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Look how the bureaucracy sets all and any question into a familiar frame: give us so many billions and .. what? An assured result? Service quality guarantees? No no we're way past that... we'll start looking into it. And so the drama goes. Please show the last time when spending unnumbered $$$ made something new, or fixed anything for real in the country. Is it time to admit it already? All the uncounted billions, the totality of the budgets go into keeping up the status quo; with some reservations and limitations. It cannot do anything else, build new, fix any non trivial problems and for a while already.

Evolution and sailing blind forever in the firm belief in the entitlement to sail blind forever are (usually) mutually exclusive outcomes. We only need to pick one.

Its main call and reason to exist is to perpetuate itself, unchanged and unchallenged, for as long as possible (that is, in its view, forever). It is, very clearly, not solving problems and finding ways forward for the society. We will have to wake up to realize it sooner or later, one way or the other. And the last, default option that is always there would be hitting an evolutionary brick wall.

Nobody is left here to look. A look will cost some billions of $$$ and will take a few decades or generations. In the meantime politicans will play a sacred cow football and why not as they are paid for it regardless of the result from the bottomless public budgets. The party will not go on forever. There will be a price to pay.

This kind of happy sham democratic party cannot continue in perpetuity. There will be a price to pay the question isn't if, only when and will we have enough to cover it.

In a different time, different age and in a different country (maybe) a wise omniscient King ruled wisely and generously until a terrible plague struck the land. That called for all kinds of emergency measures and protocols that at times seemed: overreaching; arbitrary, volatile, inconsistent or even self-contradictory. Wise people of course knew the deep and absolute wisdom of the king, his supreme priests and all and every one of their decisions just were too busy in their selfless service or struggling to find words to explain it to the lowly and dark pueblo. And that created unfortunate misunderstandings. Rumors spread that in another land the mandates and restrictions weren't ever mandatory, there were no closures and lock-downs and even that the plague wasn't a plague at all but only a flu-like respiratory infection. But priests and their apprentices were too busy in their selfless service (very understandably, raking well earned emergency benefits) and failed to take heed or Heaven forbid, attempt to explain their policies in a plain, common language. Then in an unfortunate turn of events, another wise and timely edict as the future will show (maybe, or quite possibly at the time of writing) caused angry agitation in a tiny group a truly fringe minority of the peasant folk. Unabashed, in their dim inability to grasp the supreme wisdom, they directed their base instincts and instruments of lowly peasant work to the holy place of the seat of the king. Understandably, He had no other choice but to invoke the Emergency Absolute Powers that thanks to wise forefathers of the shining democracy were always available to him in the time of great need (without checks, .. OK you got it already no need repeating). And the rest is history. The commission on trucker protest is in full swing. Several leaders of the protest are in gaol on various charges. King's justice is turning its wheels (what do you mean: effective checks on overreach and abuse of executive power?). And the reasons and justifications of arbitrary and overreaching measures? No how can we - still a taboo. In some decades there may be a High Commission of Inquiry. If the supreme wisdom would find it appropriate of course. And how else, in our democracy?

Or a similar example that 8,000 vaccines in 6 million population can somehow be "working". This is not just people, exsperts on the public media. Are we done with the reality, finally?

What if we are in post truth, post objectivity era? As heard on the radio (apparently by your public health exspert") hurray monkeypox vaccine is working hurray. Same piece: 8,000 dozes administered (compare to population of GTA: 6 million). That's like one in a thousand, and hurray its working! Have you heard about a vaccine with such a wonderful efficiency? Do you need that thing in your skull, when you have help of such wonderful exsperts? Do you even want to make sense of the reality around anymore why you have this wonderful newsfeed? In China there was an old joke: if the Sun is rising tomorrow it's only because some wise plan is working. Are we there yet, by any chance?

Sure why the h*ck design and make anything if can just sell the internals of the country abroad, build mansions and pay employee-representatives outrageous honorariums for democratic adornment of the process? When was the last time anything more than trivial, like permanent fixing of healthcare for a generation happened in this country? What century will it be when the first high speed train runs?

This is apples to apples Sweden: national fighter jet program: 1. National car makes: 3. MP monthly salary: approx $7,000 (US) Canada: national fighter jet program: 0. National car makes: 0. MP monthly salary: approx $12,000 US + who knows what benefits and entitlements, with automatic annual rises. Climate, area natural conditions similar. So is it about the entitlements or the results for the country? They aren't even doing much pushing buttons as told by the party office unlike their Swedish counterparts representing people votes. With entitlements and the results heading in the opposite directions this already smacks of the third world.

OK we have highest tax rate and three own brands of manufacturing. Or we have the first highest MP benefits and entitlements in the developed world excluding the US maybe, without clean drinking water in some communities. Only parallels.

Perhaps you can remind us of a single Canadian brand? Compared to the number of beaver, lumber, mining, oil, etc mansions? There you go. With double MP privileges, double obscene privileges and entitlements something to show for two hundred years of digging and selling abroad any kind of natural resource available. Right to the parable when riches aren't necessarily a blessing.

No perks for Swedish MP. Sweden's MP salary is about $7,000 (US) while Canadian, $12,000, not including various benefits. Sweden (population 10.5 million, less than Ontario's) produces its own fighter jet and has three major car manufacturing companies (Saab, Volvo, Scania). Lower accountability, higher entitlement, lower productivity - are these only coincidences, or inevitable and logical correlation?

As we have seen, federal-provincial layout can do very little to prevent an abuse of power at the federal level, alleged (SNC-Lavalin affair) or very real (invocation of emergency powers). These are the first bells. What happens if there's in fact an authoritarian PM with a group of close associates with a real project of usurpation of power? The answer is: we don't know and won't know until we see it. And that is worrying in itself. Because there are no effective checks and working mechanisms of preventing such an attempt. RCMP cannot investigate the holy King; the courts will look the other way; employee-representatives will vote as they are whipped; circus period is just a worthless circus. And GG a purely ceremonial role. Did I left anything out, of course the media and we have seen very clearly how it worked with Covid and other politically correct issues.

CRTC exists for over five decades. So why do we not have more competition? Why do we need an expensive bureaucratic commission on our, public dime if there are no visible results? The whole idea is nonsense - that a top paid bureaucrat by some strike of beavertale magic would care about interests of a regular Joe in the country. Of course they'll care about those like themselves, who they dine and play golf with, and no need for witnesses or public records. This happy buddy-buddy democracy will run straight into the state of Mexico democracy in no time, in historical terms. And why wouldn't it?

We are screwed either way. Without the commission we would have a cartel of monopolists with $100 Internet and $50 mobile bill (Europe: down to $10 / $5). And with the commission pretty much the same plus the bill for executive offices and exec lunches in the best restaurants. How can it be more efficient?

It needs to be stated and understood clearly at this time because the danger is already here. People may not care, they have a full right to not care like Romans didn't two thousand years back but that would be a choice. Canada's system is not a democracy - it's a carefully crafted imitation of it. And yes, it can be proven now. First, there's no independence in the system, of individuals, representatives and offices. All positions are compromised by some form of dependence. Secondly, there's no internal tradition of priorities, service and loyalty as in the UK ingrained in centuries of history and tradition. And finally, in the presumably free elections, the choice is restricted and controlled in so many ways that only the default management corporations have a real chance of winning and then a full, unchecked and unaccountable governance (as in pp 1, 2). This creates a worrying background for a possible abuse of power with no real checks or controls. It will take a first, for example a majority PM using formal very broad prerogatives to extend the power, then resorting to massive propaganda that we already know works, to cement it. It could play out along the lines of the truckers protest and again the parallels are deeply concerning. Can we sail on into indefinite future with an archaic political system that worked only due to enormous abundance of natural resources, geographical position and generally, nothing happening? Can we could that nothing much will keep happening here in a hungry, unstable world?

And in the traditional for some 300 years format of obscenely paid, opaque not accountable to anybody bureaucracy. Like is it so obviously the best possible option?

You think a majority means democracy? Putin has majority. Want to try again?

Very thoughtful. Thanks for sharing, anyways

They who? Those same who benefit from them? Like allowed vague "benefits" in the corruption law instead of clearly defined gifts, what allowed or not. No for just an innocent coincidence it wouldn't be statistically probable.

Of course it can be challenging to see the connection between a third world public governance and a third world economy. Well, that cannot be helped. In some more advanced jurisdictions though, consumers can be entitled to a compensation in case of such a massive interruption of service. Maybe CRTC will get down to it too.. somewhere in the next century but I wouldn't bet on it.

The whole foundation of the system: that a group of top bureaucrats obscenely paid out of public pocket would make best decisions in the interests of the whole country, with no transparency and accountability (recall CRTC head not recording his meetings with top private execs) is preposterous to the point of unbelievable in this century. Really can it, the credibility be stretched any further? We need a modern representative parliament and a parliamentary commission on communications with full transparency to the public. At which point, when will this system fall behind the standard of modern representative democracy beyond any hope of catching up?

I get to conjecture that that was its state for a long time, possibly from day one. The grounds for my hypothesis are simple: the system has no place for real independence, everyone in it, and every office plays golf, goes to expensive restaurants on taxpayer's dime, depends on and has a conflict of interest with pretty much everybody else. It's just that this couple of years brought out into the open so many of the things we kind of knew but never wanted to admit or even notice. Is it too late now?

After a massive service outage that lasted most of the day or for some, even longer Canadians are hoping for CRTC investigation. Off the news "we can only hope CRTC will take a look at the situation". But of course we can! We can hope for much more, like anything and why not timely CRTC action? Maybe it will want to. Or maybe it will not, too bad like it never happened. Seriously, who are you and who these offices and commissions (paid by you) are working for? I think it's not by an accident this sort of innocent expressions are spilling out into our public psych. "Mandarins" and "czars" of public offices, only an innocent joke? Phoenix system, haha. No I think we may already know something deep inside, sure we try hard and earnest to not notice and tell ourselves nothing to worry but once in a while, subconsciously it would escape into a public open causing embarrassed silence. Yeah like who here wouldn't know that we can always hope? Why say it aloud?