Dion's "Liberal Green Shift" carbon tax Plan

[Wilber]

However, the Tories have tried to sell the GST lowering as being a substitute for not removing the excise tax which they promised. Even basic math skills would show that this would have been a more significant cut than 2% of GST.

Basic math skills would tell you the higher the price the more you save with a GST cut.

[jdobbin]

Basic math skills would tell you the higher the price the more you save with a GST cut.

But compared to the excise tax that Tories promised to cut?

Plus, don't forget Harper promised to remove the GST on gas.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto...WBwblogolitics/

Conservative press release — 2005: "A Conservative government led by Stephen Harper will remove the GST on all the federal taxes the Liberals collect on each litre of gas bought."

Edited June 28, 2008 by jdobbin

[Wilber]

But compared to the excise tax that Tories promised to cut?

Plus, don't forget Harper promised to remove the GST on gas.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto...WBwblogolitics/

I'm not trying to make excuses for Harper but you and Dion are saying that it is not necessary to apply a carbon tax to gas because there is already an excise tax, so it is completely reasonable to assume that if Harper had removed the excise tax, Dion would just reinstate it and call it a carbon tax. Big deal.

[jdobbin]

I'm not trying to make excuses for Harper but you and Dion are saying that it is not necessary to apply a carbon tax to gas because there is already an excise tax, so it is completely reasonable to assume that if Harper had removed the excise tax, Dion would just reinstate it and call it a carbon tax. Big deal.

This is assuming Dion gets into power.

Why hasn't Harper carried out what he promised in 2005? I think he will likely be re-elected again so I have no idea why he didn't follow through on this promise.

[Wilber]

This is assuming Dion gets into power.

Why hasn't Harper carried out what he promised in 2005? I think he will likely be re-elected again so I have no idea why he didn't follow through on this promise.

I would be surprised if he does but stranger things have happened.

Just like every other politician who comes to power Harper either found or was confronted with other priorities for the money. Opposition is so much easier in that respect. All that remains is to see whether enough people agree with the change in priorities.

[jdobbin]

I would be surprised if he does but stranger things have happened.

Just like every other politician who comes to power Harper either found or was confronted with other priorities for the money. Opposition is so much easier in that respect. All that remains is to see whether enough people agree with the change in priorities.

It seems like so many forgot that promise. The Tories have benefited strongly from people forgetting. According to Harper's own figures, it has netted the government millions.

Give with one hand, take away with the other.

[Wilber]

Give with one hand, take away with the other.

What's your point? Like this is a new phenomena from government? How many terms did Chretien get by people forgetting? Politicians count on it. I think this is different however. The increased hardship due to high energy prices will be ongoing so people will find it difficult to forget governments part in them. I don't know why you are so critical of Harper not removing the taxes on gasoline considering what your party is proposing.

[jdobbin]

What's your point? Like this is a new phenomena from government? How many terms did Chretien get by people forgetting? Politicians count on it. I think this is different however. The increased hardship due to high energy prices will be ongoing so people will find it difficult to forget governments part in them. I don't know why you are so critical of Harper not removing the taxes on gasoline considering what your party is proposing.

I guess it is that the Tories promised to be so different.

I guess we'll see what happens. If the hardship is as deep as you seem to think, the government will have to address the situation. Of the federal plans, the Liberal one seems to raise fuel taxes the least. The expert panels in both the Globe and Post calculated the cap either the Tories or NDP party was proposing could raise gas 40 cents. I am still waiting to hear the details on how far other costs are calculated to rise.

Edited June 28, 2008 by jdobbin

[Wilber]

I guess it is that the Tories promised to be so different.

I guess we'll see what happens. If the hardship is as deep as you seem to think, the government will have to address the situation. Of the federal plans, the Liberal one seems to raise fuel taxes the least. The expert panels in both the Globe and Post calculated the cap either party was proposing could raise gas 40 cents. I am still waiting to hear the details on how far other costs are calculated to rise.

I guess we will.

[Wild Bill]

What's your point? Like this is a new phenomena from government? How many terms did Chretien get by people forgetting? Politicians count on it. I think this is different however. The increased hardship due to high energy prices will be ongoing so people will find it difficult to forget governments part in them. I don't know why you are so critical of Harper not removing the taxes on gasoline considering what your party is proposing.

I think you're quite right when you say that this situation is different!

Dion's plan reminds me of when Mulroney brought in the GST. There was all kinds of agreement that the tax was a better and more fair tax than the previous status quo and that it was "revenue neutral". If you look at it totally objectively you'd probably agree.

So what? That's not how the general population thinks. The GST was a new and obvious tax, thrust before the collective noses of the entire population. Worse, it came at the same time as a very deep and painful recession. When people hurt they look for someone or something to blame. They don't care if there were good reasons! They only know that they didn't hurt before and now they do! Trying to excuse things by saying "Well, the bad times were coming anyway and if we hadn't done this it would have been worse!" doesn't cut it. No one bought it.

Dion's argument seems to me to be very similar. He says that we have to do this because the alternatives are worse. We haven't experienced those bad alternatives for ourselves so he is asking us to just believe in him. Meanwhile we can expect to get hurt everyday with increased prices, at a time when in many provinces like Ontario we are experiencing pain from other economic hard knocks. It doesn't matter if he delivers "rebates" at tax time. The time differential is such that few voters will make the connection. Besides, any tax deductions will not be universal. Human nature states that people will remember those things that hurt and forget about any that helped compensate, just as people forgot that the GST saved them a couple of percent on a car or stove. They bought a new car or stove every 10 years or more. They got hit with GST on everything else they bought everyday.

I guess I'm describing the difference in perspective between the common voter and those rich or well-connected enough to be insulated from day to day economic pressures. It's pretty obvious that Dion is the ultimate academic.

"...the more things seem the same."

[jbg]

It seems like so many forgot that promise. The Tories have benefited strongly from people forgetting. According to Harper's own figures, it has netted the government millions.

Give with one hand, take away with the other.

Harper has kept more of his promises than virtually every other PM and/or US presidential candidate, ever. It seems you want him to keep promises that would be the equivalent of political hari-kari.

So disingenuous.

[Argus]

Harper has kept more of his promises than virtually every other PM and/or US presidential candidate, ever. It seems you want him to keep promises that would be the equivalent of political hari-kari.

So disingenuous.

Liberals are never honest. They're good at politics, though. And that's what this is - politics. It's lousy policy, but good politics - maybe, or at least they're hoping. Dion isn't as good at the political stuff as Chretien was.

[Bryan]

I would be surprised if he does but stranger things have happened.

Just like every other politician who comes to power Harper either found or was confronted with other priorities for the money. Opposition is so much easier in that respect. All that remains is to see whether enough people agree with the change in priorities.

If the CPC had a majority, it perhaps would have happened by now. With united opposition to such a plan in a minority government, it makes no sense to press every issue all at once. You have to pick your spots. For a minority govt, the CPC has been remarkably effective in getting done what they have.

I think they are going to get bolder still in the next session. It looks like Dion will fold on virtually any issue. That being the case, (again as minority, you can be bounced at any time), it's just smart strategy to keep forcing Dion to go back on his word as often as possible as priority one, while going forward with the "actual" plan only where it fits in easily.

[Rue]

The practical reality is voters do not vote for any kind of tax for any reason. It could be the most brilliant scheme in the world but its still a tax and no voter will ever vote to be taxed let alone taxed by a scheme that is all theory at this point and has no precedent.

Its a bonehead move by the Liberals. To make the basis of your platform to be elected a tax let alone a tax know on knows for sure would even work is suicide at the polls.

It lets Harper off the hook entirely. It feeds his negativity. All he does now is tell the West its another tax designed to pick on them. Its not going to win Quebec votes. In fact it may alienate Ontario voters petrified of rising gas prices and layoffs. People faced with rising energy and other costs don't want to listen about such carbon taxes. They are ripe for a negative politician like Harper.

It enables Harper to turn the greedy oil industry into good guys he can defend.

Its the dumbest strategic move I have ever seen.

The last thing you want in an electrion is Dion lecturing people on a theoretical tax. His prickly, academic, egg head demenour does not work with the guy on the street.

They want to hear easy to understand sound bites not theory that goes zip over their head as to redistribution of tax bases.

Dion underestimates the short-sighted, immediate, what's in it for me now mentality of most voters.

Dion should have avoided this issue and stuck to a platform that exposed all Harpers negative actions, his secretive government and his close relations to Bush and the oil industry and stayed silent on any green initiatives.

You don't announce and run on theory. You do run on practical issues.

He's broken the most obvious rule of electioneering precisely because Dion is an academic not a politician and his arrogance makes him blind to his own foibles and quirks.

Dion is Mr. Peebody from Rocky and Bullwinkle and he thinks we are all Shermans.

As for Harper he's an arrogant, short sighted, Reagan republican. Another Peter Lougheed. Just what this country needs a Calgary oil executive yes man.

Then we have that loser Jack Layton and his squeeze Oilvia Puppy Chow. What a choice.

They all make me puke.

I am voting for Brent Butt.

[White Doors]

GST? 1988?

[capricorn]

Dion addressed supporters at the Calgary Zoo today. This is part of his message:

Adopting the Liberal carbon tax plan is the type of policy Alberta and Canada need if the country is ever to get beyond growing U.S. threats to ban so-called "dirty oil" from the Athabasca oilsands - the second-largest oil reserves on the planet.

"Bring Canada in conformity with what the world expects from Canada - to have carbon pricing in Canada," Dion said. "Then nobody anymore will pretend that the oil coming from Alberta should be boycotted."

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national...a0-1038685d6093

This US threat Dion speaks of, would it be related to the report of the activist group called Environmental Integrity Project?

Mission:

The Environmental Integrity Project is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization established in March of 2002 by former EPA enforcement attorneys to advocate for more effective enforcement of environmental laws.

The Environmental Integrity Project has three objectives:

* To provide objective analysis of how the failure to enforce or implement environmental laws increases pollution and affects the public's health;

* To hold federal and state agencies, as well as individual corporations, accountable for failing to enforce or comply with environmental laws;

* To help local communities in key states obtain the protection of environmental laws.

EIP's main areas of focus are power plants, factory farms and refineries due to their significant environmental impacts and the political pressures that can come into play in regulating and enforcing against these facilities.

http://www.environmentalintegrity.org/page1.cfm

And this from the Montreal Gazette:

Environmental activists are warning U.S. lawmakers and consumers that the Canadian oil sands sector is an environmental disaster that is poisoning U.S. refineries.

"The environmental costs of tar sand development are staggering," says a report made public yesterday by the Environmental Integrity Project, a Washington group, in the latest salvo in a pitched public relations battle over western Canada's resource riches.

http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/news...4d-5d94b1085b70

So Dion is warning that environmental activists have warned US lawmakers about the environmental problems they perceive with the oil sands. Where is the "growing US threat to ban so-called Alberta dirty oil" he speaks of? Until I hear that threat directly from the US government, I'll put this down to an overreaction on his part and reverting to the fear factor in his sales job.

[jdobbin]

So Dion is warning that environmental activists have warned US lawmakers about the environmental problems they perceive with the oil sands. Where is the "growing US threat to ban so-called Alberta dirty oil" he speaks of? Until I hear that threat directly from the US government, I'll put this down to an overreaction on his part and reverting to the fear factor in his sales job.

U.S. Conference of Mayors:

http://www.knbc.com/greenisuniversal/16737652/detail.html

The U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in Miami this week adopted a resolution aimed at avoiding the use of high carbon fuels such as tar sands, liquid coal, and oil shale. The resolution encourages fuel analyses that include emissions from production, not just from burning the fuel.

Printed in the Globe earlier this month:

http://www.silobreaker.com/DocumentReader....tem=5_872308228

It's just one sentence buried in an 800-page U.S. energy bill that passed into law last December.

Yet it has morphed into a potential threat to Canada's oil sands boom, a contentious political football in Washington, and an early warning sign of an epic environmental battle over bitumen.

Stripped to its bare essentials, Section 526 of the U.S. Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 bans federal agencies from buying alternative fuels that produce more greenhouse gases than conventional...

[Topaz]

Dion addressed supporters at the Calgary Zoo today. This is part of his message:

This US threat Dion speaks of, would it be related to the report of the activist group called Environmental Integrity Project?

And this from the Montreal Gazette:

So Dion is warning that environmental activists have warned US lawmakers about the environmental problems they perceive with the oil sands. Where is the "growing US threat to ban so-called Alberta dirty oil" he speaks of? Until I hear that threat directly from the US government, I'll put this down to an overreaction on his part and reverting to the fear factor in his sales job.

I did report this on this forum, about the law congress past last fall to reject any oil coming into the US that harms the environment. When they realized that Canada being the second , if not the first, exporter of oil to the US they were trying to figure out a way to change the rules to allow Canadian oil in but there are some that are trying to stop Canadian oil. If you want to find out about this law, just go "surfing" the net , you will find it, try "google".

[Argus]

I did report this on this forum, about the law congress past last fall to reject any oil coming into the US that harms the environment. When they realized that Canada being the second , if not the first, exporter of oil to the US they were trying to figure out a way to change the rules to allow Canadian oil in but there are some that are trying to stop Canadian oil. If you want to find out about this law, just go "surfing" the net , you will find it, try "google".

If the US wants to ban Alberta oil that will hurt only the US. I'm quite certain the Chinese will welcome it. And the US ban will last only until the "clean" oil from Venezuala or Saudi Arabia gets yanked for political reasons and Americans are pushing their cars up to empty gas stations.

[Wilber]

If the US wants to ban Alberta oil that will hurt only the US. I'm quite certain the Chinese will welcome it. And the US ban will last only until the "clean" oil from Venezuala or Saudi Arabia gets yanked for political reasons and Americans are pushing their cars up to empty gas stations.

Yup

[MontyBurns]

We should call this "green shift" the "green shit" or the "green shaft".

[Keepitsimple]

It's just not the right time for something so radi9cal and punishing. The European countries have mostly been increasing their emissions over the past 5-10 years. They got an initial boost because they chose the base year of 1990 to claim all the reductions caused by the closing of dirty East Bloc factories. Add to that the fiasco of their own Cap & Trade system that has citizens up in arms. On top of that, the major polluters are not yet part of the solution. There are so many falsehoods that go unreported - France does well because they generate the majority of their energy via nuclear - that was true before Kyoto and is unchanged. The UK made an unrelated decision to change from coal to gas (Dash for Gas) back around, you guessed it, the late 80's - much cleaner. Even here in Quebec - they can be magmanimous about being green because almost all of their energy comes from Hydro. It's politics mixed with social engineering - and it makes all the sense in the world for Canada to have a slow and steady, pragmatic hand on the "Global Warming" tiller.

Link to the Dash for Gas: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3581637.stm

[jdobbin]

Even here in Quebec - they can be magmanimous about being green because almost all of their energy comes from Hydro. It's politics mixed with social engineering - and it makes all the sense in the world for Canada to have a slow and steady, pragmatic hand on the "Global Warming" tiller.

Why do anything at all when the right wing doesn't even believe in global warming? Just complain it costs too much and say the market will fix any and all problems.

Edited July 6, 2008 by jdobbin

[Wilber]

Why do anything at all when the right wing doesn't even believe in global warming? Just complain it costs too much and say the market will fix any and all problems.

The market is. Air Canada just announced they are cutting the number of flights from Vancouver to Beijing and Shanghai in half because of high fuel prices. That's more than any social engineering tax by a Canadian government could ever accomplish.

[jdobbin]

The market is. Air Canada just announced they are cutting the number of flights from Vancouver to Beijing and Shanghai in half because of high fuel prices. That's more than any social engineering tax by a Canadian government could ever accomplish.

Demand rises and falls. Even now some are calling the oil increases a bubble. When gas prices fell after 2001, we saw the market respond with some of the largest vehicles ever to be seen in the North American market. We saw some of the largest houses built in decades.

The market responded to that demand despite what the costs might be in emissions. A carbon tax spread over all emissions producing energy will set a cost to carbon whatever the demand is.

I keep hearing from some on the right that gas is never coming down and that we are headed for $200 oil prices. Quite a few analysts are thinking that we are seeing a bubble now. While oil will definitely rise, we are now seeing speculators set the price. A market correction is inevitable.