Andrew Weaver and Dancing With the Devil

Written by Grant G

I have never voted for the Green Party but can freely admit that many of their goals are laudable, essential, vitol to preserving life on a finite planet...

I read an article in the Financial Post, it was titled...

"Dear British Columbians, what were you thinking? NDP Influenced Provinces are Where The Economy Goes To Die"

Article was written by American Diane Francis

http://business.financialpost.com/diane-francis/dear-british-columbians-what-were-you-thinking-ndp-influenced-provinces-are-where-the-economy-goes-to-die

Diane was amazed BCers didn't hold their nose and vote for BC Liberals(her words)...Diane says that gas, oil and pipelines are the source of BC's wealth, and how BC was the darling of Canada economically because of those industries...

It was at that point I tuned Diane Francis out...her garbage column wouldn't get printed anywhere on merit, or facts, even as propaganda spin it fails in the absurd, like I said, it wouldn't get published anywhere on merit, at least anywhere reputable........Financial Post, Canada's number one business newspaper..."least anywhere reputable"...

Diane Francis is educated, unlike Christy Clark, Diane Francis probably even graduated...

It amazes me, a newspaper, Canada's number one business newspaper allows falsehoods, no, allows economic lies to be peddled like a penny stock....

BC's wealth in the long ago past was derived by a mere handful of industries, forestry, fishing, mining, limited natural gas(not LNG) but that was the past....commercial fishing is a shadow of its formal self, so is forestry, since the BC Liberals were elected in 2001....35,000 forestry jobs gone.... 150 lumber mills shuttered....Mining profits today, in 2017 are so bad the people of British Columbia have to pay big mining companies' electricity bill.....BC's wealth over the last decade has been generated through taxation on residential and commercial construction in BC's southern major urban centers, not in our north...and that's not to say our northern BC populous doesn't contribute to BC's economy, they certainly do...diversification is key, ..BC's movie industry is also a huge economic driver, however, BC's movie industry can go ice cold fast, movie industry is very mobile....Greater Vancouver movie studios enjoy the perks of a 75 cent dollar...if Canada's dollar rises to 95 cents or higher, or above the US greenback...our movie business literally evaporates..The same reality exists with tourism...low Canadian dollar and tourists flock here to see natural beauty.

Diane Francis failed to mention BC's ballooning debt, a debt rising by $5 billion per year on average under BC Liberals, that too, like unfettered resource extraction, is unsustainable..

Diane Francis failed to mention that Christy Clark, and Gordon Campbell before her sold public assets to claim balanced budgets, raided crown corporations of imaginary profits....

Diane Francis talks about BC Liberals being the only "free enterprise government"... she(Diana Francis) must be confused, does she mean free enterprise or Socialism....

Tax dollars wasted, $10 billion plus for a no-business case hydroelectric dam, being paid for by dollars generated in our cities, tax dollars, ...a vanity project, like building pyramids, 1000's of workers paid to build Site C pyramid...

$12 billion dollar Massey bridge(3.5 billion build cost and $8 billion in interest charges), more taxpayer money..more socialism...Port Mann bridge, same thing, the private sector said no to financing that project, BC Liberals in an 11th hour bailout was forced to finance the boondoggle, more and more tax dollars are required to maintain these money losers, by any definition that is socialism..money losing BC Place (with a non-functioning retractable roof)...money losing BC Convention center, both went 100% over budget, both bailed out with tax dollars, all losing money,  this is socialism not the free market...Vanity projects

No business case for Site C Dam...what business savvy entity spends money they don't have without a business case..BC Liberals do time after time...therein explains BC's ballooning debt..a massive increase in BC's debt, with Moodys ringing the alarm, with others rating agencies telling us(BC) that we've reached the end of our provincial creditcard.

Business savvy is AltaGas not building a LNG liquefaction plant in Kitimat because they had no buyers....BG(British Gas)...Shell Canada...Petronas and Woodfibre...those companies all tried to make a smart economic business case, they all made the right decision...no customers, no FIDs, those resource extractors, those free enterprisers walked away from BC because no profit was to be had..and it had nothing to do with who was in power, it was purely an economic decision

Massey bridge proposal....only Christy Clark and one local mayor(Delta Mayor Lois Jackson) want that Socialism project to move forward...all other BC mayors oppose, so do the people of British Columbia....Diane Francis, isn't free market supposed to be private money?..not government make work...hmmm, and considering we have a major bridge(Patullo) connecting New Westminster to those South of the Fraser that is at the end of its lifetime, a dilapidated 75 year old bridge that could be toppled in a windstorm....shouldn't that needed replacement be priority? before the wind blows it down?

I could go on embarrassing you Diane Francis.....no reputable publisher would allow a mistake riddled column that bad to be aired, it's almost like you know nothing about British Columbia, appears you merely went to stock/archived Conservative attack ad memes as a source, your article would fail as a thesis, fail as a homework project...it's almost as bad as Warren Kinsella's work(almost)....Financial Post...only thing missing in their newspaper name is the word.... Com

If the NDP signed longterm IPP contracts that bleed money from the public year after year, contracts going out decades, if the NDP tried to ram through a vanity bridge project that no one wanted, if NDP proposed indebting BC Hydro for 100 years while driving up residential rates without a business case....Howls from the business savvy would never end..

Like I said, never voted Green, not because of their policies, not because of sustainability or long-term vision, i've never voted Green for reasons of survival, to remove Harper one had to vote for a contender, to remove BC Liberals the same applied, unfortunately, for many reasons including financial the Green Party was not a political force under a first past the post electoral system...we can change that..but not with a BC Liberal Government.

Mines, existing mines, if they can't profit with low ore prices than they need to shutter too, like buggywhip factories, they are no more....Mines need to clean up their messes, 10's of billions in reclamation and clean-up costs stare the British Columbia taxpayer in the face, taxpayers left to clean-up the Robber Baron's messes again, with taxpayer dollars, not just here, everywhere, Alberta and Saskatchewan need $hundreds of billions of dollars to clean up the poisonous mess big oil n gas left behind....Free market...indeed..

We need to make what industry we have work, be profitable, sustainable, if technology threatens the viability of an old sunset industry, so be it...the world is transitioning to a cleaner world, renewable power, some say 10 years, old industry pundits say never...if a town is crowded, fix gridlock before you expand, the days of extracting a mountain side and polluting a river valley for the sake of creating work for those who come here is over too...planet earth is finite..how many pipelines..1..2..3...Pipelines east, west, south, north, pipelines more, and more again as more workers come here..how many more pristine ecosystems will corporate greed extinct.

Old growth clearcutting, that horrific practice was halted(mostly), thanks goodness...factories spewing acid rain, stopped...on a finite earth, like a city bus...once full, there is no need to stop to pick up passengers as there is no more room...

As a British Columbian, I would like a Manhattan type project to restore our great forests, curtail raw log exports and demand value added milling or big forestry Corporations lose access to our trees, we can also clean and rehabilitate our mighty once filled to brim with wild salmon rivers..bring back the fish, bring back a sustainable commercial fishery..let's grow food on quality agricultural land...I could ramble on with ideas as to how to create a better world..

I'm a late to the game green at heart Canadian who votes in a first past the post electoral system to remove a corporate cronyism government that is not free market but rigged to serve a select few to the detriment of both human and environmental health...Socialism for Corporate Greed, that's not a healthy Government, and it's not the way to run a country,

Andrew Weaver...... I do like you personally, think you are quite clever....I've seen 16 years of lies and betrayal from these BC Liberals/Social Credit white old man dynasty...I won't sell BC Rail, I won't tear up contracts, ..IPP money losing pits, bloated infrastructure vanity projects that are never on time or on budget..seen debt rise to over $100 billion under these so-called BC Liberal "Free Market" business experts...I have also seen too many average people fall through the cracks, seen children, teachers treated as a burden, seen morality and fairness decline..seen such blatant corruption I cringe.....watched as salmon run after salmon run vanished, watched diseased filled farmed fish destroy more wild salmon..the most fertile farmland being developed, seen BC Liberals massacre our agricultural land reserve...I've seen and heard Christy Clark blather about fracking and LNG as the future of British Columbia, witnessed the BC Liberals appoint their corporate friends to positions of power throughout our province, extending corruption to near every authoritative body....

Christy Clark and the BC Liberals won't call the legislature to session until this Fall(2017)..in the meanwhile election campaign dollars are once again rolling into the BC Liberal Party...a few $million dollars more before a urgent election issue is manufactured and a snap election called, a new platform message delivered by a new BC Liberal Leader...Kevin Falcon



Andrew Weaver, you must support John Horgan and The New Democratic Party, your Green initiatives are not far removed from NDP values, very close on most issues, not the cavernous ideological divide between Green ideals and BC Liberal Corporate cronyism...black and white, Green and Orange, good versus evil.....lastly, Andrew Weaver, if you think you can make a trustworthy deal with those Social Credit carpetbaggers....



I have an LNG Fantasy to sell you...

Latest Mainstreet Poll confirms BCers are overwhelming against a Green/Liberal coalition

http://www.mainstreetresearch.ca/vote-vote-preferred-coalition/


The Straight Goods

Cheers Eyes Wide Open