Thats January 2009 in the books

Well that’s the first month gone by for this year and a somewhat eventful one at that. President Barack Obama was inaugurated and proceeded to get busy immediately revising some of the bad legislation that George Bush imposed. That included the closing of Guantanamo Bay prison camp, which is good because their were people being held in that prison without trials for years and years without even being charged, the proper place for this activity is in a normal court of law! He also made it legal for each individual state to legislate it own vehicle emission standards, George Bush prevented this and the auto makers will finally have to keep up to the foreign auto plants who make fuel economy and emission their priority. Another thing he did just the other day was to make a new law that enabled women the right for fair and equal pay, Obama really does have values that reflect a Liberal attitude. Contrary to this new American law for women’s rights our Conservative government led by Steven Harper introduced his new budget for 2009, and in it he outlined the fact that the Canadian law for women’s fairness and equity would no longer be a legislated matter and instead is up to each women to barter and negotiate. Wow that just shows the difference between Liberals, who look out for the rights of individuals, and the Conservatives like George Bush and Steven Harper who look out for the interest of businesses and that "old boy's" club mentality. Speaking of that new budget, on Tuesday it was officially released and man o man what an expensive budget. This budget puts us on track for a deficit of over 85 billion dollars over a matter of 4 or 5 years, that’s the same debt we had over twenty years ago, the last time a Conservative government was in power, Brian Malroney. The Liberals had to vote yes to this budget because of the complete and utter chaos that our parliament was in, having being prorogued and all. Other countries were the governments could or would not take immediate action on the financial crisis surrounding all of us, have either been over thrown or their is rioting in the streets, countries like Iceland, England, France, Italy, Spain, ect. Anyways the Liberals did the right thing by not voting no, the budget will pass and some of the much needed money that has been allocated to infrastructure spending will be spent and that puts Canadians back to work and off of E.I. They also added an amendment that requires the Conservatives to report back quarterly to show how all this money and plans have helped the economy to get back to normal. I do not agree with most things in this budget but the need to get things started right away far out weigh the need to get all the details in order. The N.D.P. are really mad about the Liberals decision to support the budget because Jack Layton was hell bent on forming a coalition government and he used the agreement he had with Stephane Dion as the sole purpose to oppose everything and anything that Conservative government said or did, at the end of the day it is the N.D.P. who look childish and no cooperative. I hope under the new leadership of Michael Ignatieff that the Liberals do get back into power, and quickly, because it always seems to be the Liberals who are financially responsible and they do look out for the vulnerable and the minority groups. I think that us Canadians have the reputation in the world for being polite, pleasant, tolerant, and leaders in equality, is because it has been a Liberal government in power here in Canada for about 90% of our existence as a country. Sure they have done some things wrong or their had been corruption but every government has that, no one is perfect and the good things far out weigh the bad things with the Liberals. Anyways that’s the post this week, I have been clipping out the various infrastructure projects slated for the Okanagan and I will be following up on what government spending is done here and how many jobs it will be creating, I look forward to blogging about that.

New Budget Deficits

Well my second blog of the year and a lot has happened since last weeks post, Barack Obama was sworn in as president, our Conservative government leaked out the budget numbers before next weeks presentation, and both my N.F.L. teams were eliminated from playoffs. I am absolutely ecstatic with the fact America has a black president, but more elated that his values are so aligned with just about every reasonable human being on this planet. I believe he is going to be a great leader that the whole world will benefit from, he has already started making positive changes and he’s only on his second day.
Anyways I am trying to keep this blog related to Canadian politics, so I will voice my opinions about the projected deficit that the government figures it needs to spend to help out with the recession. First of all I can not figure out why there is such a hubbub about how and where they will spend the stimulus package, when in fact every municipality across Canada has many project to fix, enhance, or create infrastructure. We all know that working on new roads, bridges, highways, rail systems, parks and pathways, schools and universities, community centres, sports complexes, these all create jobs, and jobs generate taxes which in turn give the government more money to work on more infrastructure, which well we know creates more… I have made some comments on various blogs with regards to the thirty plus billions in deficit that Steven Harper has put in his budget and has projected that this recession will last for five years, WOW!
I find the circumstances surrounding this budget to be quit concerning, sixty four billion dollars over two years, and an increase of thirteen billion dollars spent on the daily operations of this government? I question if that amount will have any substantial long term benefit to our Canadian economy, or will this just be an exercise of futility. This type of spending over five years brings us to the same type of debt load we had almost a decade ago? The Conservatives have done very little to enhance Canadian investments and in fact with the income trust fiasco, have in my opinion done more to hurt our economy during the last three years. I’m not sure that the thirteen billion dollar increase isn’t because of their mismanagement, and that the remaining twenty one billion will only go to more public announcements and political posturing that have little or no action. Since the economic statement and the proroguing of the house, all they have been doing seems to be related to the publics perception, that they are consulting with all the right people who will advise us properly the way through this mess. If I remember correctly, during the election campaign last September, Mr. Dion was criticized by Mr. Harper that the only plan or strategy he had was to consult with business leaders and provincial leaders to make a plan, that was four long months ago. What has Mr. Harper been doing for the last four weeks?, exactly what he was criticizing Mr. Dion for suggesting. I don’t know but more and more I’m feeling that Mr. Harper has not only lost the confidence of the house, but also my confidence as well.

New Year & New Goals

Well here we are at the beginning of a new year and time for "new year resolutions", some people like to call them resolutions, I prefer to call them GOALS. I don’t smoke, don’t drink, don’t do drugs, don’t have any bad habits to speak of, ok I swear a bit now and again, and I can lose my temper somewhat, but nothing major or anything like that. Oh and the whole procrastination thing, well I definitely need to put that down for a immediate short term goal! My last blog was back in September while were in a federal election (again!), by the way my guy lost again and yes were stuck with this lying right wing nut job who has the mass media in his back pocket. On the topic of that procrastination thing, well we are already half way through the month and I'm only now putting together my first post of the year here, mind you I have posted a new blog on my other and more personal site. I have being active with my comments on a variety of blog sites so far and I continue to frequent the C.B.C. news comment section to recommend and evaluate different comments. This year I do intend to put more effort into increasing the frequency of my post, and man as I think about the various things to blog about, their are so many; election results, a new party leader for the Liberals, Barrack Obama wins and the ongoing results of that as they pertain to Canada, the ongoing problems in the middle east and Israel, and the economic atmosphere here in Canada and how that may effect the rest of the world. Some of my other goals are to; find more time for reading, to get more involved in community volunteering, and of course more physical fitness activities, and yes less procrastination.