator of the depth of planning behind the campaigns. Palmer provides the real story,
"Clark, on becoming premier in March 2011, straightaway presided over a major increase in the advertising spending."
"Liberals have admitted that virtually every dollar went to domestic advertising."Here's the columnist's closer,
"And for those needing a point of comparison, that [the $64 million of advertising] is twice what the government spends on parks in a given year, three times what it spends on arts, culture and sports, and half again as much as the annual funding for crime prevention and the victims of crime."
"[a] role of the Commissioner is to undertake investigations and inquiries . . ."Fraser might also ask the Bilderberg boys to change their official announcement of the conference. It reads, in part:
". . . all participants attend Bilderberg in a private and not an official capacity."However, I'm not suggesting any of us get too exercised about a Bilderberg conference. This plaything of the rich and powerful is an excuse to get together at opulent inns for exotic grub and wobbly pop. The Guardian newspaper calls it a weekend break for the global elite and you can read more below. We should be glad they didn't charge us a billion dollars for security as they did for that gathering of the rich and famous in Toronto.
"Campbell's invitation [to Bilderberg 2010] is a tribute to his reputation -- at least in places other than B.C."
". . . we are leading the pack in Canada and everyone expects us to be a major leading economy and province as we move into the 21st century."
British Columbia employment growth ranks ninth out of ten provinces during May 2010. On year over year performance in job creation, BC ranks fifth.
"So naturally, it's a focus for conspiracy theorists who see SECRET CABALS directing events from BEHIND THE SCENES. They see POWERFUL FORCES AT WORK, forces so powerful that some bloggers have to use all capital letters to express how profound the influence is."Of course, Leyne cannot be bothered to give any useful information about the gathering, its significance or, frankly, its near complete lack of significance. Had Leyne read Iain Hollingshead in the The Telegraph, he would have learned this and more:
"It is difficult to think of anything less real – or indeed less happening. The reality of these conferences appears to boil down to a group of willy-waggling old men comparing their security details and dreaming of past glories."Recommend this post
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| "The only good farmland is former farmland" - J. Les |
"...there was an annual general meeting in that riding and Moe Gill and his people moved in and basically threw out the entire executive and, um, replaced it with people whose sole objective apparently was to put Moe Gill in place as the nominee. Ah, they didn't do a candidate search, ah, any, or any kind of democratic process. They didn't raise any money, they didn't do any election preparedness. Ah, so, ah, obviously that led to some concern and, um, so, ah...Andrew MacLeod wrote in The Tyee that
"Moe and his people were at work for some time to try and corner the, the ah, nomination in Abbotsford South and, you know, that also is not a democratic way of going about things....
"And hopefully, after a wide open and democratic process..."
"Chilliwack officials were encouraged to see municipal and provincial laws as mere guidelines while John Les was mayor, according to a special prosecutor's report released today."Apparently, party constitutions are also mere guidelines.
New Westminster The Record, December 20, 2006However, CKNW has not gone out of its way to be honest with donors. Its current promotion is less than forthright, failing to disclose the growing administrative burden faced by the charity:
" 'I am very pleased,' said Susan Cartwright-Coates. 'It shows all that chipping away, year after year, can make a difference.'
Cartwright-Coates said there's a good reason why the business donates proceeds from the Canned Critters to the CKNW Orphans Fund.
" 'Every cent goes to the children,' she said. "There is no administration costs."
"Nineteen years ago we started a tradition of making a charitable donation to the CKNW Orphan’s Fund. We chose this charity because CKNW absorbs the administration costs, so 100% of the funds donated go to help those in need."The Corus policy quietly ended a few years ago and the Orphans' Fund now pays overhead, much of it directly to NW, of more than $200,000 a year, according to annual T3010 information returns available from CRA.
"Members are admitted on the invitation of the President of the Society and the consent of not less than three firths (sic) of the members."How the charity spends its funds and who it invites to join is not public information. That does not suggest improprieties; Ms. Stocker has been highly respected in Vancouver throughout her broadcasting career. However, I think Corus should not be the least bit proud of withdrawing its administrative support. Over $1-million has been diverted from children's programs, an unhappy situation in this province where child poverty, already the worst in Canada, continues to grow.
Nov 23 (Reuters) - About 900 barrels of crude oil leaked from an Enbridge Inc pipeline near Chicago late on Wednesday before the line was isolated, federal and state officials said.Of course, time will tell how large and how significant the "release" turns out to be. The energy industry has a poor record for honest disclosure.
The U.S. National Response Center said the crude was contained within a spill pad at the site near Mokena, Illinois, a pipeline hub where Enbridge's Line 14 from Superior, Wisconsin, ties into Line 64 to Griffith, Indiana. They have capacity of 318,000 barrels a day.
"Right now you've got 28% of people who say they think Adrian Dix would be the best Premier, Christy Clark at 16%. If you add up the undecideds and the people who don't like any of the options, you hit 48%, so almost half of the voters don't like any of the options, don't know. That's a huge room that is now left to manoeuvre, which means, really, all bets are off between now and election day."All bets are off are they? First, let's examine what pollster Angus-Reid has been saying over time.
"CTV did a similar fluff piece on their 6 o'clock news tonight. BC's MSM,still the loyal cheerleaders..."I watched Keith Baldrey's report on Global TV and found it a fair report but I agree with Will Hartman that Rob Brown's CTV report missed the mark quite completely. I wonder if these news rooms are so understaffed, or badly staffed, that they rely on talking points provided by government insiders. The news readers simply echo words fed to them and don't have time or ability for independent analysis.
Second B.C. shipping incident in two days, Vancouver Sun, Nov. 23/12"Dan Bate, spokesman for the Canadian Coast Guard, said Friday that the deep-sea cargo ship, Tern Arrow, lost engine power in heavy seas and 40-knot winds near Laredo Sound south of Kitimat on Thursday at 2:17 p.m."Freighter runs aground off Prince Rupert, Mark Hume, The Globe and Mail, Nov. 21/12
"The grounding of a 278-metre container ship near Prince Rupert has raised questions about the risk of oil spills on British Columbia’s rugged coastline.
"...The 65,000-gross-tonnage freighter was inbound from Shanghai when, according to a port official, it manoeuvred to avoid a small fishing boat and hit bottom..."
"The Prestige oil spill was an oil spill off the coast of Galicia caused by the sinking of an oil tanker in 2002. The spill polluted thousands of kilometers of coastline and more than one thousand beaches on the Spanish, French and Portuguese coast, as well as causing great harm to the local fishing industry. The spill is the largest environmental disaster of both Spain's history and Portugal's history.Recommend this post
"...The ownership of the Prestige is unclear, making it difficult to determine exactly who is responsible for the oil spill. Evidence is now pointing to a secretive Greek family who allegedly registered the ship to a front company in Liberia. Thus the sinking of the "Prestige" has exposed the difficulties in regulations posed by flags of convenience..."
"Since the 1950s, the top federal income tax rate has fallen from 90 percent or more to 35 percent. Capital gains tax rates have been cut by more than half since the late 1970s. Financial tycoons now often pay a lower tax rate than their secretaries.
"All this has coincided with the decline of some public services and the emergence of staggering levels of inequality (granted, other factors are also at work) such that the top 1 percent of Americans now have greater collective net worth than the entire bottom 90 percent."
"Premier Gordon Campbell and Finance Minister Colin Hansen announced the change in Vancouver Thursday, presenting it as a revenue-neutral way to simplify the system for business and encourage new investment.Of course, Campbell and Hansen spoke from extensive briefing notes prepared by the vast squad of minions employed by the Premier's Office and the Ministry of Finance. The statement that HST would be revenue neutral was a well considered element of the presentation.
"...Hansen said the implementation will result in a drop in revenues to the province initially, moving to a slight net increase in later years.
Let me begin by quoting David A. Brown, QC Chair of the Task Force on Governance and Cultural Change in the RCMP; you know, one of those “cake dwellers”. In the Task Force’s report of June 2007 (not much has changed since then) Mr. Brown wrote:Recommend this post
“During our consultation and analysis, serious problems affecting the RCMP were brought to the attention of the Task Force. Of these, the issues demanding the most urgent attention related to the impossible demands being placed on members and employees; demands that are compromising their health and safety…”
"As businesses owners, none of us hire more employees simply because someone gives us a tax cut. We hire more employees when our customers demand more of what we have to sell," the letter reads. "When a teacher, firefighter, or construction worker building public infrastructure loses his or her job, many of us also lose a customer."Increased Demand Gives Firms the Need to Hire, Center for Economic and Policy Research
"...Actually, an increase in the demand for goods and services forces employers to hire at the risk of losing business.Recommend this post
"If a restaurant doesn't have enough staff to serve its customers, it will lose customers. If a factory doesn't have enough workers to fill its order then it loses orders. Increased demand forces businesses to use more labor..."
Chomsky argues that the vested corporate interests controlling newspapers, television, and radio are propagandists in the service of the powerful. Political and financial interests ensure that media companies bias content accordingly.Romney likely to finish at 47 percent, Greg Sargent, Washington Post Opinions,"...there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax….”
"When all the votes are counted, could Mitt Romney really end up achieving perfect poetic justice by finishing with 47 percent of the national vote? Yup. Dave Wasserman of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report says new votes in from Maryland put Romney at 47.56 percent. He predicts with certainty that with all of New York and California counted, Romney will end up below 47.5 percent of the vote.Further reading:
"Rounded, of course, that would put the final tally at 51-47. Anticipating this moment, Markos Moulitsas has inaugurated the “Romney 47 percent watch."
Recommend this post"...Clearly, the powers that be running the show at BC Lib headquarters are bound and determined to demonstrate to the public that they don't even care about democratic process in their own den of inequity. Good grief. At least this riding association has some sense and walked.
"This comes on a recent scathing column also run in the Abbotsford Today highlighting some Pro's and... ahem... Cons of having Plecas as a candidate in which Mike Archer leaves readers with this line:
" 'It also speaks volumes as to the lengths to which the BC Liberals will go in their desperate search for candidates to join their own sinking ship...' "
" As many as 80 percent of workers in [U.S.] Wal-Mart stores use food stamps."Inequality, exhibit A: Walmart and the wealth of American families, Josh Bivens, The Economic Policy Institute, July 2012
"Concretely, between 2007 and 2010, while median family wealth fell by 38.8 percent, the wealth of the Walton family members rose from $73.3 billion to $89.5 billion…In 2007, it was reported that the Walton family wealth was as large as the bottom 35 million families in the wealth distribution combined, or 30.5 percent of all American families.
"And in 2010, as the Walton’s wealth has risen and most other Americans’ wealth declined, it is now the case that the Walton family wealth is as large as the bottom 48.8 million families in the wealth distribution (constituting 41.5 percent of all American families) combined..."
"A hot trend in food labeling these days is labels that boast 'blueberries' and feature images of the antioxidant-rich superfruit, but in fact contain no blueberries--and sometimes no fruit at all!
"...The ingredients in blueberry bagels sold at Target include 'blueberry bits,' which aren’t bits of blueberry but rather blobs of sugar, partially hydrogenated oil, and blue food dye. Natural and artificial blueberry flavoring show up later in the ingredients list; real blueberries, even later.
"And what about Betty Crocker’s Blueberry Muffin Mix? Hard-to-read print says: 'Imitation blueberries, artificially flavored...'
"The trend even extends to other popular fruits. A reader in Cummaquid, Mass., who was 'really hungry and in a hurry' bought packs of Quaker Multigrain Fiber Crisps Blackberry Pomegranate, showing a cut-open pomegranate bursting with seeds next to two blackberries. Only later did he notice the tiny type stating, 'Does not contain fruit.' "
"Have you no sense of decency? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"Baldrey seems amused and amazed by the mindless effrontery of people he calls rank amateurs:
For more Liberal outrages, read this offering from The Gazetteer: Re-Invasion of The PAB-Bots Snatchers... Fire Them All!"For a glimpse of how manipulative and detached from reality many B.C. Liberals have become, one needs to look no further than a three-page memo written by party insiders that deals with the future of Burnaby General Hospital.
Burnaby Hospital Community Consultation Committee
"...The memo was written back in December 2011, and reveals in fine detail how utterly politically partisan a committee created to plan the hospital's future really is and how it was created to save the hides of B.C. Liberal MLAs.
"The memo's authors are B.C. Liberal party insiders, including a former president of a Burnaby riding association for the party...
"Talk about delusional...
"The great irony, of course, is rather than using the hospital to win three seats in Burnaby, this whole episode has more likely cost the B.C. Liberals seats.
Or, in the words of the memo's authors, they've "sealed the deal."
"currently holds a lucrative contract with Government Communications and Public Engagement allowing him to bill up to $10,000 a month for advisory services..."Again, decency is absent. The money they waste on partisan government advertising is only the obvious part of a campaign to debase democracy.
"acting with or showing care and thought for the future."
Liberals under Campbell or Clark have done the opposite; they've been remarkably unwise and imprudent. The scale of financial follies has grown so large in this province that citizens are inured. Collectively, British Columbians shrug, unable to notice the situation described by Everett Dirksen long ago:"A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon, you're talking real money."I've written here extensively about BC HYDRO, BC FERRIES, BC RAIL and bcIMC.
"Hardenberg was astonished when he found out about the B.C. government’s decision to replace the Port Mann bridge with a new cable-stayed structure that will open in late 2012 or early 2013.Indeed, the 1964 Port Mann bridge received extensive seismic upgrades in 2001 after which, according to highways engineers, its useful life had been extended to at least 2040. Of course, the decision to spend $3.3 billion for a new toll bridge and roadway improvements was about serving the real beneficiaries of BC Liberal rule: land developers and constructions contractors, especially Kevin Falcon's favourite: KIEWIT.
" 'I consider the project a waste of money, firstly, because the present bridge has not come at all to the end of its useful life,' he said.
"...'I think that the final decision for the project is influenced by the desire to save the government the trouble of financing the whole scheme by cunningly replacing a free bridge with a toll bridge,' said Hardenberg.
" 'Politically, this transition seems easier if you go for a completely new scheme and remove the old bridge.' "
Two unions are in court to overturn Temporary Foreign Worker Program permits that allow 200 Chinese coal miners to work in northern BC. The labour organizations claim the permits were based on improper and invalid Labour Market Opinions. LMOs are supposed to determine if there are permanent Canadian residents able to fill the jobs offered to foreign workers. "Now, they want to have full access to the LMOs to see if the company cut corners in order to purposely disqualify Canadians from the jobs so it could use miners from China at a cheaper cost.Recommend this post
"Lawyers representing the government and mining firm don’t want to release the records for privacy concerns and said the unions were on a 'fishing expedition.'
" 'There’s fish in the lake,' said Federal Court Justice Douglas Campbell..."
"[Paul] Hutcheson started researching the B.C. Teachers' Pension Plan in 1999 after learning the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan invested in Talisman Energy. At the time Talisman, an oil and gas company, owned Arakis Energy, a company with connections to oil and gas in Sudan. The government of Sudan, when not evicting residents from land for oil and gas development, was conducting a bloody civil war using this fuel to run its war machines.Ms. Hyslop focuses on investment policies related to teachers' pensions and that fits her education beat at The Tyee. However, while her contribution is worthwhile, it addresses only a small part of a larger story.
"Disturbed, Hutcheson took a look at B.C.'s plan. He found not only investments in Talisman but in British American Tobacco, which in addition to manufacturing and selling cigarettes had suppliers in Malawi accused of child labour and abuse; Comcast, an American cable, digital phone, and Internet company which sells on-demand pornography; and other corporations he considers unethical..."
I've tried to interest corporate media in bcIMC but they prefer stories about four-star officers caught with pants at half mast. Those reports are more titillating than examinations of unethical investments and safer than covering self-interested actions of executives who hide behind well constructed barriers of secrecy, reinforced by endless legal and PR resources."From what I understand, unlike many funds, they make decisions without ethical or other considerations. You are right that there are a lot of opportunities for self interest and few if any people keep an eye on what they do, either from an ethical or personal self interest point of view.Any readers who agree this subject should be more fully explored should say so in every available forum. Introduce it on radio talk shows, on internet forums and in union meetings. Write letters to the media and to politicians and party hacks.
"I for one was very surprised by the tobacco investments. That's not what a government and its entities should be investing in."
A few days ago, Mary Polak's Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure announced the "B.C. coastal ferries consultation and engagement process". They invited,"input on considerations to achieve $26 million in savings to 2016 and input on establishing a long-term vision for coastal ferry services in British Columbia that will keep our ferries affordable, efficient and sustainable."Anyone else wondering if the current roster of flacks and politicos earn by-the-word bonuses?
"In 2008, the company announced plans to move into 90,000 square feet of a building at 800 Yates Street then under construction by Jawl Properties. B.C. Ferries sold its long time head office building, 53,000 sq.ft. at 1112 Fort Street, to the Jawls for $11 million. By sheer good fortune, the new owners quickly found another tenant: Elections BC.There is another, perhaps easier way, to find the funds Mary Polak says she needs from BC Ferries. That is to reverse the private company fiction that results in interest rates far higher than the cost of financing that BC taxpayers should be paying.
According to Note 12 on the BCF 2011 Audited Financials, the lease of new offices in downtown Victoria is for fifteen years, with four renewal options of five years each. The lease agreement includes payment of building operating costs and property taxes but other terms are undisclosed.
In addition to signing a long term lease before completion, BC Ferries lent the Jawls, developers of the $100 million property, $24.2 for fifteen years, secured by a second mortgage of the property.
What does BC Ferries get out of this? Certainly, it gets substantially more luxurious executive offices, almost twice the size of those in the old building. They also earn enduring gratitude of the influential Jawl family, people who style themselves as the largest private owners of premium offices and industrial space in the capital. Their properties include Cordova Bay Golf Course, Mattick’s Farm, Sayward Hill and Selkirk Waterfront. They are, of course, substantial contributors to the BC Liberal Party."
Six CPC members of Parliament may be deposed if the Federal Court accepts allegations of widespread voter suppression during the May 2011 election. This action, to be heard in December, is separate from the investigation of misconduct by Elections Canada. The CPC faces what one pundit calls "high-stakes drama" but the worst case outcome is not likely to threaten Stephen Harper's immediate hold on power."Republican lawmakers and conservative activists undertook a concerted effort to keep minorities, students and those with lower or fixed incomes (including many of our seniors) from voting."In a similar vein, Andrew Cohen, contributing editor at The Atlantic and legal analyst for 60 Minutes, said this,
"...Yet the untold story of the 2012 election is not the efforts of lawyers or activists, but the unyielding determination of everyday ordinary citizens determined to cast their ballots.
"...When the dust settled, the very groups targeted for suppression and intimidation had voted in record numbers..."
"Americans don't like it when their right to vote is threatened. The very people whose votes the Republicans sought to suppress came out to vote. In places like Akron and Orlando and Denver and Milwaukee, they came. They waited in long lines and endured the indignities of poll workers. Yet they were not cowed. Today is their day. A day when they can look at one another and appreciate that they are truly a part of the history of civil rights in this country..."H/T G.G. Recommend this post
"We're ensuring British Columbians have the skills they need to be first in line for jobs."October 16, CKNW's Sean Leslie reported:
"Premier Christy Clark is playing down a controversy over mining jobs in BC going to Chinese workers.Recommend this post
"Clark says the 200 Chinese miners are just doing exploratory work..."
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