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Rasputin

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  1. Look it, this is getting pointless. I challenged you to provide sources, proof and rationale and you provide none. This is not helpful. I don't understand your emotional rejection of what most experts who have spent a lot of time and energy are saying; Canadian govts eat up 43 % of GDP. I have already told you your selective use of OECD data is wrong. You forget; deficits, transfers to gov't controlled groups and indirect revenues captured by gov't crown corps and municipal taxation not captured by the OECD which only acesses prov/federal numbers provide by Stats Can. OECD numbers DO NOT capture those items. The 43.5 % can also be counted up by reading Dept of Finance websites and adding to that Municipal transfers across the country direct to municipal offices [ie. not via provincial transfers]. Mintz, the CTF, the FI, and the other institutes i have used as sources do not make up their data- this is why these guys don't work for the Toronto Star or the CBC. They are not basing their discovery on prov/fed govt budgets only which the OECD erroneously does [it does this for comparative reasons to simplify its analysis and get around the great differences in tax gathering and accounting by country]; http://www.stat.gouv.qc.ca/donstat/econm_f.../pdf/CHAP13.PDF Mintz states categorically in a speech using OECD numbers themselves that Govts take in 43 % of GDP - indeed that is his opening sentence: http://collection.nlc-bnc.ca/100/200/300/f...heLeastPain.pdf But of course Jack is just bought off by special interest groups and is part of the right wing conspiracy. As i stated compared to Aust., Ireland, the UK and the US our tax position is bad. As i also stated, taxes as a % of cash income, unfunded liabilities as a % of GDP which are nothing more than future taxes and regulatory costs which are hard to measure but nonetheless according to the Fraser Inst. which has spent much energy on the issue account for 12 % more of GDP - are issues that Canadian govts are not addressing. This was and IS the main point. You also stated incorrectly This is ridiculous. In every post i said the same thing, providing more backup and different backup to the same 3 themes i provided in post #1: -Govts take of GDP is 43.5 % - i provide lots of proof, Govt ownership of the economy is taxes provided to Govt and Govt agencies - As I explained 10x the OECD you provided ignore all of the transfer to Govt. Jack Mintz whom i quoted uses OECD numbers which include all transfers not selectively ingoring certain transfers like you do. -Canada's tax misery index is higher than many trading partners and vastly higher than the US [the only meaningful comparison btw] -Current Liberal policies address none of these economic factors Your arguments are purely emotive. You are the type of guy who would defend Kyoto with no facts or state that what the Toronto Star or Paul Martin says on Tax and Govt collection is true.
  2. Hardner - Your comments add zero value. You do not argue with facts or with figures but with little sweeping comments that do nothing to advance debate. Jack Mintz who is of course not as smart as you are, had a series of articles published in the NP [but of course that is part of the vast right wing conspiracy!]. He compared using OECD numbers total Gov't receipts between Australia and Canada. His sources are the OECD.As I said before your original data was wrong. You excluded Gov't receipts and spend from Gov't owned groups. This is clearly incorrect and nonsensical. Mintz makes the important point that in Aust. Federal public debt is only 5 % of GDP vs. over 55 % in Canada. 40 cents of every tax dollar in Canada pays interest only. As i already and correctly stated, the tax burden, tax as a % of net income, tax as a % of cash income, debt as a % of GDP and unfunded liaiblities as a % of GDP are higher in Canada than in the US and higher than countries experiencing economic growth and job creation ie. like Ireland or even Australia. I have already posted the numbers so will not bother to do so again. My point - which your ranting has failed to comprehend - is that spending in Canada must be curtailed, taxes reduced especially on income and investment and our debt retired. Nothing in Manley's budget last year [biggest spending increases in 20 years] nor in the Throne speech this week, addresses these issues. If you want jobs and good jobs, certain economic principles must be applied. Your inane comments such as: Yeah no kidding one and the same. Look it up. These numbers are used by the sources and Institutes i mentioned. Dept of Finance [verbatim] sources can be found in July 2002 Cdn Business for instance which back my quoted the 43.5 % Taxes/GDP number. This is only one of many sources given. Really by my count I quoted and listen about a dozen. Since you don't understand the numbers don't argue about them. Source and provide proof why the numbers, institutes and studies i mentioned are 'made up'. Read the entire sentence - I posted; "sce; Take a load off. (tax reduction) : Myers, Jayson using Stas Can and OECD data." It is a white paper that appeared in various media sources - oh sorry ! not the CBC or Toronto Star where you get your news. I could list other sources as well, and did but what is the point, you don't read them. You said in your usual arrogant manner; The Misery list has nothing to do with the CTF - i clearly said the CD Howe Institute and Jack Mintz. And the misery list is a valid economic calculation that weights and calculates ALL taxes and payments to Gov'ts not using selective data which you and your fellow travellers love to do. As well, as I already said if you want to refute the 43.5 % taxes/GDP number, the misery index number and the Economic Freedom number Post why they are wrong. Your comments clearly show you don't know the topic well.
  3. Ronda, you stated and i agree with Poverty is the casus belli of demagogues - only about 10 % of money targeted at the poor actually gets there - why ? Every level of gov't strips off their take and then allocates the money for non poor programs. Most of the Cdn entitlement programs are targeted at the middle class not the poor. One of the great fallacies in Canada is the compassionate society. Most tax money is earmarked for decidedly uncompassionate reasons. As well keep in mind that there is NO agreement on how many poor we have. I cited elsewhere on here a study from the US quoting that 2/3 of the 'poor' owned their own home. What is true in Canada is that spreading income around and up and down the income ladder has equalised incomes across regions. But to your point over taxation IS immoral. Gov't waste, corruption and white elephants abound. So many interest groups and do gooders are bought off by the largesse it makes reform very difficult. Martin is no tax cutter - he played a shell game in the 90s by reducing personal but increasing business taxes. Canada heavily taxes income and investment - not smart policy to attract FDI or generate high wage jobs.
  4. Hardner you are ridiculous. The Tax grab by Cdn govts IS 43.5 % i have listed numerous sources and even the Dept of Finance numbers confirm that the total take is 43.5 %. OECD numbers do not account for the list i posted nor for deficit spending [ie. in Toronto we run deficits contrary to Municipal law], nor on gov't agency spending - all of which are paid for by taxpayers. Add in indirect revenues from regulatory costs and the total take is over 50 %. You ignore facts, quotes and figures. sce; Take a load off. (tax reduction) : Myers, Jayson using Stas Can and OECD data. Other posts list lots of detail on Cdn tax levels. Do some reading. You said: Incredible. All of the stats i quoted are from public records - not made up in your fantasy land. If you disagree with the CTF, Fraser Inst., CD Howe, Montreal Institute, Atlantic Institute, GTA Task Force, Council of CEOs, Heritage Org, Stats Canada and others, than list where they are wrong. List where the 43 % figure is wrong and why. Maybe you can write these institutes and tell them how stupid they are. As well i have not even mentioned the 2x GDP of unfunded ie. future taxable, liabilities we have, nor of the 47.5% of taxes to income cash ratio that exists in Canada. [see p. 71 of the Fraser Report on Taxes 2003]. Our tax burden and misery is very high compared to our trading partners - especially the US and our overall burden of taxes as a % of cash income is close to 50 % - that is the average Cdn family pays out 1/2 their incomes in taxes, fees and gov't costs. This is one of the highest levels in the OECD. One only has to look at Ireland as a case example of a good tax strategy - it has leap frogged Canada on GDP per capita and take home cash income. 20 years ago it was a basketcase. You are in general a bore.
  5. Well BMG, for once i agree with you. The Medicaid bill should be withdrawn and re-voted upon. However keep in mind that the estimates of an extra $150 billion are estimates only, and use a lot of conjecture to come to that number. Having said that, i was against this bill from the beginning. It is just another spend and entitlement program that is highly unnecessary. The only intelligent aspect of the bill are the HSA's but they only start in 2007 i believe. There is a good thread in this section on the Health Care bill. It is a bill designed to steal a little of Hitlery's socialised medicine concept. Kramer by the way is a life long democrat supporter and not on the side of Bush and the Reps [except on Iraq and tax cuts].
  6. Look it the OECD numbers do not account for any gov't owned group, corp, agency or board that spends tax dollars. This is called public spending. In other words the myriad of crown corps, marketing boards, TVO's, CBC's, RDI's, and so on are not accounted for - these are clearly entities that SPEND TAXPAYER money funded by Presto !! yes tax dollars. So of course they need to be factored into any analysis of what gov't takes from the GDP. The OECD looks only at tax receipts and excludes spending by gov't owned corps and groups. This is ridiculous of course. It also disregards 12 % or of the GDP that gov't takes through user fees, regulatory fees and regulatory costs. Also specious - far better analysis exists of gov't control over our economy at various think tanks including the Montreal and Atlantic Insitutes as well as Fraser and CD Howe. Jack Mintz of the CD Howe Inst. has done much analysis on the tax burden in Canada and what he calls the 'tax misery index'. In any tax regime the mix of taxes is important, not only do Govts in Canada eat up 43.% of the GDP through taxes but they tax investment, profits and income far more than consumption, hurting domestic investment, capital creation and foreign direct investment. According to Mintz - June 19 2002 in Cdn Business - Canada's total tax burden including all taxes and payments is the 8th worst in the OECD 23 countries and deteriorating not improving. Considering that we are far behind the US in any tax category save Corp tax rates, this is a great cause for concern. Creating an EU ninny state with vast schemes of welfare, redistribution and protectionism of politically important sectors is a sur-tax on hardworking consumers and citizens, that is unneeded and immoral. But don't let that reality intrude on your little thesis that Canada is under taxed and has great economic freedom. This is the message of the Liberals - tax and spend. It is an immoral and corrupt message and uses incorrect numbers to justify further gov't tax and spend schemes. Just ask the people who compiled the World Economic Freedom Report in which Canada has gone from 8th to 16th place in the past 3 years, if your idea that gov't is small and taxation a moot point are true. If you bother to read their methodology it includes of course the burden of gov't on society which would include taxes. You claim that the Freedom Index is incorrect is as usual, totally unsupported - i want proof that its methodology and construction are invalid and that its output is false. You can post their methodology and then deconstruct it with intelligent criticisms instead of your usual sweeping b.s. Yes loosey goosey is a great and penetrating analysis. Thanks for sharing that. You numbers and analysis are wrong.
  7. Hardner you really are a blowhard. Nice selective use of numbers. Tax burden is defined by gov't tax revenues plus spending. In this case Cdn gov'ts collect 43 % of the GDP not the number you quoted. As well according to the Fraser Inst. CD Howe Inst. and others another 12 % is collected in regulatory fees. So in effect Canada has gov'ts controlling 55 % of GDP. In Economic Freedom we are 16th in the World - this was posted on this site as well. Behind such luminaries as Estonia and Ireland. From the CTF for instance: According to your #'s that puts Canada in 7th overall of 23 OECD countries. Congrats on having your own inanity used against you. And health care is not to blame for the spending of Cdn govts. Spending is simply out of control: From Cdn Council of Chief Executives: But of course these people quoted above are not nearly as smart as Hardner and his blow hard friends who have not seen a tax hike that they haven't embraced - all the while misquoting sources and numbers to justify more gov't control. Lots of other posts here provide source material on Cdn taxation. I suggest you read something on the topic before posting your usual nonsense and piffle.
  8. The NP says Paul Chretien is running to the left to ward off the charging, snarling, demagogic and all powerful rabble rouser Jack Layton. Give me a break. The NDP has a whopping 15 % of voters according to polls, which should be taken anyway with aspirin and a glass of water. Lots will change between now and a vote. Basically in reading the speech on the web i read a whole lot of typical Liberal platitudes but nothing fundamentally different than what Jean Martin did in the 90s. More money exists for just about everybody and everything - except business, taxpayers and the military. I don't see how Paul Chretien can keep his 1 million promises given that our economy was stagnant last month and our tax burdens are already amongst the highest in the West. Kyoto is even apparently going to still go through - this will be fascinating to see what Paul Chretien does if Russia says Nyet. How will he buy the Green vote then ?? Maybe buy David Suzuki and his eco-fascist friends tickets to the next UNO jamboree on climate nonsense. In general the spending and tax burdens will only rise not fall given the tenor of this budget and Toronto which gives Ottawa almost $20 billion per annum will receive a whopping $50-100 mn back from Gas Taxes and GST relief. Wow !! Thanks for the rebate. Obviously Paul Chretien is going to utterly transform Canada from a country of rhetoric to a country of compassionate rhetoric. Big deal.
  9. Flea, now you are making some sense this is good. I agree with you that Islam is the total state of being. I was reading a book by Fuller 'Political Islam' - pretty good one - though he is a bit of an apologist for Islam. Fuller states that within Islam there are 'liberals' who want Western styled secularism and separation of powers. Most of these so called radicals are dead or in jail. He states that the Koran like the bible however, is rather inconsistent and you can pull out of the text many lines to support your point of view. He also makes the case that Sharia law is actually not a law but a flexible code that gets manipulated by whomever is in power. From what i have read i would say you are right about the Koran - in so far as fundamentalists, and non liberals view it as being the total path and way of life and the 'word'. I have never read it, and have no intention of doing so - so i have no idea what it really contains. But in reading Fuller and many others it is clear that the text designed for living in the 6th century would be seriously rewritten and updated by Mohammad himself if he were alive today. Islam needs internal reform - if not then exogenous factors will force it to recreate itself.
  10. Flea your statements are false you said: This is wrong. Resolution 1441 and many resolutions before 1441 clearly stated that Hussein did not comply with UN resolutions and regulations pertaining to the ceasefire. This is diplomatic mumbo jumbo that says - comply or die. There were many reasons - all of them justifiable for the war. What is not justifiable is your immorality in not recognising some obvious facts; 1. Iraq's support of terrorism. 2. Iraq's anti-Israeli pronouncements for jihad and pan Arab expulsion of the Jews. [but in Canada that is okay, they are only Jews !] 3. The use of chemical weapons internally and against Iran. 4. The threat to the entire region's economic and political systems. 5. Cooperation with other unsavoury regimes around the world. 6. Bribery of French, Russian and no doubt UNO officials. I don't see you and your like minded socialists with your inane sandwich boards decrying the cost of Iraqi life during the 1990s nor shedding many tears for the victims of 9-11. This is moral equivalency at its worst. To substantiate your claims you make up facts like the one i just quoted above.
  11. What do people think of the throne speech given by happy traveler Mme Clarkson ? It confirms to me that Paul Chretien will not enact any meaningful reform in the coming year at least and most likely beyond. No program reforms, no spending efficiencies, no tax cuts, no military spend, no real deal for cities [especially Toronto]. The Council of Chief Executives states, "the lengthy agenda will drive further rapid and unsustainable growth in Federal spending.' But not on the military of course.
  12. RTR i agree that the war is justified and in fact was 12 years overdue. I don't deny that WMD were central to the argument - but WMD was one of 3 legs of the stool so to speak. Bush made an error by allowing his EU 'Allies' and the UNO to force the conflict over WMD - or at least to use WMD as the driving rationale behind regime change. It would have been much smarter to stay with a tripod approach and use many arguments to underline the threat that Iraq posed to the world. Colin Powell and the State dept. did Bush a disservice by allowing the UNO to armtwist the US over how to 'frame' the issue. It is also not clear to me that WMD will NOT be found. It is too early yet to say this definitively though the Liberal media is doing its best to turn this into an early election poll on Bush's leadership. In any event, Bush should now pursue and keep selling his plan of waging the war on terror and regime change through pre-emption if necessary. Iraq is only the first of many steps. American voters will understand this.
  13. Ned I agree with you on immigration. First as another post outlines immigration is a net benefit - both legal and illegal together - to the US. Second, criminalising people who are doing low wage jobs that US citizens WON'T do is nonsensical. Not to mention as you do, that the gestapo apparatus to deport 8 million people, 4 million of whom are Mexican, would make the Patriot Act look like a Sammy Davis candy man song. On to Kerry and the Dems and can they win ?? Kerry has issues that the Dems need to understand: 1. He is two faced and has a problem with being consistent. Two obvious issues 1. he favored military spending cuts and 2. he voted for the war in Iraq. Now he tries to deny both by spinning that the spending cuts were to force more human intelligence and that the war has been handled incorrectly. 2. His personal life. Kerry is pretty adept at marrying beautiful rich heiresses and is certainly an East coast establishment figure. Neither one plays that well in various parts of the US. He left wife #1 and 2 kids i believe, for wife #2 after a long affair with #2, who happens to own the keys to the Heinz fortune. He is not your standard FAMILY man. I wonder how the media will report on this [if at all]. 3. Economics. Kerry would raise spending even more than Bush, and raise taxes. Not smart. The US needs permanent tax cuts and decreased pork. Kerry's backroom is dominated by the usual Dem suspects - trial lawyers and unions. He can't afford to cut pork. 4. War. I doubt Kerry would pull out of Iraq but to mollify his left wing and cut off any potential 2008 challengers he just might. Hard to say what he would do on the War on terror. He has not made any plans obvious or concrete and this is a BIG question mark hanging over Kerry. This election is Bush's to lose. His biggest problem is spending money like a drunken sailor. His budget must be rejected and hacked down to size.
  14. Commie, i don't understand the point of your post. If you had read my post you would have read: 1. Every agency in the world pre war felt that Hussein had WMD and was a threat. 2. WMD might very well still be found - it is far too early to determine as Kay as done, that none will be found. 3. WMD could easily have been shipped to another country or sold or stored or hidden. We don't know - which is why the ISG needs many more months to investigate on the ground in Iraq. 4. WMD has been made the central issue for the UNO - why ? Because though the French and Germans agreed that Hussein was a threat they would only agree with the US that an attack was warranted by the threat of WMD. Yet US speeches and presentations listed a number of reasons to invade Iraq. From your post: So in effect US policy which was a tripod policy - WMD, humanitarian and geopolitical - was effectively cut down in the public perception by the UNO to one issue - WMD. This episode is just another reason why the UNO is a nonsense on important international political matters. Your post addresses none of these points and adds little value to the discussion. In fact you don't attach any proof or commensical arguments to refute the above 4 points. If you read the full text of Bush's speeches he makes it clear that WMD is one of many reasons to invade: For example Bush's speech, from Oct. 7 2002 in Cincinnatti: There were and are many good reasons to invade, liberate and reconstitute Iraq. Iraq was a definite threat. In order to get the UNO world on side the US made a grievous mistake in emphasising WMD. They should have stayed with the tripod policy. The Libs have been wrong on all major issues pre, during and post war - WMD will be no different. You might be surprised if the 90 % of sites still to be inspected turn up some WMD evidence. Sorry to hurt your feelings, a good cry will make you feel better.
  15. Maple, what did you think ? My 2 cents worth? Belinda is the puppet on the strings of John Laschinger, and his rich Bay St. legal eagle friends. John et al. are savvy, experienced, smart, ruthless and 'pragmatic' ie. non - ideological. They must perceive that BS's image [and perhaps b.s.], is necessary to appeal to some voters that are fence straddlers. Well though John and co., are light years smarter than I am, i would kindly disagree with their analysis. Policies, content and substance do matter. 10 years of John Christ was enough - and Martin has given us little fodder to think he will be any different - we will see some hints during the Throne speech of what he wants to do, but I would guess it will amount to 'not much'. Running BS against the Liberal media machine is like sending Mary and her lamb to visit the wolf. Not a good policy nor strategy for the new Conservative party. It makes the Conservatives about as serious as a Super Bowl where Justin and Janet vy for dummies of the year with flash dancing. Unnecessary.
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