Taxes, Taxes, Taxes

So the Alward government has resorted to increased taxes again to help slow the flow of red ink. It was bad enough the wealthy in this province had been singled out to be punished, now every person in the province working person in the province will be required to pay more for the bureaucratic / crony capitalist empire that we call the New Brunswick government.

Are spending cuts not on the table at all? Is there anybody in government who realizes we cannot tax and spend our way to prosperity? Are there any conservatives in government?

This is very disheartening to say the least.

The government will hide behind the line that the tax cut had not been implemented yet, but announcing the hike during the Christmas season shows that higher taxes, more spending and runaway bureaucracy and regulation is the plan to grow our economy.

Some plan.

When you steal from Peter to give to Paul, you can always count on the support of Paul.

A Good Start - Eliminating 6 MLAs

Have to give Alward some credit on the plan to shrink the size of the legislature from 55 members to 49.

Taking it down to 39 would have been better, but the reality of trying to keep his caucus together probably limited how much he could really reduce the number.

When the census data quantifies the movement of people from rural areas to urban areas, our hope is still that the suggested range of +/- 5% is adhered to. Every vote should have equal weight, whether that voter lives in Dieppe or Bathurst.

A Law For Thee, But Not For Me

The Energy Minister is evidently going to void a legally binding contract with Enbridge Gas NB. While he is doing that, could he also write legislation cutting everybody's mortgages by 15%?

Read CBC story here.

So the government makes a terrible deal years ago with a company acting in good faith. The company would assume the government would act in good faith. Now we are going to use force to accomplish what we could not accomplish at the bargaining table.

This does give us hope that when we fuck up the deal to extract natural gas from our land we will at least act like a third world dictatorship and just void the contract.

Just because Enbridge Gas NB is part of an evil energy company should not make them crime victims at the hands of our provincial government. But to be fair, we are going in by the front door, not smashing a window and crawling through to pillage their assets.

Dog Bites Man

So, lets get this straight:

Rural MLA in New Brunswick lobbies Minster responsible for DOT to get a local guy a job and a local guy with a truck a gravel contract.

And this is news? This is exactly what New Brunswick politics is!

As long as government uses employment as a way to collect votes, offers of employment will be used to collect votes.

Priceless, Pig at the Trough Line of the Week

Elected Senate Illegal

Not only is she a pig at the trough, she thinks anyone that the people select would be illegal. She is not only a blood-sucking vulture, she is stupid to boot.This is what appointed Senators yield.

Based on Wikipedia, this woman has been trough-feeding for almost a quarter of a century.

Senator Ringuette is required to leave the senate in about 20 years. She has already been there almost 10.

She is shockingly arrogant and stupid. Thank you Jean Chretien for this wonderful gift that keeps on taking.

Will Alward Do It?

Throne Speech Today.

Hopefully the needed spending cuts are coming. We will see.

Why Does the NB Government Have to Look After Your Parents?

The endless screaming "Government do More!" keeps on at cbc.ca

Here is the latest article.

What did we do before the advent of taxing people to into submission? Did people look after their loved ones? Did churches and charities help out?

Maybe if taxes were not so high, son or daughter could look after their own families, like what happened for generations.

It does not take a village to look after Grandma, it takes you. And I would wager a bet if you were paying for Grandma's accommodations, the quality would be better. But that is only because it would be your money, not "The Government's".

Blaine Higgs, Minister Alone

First off let me state I think Minister Higgs is wrong to suggest higher taxes (as he has recently), is the answer to our fiscal problems.

But at least he is stating the obvious, we are in a pickle.

We are like the alcoholic that wakes up in the morning thinking the solution to our hangover is "Hair of the Dog".


Our problem is they cannot stop spending our children's future incomes. We need real solutions to their spending problem, not just another credit card that someone else makes the minimum payment on.

I worry nobody is listening to Minister Higgs, whether it is in the Legislature or the halls of the government offices.

We need to eliminate a dozen departments, hundreds of programs, and thousands of civil servants. Just raising taxes to have it wasted in Fredericton will not make us richer, it will only transfer wealth from the creators of the wealth (businesses and their employees) to government employees. Which is only great if you are one of the chosen with a job for life and a defined benefit pension plan.

Harper and Flaherty, Are They Just Liars?

Minister Flaherty;

If the budget is not balanced by the end of the current term, and families do not receive the promised tax cut through income splitting, you are a liar.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has a good piece on it.

Spending Problem? No Problem, Just Raise Taxes

It seems Finance Minister Higgs cannot control spending, so he is moving to the other side of the ledger, and just raising taxes. I pains me to keep stating it, but you cannot increase taxes to increase the wealth of New Brunswickers.

CBC Link here.

Now user fees are generally fine in my books, if they would cut taxes somewhere (anywhere?) else. But I wonder why everyone seems to like this tax, er, user fee, as opposed to user fees on other things?

The problem in NB is runaway spending, and Minister Higgs appears to have zero ability to control that.

Health spending is increasing exponentially with no plan. The Minister of Health needs to do something other than backtrack on a plan to stop covering the cost of flu shots.

Education is still increasing in spite of declining enrollment. Time to 'rationalize' our assets. Close and sell some schools, even the empty ones in the Speaker's riding.

Welfare is out of control with a minister who thinks paying people to not work will help them. Welfare is a trap. Spending more money their will lead to careers collecting welfare. And nepotism in the welfare collecting business is rampant. We are not just creating current people with no hope, but future generations of no hope.

Our government is spending so wildly drunken sailors are concerned we are hurting their reputaion.

More spending and higher taxes will not improve our economy Minister Higgs.

Saint John workers 'attacked'

CBC is reporting that Jamie Hachey, President of the Saint John Police Association, is extremely upset that the city is broke.

No, actually he is upset that the city may finally do something about their abysmal financial situation.

The City of Saint John is driving residents away. Maybe de-indexing pensions is better than bankruptcy, but Mr. Hachey does not seem to care how broke the city is, how shoddy the infrastructure is, or how many people leave the city to get away from runaway staffing costs inflating their tax bills and eating up city taxes that could be spent fixing roads.

Those who cannot afford to move to Quispamsis or Grand Bay will be left holding the bag in Saint John.

Like Fredericton to the north, many city employees have so little interest in supporting their city they will not even live in it. The union leadership in Saint John is blind to reality. The provincial government is not going to bail them out.

Saint John is a city in decline in search of leadership. Ivan Court is not it, and obviously the union leadership thinks there are still 90,000 people living in the city paying property taxes.

Taking 'til It Hurts

Alec Bruce of the Moncton Times Transcript has a great article titled 'Giving until it hurts'.

Read it here

Now the T&T has some run some stupid columns, but is there nobody there reviewing this crap?

Mr. Bruce starts off with a wonderful bit about how charitable we are (second only to Malta, tied with Ireland!), then starts on some garbage about the federal government wanting value for money or some stupid thing from those organizations our tax money gets showered on. Imagine! Actually showing you did something with the money, what do these damn crazy right-wingers want?

A few points for Mr. Bruce:

1. The federal government taking your wealth and sending it elsewhere is not charity, it is taxation. Charity is money you voluntarily part with.

2. Expecting said charities to actually DO what they claim to do may seem onerous or unrealistic to you, but expecting more than nice brochures and a couple of trips to the Caribbean is not too much to ask, is it? The people the money was confiscated from would like to know who got to go to Barbados and did they get the buffet. And did Busty Hookers get expensed?

3. You then move on to a paragraph about the crime bill and the gun registry. It is damn stupid legislation to lock up pot heads for being stupid, but what does this have to do with charity? And allowing people to own guns without a Toronto bureaucrat in the loop? What does that have to do with charitable giving? Or are the billions wasted on that more 'charity'?

4. Next we move on to Britain. PM David Cameron expects the private sector to burden more of the charity work. Well duh, if the government is doing it, it ain't charity.

5. Lastly, you state 'There is no credible evidence that points to federally-funded, Canadian non-profits wasting vast amounts of taxpayer money en masse.' Well Sherlock, who is measuring it? Nobody, that's who. And you seem too suggest this person, nobody, is who should measure it.

Confusing charity with taxation is possibly the dumbest thing the T&T has printed this week. But it is only Monday.

ALWARD - MORE PROGRESSIVE THAN CONSERVATIVE

When the political pundits get bored in the in the distant future and decide to do a historical search for “Canada’s Worst Provincial Premier EVER”. Shawn Graham would be NB’s nominee.

Comparing Alward to Graham is ridiculous in the sense that Graham performed so poorly that we would have been better served by a semi-retarded lump pulled from the Jobs Unlimited labour pool. In other words, Alward can only be measured by his actions. Lets have a look at some of them.

1.The New Brunswick Energy Commission: Remember this? Bill Thompson and Jeannot Volpe roaming the province with their “public engagement” entourage. What were their final recommendations?

a.Provide more bureaucratic over-site for the already bloated crown corporation,

b.Ban electric baseboard heaters and

c. Increase power rates for those who already have them installed.

Not bad content for a 10 yr energy plan. Somebody should dig this report out if or when Craig Leonard decides to do something with his portfolio other than open an office in Fredericton and make sure his sister has cushy job in the Premier’s office.

2.The Cell Phone Legislation: The list of unnecessary legislation is long but this one may be the proof that the PC Party of NB is really not in the business of doing anything that really makes a difference. The Nanny State grows yet again. What’s next? Tanning beds?


3.Cut Spending and Lower Taxes: What is the correct word for a government that says one thing but does the exact opposite. Gas tax up, booze tax up, gov’t spending up 63 million. Not to mention this gov’t is trying to soften the ground for an HST hike. This isn’t governing, this is pandering.


4. INVEST NB: WTF?? They created ANOTHER gov’t agency! This all we needed…more government. Whatever the current moniker of age old gov’t sponsored economic development, the results are always the same, cronyism and the vanishing of taxpayers money.


5. Alward DID NOTHING to help New Brunswickers get to the bottom of the ATCON scandal. $70 million gone forever and tory backbenchers silenced on the issue.

That being said, the most disappointing aspect of Alward, year 1, was the budget. They missed the best opportunity in decades to tackle the size of government.  I will end with a question. Do fiscal conservatives exist?

It Was Not Just Us Who Got Screwed on Solar Panels

From National Review:

The best quote from the article could be written about scores of New Brunswick politicians, many masquerading as Conservatives.

"His economically illiterate base spends its time decrying “corporations,” but urban-gardening cooperatives don’t create a lot of jobs, and community-based nonprofits by definition don’t create any profit, and therefore no investment capital, and therefore no economic growth. You want to see some real, sustainable, long-term jobs created, your best bet is to look to a “corporation”—“corporation” simply being the word for a business that has grown large enough or profitable enough to require the legal organization of its affairs. But if you’re Barack Obama, not just any corporation will do: It has to be just the right sort of corporation."

Here in New Brunswick we spend our days complaining about the Irvings and McCains being too rich. The difference between them and our politicians is you can buy gas and French fries if you want. Or not. But short of leaving, which many of our friends have done, you cannot escape the ever greedy politician.

UPDATED: Very, Very, VERY Important People, and the Newspapermen Who Heed Their Wishes

The original post follows below.

Seems the Telegraph Journal has taken down the story linked below.

Not sure why, but here are some possibilities.

1. Mistakes in the story. Could be, but why not fix and a retraction?

2. The government carrot. The government offered them something worth more than the reputation of their flagship New Brunswick daily.

3. The government stick. Government threatened to punish them harshly, since they are in terribly over-regulated businesses, they understand the cost of even more draconian regulations.


Original Post

It seems the people of New Brunswick have been hosed to the tune of $810,000 in six months so they can fly around the province instead of drive like everyone else.


All these Cabinet Ministers are staffed with Executive Assistants. The EA can drive while the good minister rests.


Read about it here


These are the things that average New Brunswickers lose their minds over.


Sell the damn plane. And for those ministers that feel the need to use the plane, be prepared for the disgust of the people.

It Seems $1.5 Million is Small Change

Reminds me of the old joke; a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon we are talking real money.

Why is $1,500,000 insignificant to the people of New Brunswick?

Regardless of what is being said, it is still actual dollars and cents for New Brunswickers. I would wager if the 1.5 mil was coming out of Minister Leonard's pockets this would warrant more attention.

To Frack or Not To Frack

The government of NB is doing a horrible job building the case for shale gas exploration via hydo-fracking.

Some think fracking is the economic promise land for the province, others think it will turn our environment into something resembling Sudbury in the 80's.

The answer is neither of those things. There will be some environmental hurdles to overcome, but on the other hand we will not become the Clampetts.

But to ignore the potential of shale gas because a few people are handing out bootleg copies of Gasland, stupidifying the population regarding the issue, is not the answer.The government needs to educate the population to the benefits and risks. So far all we have heard is "It is in our platform". The people of NB need truthful information, not provided by those that think one dead frog is too many.

Hiding in the Centennial Building, hoping the problem goes away is not working. There has to be someone sitting around the cabinet table with a grasp of the facts who can refute the nonsense of the Gasland Kool-Aid drinkers.

Someone. Anyone?

Unemployment in New Brunswick Increases Again

1500 more people without work

It appears you cannot tax, spend and regulate your way to a better economy after all.

For comparison, Maine is at 7.8% unemployment, New Hampshire is at 4.9% unemployment. NB has an unemployment rate double that of NH and 29% higher than Maine.

More government spending will not help.

L'Acadie Nouvelle Wants In Your Pants

So L'Acadie Nouvelle is running out of cash.

Nothing sexual about this, they only want your money. Do not distress though, they only want the money you have chosen to spend somewhere other than on a subscription to their paper.

The paper cannot earn enough to stay afloat, even with a trust fund set up to generate cash for them to burn each year.

Now Paul Robichaud gets to pick, you keep your money or L'Acadie Nouvelle gets it. This should be a simple choice.

Private Donations? Robbie Burns Returns to Fredericton

Too bad the entire statue could not have been funded privately, but halfway is a good start.

Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Irving for stepping forward and donating their money to this.

It Could be Worse

This is staggeringly astonishing that Bernanke could state this.

http://business.financialpost.com/2011/07/13/not-raising-debt-ceiling-like-refusing-to-pay-your-credit-card-bernanke/

And we think politicians are stupid.

It really has nothing to do with New Brunswick government incompetence, but does highlight stupidity goes clear to the top.

Only in Fredericton

So the residents of Fredericton are about to acquire a strip joint.

The Movie Monkey Business

The taxpayers of New Brunswick are back in the movie business.

Giving away money to Investors, Actors, Directors, Producers and Technicians was such a good idea, they cancelled the free loot a few months ago.

But that was a few months ago, before Economic Development Minister Paul Robichaud realized the vote-purchasing could be had in his area of expertise, the Acadian Peninsula.

Now Minister Robichaud has never met a vote-buying scheme he didn't like, so it is not surprising he is so newly enamored with the film industry.

If subsidizing this industry it is such a good idea today, why was it such a bad idea a few months ago? Were the old filmmakers in ridings the Tories did not win last year? Do filmmakers not vote PC? Is the current crop of taxpayer cash recipients better connected than the ones who got spurned before?


Check out the CBC Story

This vote-buying vignette has been made possible by the taxpayers of New Brunswick and Canada.