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Freespend screws over Canadians with success tax.


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On 4/23/2021 at 11:19 PM, Right To Left said:

I am not a liberal, nor do I support the Liberal Party and/or its leader, who seems to have the CBC and most corporate media in this country kissing his ass.  Politics in Canada has become just as much about spectacle as in the US, and just as devoid of substance!

 but I think we're doing a little better because even though a lot of the supposed covid relief benefits have been skimmed off by the rich and business owners, unlike the US, some of the money has at least tricked down to prevent more people from falling through the cracks!

- on that, we do need to note that even where I am, I can see a big increase in our homeless populations this year from a year or two years ago. Those who are already on the bottom rungs of the ladder because they are mentally ill, disabled or unable to earn enough to keep their apartments in an insane real estate situation, have been in a precarious situation this winter. I don't know how many died over the last six months or so, cause they were living outside and not allowed into shelters for various reasons, but I'm sure the number is way higher than normal cause there seems to be so many out there now...in back alleys, parks etc.

1. Well, atleast we are narrowing down the field... but there is not much left, I'm guessing NDP, who have even grander plans for more social spending, so for i guy that practices good finical decisions, why are you willing to spend money we don't have on social programs, where at best would only be temporary as they are not sustainable... or they are election lies to get a few more votes...  

2. and yet the liberals are not going to do anything about those that cheat the system, 60 % come from families with incomes over 150,k but what the hay, it's only money right...

3. I wonder how the NDP's needs and wants are going to be financed, and how many more homeless are going to be in the streets when taxes go up to pay down all of this. these bils being spent could be directed at a lot of things, fixing our broken health care system, funding education, putting some into our infra structure, mega projects like Montreal sewage system as an example, creating jobs, funding small business... funding our military to 2 % GDP, the Australians just invested 340 bil into theirs. Give our vets back the funding to cons took away, and Justin has wiped his arse on, there are a million projects we could accomplish with all this new money Justin is going to spend...   

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15 hours ago, Army Guy said:

1. Well, atleast we are narrowing down the field... but there is not much left, I'm guessing NDP, who have even grander plans for more social spending, so for i guy that practices good finical decisions, why are you willing to spend money we don't have on social programs, where at best would only be temporary as they are not sustainable... or they are election lies to get a few more votes...  

I don't expect social programs and especially healthcare to be run perfectly! Certainly if I was running healthcare, I would want a lot more money and focus put on HEALTH, and NOT probing and testing to find undiscovered or previously unnoticed maladies (called preventative medicine....kind of glad the emergency situation now has pushed so much of that crap aside).

But, the biggest nightmare situation would be to leave it all up to everyone's ability to buy or access privately managed health insurance providers!

This is why so many Americans...who thought they were preparing for retirement, have had their plans and hopes dashed as one bad prognosis can leave them or a family member with thousands of $Dollars of debt to be paid...so they end up having to keep on working even if they are sick and barely coping!

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2. and yet the liberals are not going to do anything about those that cheat the system, 60 % come from families with incomes over 150,k but what the hay, it's only money right...

If you're making over 150K per year, what are you bitching about? I know those that cheat the system, can be held liable. There are at least a few people in the news who are being charged with bilking or taking illegal CERB and other payments this past year. Besides, most of the cheating is done by those at the top...who are making over 150,000 per year and up. The difference is, they are not looking over their shoulders afraid of getting caught. Instead, they feel entitled to steal whatever they want from whomever....government, employees, clients, customers, you name it! 

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3. I wonder how the NDP's needs and wants are going to be financed, and how many more homeless are going to be in the streets when taxes go up to pay down all of this. these bils being spent could be directed at a lot of things, fixing our broken health care system, funding education, putting some into our infra structure, mega projects like Montreal sewage system as an example, creating jobs, funding small business... funding our military to 2 % GDP, the Australians just invested 340 bil into theirs. Give our vets back the funding to cons took away, and Justin has wiped his arse on, there are a million projects we could accomplish with all this new money Justin is going to spend...   

Most people that are in the streets are there because our economy has become more and more unequal and stratified like so many other capitalist nations, that make a turn from liberal or social democrat capitalism to unadulterated neoliberal capitalism that demands constant cuts to all public services and education. Only waste the neoliberal right will allow and support is the goddammed military spending!  Haven't heard much news lately on those flying bricks otherwise known as F-35's for one, but with word that Congress is considering pulling the plug on this 1.7 Trillion welfare check for Lockheed-Martin, that would be one less expensive toy for the Feds to spend money on!

But, even if it did work exactly as the designers and Pentagon hype machine planned, that would even be worse! Because it would mean the US and every other NATO member nation would be expected to fork over billions in tax dollars for more exotic and expensive weapons.....that America has to start more proxy wars and engage in more and more saber-rattling with non-compliant nations to justify making more shifts towards the dangerous game of militarization!

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On 4/23/2021 at 10:33 PM, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

Actually, the U.S. unemployment rate is lower than in Canada, and the U.S. economy is doing much better.   Canada may still be the worst among G-7 nations, and was teetering on recession even before COVID because of low oil prices, domestic unrest, rail stoppages, etc.

Because the US is a Dickensian hellhole, where workers made unemployed by lockdowns have been stuck with no legal sources of income. However you want to slice it, socialist nations...even the poorest and most sanctioned, including vaccines (should be illegal) like Venezuela, have done better at handling the Covid-19 pandemic than the uber-capitalist nations like the US, India and Brazil, which value economic earnings more than people's health! 

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6 hours ago, Right To Left said:

Because the US is a Dickensian hellhole, where workers made unemployed by lockdowns have been stuck with no legal sources of income. However you want to slice it, socialist nations...even the poorest and most sanctioned, including vaccines (should be illegal) like Venezuela, have done better at handling the Covid-19 pandemic than the uber-capitalist nations like the US, India and Brazil, which value economic earnings more than people's health! 

 

And yet, Canada is begging for covid vaccines from other nations, including the U.S. and India, because it did not develop, test, or manufacture covid vaccine domestically, or maintain the capability to do so.   Economics 101.

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1 hour ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

And yet, Canada is begging for covid vaccines from other nations, including the U.S. and India, because it did not develop, test, or manufacture covid vaccine domestically, or maintain the capability to do so.   Economics 101.

We're a bunch of snotty fuckers aren't we . . . (?)

Arrogant and self righteous  . . . that's us.

Sad but true.

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On 4/19/2021 at 6:14 PM, Moonlight Graham said:

They're putting a 10% tax on cars over $100k.  A bit weird that boats are so much higher threshhold at over 250k.  Motorhomes are except because they don't want to make retired seniors PO'd.

In my opinion a car over $50,000 qualifies as a luxury vehicle. 

Any boat is a luxury boat unless its use is to bring people from the mainland to an island where those live. Same with aircraft.

In addition, any snowmobile, ATV or Harley motorcycle will be luxury items.   This list goes on..

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12 hours ago, cougar said:

or Harley motorcycle

wait so Buell is ok?

 

1 hour ago, cougar said:

This reminds me that the luxury tax can be combined with the carbon tax and be called carbolux tax !

Where does tax money go, in a big pot right? Sounds goof to me. I mean, the carbon still went up. And if I were a mfg I can just pay my taxes, pass it on to my customers and release the halogens and bromides to my content.

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13 hours ago, cougar said:

Any boat is a luxury boat unless its use is to bring people from the mainland to an island where those live

I

So says you . . . . 

Just in case you haven't noticed . . . . boats/barges are used to get logs from the Skeena/Nass/etc. down to the markets in the lower mainland.

Fish for consumer palates is caught /shipped by boat . . . . fish herring, wheelbarrow full of money, buy house and Harley. 

What colour is the sky in 'your world' ?

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31 minutes ago, Nefarious Banana said:

Just in case you haven't noticed . . . . boats/barges are used to get logs from the Skeena/Nass/etc. down to the markets in the lower mainland.

Fish for consumer palates is caught /shipped by boat . . . . fish herring, wheelbarrow full of money, buy house and Harley. 

I did not mean commercial boats, of course.   A private fishing boat with an engine or two is a luxury, as one can go without it, still catching fish.  The trailer the boat is on will also be a luxury item, of course!

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1 hour ago, OftenWrong said:

wait so Buell is ok?

 

Where does tax money go, in a big pot right? Sounds goof to me. I mean, the carbon still went up. 

Of course.  It is bull***, but we can think of it as nothing more than an addition to the present income tax.  So why not make it such that the rich people with the luxury items who burn fossil fuels like crazy and fill up the landfills with plastic pay more and more and more?

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1 hour ago, cougar said:

Of course.  It is bull***, but we can think of it as nothing more than an addition to the present income tax.  So why not make it such that the rich people with the luxury items who burn fossil fuels like crazy and fill up the landfills with plastic pay more and more and more?

Do you think of yourself as a 'landed Communist' . . . ?

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20 hours ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

And yet, Canada is begging for covid vaccines from other nations, including the U.S. and India, because it did not develop, test, or manufacture covid vaccine domestically, or maintain the capability to do so.   Economics 101.

You know why, and are just trying to change the subject!  You were told many, many times before that Canada bought in to all of the Reaganomics Supply Side bullshit and went on a spree privatizing public institutions of all kinds, and since one of them was Connaught Labs, Canada lost its last facility to produce the serums needed for vaccine-making. 

But as US patent and copyright law was applied against the rest of the world to create big pharma monopolies among others, most Canadians thought that we were immune from the worst of US policymaking.....but we've discovered we, like other allies and adversaries alike are all disposable when Washington decides to use another tool...even vaccines to carve out and control international markets.

Now, weren't you in the middle of bragging about 'low US unemployment' rates, which don't account for how many hours a week or how much money those new jobs pay! But, it's likely not a lot, since, as one economist- Jack Rasmus noted from new data released, it would be the first time a rise in employment didn't raise GDP or improve productivity numbers.

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6 minutes ago, Right To Left said:

You know why, and are just trying to change the subject!  You were told many, many times before that Canada bought in to all of the Reaganomics Supply Side bullshit and went on a spree privatizing public institutions of all kinds, and since one of them was Connaught Labs, Canada lost its last facility to produce the serums needed for vaccine-making.

 

Wrong...Canada still has facilities that can make vaccines.   The Trudeau government failed to invest the billions necessary to get the job done like other nations did, betting on China instead.    Either way, it was Canadian choices that led to this situation, regardless of PM or ruling party.

 

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But as US patent and copyright law was applied against the rest of the world to create big pharma monopolies among others, most Canadians thought that we were immune from the worst of US policymaking.....but we've discovered we, like other allies and adversaries alike are all disposable when Washington decides to use another tool...even vaccines to carve out and control international markets.

 

"Allies" does not mean freedom from competition or the right to steal IP.   Canada use to be able to do such things domestically...not any more.   Canada has one of the lowest R&D spending levels among OECD nations.

 

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Now, weren't you in the middle of bragging about 'low US unemployment' rates, which don't account for how many hours a week or how much money those new jobs pay! But, it's likely not a lot, since, as one economist- Jack Rasmus noted from new data released, it would be the first time a rise in employment didn't raise GDP or improve productivity numbers.

 

More Canadians defect to the USA for jobs and higher pay than Americans going to Canada.  It has been that way for....decades.

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3 hours ago, cougar said:

Of course.  It is bull***, but we can think of it as nothing more than an addition to the present income tax.  So why not make it such that the rich people with the luxury items who burn fossil fuels like crazy and fill up the landfills with plastic pay more and more and more?

Ok then I concurr, as long as it really makes buggers eyes water.

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20 hours ago, cougar said:

In my opinion a car over $50,000 qualifies as a luxury vehicle. Any boat is a luxury boat unless its use is to bring people from the mainland to an island where those live. Same with aircraft.

Spoken by someone who obviously has no clue about transportation in the North.  

i have owned, rented and used general aviation aircraft for 49 years involving thousands of hours of travel.  I would estimate fewer than 5% of those hours were recreational use (family holidays).  In much of the North of this vast country, they are the only practical and often possible way to get around.  Between the total BS "carbon tax" and this exceedingly political tax it is a severe penalty on small business.  The Liberals count on public ignorance to pull this shit off.  Butts in a supreme a-hole - but a politically astute one exploiting ignorance and envy.

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4 hours ago, bush_cheney2004 said:


Wrong...Canada still has facilities that can make vaccines.  

Where??

 

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The Trudeau government failed to invest the billions necessary to get the job done like other nations did, betting on China instead.    Either way, it was Canadian choices that led to this situation, regardless of PM or ruling party.

I wish we were betting on China! We would get better treatment than your US of A, which up till a couple of weeks about, had only allowed 3 million doses to be exported, of the 238 million produced as of April 15, while China kept 196 million and exported 166 million of theirs. So, who's the better global citizen: China or the US?

4 hours ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

"Allies" does not mean freedom from competition or the right to steal IP.   Canada use to be able to do such things domestically...not any more.   Canada has one of the lowest R&D spending levels among OECD nations.

This would be a good place to drop a little truth on you! 

We don’t do vaccines. But we have a great portfolio from places that do

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Cancelling that capacity was also deliberate policy, known then as free trade. We can get it cheaper elsewhere, so let’s go shopping. Brian Mulroney launched that in the late 1980s, Jean Chrétien ratified it in the 90s, and Stephen Harper nailed the lid on the coffin. The totality of his economic policy amounted to: pump oil from the ground and sell it fast to others who’ll do whatever to make it more valuable.

Their argument for abandoning the capacity to make things was largely based on fashion. The free trade train is leaving the station, they said, and the question is: will Canada be on it? You wanna be hip or what? 

There’s a sense of heroism in resource industries; “it’s life and death in there every day,” said the guys who gingerly stepped around the molten “pots” in the aluminum smelter at Kitimat. But making stuff is now more a hobby than a livelihood.

Yet we’re the place that gave the world insulin. The non-profit Connaught Laboratories in Toronto produced it, plus diphtheria and polio vaccines. They distributed them worldwide, at cost. They were in a class with the Pasteur Institute in Paris and Lister Institute in London. Under Trudeau the elder, its mandate got diluted into private-public bullshit. Then Mulroney privatized and sold it off. We still have labs that work on vaccines,but no production capacity — so even if they succeed, they’d have to send it elsewhere to be mass produced.

You were saying?

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More Canadians defect to the USA for jobs and higher pay than Americans going to Canada.  It has been that way for....decades.

I'd like to see those numbers! Are you getting us confused with Mexico again? I'm glad I came back. You can have your rat race, and I hope one of the changes that will come with an endless series of communicable diseases is an end to all of this free trade bullshit and supply lines that are thousands of miles long.

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9 minutes ago, Right To Left said:

Where??

 

"Canada has two major manufacturing facilities for vaccines, a Sanofi Pasteur facility in Toronto and a GlaxoSmithKline facility in Ste. Foy, Quebec."   - National Post

 

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I wish we were betting on China! We would get better treatment than your US of A, which up till a couple of weeks about, had only allowed 3 million doses to be exported, of the 238 million produced as of April 15, while China kept 196 million and exported 166 million of theirs. So, who's the better global citizen: China or the US?

 

The U.S. exported 4 million doses, far more than Canada has exported.   Canada is actually taking COVAX vaccine doses from poorer nations...it is that desperate.

The U.S. is not responsible for Canada's failure to maintain adequate vaccine development, testing, and manufacturing.    China already laughed in your face (CanSino).

 

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I'd like to see those numbers! Are you getting us confused with Mexico again? I'm glad I came back. You can have your rat race, and I hope one of the changes that will come with an endless series of communicable diseases is an end to all of this free trade bullshit and supply lines that are thousands of miles long.

 

Use America's Google and start with "brain drain" from the 1990's and work your way forward to all the engineering graduates seeking much better jobs and pay in the USA...including Google !

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20 minutes ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

"Canada has two major manufacturing facilities for vaccines, a Sanofi Pasteur facility in Toronto and a GlaxoSmithKline facility in Ste. Foy, Quebec."   - National Post

https://canadanewsmedia.ca/why-canada-is-at-the-mercy-of-vaccine-nationalism-during-the-covid-pandemic-national-post/

Currently, Canada has two major manufacturing facilities for vaccines, a Sanofi Pasteur facility in Toronto and a GlaxoSmithKline facility in Ste. Foy, Quebec. But both facilities have existing contracts with little spare capacity and aren’t equipped to make the leading COVID-19 candidates.

You were saying?

As Canada scrambles with the rest of the world to secure vaccines, one major issue has been this country’s lack of domestic production. It is an issue that will leave Canada at the mercy of vaccine nationalism until at least the end of 2021.

Israel’s success as the world leader of the vaccine race appears to have been because it paid more for doses and agreed to share health data. Other countries leaving Canada behind are using vaccines from China or Russia that have not even been considered for use here. And some have approved candidates that Canada has purchased, but not yet approved.

The U.K. is using the AstraZeneca vaccine, which has not yet been approved in Canada, and both Britain and the U.S. have another advantage in their plan; they manufacture vaccines on their home soil.

Canada’s Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are manufactured in Europe and both have supply chains that see different components of the vaccine created in different parts of the continent before coming together in so called fill and finish facilities.

When the European Union mused about imposing export restrictions they had the power to shut down Canada’s vaccine deliveries completely. Canada’s only link in the vaccine chain is as a customer for now, giving it no leverage with major companies.

Meanwhile, Pfizer reduced shipments for the last month as it upgraded its Belgium manufacturing facility, but the reductions were deeper in Canada with less than half of our expected shipments arriving.

Robert Van Exan, who has decades of experience in Canada’s pharmaceutical industry and is president of his own consultancy, Immunization Policy and Knowledge Translation, said for far too long the country was a hostile space for manufacturers.

“A lot of companies closed down pharmaceutical manufacturing in this country, because the environment was totally toxic to them,” he said. 

The strikes against Canada, Van Exan said, included weaker patent protections and price controls that cut into company profit. Prior to the pandemic, the Liberal government moved to reduce pharmaceutical prices further with changes to the pricing system for patented medicines, drawing criticism from industry. The government exempted COVID vaccines from that new process, but it remains in place for other medicines.

https://canadanewsmedia.ca/why-canada-is-at-the-mercy-of-vaccine-nationalism-during-the-covid-pandemic-national-post/

Well, what can I say besides Fuck You, Robert Van Exan!  This and other greedy asswipes in big pharma expect to be allowed to squeeze more and more profits from the sick and desperate around the world. If you want reasons why health and medicine should not be set up for "free enterprise" profit-taking, that's it! Back when Mulroney was in power in Ottawa, he doubled the life of patents -- extended from the traditional 7 to 14 years. And now they're immortal...just like our corporations that rule over us! 

This is why it will be impossible to get vaccine doses to the entire world's populations, who are not going to be able to cough up enough money demanded by big pharma now!  The end result is permanent, neverending pandemics that the rich will write off as afflictions of the poor, as they did throughout the middle ages in Europe, when nobody could be bothered building adequate water and waste management systems for the cities across Europe, even when the technology was available. why pay taxes so the unwashed rabble can drink clean water?

I've been telling a few conservatives here, gnashing their teeth, circling menacingly, unsure of who to attack first.....condemning both big business and big government out of opposite sides of their mouths, that the conspiracy they're all looking for is hiding right in plain sight! It's not about the Chinese or Pfizer creating a covid virus to spread around the world and make everyone stay home and put on a mask and shudder - take their vaccines before they go out again... NO, the billionaires and the drug companies they control knew that at some point, a brand new, fast-spreading disease would pop up somewhere...as it has all throughout history, and now, they would have all the tools to profit from the whole world's miseries: international patent law that provides them monopolies over production and pricing of new vaccines and medicines needed to treat the new illness.

Their only miscalculation is that Covid-19 has exceeded their expectations and is causing so much havoc around the world, and will continue to do so this year, that the wealth destruction that will be realized when government-backed currencies are bankrupt, because their governments can't backstop all of the debts piling up and being pushed along for future suckers to deal with! There will be spikes in inflation...whether it's recognized or not -- food prices and necessary commodities will go shooting up as more and more holders of worthless assets can't get paid back a fraction of what they are owed. There will be food shortages, famines, a breakup of those long supply chains and outsourcing will be a thing of the past finally! 

I'm sure the executives at Pfizer and other pharma rackets, the FAANGS, and the big banks, who will repeat the 1930's and end up as the holders of vast tracts of land and real estate, will all be in hiding, to try to avoid mobs of dispossessed to take revenge on. The richest will be in hiding, but top level employees have to run the shop. They can't all run businesses by making zoom calls with each other. At first, the future will be looking like a return to the Great Depression. And then it will start looking like the Dark Ages, as resources become more scarce and 'civilization' becomes lost, just as much of it did after the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century.

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8 minutes ago, Right To Left said:

You were saying?

 

Canada screwed itself...Reagan and Thatcher had nothing to do with Canada's decisions (then or now) and policies which now finds it begging for vaccines from nations that did not make the same choices.  

By the mid 1990's, Canada was in such poor fiscal shape, Chretien and Martin had to slash spending and attempt to save the Canadian peso.   Even today, the province of Ontario has the most sub-sovereign debt per capita among OECD nations.

Joe Biden will likely export more AZ vaccine to Canada, just like any other requesting third world nation.

Good job using America's Google...we are here for you !

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5 hours ago, Right To Left said:

 

Well, what can I say besides Fuck You, Robert Van Exan!  This and other greedy asswipes in big pharma expect to be allowed to squeeze more and more profits from the sick and desperate around the world. If you want reasons why health and medicine should not be set up for "free enterprise" profit-taking, that's it! Back when Mulroney was in power in Ottawa, he doubled the life of patents -- extended from the traditional 7 to 14 years. And now they're immortal...just like our corporations that rule over us! 

This is why it will be impossible to get vaccine doses to the entire world's populations, who are not going to be able to cough up enough money demanded by big pharma now!  The end result is permanent, neverending pandemics that the rich will write off as afflictions of the poor, as they did throughout the middle ages in Europe, when nobody could be bothered building adequate water and waste management systems for the cities across Europe, even when the technology was available. why pay taxes so the unwashed rabble can drink clean water?

I can't buy into your tinfoil hat conspiracy theories, but you DO hit on one key point quite accurately

Canada is stuck in the no-man's land between the "everything is business" neighbour to the South and Uncle Karl;s "means of production" all belonging "to the people.  But, being in that position, we need to learn what should be business and what should be public and social service.  Sick care and health care  are two of those that really need to be seen for what they are (or SHOULD be) - social service.  This is a unique opportunity, since we can look at what others have done and choose to emulate success rather than failure.  If you think back a bit, you might remember when Chairman Mao mouthed your words and tried to save his food supply system from exploitation of those horrible capitalistic farmers, so he nationaiized all of the land - and 100,000,000 or so Chinese starved to death.  You see: very few governments EVER could organize a piss-up at a brewery.   You might have noticed that the UK went through this pandemic by NOT relying on big Euro government - that pretty much screwed up totally - but took the national position of co-operating between business and government to develop its own vaccine technology AND production.  The US went 90% business.  BITH got the vaccine job done....the US at about $20 a dose and the UK at $2.  Even China (who I can guarantee you has no desire or need to engage with Pfizer) used its Facist tactcics to exploit business to get the job done.

We have VIDO, and they are a great resource - but we need to think the whole thing through to get the right balance between state and citizen to make it work.

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7 hours ago, cannuck said:

I can't buy into your tinfoil hat conspiracy theories, but you DO hit on one key point quite accurately

Canada is stuck in the no-man's land between the "everything is business" neighbour to the South and Uncle Karl;s "means of production" all belonging "to the people.  But, being in that position, we need to learn what should be business and what should be public and social service.  Sick care and health care  are two of those that really need to be seen for what they are (or SHOULD be) - social service.  This is a unique opportunity, since we can look at what others have done and choose to emulate success rather than failure.  If you think back a bit, you might remember when Chairman Mao mouthed your words and tried to save his food supply system from exploitation of those horrible capitalistic farmers, so he nationaiized all of the land - and 100,000,000 or so Chinese starved to death.  You see: very few governments EVER could organize a piss-up at a brewery.   You might have noticed that the UK went through this pandemic by NOT relying on big Euro government - that pretty much screwed up totally - but took the national position of co-operating between business and government to develop its own vaccine technology AND production.  The US went 90% business.  BITH got the vaccine job done....the US at about $20 a dose and the UK at $2.  Even China (who I can guarantee you has no desire or need to engage with Pfizer) used its Facist tactcics to exploit business to get the job done.

We have VIDO, and they are a great resource - but we need to think the whole thing through to get the right balance between state and citizen to make it work.

Too bad you didn't read the Canada News Media story I posted, or opened the link to read the rest of it, which tries to take a wide-angle view of Canada's vaccine and drug acquisition problems without much commentary.  So, like it or not, I added my commentary!  When I read this Van Exan saying:"

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“Our procurement process does nothing to encourage companies to stay in Canada, to do research in Canada, or to manufacture in Canada.

All of Canada’s policies have pushed drug prices down compared to international comparisons and fostered a large generic industry, but Van Exan points out the generic industry is not developing the next vaccine."

 

I see red! And so should every Canadian and every citizen of Planet Earth who doesn't want to be bled dry by corporate profiteers trying to grind us down for everything we have and can earn in the future! Because, although they won't attack the system of globalization, that was presented to the public as "Free Trade" 40 years ago, and we got hammered on an almost daily basis about how and why tariffs and duties needed to be eliminated or reduced drastically. 

Those of us who worked in industries on both sides of the border that were declared "less competitive" found that factories owned by industrialists with itchy fingers, just waiting to outsource their operations to some non-union paradise with no or few regulations of any kind ( first Mexico and the Deep South), and plants in Canada and the "Rust Belt" states, were just left to rot, because mere dumb factory workers were demanding too much money and the owners wanted a workaround.

And the nightmare never ended! As recently as the Trump Administration in the US, when the steel industry was declared 'essential for national security', mills are still poorly run, almost completely unregulated, and allowed to be sold off to foreign black market operators: https://newsinteractive.post-gazette.com/ukraine-money-laundering/

Now, even though the mostly social media fights happening now between some of the bastards who run global capitalism may seem off-topic, they may be one more example of how the wheels of globalization are coming off the wagon in a time when disease has played a role in damaging supply lines and threatening operations including Big Pharma, which have assets involved in producing products scattered across several nations. So, for the first time that I can recall, the bastards that run this world are taking their personal fights out in the open. They've noticed that their real profit margins (excluding soon to be worthless central bank loans) are not growing and only under wishful thinking scenarios will meet future expectations. So, we got the CEO of Apple (whatever his name is) attacking Spock Zuckerberg, and uber-narcissist Elon is engaging in a dirty fight with richest ugly nerd in the world - Bezos. So, maybe this loose, mutually beneficial cooperative arrangement the global elites have been carrying out since the age of globalization began, and are able to keep their beefs and disputes behind closed doors, is now coming to an end! So, the only way to carve out and try to expand their fiefdoms is to go to war with each other....just like the lords of little fiefdoms of Europe back in the Middle Ages. 

Unless they have pushed too fast and too hard for most people not to notice, the drive towards increased generic drug production that these bastards...which include Bill Gates all of a sudden as a 'voice of reason':

Bill Gates Doubles Down On Opposition To "Open Vaccine" Movement

I didn't know Bill Gates had such a large stake in all this, but at a time when the COVAX system was created to supposedly get vaccines to everyone in the world, Gates has to hope that MSM brainwashing will prevent us all from learning that the US is hoarding their supplies...barely exporting 3 million doses and claiming to finally send out 60 million doses of the foreign Astra Zenica vaccine that were impounded because of questions over safety standards at a production facility near Baltimore.  So, that's what Canada gets to celebrate soon. We'll be taking our chances on those AZ vaccines, and of course hope any potential risks vastly outweigh the dangers of a Covid-19 infection. While the real apprentice to the global empire - England..as the Canada News article noted, is the only other nation that appears to be allowed to hoard vaccines it produces. India, the largest drug and vaccine manufacturer is in the middle of the worst disease outbreak in the world, and yet they are forced to export vaccine shipments that are under contract to foreign drug companies! 

https://www.axios.com/biden-share-astrazeneca-coronavirus-vaccine-doses-233bb5b2-db11-423e-9a34-0c18a4959fec.html

This is the kind of situation that causes uprisings, revolts and revolutions, and the monopolists may be sounding like they are hitting the panic button now because they know that if conditions don't vastly improve for the vast lower classes of India real soon, there will be a revolution of some kind or other that will sweep that Hindu fascist - Modi and his flag-waving grifters out of power completely and will not accept a close copy from the degraded Congress Party. "May you live in interesting times," is a rough translation of what we're told is an ancient Chinese curse. I suspect times are going to get real interesting for all of us in the coming months and years!

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17 minutes ago, Right To Left said:

....Those of us who worked in industries on both sides of the border that were declared "less competitive" found that factories owned by industrialists with itchy fingers, just waiting to outsource their operations to some non-union paradise with no or few regulations of any kind ( first Mexico and the Deep South), and plants in Canada and the "Rust Belt" states, were just left to rot, because mere dumb factory workers were demanding too much money and the owners wanted a workaround.

 

Canada left itself to economic rot...refusing to invest more R&D dollars...increasing dependency on foreign direct investment/ownership (FDI) as a national policy...lagging way behind in worker productivity...crippling energy distribution east by pipeline...and doubling down on "integration" and "harmonizing" with the U.S. economy to the point of being a vassal state.

The "Reagan and Thatcher" supply side nations funded, developed, tested, and manufactured covid vaccines in record time...Canada was doomed to fail with hopelessly feeble attempts that were undermined by a political leadership and citizen base that already defines and believes Canada is a "post national state".

Canada use to be better than this.

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On 4/26/2021 at 8:17 PM, cannuck said:

 In much of the North of this vast country, they are the only practical and often possible way to get around.

I interpret the luxury tax as payable by individuals who own a plane or a boat and use them entirely for pleasure, not a business.

Excuse me, but having someone live in the wilderness where the only means of transportation is an airplane does not sit well with me.  You have a situation where thousands of wildlife and humans get disturbed and hundreds of liters of fuel are burned for one individual's extravagant desires.  I secretly hope people who do that either crash one day or become grizzly food.

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