Is Thomas Mulcair's $15/hour Minimum Wage Empty Politicking?

The "Bearded Wonder" certainly
has folks abuzz this weekend.

Well good old Tommy certainly has folks all abuzz this weekend with his talk of introducing a federal minimum wage hike to $15 per hour. 

After a rather tepid summer for the NDP in which their only newsworthy announcement was their parroting of the Reform-a-Cons indecent position on the willful destruction of  Gaza, this comes as some good news. 

Yes, they've definitely scooped the Cons and the Libs with a truly positive suggestion for reducing wage inequality (at least a little), reducing poverty (somewhat) and giving consumers more ability to consume (which in the end, is good for the economy...right?) They even have a catchy phrase to go along with it: "People who work full time shouldn't have to live in poverty". 

So the "Bearded Wonder's" plan is to introduce this bill in Parliament within the next few weeks and folks from coast to coast to coast are all enthusiastic that something good might finally be coming their way from Ottawa. 

But hold on a moment! The Reform-a-Cons have a majority in the House, which they tend to wield like a sledge hammer. Everyone knows they are pro big business, free markets, privatization, small government and definitely against anything remotely Socialistic. Mulcair's bill, even if it has full Liberal support (which it won't, most of them will probably have someplace better to be when it comes time to vote) doesn't have a western journalist in Syria's chance of survival. So what the hell is he thinking?

Stephen Harper's collection of
festering Bridge Trolls!

Well, that's the beauty of being the opposition party in a majority government. You can introduce any kind of bill, no matter how outlandish - a free pony to every child born in the month of May for example - knowing full well it will be voted down and you'll never be held responsible for it. The purpose is to make the Government look like a nasty bunch of festering bridge trolls...which they are of course. 

So is this little ray of hope and sunshine from the NDP nothing but an empty gesture aimed at playing politics at the expense of the Evil Empire? Well of course it is. But it's a little more than that too.

Since the Cons have introduced the notion of the perpetual campaign to the Canadian political scene, all three main party's have been jostling for the limelight. Thus far, the charismatic and photogenic Prince Justin seems to have done the better job of this with his perpetual message of "hope, hope and more hope". He's not really saying what exactly we're hoping for as yet, but hey, anything is better than four more years of Harper and his merry band of bobble-heads. 

All the while, Mulcair has been plodding along, being perhaps, the best Opposition leader in recent memory. But being good at roasting the government in Question Period doesn't really score a lot of points with the GP (general public). NO one watches CPAC (except for journalists and political junkies) so most folks don't really "get" just how good Tommy is at his job.

So with 2015 just around the corner, this $15 minimum wage bill is certainly a good way of getting the GP talking about the NDP again and you can bet that it will be a central plank in their 2015 election platform. And by forcing the Cons to unanimously vote the bill down, you can also bet Mulcair will be reminding us at every turn how Citizen Stephen and the Harpercondriacs don't want Canadians to make a decent living wage. Because they're evil and all.

So then, what are the chances of this bill ever receiving any serious discussion? Well, none in the current Parliament. But there is a very good chance that the next Government will be a minority, so if the Dippers can hold on to the momentum they gained in 2011, they could well be in a position to wield some significant clout. If they're not the outright governing party, they could be the ones holding the votes that sustain whom ever is in the driver's seat. And with the skillful use of "give and take politics", that's a pretty good place to be sitting.

So in the short term, Tom's minimum wage bill might seem like some empty politicking, but in the long term, there might actually be a glimmer of hope of him actually pulling this off. But to do this, he has to keep his momentum going and keep people talking about the NDP. This weekend, he's done just that. 

An idea who's time is long overdue?

On the passing of Jim Flaherty

I intended to say nothing out of
respect for his family. But.....

As my Dad used to say, "if you can't say something good about somebody, then say nothing at all". Good advice for the most part that I've admittedly ditched in my mad rantings about the evils of Stephen Harper's Reform-a-Cons in this blog. But when one of the enemies of the state pass, it's only good etiquette to suspend the vitriolic volleys out of respect for the family of the deceased. 

So with that in mind, I had resolved to say nothing at all regarding the late Jim Flaherty. I didn't like the man in life, but the passing of any human being is a tragedy of mammoth proportions to the family of the deceased. I know this from personal experience. So do most people my age. So I suspended my twitter attacks on the Harpercondriacs for a good 24 hours out of respect, not for the passing of the man himself, but out of respect for his grieving family. 

The Opposition parties were suitably solemn as one would expect them to be when any of their colleagues buy's the farm. Hell, even Harper himself was positively magnanimous about the departure of the late Jack Layton, offering to allow him a state funeral. But knowing what a cold hearted heel Harper is, this was probably not as much out of respect,  but thanks for the surge in Laytons NDP in 2011 that may well have helped Harper win his fraudulent majority government. 

But now the undeserved accolades for Flaherty are pouring in. Mostly from the

Jim Flaherty, Friend of the 1%.

mainstream media who hypocritically seem intent on canonizing the very man they routinely lambasted (and rightly so) in their columns. It is one thing for Citizen Stephen to heap adoration on his co-conspirator, calling him a "great Canadian". One would expect that. But for the supposedly unbiased news media, this is absolutely intolerable. 

 The Ottawa Citizen said that Flaherty was: "a steady hand on the tiller", a phrase taken directly from the "Harper spin-doctor" play-book. The Halifax Chronicle Herald claimed that Flaherty had:  "...a reputation at home and abroad as a capable minister" (I'm sure the Euro Zone won't much miss ol Jim's finger pointing and vacuous lecturing).  The Globe And Mail even went so far as to say that: "Jim Flaherty helped save the world from economic meltdown". Puleeeeze!

All old Jimbo did, was to take credit for the work Paul Martin did in stabilizing our economy and regulating our banks against just the sort of meltdown that did occur in 2008. If you'll remember, Jimmy denied the very existence of the recession at first. And even prior to the 2008 crisis, he had already squandered the $16 billion dollar surplus he had inherited from Martin on tax cuts that every expert in the field had advised against.  And when Mark Carney left the Bank Of Canada for England, Flaherty seemed absolutely lost.  

Put the fucking homeless in JAIL!

I can go on ad nauseum as to why Mr. F was nothing like the "Great Canadian" he is being made out to have been today. But think Austerity (ever notice that Flaherty and austerity rhyme?). Think vindictive cuts to the CBC. Think about the attack on the jobless via EI. Think about the attacks on the CPP and universal health care. Think about those mammoth, undemocratic, Omnibus-budget bills of his. And Think about the man who wanted to jail the homeless as Jimmy wanted to do when he was a Harrisite in Ontario. And while we're on the subject of Ontario, I'm sure there are thousands of families in Walkerton who will never forget nor forgive what Flaherty, Harris and Clement did to them. 

For more detail on Flaherty's record, see what the good folks at Progressive Press had to say when Uncle Jimmy stepped down as Finance Minister last month: What's With All The Praise For Jim Flaherty's Record

Well I've done a fine job of not heeding my father's advice once again. I didn't wish to speak ill of Jimmy at this time. It goes against the grain for me. So can't we just get by with saying Jim was "a good family man with a sense of humour" and leave it at that? Do we need to get all hypocritical and, well, LIE about the man? He was a career public servant, yes. But there are many, many, many Canadians today who wish he hadn't been. So lets just be respectful of the family and drop the Bull Shit. Ok?

The man who said "there's no such thing
as a bad job" never worked at a "McJob",
harvested tobacco, or slaved in a factory.

Why Do the Reform-a Cons Lie Cheat and Steal? Because They Can!

It is a basic tenet of consumerism/corporatism that the market will charge for it's products and services what ever it can safely get away with. Traditionally, this means that producers/businesses will charge whatever consumers will pay for their widgets. It has nothing to do with the actual value of their products or services in real terms. It is all about the value that consumers place upon them. What ever the population is willing to accept.  It is supposed to keep the markets fair and act as a means of keeping the producers from gouging the public.  

The price of a given product rarely
has anything to do with it's actual
value.

But have you ever wondered why we are paying $1.30 for a litre of gasoline (more in many places across Canada), $12 for a pack of cigarettes, $3.00 for a bag of chips or 20 (+) % interest on a credit card when the prime lending rate is 7 or 8%? And remember when we didn't have to pay "Interac" fees for banking at ATMs other than our own? It's because the people who make these things or provide these services CAN charge us these abominable rates. We are addicted to gasoline and cigarettes so our collective "need" is vastly exploited by the producers. We WANT our chips so we will pay almost anything the producers will charge and we desperately NEED our credit cards, at any cost. A citizen without a credit card is no citizen at all. And banks charge us Interac fees now because we have become accustom to the convenience here in our new-improved hyper-convenient society. In essence, we are charged exorbitant fees and prices because the markets CAN charge us exorbitant fees and prices. There is no law against it in a "Free Market" economy and any so-called watch-dogs have little or no clout to enforce reasonable pricing. This is a capitalist society. It's how it works.

The Invisible Hand
of Capitalism.

But what does all this have to do with the Reform/Conservative Party (otherwise known as the Conservative Party of Canada, or as I refer to them, the Reform-a-Cons)? I mean, they are a political party, right? What does corporatism have to do with politics? Well for starters, traditional Conservative parties have been identified with Business interests. Their philosophy, whether you buy it or not, is that whatever is good for business is good for the country and hence good for society. This is not necessarily and erroneous belief as long as one also believes in the "Invisible Hand" of capitalism which is supposed to be in essence, the law of supply and demand and that the wealth from prosperous businesses will trickle down to the consumer class, thus creating perpetual balance in the capitalist society. A lovely notion if it were true. The problem is, if there ever WAS an Invisible Hand, it no longer exists. But I digress...

It stands to reason then that in traditional Conservative circles, these politicians have often been well connected in business. If not, they have been extremely sympathetic to the needs of the business class. But let us not forget, our current Majority Conservative government is anything BUT a traditional Conservative group. This so-called party has evolved from the extremest, evangelically driven Reform Party. They possess the Conservative name only because of the treachery of Peter MacKay who, as the last leader of the old Progressive Conservative Party, sold his soul to Stephen Harper in return for power and influence. So imagine then, the traditional business friendly Conservative principles, mutated and distorted by extremism and religious dogma. This then, is the Reform-a-Con Party of Canada and they view themselves as being on a divine mission.

And if you buy that line of crap that the
Reform-A-Cons had nothing to do
with fraudulent Robo-calls, then have I got
a deal for YOU on Florida swamp land. CHEAP!

So this current Conservative party has decided to use the marketing strategies and unwritten principles of the corporate world in order to achieve their mission. Harper has decided to run the country as though it was a business and he views Canadians as being no more than consumers, purchasers of his snake-oil, to be bamboozled and exploited.    As a result we end up with Robo-calls, secrecy, contempt of/for Parliament and disregard for the well being of the general public and their democratic rights. Not to mention the blatant disregard for the environment, women's rights and science, all of which are seen, as being bad for the Reform-a-Con Business.  So we now end up with the most corrupt government in our history. 

But why would a political party, who's future is based solely on the approval of the masses lie, cheat and steal their way into power? And how on earth can they get away with it? Well aside from the fact that they believe it is their divine mission, they use these tactics for the same reason businesses and services rob from us. They do it because they CAN and there is no one to stop them. The Reform-a-Cons have learned their business strategies well and have become adept at  exploiting every conceivable loop-hole in the law. Canadian law, at least as far as politics and elections are concerned, was established for Canada as it was 100 years ago with minor modifications being made along the way. It was not designed for, nor could it ever have envisioned, the information age nor the coming of the Reform-a-Cons. As such, it is outdated and ripe for exploitation by a zealous generation of "political entrepreneurs". 

So who is to stop this corrupt bunch from making a mockery of our democracy? Elections Canada? The RCMP? It took five years for Elections Canada to finally gain a conviction over the Reform-a-Cons for the "In and Out" scandal of 2006. And what was the penalty? a $52,000 fine. A slap on the wrist. The Government of Harper spent ten times that amount just in court costs alone. And because the Reform-a-Cons had all the money (our tax dollars) they were able to drag the case out for years. And what ever happened to all those breaches of ethics by one Minister or another? A few Mea Culpas and that was it. And what ever happened to that Contempt of Parliament ruling? The Reform-a-Cons used it to spin, manipulate and connive their way into majority government. No accountability what so ever. And what about the travesty of the G20, the Gazebos? NOTHING? And what about the Supreme Court ruling that The Government of Harper had actively denied Omar Khadr his Charter rights. NOTHING!

When they had a minority government, the Reform-a-Cons successfully kept the sadly splintered opposition chasing their own tails. Now that they have a majority government, there is essentially, no one to hold the Government of Harper to account. The watchdogs that weren't already toothless, have become so under the Harper regime. And we are three years away from the next election so even the voters who care and are inclined to do so, are powerless to topple this corrupt, banana-republic regime. 

So the Government of Harper, as I said earlier, the most corrupt government in our history, lies, cheats and steals from Canadian taxpayers on an almost daily basis, because they CAN and no one and nothing can stop them. It's just good business.