Looks like we're going to the polls.

[Guest eureka]

Why don't you refute my assertions then, Wellandboy. Saying that dire consequences will not follow a Conservative government of this persuasion is not an argument. I have said that they will and I have given reasons.

Refute them if you can. The exercise may help you to waken from the dream world you are living.

[shoop]

For the sake of moving towards actual debate, could you restate your reasons for why *dire* consequences will follow a Conservative government.

For the sake of the same thing I will state why I don't think *dire* consequences will ensue.

History is the best basis for predicting the future. Historically the final days of the last Conservative government corresponded with the start of the biggest (and longest) peacetime period of economic expansion in our history.

There is every reason to believe the next Conservative government will behave just as well in manging the finances of the government.

Respond to that without resorting to name calling please.

Why don't you refute my assertions then, Wellandboy. Saying that dire consequences will not follow a Conservative government of this persuasion is not an argument. I have said that they will and I have given reasons.

Refute them if you can. The exercise may help you to waken from the dream world you are living.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Minimus Maximus]

I have been following this thread for a bit but have not had time to post an opinion until now. I think Shoop is correct in stating that a Consevative gov't will not result in "dire consequenses" which will make Canada resemble some south american country with two classes, extremely rich and extremely poor. The "sky is falling" spin which Eureka is attempting to put on the CPCs' is just that, spin. The Canadian electorate is just not that stupid as to accept a party that will create these extremes.

Harper lost my vote along time ago over the comments made about Martin supporting kiddie porn. However, the acountability legislation which the CPC's have proposed have won me back over to the blue side of the political spectrum. This coupled with the Liberals proposed whistleblower legislation which will result in... well a lack of people willing to blow the whistle have put me on the decided list as far as the next election goes.

I guess I will never understand extreme partisanship in any political direction as I usually vote based on policies which I support, not political stripes. The last time I voted for the Liberals in a federal election it was a vote for the elimination of child poverty. I would like to recind my vote now please and thankyou.

What people like Eureka don't seem to understand is that this country is succesful because of its mixture of conservative and liberal values. The elimination of one will ultimately result in the elimination of the other. After all fiscal conservative values pay for the social liberal values we all want (maybe not all, but most of us).

Eureka, Chicken Little was a fairy tale. Nothing more, nothing less. I don't advocate the elimination of social programs, but have seen too many people abuse welfare and UI. Stricter regulation and controls are definitely reqiured in these areas to ensure that people who are healthy enough to work but to lazy to get off their collective asses and do it don't recieve any of my tax dollars.

[Argus]

First, ir is not my definition of evil. Evil is a concept I do not accept. However, for those who do believe in evil, it is not a great leap to see the wilfull destruction of what was a decent nation as evil.

This is a matter of interpretation. First, no policy by any party is "wilfully" going to destroy the country.

No... just dismantle our public health-care system, under-fund education, restrict and reduce UI benefits, practice tight-money policies which benefit only the wealthy.... That's not destroying the country... It's making it better for the really wealthy....

Possibly, depending on how it is done.

But it is only your supposition that they intend to do any of those things. I, for one, don't believe they have that intention.

Like what? I mean, given social programs are a provincial responsibility.

And much of the funding for social programs, like health care, subsidized housing, etc... comes from the federal government and is doled out by the provincial government.... So when the federal government cuts transfers to the province, it has to cut something.... and social programs seem to be the easy target...

And yet the Liberals slashed transfer payments for health, education, and social welfare. And the country was not destroyed. So are you suggesting the Liberals tried to destroy the country? And if so why should we vote for them? You are asking for the re-election of a government which has already done the things you only fear the Tories might do.

[wellandboy]

Eureka,

Under the Conservatives Provincial power will be increased. This began ironically under the Chretien government and more appropriately under Finance Minister Paul Martin when they downloaded responsilibities to the provinces. What they did specifically is increase their responsibility without the appropriate authority. The Canada Health Act is a perfect example, whereby the provinces were forced to do the same with less. As the the problem developed with ever increasing costs the Feds waved the Canada Health Act, threatening to stop funding if the particular province didn't play within the narrow definition of the Act. This stifled all attempts to find creative solutions to the ever deepening crisis. As I stated in an earlier post the present government forbids discussion to examine alternative solutions to this problem. This as an Ontarian this is an unacceptable situation. By the way the very Liberal McGinty government makes me pay a Healthcare Tax based on my income; which I don't necessarily have a problem with but has in fact slyly created a two tier system.

Briefly, with regards to Social programs, I personally support them provided they offer value for money. Reading the last 10 years of the Auditor Generals Reports the blundering incompetence repeats itself and only when their feet are held to fire do they react.

I do not live in a dream world as you rudely suggest. I have a small business as a tradesperson, do volunteer work, am deeply committed to my community and my country.

[tml12]

First, ir is not my definition of evil. Evil is a concept I do not accept. However, for those who do believe in evil, it is not a great leap to see the wilfull destruction of what was a decent nation as evil.

This is a matter of interpretation. First, no policy by any party is "wilfully" going to destroy the country.

No... just dismantle our public health-care system, under-fund education, restrict and reduce UI benefits, practice tight-money policies which benefit only the wealthy.... That's not destroying the country... It's making it better for the really wealthy....

Possibly, depending on how it is done.

But it is only your supposition that they intend to do any of those things. I, for one, don't believe they have that intention.

Like what? I mean, given social programs are a provincial responsibility.

And much of the funding for social programs, like health care, subsidized housing, etc... comes from the federal government and is doled out by the provincial government.... So when the federal government cuts transfers to the province, it has to cut something.... and social programs seem to be the easy target...

And yet the Liberals slashed transfer payments for health, education, and social welfare. And the country was not destroyed. So are you suggesting the Liberals tried to destroy the country? And if so why should we vote for them? You are asking for the re-election of a government which has already done the things you only fear the Tories might do.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The Martin government is running a fear campaign accusing the Tories of something they themsevles did to balance the 1995 budget...

[Guest eureka]

The naivete is showing!

Isn't it odd that we have all seen welfare abuse and UI abuse even though every investigation shows that they do not exist except in very small degree. But, we like to sit back and feel "holier than thou."

The abuse of welfare and EI that is rampant is governmental abuse. Government has reduced welfare to the point where, in Ontario, the rates are effectively 40% lower than where they were a decade ago. It is the principal reason that poverty remains so high.

Only about one third of the unemployed can now qualify for EI under the new rules of the Liberals. That is a drag on the economies of many areas.

Certainly the Liberal government has reduced transfers to the provinces and should have been turfed out for doing so. Only there is no alternative likely government that does not promise worse. The transfers were reduced by Mulroney most draconially to the point that we almost lost the country as the federal government lost its only remaining effective power: that is the spending power. The Liberals continued that process until the results became apparent and have made some progress in reversing the decline - not enough.

When Health transfers were cut, they were done in negotiation with the provinces who got what they wanted. The old adage about being beware is pertinent. The provinces also received a transfer of tax points to compensate: these they did not use since they realized that to do so would not allow them to continue to blame the federal government for being a "tax and spend" regime.

The Canada Health Act has no teeth. That is why the federal government does not and cannot control the provincial mismanagement of the system.

Harper wrote the Reform Party Caucus statement of 1988. In that document, he proposed that access to health care should be two tier with means tested access for the poor and middle class. He proposed it quite explicitly. He also proposed the removal of the federal government from healthcare and the total provincial control with all the different standards that would bring.

He has not changed his spots and his sugar coated pronouncements are posturing.

Canada is the most decentralized nation in the world by a long way. It is the only nation where the central government has no powers in education, health and welfare. It is the only member of the OECD that does not have an education minister and cannot attend international conferences on education. It is also the only country that does not have national control of its resources.

Harper proposes to further decentralize by curbing the central government's spending power - the only way it has of exercising any influence in those areas.

That would effectively end Canada as a nation.

The USA and Switzerland, the two countries that are held up as examples of federalism that we should look to, are models of centralisation by comparison. Yet, so many Canadians soak up the propaganda of the Quebec "Nationalists" and the Western Reformers who cry "centralisation" to a populace that is too gullible to understand that they have no more than personal aggrandisement behind their rhetoric.

And, you call anyone who wants to prevent the disintegration of Canada a Liberal.

[August1991]

eureka, your rant contains a significant error. Switzerland, a member of the OECD, does not have a central education ministry.

In Switzerland the educational system and educational administration are based on federalist structures. There is no Ministry for Education at a national level.

Le portail de l'éducation

[Guest eureka]

I made no mistake, August, and it was not a rant but a factual assessment.

In Switzerland, the Minister of the Interior is responsible for education, Because of the divided responsibilities, the portfolio is not as important as in most countries. In Switzerland, education is divided and some areas are a federal responsibility.solely.

Canada is alone in its incoherence.

[shoop]

Here's another error.

The Department of Health and Human Services plus The Department of Education are ABSOLUTELY powerless. Every single contested Presidential cycle one of the Republican candidates seriously proposes getting rid of one, or both, departments.

eureka, your rant contains a significant error.  Switzerland, a member of the OECD, does not have a central education ministry.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Guest eureka]

Perhaps you find the Swiss Constitution a little difficult, shoop. However, read carefully this little summary of the relevant part.

The federal government in Switzerland is empowered to guarantee Healthcare and what you understand as Human Services. It can legislate if necessary and, with health, is empowered to do so in the absence of adequate private care.

It is the responsibility of the federal government to make the decision.

[August1991]

eureka, you stated:

Canada is the most decentralized nation in the world by a long way. It is the only nation where the central government has no powers in education, health and welfare. It is the only member of the OECD that does not have an education minister and cannot attend international conferences on education.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Then you stated:

In Switzerland, the Minister of the Interior is responsible for education...

So, by your admission, the Switzerland Confederation government does not have an education minister...

[incidentally, the Canadian federal Minister of Industry has responsibility for education in the same sense that the Swiss Minister of Home Affairs is responsible for education.]

[wellandboy]

Eureka,

He(Harper) has not changed his spots and his sugar coated pronouncements are posturing.

And your evidence for this is.....?

That would effectively end Canada as a nation.

It would change Canada, but Canada would still be here, perhaps not in a fashion that you agree with.

Still can't resist the temptation to insult and belittle those who don't agree with you, can you? Present your case and drop the personal attacks. I respect your passion on Canadian issues, but the effectiveness disappears, when you piss people off.

[shoop]

Methinks you are the one having difficulties. I was clearly talking about the U.S.

Unless Switzerland has changed the terminology for their national departments.

Perhaps you find the Swiss Constitution a little difficult, shoop. However, read carefully this little summary of the relevant part.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Guest eureka]

They are not the same at all, August. The Swiss Ministry has an actual role to play on education and is responsible for facets of the system. It is a Ministry of education with a dual portfolio and the Minister attenda international conferences on education.

[Guest eureka]

Wellandboy, the only people who would be "pissed off" are those who deserve to be "pissed on." The people who complacently watch the destruction claiming that it is not happening.

Why not try to show that it is not happening if you believe that instead of doing a shoop and pretending to be insulted.

[Guest eureka]

shoop, you were not clear about writing of the US and I am not carefully considering the names you gave.

The US ministry is not powerless. The federal government has the greater powers over education. Look at Bills like "No child left behind;" the Bush pretext at improving their system.

[err]

First, ir is not my definition of evil. Evil is a concept I do not accept. However, for those who do believe in evil, it is not a great leap to see the wilfull destruction of what was a decent nation as evil.

This is a matter of interpretation. First, no policy by any party is "wilfully" going to destroy the country.

No... just dismantle our public health-care system, under-fund education, restrict and reduce UI benefits, practice tight-money policies which benefit only the wealthy.... That's not destroying the country... It's making it better for the really wealthy....

Possibly, depending on how it is done.

But it is only your supposition that they intend to do any of those things. I, for one, don't believe they have that intention.

Actually, I don't believe that it is their primary intention to destroy the country for the poorer and middle classes. However, it is obvious that this being a natural conseqeunce of their actual intentions doesn't seem to bother them, so in my opinion, they are just as guilty.

Like what? I mean, given social programs are a provincial responsibility.

And much of the funding for social programs, like health care, subsidized housing, etc... comes from the federal government and is doled out by the provincial government.... So when the federal government cuts transfers to the province, it has to cut something.... and social programs seem to be the easy target...

And yet the Liberals slashed transfer payments for health, education, and social welfare. And the country was not destroyed. So are you suggesting the Liberals tried to destroy the country? And if so why should we vote for them? You are asking for the re-election of a government which has already done the things you only fear the Tories might do.

The Martin government is running a fear campaign accusing the Tories of something they themsevles did to balance the 1995 budget...

I dislike Martin's Liberals because they are fiscal Conservatives. When Martin's Liberals were patting themselves on the back for deficit reduction, the Harper Cons were complaining that they "didn't go fare enough" with the cuts. Thus, while I think the Liberals are bad, the Cons. are unquestionably much worse.

There is another choice though... vote NDP.

[err]

Eureka,

Under the Conservatives Provincial power will be increased. This began ironically under the Chretien government and more appropriately under Finance Minister Paul Martin when they downloaded responsilibities to the provinces. What they did specifically is increase their responsibility without the appropriate authority. The Canada Health Act is a perfect example, whereby the provinces were forced to do the same with less. As the the problem developed with ever increasing costs the Feds waved the Canada Health Act, threatening  to stop funding if the particular province didn't play within the narrow definition of the Act. This stifled all attempts to find creative solutions to the ever deepening crisis.

The solution is not "being creative", like inviting private health care into the picture. The problem is the cuts in federal financing of health care.

The problem, in recent history began with deficit reduction. Being easier to point to "rising medical costs" as a source of deficit than to look at the reduction of revenue due to corporate tax cuts, Paul Martin (and his predecessors), and our provincial governments chopped financing for health care.... and chopped some more, and chopped some more.

The Federal government has cut transfers so much (to fund corp. tax cuts and deficit reduction) that we have a problem.

This problem is at the forefront of our current political crisis in Canada, but is being pushed out of view as best as possible by the Liberals and Conservatives. The big issue that the NDP has with the Liberals is that they will not put a serious effort into preventing the privatization of our public health care system. The NDP has demanded that all new federal funding (to the provinces) for health care cannot go towards private health care. It has to be spent in the public system. While the Liberals pretend to comply with this for "new" spending, they will not apply it to the $40 Billion of increased health-care funding announced in recent months....

What's wrong with the NDP proposition.... if you really cared for our public system, it is the only sensible course of action. And realistically, according to the Canada Health Act, that is how it is supposed to be..... But Paul Martin's Liberals want some of that $40 Billion to make it back into the hands of the companies that financially contribute to the Liberal party. (Make no mistake, the Cons. are worse than the Liberals in this regard).

The solution is to show the federal parties that we support the parties that support our health care system.... vote NDP.

[Argus]

The naivete is showing!

Isn't it odd that we have all seen welfare abuse and UI abuse even though every investigation shows that they do not exist except in very small degree. But, we like to sit back and feel "holier than thou."

I think you misunderstand the basic nature of people's dislike of welfare abuse, as well as investigations of that abuse. When people like me talk about welfare abuse they talk about healthy young men and women who are too lazy to work, who couldn't be bothered to take on poorly paid, unpleasant jobs, even though you have to start somewhere, who prefer to stay on welfare, drink, hang around with their buddies, and scrounge extra money by begging or doing odd jobs.

When the government investigates welfare abuse it is talking about people receiving welfare cheques under multiple names or at different addresses, or making claims to having children they don't have, etc.

To my mind, if government worked efficiently there would be no healthy people on welfare except for brief periods of time. If you can't find something to do the government should damned well find you something to do. As an example, because many cities have slashed funding for landscapeing, and cut herbicide use over health fears, many cities strees, highways and lands are overgrown with weeds. Put the healthy welfare recipients to work. And after that they can go clean up garbage in parks and along rivers and lakeshores. Before too long they'll decide they want to find some other job, one inside, which pays better.

And for those who believe that organizing such things would cost more than it would save; think again. The idea isn't to get a perfect day's work out of these bums. It's to get some work, and encourage those who can find work elsewhere to do so.

Naturally, I would couple this with a much better skills and education training program.

Only about one third of the unemployed can now qualify for EI under the new rules of the Liberals. That is a drag on the economies of many areas.

It is sad you'd even talk about pogey as an economic boost to economies. It was never intended to be used as it is being used. Whole industries now make use of it to suppliment salaries and keep employees in a non-working state for months at a time. Fishermen, for example, will fish just long enough to get pogey, then sit on their asses the rest of the year. The result? We have far too many fishermen. Without pogey most of them would drift away into doing something else. And if that means leaving fishing communities because there isn't enough fish - so be it.

Construction workers are another heavy abuser of pogey. They get far more than they're worth because over time their wages have taken into account that most of them can't work in winter. But now they get pogey all the times they're not working, and few bother looking for something else to do in winter, as people used to before pogey.

Certainly the Liberal government has reduced transfers to the provinces and should have been turfed out for doing so. Only there is no alternative likely government that does not promise worse. The transfers were reduced by Mulroney most draconially to the point that we almost lost the country as the federal government lost its only remaining effective power: that is the spending power.

We almost "lost" the country? To where, may I ask? In fact, Mulroney's cutbacks were nowhere near as bad as Chretien's, and his was done in the midst of one of the worst recessions in memory. Chretien, on the other hand, sat on fat surpluses year after year. Just as Martin continues to do.

Harper wrote the Reform Party Caucus statement of 1988. In that document, he proposed that access to health care should be two tier with means tested access  for the poor and middle class. He proposed it quite explicitly. He also proposed the removal of the federal government from healthcare and the total provincial control with all the different standards that would bring.

I really don't care what Harper proposed seventeen years ago. I care what the Tories are proposing now. And if adding private resources improves health care service across the board I'm in favour. If it doesn't, then we'll look to someone else. It's not like these processes are irreversable, you know.

Harper proposes to further decentralize by curbing the central government's spending power - the only way it has of exercising any influence in those areas.

That would effectively end Canada as a nation.

[Argus]

The solution is not "being creative", like inviting private health care into the picture.  The problem is the cuts in federal financing of health care.

Why, then, do I continue to see studies which show that Canada spends as much or more than almost anyone on Earth for health care? We spend as much or more as some of the Scandinavian countries, yet do not receive health care services which are as good as theirs.

[Yodeler]

It is sad you'd even talk about pogey as an economic boost to economies. It was never intended to be used as it is being used. Whole industries now make use of it to suppliment salaries and keep employees in a non-working state for months at a time. Fishermen, for example, will fish just long enough to get pogey, then sit on their asses the rest of the year.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

At least the teachers work for close to ten months before (by not renewing their contract until the last minute) they get to enjoy the pogey for two months of each and every year.

[shoop]

Why, then, don't you provide a link to one of these *studies*?

Why, then, do I continue to see studies which show that Canada spends as much or more than almost anyone on Earth for health care? We spend as much or more as some of the Scandinavian countries, yet do not receive health care services which are as good as theirs.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>