Belinda Stronach appointed to Cabinet

badboy

Nominee Member
Apr 13, 2005
99
0
6
Re: RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Derry McKinney said:
Ummm, Blue Boy? How come you conservative types keep getting confused between money spent on programs and money lost on corruption? I'd really like to get to the bottom of this sponsorship thing too, but if you keep confusing money legimately spent on programs you didn't like with money that disappearred due to corruption, you hurt the credibility of everybody who wants to ask questions.

Now the target is "sponsorship like programs?" F**k, we could sink every government; civic, provincial and federal; since 1867 on that one.

Wow , the gun registry is a black hole and needs to be stopped. If this is what you call " money spent on programs" you need to see a doctor NOW.
 

bluealberta

Council Member
Apr 19, 2005
2,004
0
36
Proud to be in Alberta
Re: RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Derry McKinney said:
Ummm, Blue Boy? How come you conservative types keep getting confused between money spent on programs and money lost on corruption? I'd really like to get to the bottom of this sponsorship thing too, but if you keep confusing money legimately spent on programs you didn't like with money that disappearred due to corruption, you hurt the credibility of everybody who wants to ask questions.

Now the target is "sponsorship like programs?" F**k, we could sink every government; civic, provincial and federal; since 1867 on that one.

Lets see, gun registry initial cost $2million, actual to date cost, $2billion. Gee, sounds legitimate to me :lol:

Get real, both overspent programs coming in well over budgets and actual stealing, the bottom line is it is all taxpayers money. And this coming from a man who preaches fiscal responsibility? Hoo boy, what a joke. Both issues are wrong, its just that there are so many things to go after with this government that its hard to keep them all straight.
 

Derry McKinney

Electoral Member
May 21, 2005
545
0
16
The Owl Farm
RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Still not what I was talking about. Not what you were talking about either. You keep trying to say that programs are stealing, just because you don't agree with those programs. It gives you credibility at all.
 

S-Ranger

Nominee Member
Mar 12, 2005
96
0
6
South Ontario, Toronto District
bluealberta said:
Here is the historical exchange rate for the Canadian dollar vis-a-vis the US dollar. My source is The Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Foreigh Exchange Rates Historical Search. I got the rates for every six months, June and December and also got the high and low during this period.

Holy cow, I'm too slow for this site. :) Or you guys are too fast. I think there are ten pages ahead of me Ooops, probably 11 by now.

Not to nitpick, it's only because it's public, not a pm or email between you and I, but Federal Reserve Banks (FRBs) are branches of the U.S. Federal Reserve and they provide financial services (see http://www.frbservices.org/) for districts. The one you found covers New York (state), Northern New Jersey, Fairfield County in Connecticut, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.

The Federal Reserve sets monetary policy and then distributes Federal Reserve Notes (USD) to Federal Reserve Banks (and others; it's a bit more complicated than Canada's system but it's necessary given the usage of the USD), charging them interest, which they cover by selling bonds and other financial services; almost as though they're commercial financial institutions.

None of them distribute Candian currency, nothing that they lend (seem to sell but currency and other things based on it, stocks, bonds, t-bills, certificates (securities), coupons, etc., can't be destroyed, only traded, unless they're Enron stocks or the like) because it's illegal. The Bank of Canada (BOC) is the sole note-issuing authority (and even copyright holder for anyone who wants to complain about "design" :)) for Canadian Bank Notes and it sets the interest rate (Bank Rate) for them, not the Fed or any FRB or commercial U.S. financial institution. Canadian currency is not legal tender in the U.S.; only in Canada.

You can't "buy" currency, let alone off a central bank (unless you're a financial institution, then you can borrow it at the rate the central bank is charging; or FRB as the case may be) so even if an American wants to "buy" Canadian currency, in reality they have to trade something for it and probably U.S. Federal Reserve Notes. Then the interest is due (whatever the Fed happens to be charging on currency) and has to be paid by whatever exchanges the Fed's note (eventually, a financial institution making the transaction, anywhere in the world, which is why it's good to have others using/trading your currency; it makes money -- like oil being priced in USD forces everything to trade USD for oil, a financial transaction, paying the Fed interest) for the Canadian Bank Note, which has to be borrowed from the Bank of Canada at whatever interest rate it's charging.

Then, if you're an American with notes from the Bank of Canada and trade the Canadian Bank Notes for a case of beer in Canada, a financial transaction has been made and the interest on the Canadian currency is due (when whatever selling the beer deposits it into a commercial financial institution, it becomes part of the bank/financial instituton's deposit, which they have to pay the Bank of Canada interest on: and everyone passes the costs on to the consumers as usual but it's quite necessary).

It's one way they control inflation; by making it more (or less) attractive to trade the curency for anything outside our own economy, or even to trade it for a house or new elecronics/machinery/whatever in our economy if the BOC raises the Bank Rate, passing the costs on to every financial institution, causing them to raise their lending rates.

And inflation isn't just the Consumer Price Index, which is only one measure of it, and can be deflation, but it's always called inflation and the BOC's target range for inflation (overall economic growth by their mesures, which you can find on their web site) is 1% at the low end (cut the Bank Rate to increase spending/production), 3% at the high end (raise the Bank Rate to decrease spending/production) to get inflation back in the target range of 1-3%, with 2% inflation being "the best". Not too high, not too low, right in the middle of the target range -- from one policy session to the next.

There's really no way to know what the Canadian dollar is worth (it's worth exactly $1.00; in Canada, always just as a US dollar is worth exactly $1.00 in the US, always :)), without working on both ends; like what it costs to trade 1 CAD for 1 USD from here and vice versa and it'll never match up due to interest rate differentials (at the least) between central banks.

http://www.bank-banque-canada.ca/en/exchange.htm

The above has links to tell you what you'd have to pay in Canadian currency for other currencies along with historical information. Exchange rates are expressed in Canadian dollars, which still means nothing without the interest rate differential if it's taken alone.

If you select USD you'll get what you'd have to pay in CAD to exchange into USD, which is like a conversation between the BOC and the Fed; but electronically. Dec 30, 1994, for example, you would have had to pay (if you were a financial institution in the U.S. trading USD for CAD, via the Bank of Canada and the Fed or one of its banks. Federal Reserve Banks, that aren't commercial banks but sort of act like it):

1.4018

Over 40 cents more, so does that mean that the Canadian dollar was worth 0.5982 cents U.S. at the close of 1994? Yes and no. It depends which end you're on.

It was:

1.2661

as of 20 May 2005 (at closing), the latest available, nothing is (was when I looked) available yet from the BOC for today's (now yesterday's, I got interrupted wih real life things) close and they skip weekends.

US$0.7339 is what the Canadian dollar was worth at Friday's close?

US$0.7889 is what I recall off the top of my head. But from which end according to what interest rate?

1.2661 CAD it's what you would have had to pay the Bank of Canada and the U.S. Federal Reserve to exchange/trade 1 CAD for 1 USD (or anything based on CAD/USD), due to the interest rate differential: if you were a Federal Reserve Bank in the U.S. More at a commercial institution.

Nothing ever "adds up" exchanging/trading currency. Aside from currency speculators and everything else that trades and affects economies, central banks have different interest rates, which are passed onto commercial financial institutions, because they have to pay their central banks the interest on their deposit, eventually in the U.S., and they have to cover their costs (commercial institutions) and turn a profit.

After much study I found that the Beer Store (owned and operated by the breweries) in Ontario had the best deal on U.S. currency trading around.

But then I told everyone and now their rates suck. USD for Canadian beer; no bank would match the exchange rate, let alone trade USD for beer. And I did get my change in Canadian currency -- and lots more of it than I would have got back from any bank around. What they were doing with the U.S. currency to be offering the best exchange rates around, at the consumer/commercial level, no one would ever tell me. It probably had something to do with beer. :)

You're showing trends and as long as they come from the same place it's all that matters but it's not what the Canadian dollar was worth; other than at that FRB, and if you were an FRB, then that's what you would have had to pay to get a Canadian dollar turned into an American dollar. But you can see the difference vice versa at the Bank of Canada's site. We're paying more to buy American whatever, anything based on the USD than anything in the U.S. is paying for anything based on the CAD. Email the Bank of Canada to find out why. Or see if the manager of your local bank branch knows.

And ... the Bank of Canada (and Fed) is based on the Bank of England. A private corporation that has nothing to do with the feds. They can't tell the BOC what to do anymore than Congress can tell the Fed what to do. And all of them (the Group of Seven/G7 for starters) have more control over financial markets than any elected feds do.

Greenspan doesn't go ask Congress or the Exec Branch (which would be quite inappropriate without involving the Congress) if it's okay to give a speech and release the Fed's summary of the U.S. economy and future trends (that tend to come true), changes to interest rates, how much currency is in circulation or anything else. The U.S. government (treasury) has to borrow off the Federal Reserve to cover debts, and has to pay interest to the Fed.

So do we. American currency (in whatever forms) is what's stuck in just about every treasury on the planet to cover debts and surpluses. So when the Canadian dollar goes up, in relation to the USD, it effectively lowers the interest rate that we have to pay, not the Fed, it's not a commercial bank, but the NY financiers that underwrite Canada's national (public; not to be confused with credit card debts, mortages or anything else from commercial financial institutions) debt. We pay less for American currency and the interest rate is "lower" because the value of the Canadian dollar is higher in relation to what our debt is covered by; American currency.

Which is good, because it frees up revenues for other things, while still paying the "the same" (in CAD) on public debts. But it also raises the costs of all exports from the Canadas, which are called imports on the U.S. end. And possibly decreases cross-border shopping (from the U.S. to whatever they go to across the border) and possibly international tourism.

But the UN World Health Organization slapping a public world-wide travel advisory on Toronto in 2003 did more economic damage, followed by a 5 and 6 day blackout, thousands of cancelled business trips, dozens of cancelled conventions, and tourism too, than any raise in the value of the Canadian dollar could have done.

Lots of things happen that affect economies other than what worthless politicians do.

As I said and did in the last post, you have to get economic reports and business news, just here let alone in the U.S. (then all over the world due to the U.S. economy), to find out what is causing a currency or economy if it's long-term, to rise or fall against another: and currency trading/exchange rates aren't always the best measure and are never a measure alone.

bluealberta said:
Where rates were basically the same for a long time, I summarized:
...
The low was 62 cents in January, 2002, and the high was 85 cents in November, 2004.

So, from January, 1994 - June, 1997, the dollar was stable at around the 73 cent mark. However, from June, 1997 - December, 2002, the dollar fell steadily and stayed around the 65 - 66 cent range on average. In 2003 the dollar started to rise. Coincidentally, in 2003, Chretien announced he would retire in Feb/2004.The dollar contiuned to rise at the same time there was confirmation of an election. It continued to rise under a minority govenrment until November, 2004, when again ...

You have found a recession. And it didn't start in 1997 and you're looking at it from the U.S. end, not our end, and based solely on currency.

I: INTRODUCTION
The severe economic fallout of the early 1990s recession represented a watershed in the evolution of the Ontario and, within the province, the role of Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). Four years after the onset of the recession, Ontario’s employment still languished at roughly 96% of its pre-recession peak. And employment in the GTA fell by nearly 10% from peak to trough.

On the fiscal front the economic fallout was nothing short of spectacular: Ontario’s governing New Democratic Party (Canada’s version of a social democratic party) oversaw five consecutive years (1990-95) of deficits in excess of $10 billion, for an overall increase in government debt of nearly $60 billion, surely a record for a sub-national government, anywhere, anytime. Thus, by 1995, Canada’s most powerful and populous province(1) was verging on “fiscalamity”.

With the election in 1995 of Mike Harris and his fiscally conservative and market-oriented Progressive Conservative party, the role of Ontario (and Toronto) within Canada and North America
changed in a dramatic and irreversible manner.

Ontario effectively transcended the erstwhile conception of itself as the economic and cultural focal point for an east-west economy and turned its attention and its policy arsenal to take advantage of the emerging opportunities ushered in by the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and by NAFTA. (Perhaps it is more appropriate to refer to this as a major political turning point since [as usual], on the economic front, Ontario’s private sector was already in the throes of pursuing north-south integration [with the hopeless Ontario feds a decade or so behind, when decades mean hundreds of years now]).

As Colin Telmer and I (1998) have detailed in our recent book, Ontario is [was, it's a 1999 document and you do remember what happened on Sept 11, 2001?] in the process of making the dramatic transition from Canadian “heartland” to a North American Region State. In effect, the powerful message of the recession was that the former pan-Canadian, or east-west, economic perspective was leaving Ontario ill-prepared to address the open borders of NAFTA.

Likewise Toronto, long ensconced in the comfortable pew as the natural and national centre for the provision of pan-Canadian public goods and services, realized that, of and by itself, this [Canada] was no longer a viable economic future. [More politics. As usual the business end was already long gone.] Hence, Toronto and the GTA also had to make a key transition – from a national economic capital with a significant international reach to a full-blown global city intimately tied to NAFTA’s emerging geopolitical reality. I hasten to add that neither Ontario nor Toronto have abandoned their east-west role: rather, their focus is shifting markedly to ensure that they are positioned to become competitive and to excel in a north-south economic environment and, within this, to preserve and promote their east-west hegemony.

RESPONDING TO THE NAFTA CHALLENGE: ONTARIO AS A NORTH AMERICAN REGION STATE
AND TORONTO AS A GLOBAL CITY-REGION

Paper Prepared for
Global City-Regions Conference
UCLA School of Public Policy and Social Research
Los Angeles, October 21-23, 1999
PDF http://www.irpp.org/newsroom/archive/1999/1025pape.pdf

Ontario (south as usual) turned itself upside down and re-invented itself in the time period you're talking about, it was running a $60 billion deficit from the first (and hopefully only) time the NDP got control of Ontario, was on public notice from the World Bank that if it didn't get its ecnomic house in order it would be slapped with a Third World credit rating/interest rate, and the NDP discovered what pays for "the working man" and unions along with other insanity, running up $10 billion deficits every year for five years, in a recession.

But the recession was still going when Mike Harris took over in 1995 with the Common Sense Revolution, and paid the deficit off the only way Toronto let alone Ontario can -- with no help from this "federation", ever, no breaks in the tax raping and plundering by the "federation", so by selling off/privatizing everything that could be privatized, cutting everything that could be cut, slashing and burning the rest.

...
On May 3, 1994, Harris unveiled his aggressive "Common Sense Revolution" platform, which was inspired by the United States Republican Party's "Contract with America," although free of much of its social conservatism [religion: it gets in the way of capitalism]. It called for sweeping spending cuts and large tax cuts.

By 1995, the governing New Democratic Party and incumbent Premier Bob Rae had become extremely unpopular with the electorate, largely because of the state of the Ontario and North American economies. The Liberals were leading in the pre-election polls, but after running a disastrously poor campaign began to lose support. Harris was elected with a sizeable majority government in the 1995 election. Roughly half of his party's seats came from the more affluent regions of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), especially the suburban belt surrounding Metro Toronto, often called the '905' for its telephone area code.
...
http://www.answers.com/topic/mike-harris

And he didn't cut taxes "too early", Chretien hated his guts. Harris was very "un-Canadian", not that there was any choice, and what if it worked and caught on? There was and still is a phase II to the Common Sense Revolution that nothing in the world could believe was happening, let alone at the sub-national government level, not that "Canada" noticed, Ontario was out of commission during the years you happened across and Chretien is to blame for a lot of it, but the NDP ... it's a factor for the harper. Talking the talk doesn't amount to being able to walk the walk.

After turning the province upside-down, and leading the G7 in economic growth, as planned, expanding the tax base to end up from a $60+ billion deficit in 1995 to an accidental surplus (and small; nothing like "conservative" Alberta's massive over-taxation; $375 million at the end of fiscal 2000-01 and with over 11 million people, not the $7,800 million surplus the Alberta "conservatives" ran up on less than 3 million Albertans in over-taxation in the same year; then bitched to "the feds" to build some rapid transit system in Edmonton while Toronto was on year 16 of trying to install a new subway line with property taxes, while the Ontario and confederated feds downloaded their own expenses onto Toronto city hall and still do), then shrugged off the ongoing U.S./Canada/world recession (which is how Ontario ended up leading the G7 in economic growth) ... it was time to put the extra revenues back into rebuilding after disemboweling Ontario but Chretien hated Harris (and the feeling was mutual) and took all the extra revenues from Ontario and it's still sitting around waiting to rebuild while this "federation" plunders it of tens of billions of tax dollars a year.

C-78 won't fix it but it's better than the kick in the teeth Manning, Day, Harper have been inadvertently promising us forever out of ignorance and the fact that most of their support is rural: which is a problem because the majority of Canadians live in cities. And cities generate most of the revenues.

If only the harper got in then... what? He doesn't even know. He's committed to the same spending in C-78, now that he knows it's what the majority of Canadians want and economic analysts don't see too much of a problem with the spending as long as the economy keeps chugging along, there will be a whopping federal over-taxation "surplus" (real Conservatives with capitalist C's call "surpluses" over-taxation; pass it around -- to Klein) in the next five years. If not, well the harper has committed to the same spending -- and tax cuts too. And free lollipops for everyone and along with sounding like the NDP, that is just plain freaking economists out -- while he also tries to bitch about "liberal deficits" and I have no use for any of them but if anyone is Mr. Dithers it's the harper. I've never seen such ridiculous songs and dances in my life, other than from the NDP.

bluealberta said:
coincidentally, reports from Gomery started to come out more publicly. Since then, the dollar has fallen again, to its present level, and fell after the NDP/Liberal deal was made.

No cooincidence and you just blew your entire argument. It's the only time that politics started to affect the dollar, and moderately, not from 85 to 62 cents. Recall your original claim that the dollar was at 62 cents U.S. 8 months ago and only started to rise due to the "possibility of another government" (which one, with a handle such as bluealberta? :)) taking over.

But how do you explain that testimony that would seem to conclude the harper taking over as PM ended up DROPPING the dollar?

Shouldn't the dollar have gone UP over this wonderful revelation by investors? "Finally that corrupt bunch of 'liberals' are on the way out ... so let's SELL Canadian investments to show how happy we are about it!" :?:

Everything negative that has led to the potential of the "liberals" getting kicked out and the "conservatives" taking over has DROPPED the value of the Canadian dollar.

When Stronach left the "conservatives" the dollar went UP not down.

When Parrish (already known to be voting FOR C-78 not against it with the "conservatives" and Bloc) ended up in the hospital the morning of the vote and the Canadian dollar DROPPED.

When the news came out that she was released and was able to vote the dollar went UP.

That's a vote of non-confidence by international investors against the "conservatives" not for them.
 

bluealberta

Council Member
Apr 19, 2005
2,004
0
36
Proud to be in Alberta
Ranger,

Your posts are just way too long to read and respond to. The exchange rates I quoted are international exchange rates, and the source had all currencies on it. It has nothing to do with where it is, the exchange rates are what they are. This site was the one I found that went back to 1994, which was necessary to the point I was making about the dollar dropping during the Chretien years. If you don't want to believe the source, fine.
 

bluealberta

Council Member
Apr 19, 2005
2,004
0
36
Proud to be in Alberta
Re: RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Derry McKinney said:
Still not what I was talking about. Not what you were talking about either. You keep trying to say that programs are stealing, just because you don't agree with those programs. It gives you credibility at all.

I have been consistent: Fiscally irresponsible programs, with cost overruns, budgets out of whack, and corruption are both draining billions of dollars out of the economy. There is no way you or anyone else can justify the difference in the budget for the gun registry and the current cost. The difference is staggering, yet you and others seem to think it is okay. I would sure like to do some work for you, quote you a couple of hundred, charge you a couple of hundred thousand, and you would pay. If you say no, then why are you supporting the cost of the registry.
 

Derry McKinney

Electoral Member
May 21, 2005
545
0
16
The Owl Farm
RE: Belinda Stronach appo

They aren't that long, Blueboy. His posts, I mean. While I don't agree agree with his slamming of the NDP (a party which I believe he knows very little about) he does make sense when it comes to the finances.
 

bluealberta

Council Member
Apr 19, 2005
2,004
0
36
Proud to be in Alberta
Re: RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Derry McKinney said:
They aren't that long, Blueboy. His posts, I mean. While I don't agree agree with his slamming of the NDP (a party which I believe he knows very little about) he does make sense when it comes to the finances.

Maybe, but my post was about the historical exchange rates, nothing more. Conciseness is nice.
 

Derry McKinney

Electoral Member
May 21, 2005
545
0
16
The Owl Farm
RE: Belinda Stronach appo

So if somebody puts up a concise post, you just change it to whining about corruption and if somebody puts up a detailed post you say that it's too long to read?

You really do have to meet Andrew Scheer.
 

bluealberta

Council Member
Apr 19, 2005
2,004
0
36
Proud to be in Alberta
Re: RE: Belinda Stronach appo

Derry McKinney said:
So if somebody puts up a concise post, you just change it to whining about corruption and if somebody puts up a detailed post you say that it's too long to read?

You really do have to meet Andrew Scheer.

There is a difference between a detailed post and baffleing with bullshit.

And no, I really don't. :twisted:
 

S-Ranger

Nominee Member
Mar 12, 2005
96
0
6
South Ontario, Toronto District
bluealberta said:
Lets see, gun registry initial cost $2million, actual to date cost, $2billion. Gee, sounds legitimate to me :lol:

"Conservative" reform-alliance supporters do the parties ("conservative" reform-alliance parties) a disservice, if that's possible, by parroting marketing without knowing the facts.

Where did you get that $2 billion number from? The "conservatives", Bloc and NDP were trying to get a ballpark figure as to how much over-budget the gun registry was and kept getting, "The member knows that it is against the law for the federal government to dislose how it spends the money of Canadian taxpayers under the Privacy Act."

The NDP took ads out. No one could get an answer so they picked $2 billion and took ads out, to force the government to respond or we just pick a number out of a hat and, oh well, that's how much it's over-budget (as in, setup and administration costs, not what people are paying for fishing, hunting, vehicle registrations, driver's licenses, or to register their firearms).

It forced the government to produce the real number, which of course, leads to documentation, don't just tell us, get it in writing and table it.

But we have things called auditors and an Auditor General to combine it all and report anything to. The department of the Auditor General looked over the Canadian Firearms Board with a fine-toothed comb and never came anywhere near $100 million let alone $2,000 million ($2 billion).

There are three issues:

  1. The budgeted setup cost and costs of administering the "gun registry" (Candian Firearms Board);
  2. How much over-budget the administration costs are;
  3. Irrelevant: How many gun owners (or fishers or people driving cars and having to register them and get driver's licenses, hunters and hunting licenses, etc.) there are and what they have to pay in some total as though that has anything to do with the cost of administering the registry.

Only 1 and 2 "costs taxpayers" -- who don't even own guns. So the ones who do should at least cover the setup and administration costs. But how many people in Canada own how many firearms? You want to cover the costs, but what's the price per license to do that when it costs money to process every registration and the program is new, so there's nothing to base anything on.

How much does it cost to process a registration? They can run trials on that, assuming they keep the same human capital to enter the information into the computers; assuming that the computer systems analysts contracted did their jobs properly and they didn't. [Read a "little" software contract from Microsoft of anything else and see how legally responsible anything around computers are.]

Oh ya, the little gun registry thing. I almost got mixed up with real economics there for a second.

1995

Bill C-68, the strictest gun control legislation in Canadian history, receives Senate approval. It calls for harsher penalties for crimes involving the use of guns, creates the Firearms Act and also requires gun owners to be licensed and registered. At the time, the government says the registry would cost about $119 million, but the revenue generated by registration fees would mean taxpayers would only be on the hook for $2 million.

So what? How are they supposed to know how many gun owners there are until the registration fees start coming in and they'd better at least cover the cost of setting up and administering it. $119 million is all "Canadian taxpayers" have a right to give a crap about. How much over-budget are the setup and administration fees that "all taxpayers" (uh huh; south Ontario) have to chip into, whether they own guns or not -- particularly if all gun owners are only paying $2 million out of the $119 million in costs. They should be paying all of it and then some because it costs money to keep the administration going and it's not fair to charge taxes to people who don't fish or hunt for the adminstration of fishing/hunting licenses anymore than it is to charge taxpayers who don't own firearms for the administration/enforcement costs of those who do.

It's $75 to renew my driver's license this year. The Ontario government "had to" raise the fees on that and raise other taxes and make more cuts because of SARS and the power outage, along with $23 billion in tax plundering just around transfer payments (tax returns to Ontario, pittances of tax returns, always -- no jurisdiction in this "federation" is capable of "transferring" one cent into Toronto let alone Ontario and never has.

$23 billion is 23,000 million dollars. In one fiscal year, and just around "transfer payments" that the other 9 provinces got back (from where?) in transfers per capita that Ontario did not get back in transfers per capita. The City of Toronto paid out $11 billion of that; about a billion more than the province of Alberta paid out in taxes last year (debatable with handouts Alberta gets that Ontario doesn't and never has and never will get and are called "federal" expenses but they don't benefit Ontario -- or Quebec for that matter -- at all so they are not federal they are provincial subsidies).

$119 million, is lunch money. Ontario's real GDP, still not economy, which is elsewhere creating/maintaining jobs, is almost $500 billion or 500,000 million dollars. $119 million? $2 billion? Just out of the taxex plundered from the City of Toronto last year alone, even if the administration costs of the gun registry were $2 billion, the City of Toronto paid for over 5 years of it last year alone.

But the cost (to taxpayers who don't own fishing rods, automobiles, restuarant/liquor licenses, hunting licenses, or firearms) is nowhere close to $2 billion.

2000

In a report released early in 2000, the Canadian Firearms Program notes that implementation costs are rising, and cites the following as contributing factors:

  • major backlogs in registration, largely as a result of firearm owners waiting until the last minute to apply
  • general increase of costs
  • fee waivers for early applications
  • high error rates in applications submitted by firearm owners

Great. Firearm owners can't even fill out forms properly and are increasing expenses as a result. Do firearm owners deserve to have them if they can't even fill forms out properly? I'd like to see the breakdowns of exactly where all of the high error rates in applications submitted came from. Probably not Toronto. And it's already paid for $11 billion on it, last year alone so there's lots more money to spend to find out who the idiots with firearms are who can't even find someone to fill a form out for them are and where they are so we can blame them.

A commission should be established immediately to find out where all of these stupid idiots with firearms are: and they're probably the same ones doing most of the bitching about the costs. As usual.

April 2002

An estimated $629 million has been spent on implementing the gun registry program. [Setup costs.] Here is a breakdown of the costs:

  • $2 million to help police enforce legislation
  • at least $60 million for public relations programs, including television commercials
  • $227 million in computer costs. Complicated application forms are filled with personal questions, slowing processing times and driving costs higher than anticipated
  • $332 million for other programming costs, including money to pay staff to process the forms.

Wow. I've never heard of such a thing. A government program, corporate contract, the U.S. military spending $1,000 each on hammers and toilet seats? It could never happen, this is just an outrage.

January 2003

January 1, 2003, was the deadline for gun owners to register their non-restricted firearms. According to the federal government, 75 per cent of all gun owners met the deadline, registering 5.8 million of the estimated eight million unrestricted firearms in Canada. But that didn't stop gun owners and politicians from expressing opposition.

Days after the deadline passed, Ontario's public safety and security minister called on Ottawa to put the program on hold. Bob Runciman criticizes the program as an "unconscionable waste of taxpayers' money," (which tends to mean OUR MONEY) and calls on the government to cease further spending until an audit can be conducted. His demands are later echoed by provincial justice ministers in New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia. [No Alberta?]

Others who seem to doubt the efficiency of the gun registry include Toronto police Chief Julian Fantino, who says the program will neither prevent crimes nor help solve them.

But Ottawa's chief, Vince Bevan, countered this in a speech on behalf of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. [Which means what? RCMP everywhere but in Ontario and Quebec of course.]

"It is very difficult, of course, to prove that, as of this point, the new law has saved lives. But certainly we have seen ample evidence of the gaps in the old law that this legislation has addressed," he said. "If this legislation saves even one life, it will have proven its worth."

Not while it along with other insane "confederate" expenses, like Ontario paying 50% of the expenses on a federal debt it doesn't owe one cent of, or other real "federal" expenses, let alone all the handouts to jurisdictions that are worth nothing, have no markets to speak of, not only don't belong in an economic union with the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor but make it impossible, and after a hundred years of it and looking around at nothing but failure and our own cities crumbling due to tax plundering, with SPAIN having a higher GDP than this stupid country does, Japan with no resources, it has to import them and the Outer Canadas are only too happy to hand natural resources away along with all of the jobs, spin-off jobs, new markets, expanded economies/tax bases, like every Third World country.

If the resources were actually intercepted and used, such as the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor does, adding value to everything, creating all of the real economic growth, new full time non-seasonal and higher paying jobs (higher the value of the whatever, the higher the value of the employees) and looking at Japan makes me want to puke looking at this pathetic mess, so rich in resources but throwing them all away.

Oh ya, the stupid gun registry again.

I tended to agree with Fantino given that Toronto has more problems with guns than any other province, let alone city. A lot of it has to do with tax plundering to pay for this sorry "federation". As is.

But we're paying for it, Ontario (south, the north would be on equalization and would have RCMP "federal"-provincal law enforcement in it overnight if the south separated from it; rather, when and if it simply separated as a province it'd have to pay for the equalization and law enforcement anyway, so what good would that do?) by far pays for the bulk of everything so if anyone has a right to bitch about, we do.

Alberta doesn't even amount to the City of Toronto proper let alone the GTA, in GDP, revenues paid out or anything else; not even highways and roads to maintain and the Toronto police force (on down and up to everything, academies, the lot), paid for entirely out of residential propety taxes, would have no problem looking after Alberta. They'd just be more spread out, because the population is quite a lot more spread out in Alberta with its 3 million people in the 642,317 square km of land, and the Toronto police marine units would have no problem with the water either. They have to patrol "federal water" in Lake Ontario.

March 2003

Despite the outrage and widespread condemnation of the rising costs, the Liberals vote to bolster the gun registry with an additional $59 million in funding.

On March 24, the bill is approved on two separate votes – 173-75 and 173-76.

The additional funding is for this fiscal year ending March 31. The registry is expected to cost $1 billion by 2005.

Some Liberal backbenchers threaten to vote with the opposition against the funding, but sit out the vote after Chrétien threatened to expel them from caucus. [He not only "threatened" Martin -- he fired him for disagreeing with every word that came out of Chretien's mouths a thousand too many times.]

Liberal whip Marlene Catterall says that, because the vote involved the spending of money, the prime minister considered it a vote of confidence in the government. [All the more reason to make political parties illegal and dump the confederate feds outright; with a 21st century union of republics to replace them.]

No Liberal voted against the bill but three who were in the House abstained. Most of the Bloc Québécois supported the motion. The Canadian Alliance, Progressive Conservatives and most New Democrat MPs opposed the funding and continue to say it is a misuse of taxpayers' money.

That $1 billion includes registration fees. And I don't want the thing, but what is poor Ontario supposed to do against the confederate feds? it can't even get as much of its own taxes back, in total, let alone per capita, as Newfoundland and Labrador was handed overnight for flag flapping.

We could pull every flag in Ontario down, dump them on the "Royal Lawn" of confederate mound, pour raw sewage and gasoline on them and light them on fire and would get fined $5 billion for it.

Then the Ontario feds would make more cuts in Toronto and raise provincial taxes to pay for it; and Toronto pays for most provincial taxes too and Toronto always means the GTA unless it's predeced by "inner city" or City of due to the forced amalgamation of the former five suburbs then six cities of Toronto, six city halls into one, no more Metro Toronto, which became the dysfunctional semi-new "GTA thing" whatever it's supposed to be other than intentionally dysfunctional to keep the city councillers in the city halls yelling and throwing things at each other, with a powerless mayor of Toronto (over the City of let alone whatever this GTA thing is; no body other than the Greater Toronto Airports Association, oversees whatever this "GTA" thing is other than the Ontario feds -- and they're from all over the freaking province from places I've never heard of let alone anyone outside Ontario) and each city hall fighting with each other, giving the Ontario and confederate feds a break while they plunder taxes.

I thought "conservatives" didn't support the NDP. They took the ads out claiming $2 billion on the gun registry, it's what you're quoting, nothing real and backed up with nothing as usual, but aligning with the NDP when it's convenient.

And the harper has done the same spewing the $2 billion number out that has absolutely no basis in fact, let alone as the budget overrun to administer costs that were not budgeted properly for many reasons -- including idiotic firearms owners not filling forms out properly, filing late, filing early and getting a break, and as with fishing and hunting licenses -- something has to enforce them.

OH. I'm quite against the ridiculous gun registry but that doesn't entitle me to make up BS; particularly around here because no one cares anyway; other than wherever all of the hoards of senior citizens come from when voting time comes around.

And Martin wasn't even in government when it went down. Chretien fired him as Finance Minister for disagreeing with just about every word that came out of Chretien's mouth. They were/are quite bitter enemies and the Minister of Finance isn't the Minister of Defense or Minister of Aboriginal Affairs or Minister of an Anglican Church or Minister of Justice or the Canadian Firearms Board/gun registry. And that makes the harper look like he has no clue how the government even works -- or makes him look like a joke, trying to insult our intelligence on purpose as though the current government came up with it.

Then Chretien finally stepped down after "the longest farewell ever" because he knew his hated foe Martin would be taking his job:

Jan. 7, 2004

Prime Minister Paul Martin says the gun registry is under review. "We are committed to gun control [which means old people with grandkids, old people who are from another planet, who vote in force and actually believe that the thing works and amounts to "gun control" that affects criminals or the kids in gangs in Toronto due to disasters around public schools and everything to do with keeping kids/teens occupied and out of trouble -- due to tax plundering and the Common Sense Revolution, which would have made plenty of sense and did: until we again figured out which ridiculous socialist mess of an excuse of a "country" we're in, that penalizes ecomonic success to reward failure, automatically and with zero accountability] and we are committed to the registration of weapons, but at the same time, common sense dictates that there have been a number of problems," says Martin. "They will be looked at and dealt with."

Feb. 13, 2004

Documents obtained by Zone Libre of CBC's French news service suggest that the gun registry has cost $2 billion so far.

Including registration fees, which are totally irrelevant. And the NDP took ads out over it but it turned out to be a load of shite.

May 20, 2004

The Liberal government eliminates fees for registering and transferring firearms. Ottawa will also limit its spending on the gun registry to $25 million a year, spending which has averaged $33 million a year and reached as high as $48 million. Licensing of gun owners and firearms will continue.

"Reached as high as $48 million" in adminstration costs, and that is according to the Auditor General not some news that "suggested" anything. $2,000 million ($2 billion) is a long way from the peak of $48 million, or the average of $33 million a year. And if you think that $33 million is a lot of money, well, it says a lot about your lack of knowledge of everything federal, along with where all federal revenues come from -- and it's not Alberta.

And you wonder why the harper isn't trusted and why "conservative" boosters (not you personally, I have no idea what you wonder but I see a lot of "wondering" around "conservative"-socialists) are laughed at for swallowing the marketing hype of an opposition party whose sole job is to try to discredit and embarrass the government?

If they could get their facts straight it'd be one thing. But if they think that we're as stupid as they are they are sorely mistaken.

bluealberta said:
And this coming from a man who preaches fiscal responsibility?

I assume you mean that Martin set up the gun registry and personally ran the whole thing, had nothing better to do, as with the lunch money over the advertising campaign by the Quebec Liberal Party?

And you actually expect people to believe that? Or you do and are demonstrating exactly why the harper should try running for mayor of Stampede Town and if he could pull that off, he could try for Finance Minister of Alberta and would still end up with not the faintest clue about the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor or the federal Department of Finance. How much did it cost Canadian taxpayers when Dubya Bush visted from D.C.? Probably about $10 million. Lunch money. And he brought his own security and transporation.

I wonder how much it cost us for the irrelevant Liz of Queen of Brittania to visit for no apparent reason? Probably triple what it cost for Bush to visit; and actually discuss some business; not that it matters around the moronic confederate feds. We have to pay for every cent of what some irrelevant Queen costs to visit; they bill us for it all. And florists made some money off of it, but will they cover the costs if anything ever bothers asking/telling anyone what it cost south Ontario taxpayers for Liz to visit Saskatchewan and Alberta? I'd be all over it, and the less than worthless Governor General (she blew over $2 billion in 2002, unaccounted for, got not even a slap on the wrist for that so blew $4.6 billion in 2003 unaccounted for) ... and for what?

It travels around and says, "Hello, I'm the Governor General of Canada." And others say, "You're what? What are you doing here?" And it says, "I don't know. I'm here to say, Hello, I'm the Governor General of Canada." And then people walk away. That's certainly a good use of taxes.

Given that Martin, the "mastermind of the gun registry" (as Finance Minister of Canada? Why not the Minister of Defense? Why not the Minister of Justice? What did the Minister of Foreign Affairs do? I bet it ran the whole show ... Liz called the "governor general" to tell it to tell the Dept. of Foreign Affairs, via the elected public relations elected "minister" that Britannia wanted similar and would use the colony of Canada as an example) turned out balanced or better budgets while paying down the last $42 billion Conservative "deficit" to zero and...

Government Announces First Budget Surplus in 28 Years

Finance Minister Paul Martin today announced that, for the first time in 28 years, the Government of Canada has recorded a budget surplus. The surplus was $3.5 billion for the fiscal year 1997-98.

"This is an historic milestone. And it is an achievement that belongs not to government but to Canadians themselves," Mr. Martin said. The $3.5 billion surplus has been applied directly to the debt – the first time the Government of Canada has paid down the debt in more than a generation.

And looking at "conservative" Klein and poor Alberta, while Libya does better, a "conservative" who keeps a higher "rainy day fund" than the federal government does, over $10 billion as opposed to the $4 billion the feds try to keep in place for economic downturns, you're not standing on any ground to be making any judgements from.

Budget vows to slash debt, banks on stronger growth

Sandra Cordon
Canadian Press

Tuesday, March 23, 2004

OTTAWA -- Finance Minister Ralph Goodale promised to keep the federal books in balance well into the future with a budget Tuesday that pledged to pay down the federal debt [not just pay the interest on it] at a brisk enough clip to reduce the national debt to just 25 per cent of GDP within a decade.

Analysts said that goal will require balanced books for a decade [which means keeping Harper away from anything, he's worse than the NDP] with enough left over to keep paying down the country's $510.6 billion debt while counting on continued economic growth.

''Some [I wonder who?] have suggested [over and over to the point of being nauseating] we will throw fiscal caution to the wind,'' Goodale said in his maiden budget speech, coming only weeks before an anticipated spring election call.

''We will not,'' he said in presenting Ottawa's seventh consecutive balanced budget - the first such string since Confederation.
...
This budget anticipates spending in fiscal 2004-05 of $183.3 billion, about 4.4 per cent higher than the previous years, with a surplus projected at $4.2 billion. [But with another "liberal" Finance Minister who uses conservative economic forecasts, quite unlike the harper, when the economy performs better than conservative estimates predict, the $4.2 billion turned into over $9 billion in surplus -- more revenues than were spent, which allowed more to be spent this year -- and on what Canadians wanted it to be spent on and what Toronto NEEDS it to be spent on, even though it's just a pittance of its own taxes back over 5 years -- this year's budget, not last year's in this document. Budgets are just that. You have to wait until the fiscal year is over to see how they worked out and around any long-term investments, many years.]

The year's document is built around predictions of GDP growth of just 2.7 per cent this year, rising to an economic expansion of 3.3 per cent in 2005.

That's not exactly a barn-burning pace but much stronger than the 1.7 per cent recorded last year. Then, the economy was rocked by a series of crises ranging from SARS and mad cow to forest fires in British Columbia and a massive power blackout in central Canada.
That will be just enough to ensure that Goodale has the cash to restore the full $4 billion rainy-day fund that Prime Minister Paul Martin initiated when he was finance minister. [Before being fired by Chretien for disagreeing with every word that came out of Chretien's mouth 1,000 too many times.]

Most years, that was left over at year-end to become a debt payment.

Beginning in this budget, Goodale pledged that the $3 billion contingency reserve would once again be used for debt [repayment] if unspent at year end while the $1 billion economic prudence reserve would be used for extra spending. [Until the economy out-performed the conservative economic forecasts, um created by economists not "the conservative reform-alliance", used to create the budget. Harper uses the most liberal economic forecasts around and still comes up short, with dithering numbers that he can't even make sense out of.]

Despite all the troubles in the economy last year [Ontario, 2003, SARS and a power outage], Goodale was able to scrape up about $1.9 billion in fiscal 2003-04, which officially ends March 31, for debt repayment, offering proof [not hearsay that makes no sense around Harper who has never run anything but his mouth off] of his credentials as a good fiscal manager.

That would help reduce the debt to $508.7 billion in 2004-05.

Ottawa [Martin, Manley] has already paid down roughly $52 billion [of the federal debt] to reduce its debt-to-GDP ratio to 42 per cent in fiscal 2003-04 from a peak of 68.4 per cent in 1995-96.
...
Social activists, health and environmental organizations have all argued that the government should be less concerned with paying down debt than with reinvesting in social programs.

$42 billion paid to zero from the last Conservatives then $52 billion paid down on the federal debt, and with balanced or surplus budgets and that's not fiscally responsible?

You need some learnin'.

bluealberta said:
Hoo boy, what a joke.

Ya, and it's on you. Perhaps start learning facts as opposed to listening to whatever drivel the "conservative" (around what? I've asked enough times) reform-alliance marketers spew out. And the NDP too. What's next, Bloc marketing propaganda?

bluealberta said:
Both issues are wrong, its just that there are so many things to go after with this government that its hard to keep them all straight.

You've got that quite backwards. Harper has no hope now and if the "conservative" reform-alliance wants to be anything but a minority party until south Ontaro and south Quebec work out their deals and kick the confederate feds off our land, they're going to have to get someone from the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor, urban, successful, with experience running something real to run that party. And they're going to have to kick all of the former reform-alliance members out and restructure the party around where all the votes are, where the economic backbone of the Canadas is, where 70% of all federal revenues come from -- and that's not in the western Canadas combined or all of the rest of the Canadas combined.

Someone like Belinda Stronach would have been a good choice to try to lead those parties out of the doom and gloom, but it's quite obvious that no one with a clue or hope can stay with that party/parties. The old PC's are washed up with no clue (or they would never have joined an even more clueless party) and the reform-alliance has no hope, never has, never did, never will.

The two-bit players in the advertising campaign in Quebec will be banished to work as corporate lawyers and the like, Stronach is a hero not a villain, but the rural west doesn't and never will understand the most successful region of Canada, the Ontario section of the Windsor-Quebec City Corrridor, which is where Stronach is from and she proved that it's impossible to represent this region while being in the "conservative" reform-alliance mess.

She's a hero for Newfoundland and Labrador, saving the Atlantic Accord, was received quite well up there but the bi-election, whenever it is, wherever it is, the people will vote and probably not for the party that tried to force an election that the majority of Canadians didn't want, yet, because the Gomery inquiry is not being run by the harper and its minions, but a justice with lots of experience (does the harper have a degree in law? No, he has nothing but a "career" that is as mixed up as the "parties" he tries to run) while refusing to pass a budget that the majority of Canadians did want, and standing up to be counted with the Bloc Quebecois, and it doesn't matter if you "get it" or not.