Thursday, March 22, 2018

John Horgan-Once Gaining Power Veers NDP Party To Right-Abandons Grassroots-Rolls Electoral Dice-Can Horgan Garner BC Liberal(Conservative) Voters to Make up for Losing BC's Progressive "Activist" Support







Updated March 22/2018.......as written below, everything I said has come true...any shred of the BC NDP pre-election 2017 is now gone.....Horgan sold out the province and the people....Horgan gave the LNG industry PST exemption(read HST in a new form)..how long til all industry demands a HST tax regime....Horgan exempted LNG industry from the carbon tax....Horgan also removed BC's LNG taxation framework...a tax that started at 7%....then BC Liberals slashed that tax to 1.5%....Today John Horgan slashed that taxrate to ZERO %.....and with $billions in unclaimed(as of yet) deep-well drilling credits.....Corporate welfare on steroids....we have officially entered into the Australian like LNG taxation zone....meaning BC we never see any revenue from LNG......and with that...adios BC NDP....hope some of you cross the floors, I'd hate to see all you MLAs look like word salad idiots and Party Root sellouts....do any of you NDP MLAS have any honour, morals or backbone...Probably not!....

It's far worse people...because today in Ottawa(March 22nd 2018) several northern BC Mayors pleading for the federal Government, pleading to Trudeau to REMOVE IMPORT DUMPING DUTIES ON ASIAN STEEL COMPONENTS....because as you know, LNG Canada is having the entire natural gas liquefaction plant built in S Korea and barged to B.C.....along with Korean workers to reassemble what THEY built....that's how it is done....so, Trudeau has Horgan by the balls....Horgan begging to remove import duties....Trudeau wanting Horgan to get out of the way of Kinder Morgan....this is a twofer, and it's coming.....Horgan has already made a deal with Trudeau...here it is....(BC Government after studying Ottawa's and industry's spill response have determined that Kinder Morgan's pipeline expansion is safe to proceed) ...Horgan will boast.. that in return he got import duties removed too...

http://northcoastreview.blogspot.ca/2018/03/northern-mayors-delegation-in-ottawa-to.html

Horgan campaigned left and now governs far right....what a dishonest bunch BC NDP are..

Bottom line for LNG Canada and their project....They are PST exempt...no carbon tax...no LNG tax...royalties will be next to none as there are $billion in drill credits, with more on offer...the LNG Plant itself, modular form, built in sections, all fabricated in South Korea...barged to BC...where Shell Canada will writeoff the build cost(money spent in South Korea), and the interest cost(money they lend to themselves)..Build cost, interest payments, all written off against future taxation...we'll never see a dime....read these two links..

https://www.bloomberg.com/gadfly/articles/2017-03-26/everyone-s-a-loser-in-australia-s-lng-boom


http://www.world-psi.org/en/chevrons-tax-schemes-piping-profits-out-australia


I mentioned I knew/know Horgan's playbook(beside's being a traitor)....The below post...100% accurate..it's almost like I knew...? I took a lot of heat for shouting out the truth to party faithful....too bad many still believed different.....


Cheers

Enjoy the read......


Written by Grant G


"Will the real John Horgan please stand up"


I must say....John Horgan's year end message to me, to all BC's progressive voters, to all NDP issue savvy voters is rather disheartening, to say the least, it's actually more..

John Horgan is telling you to shut up, be quiet and accept the status quo, accept the New NDP Government,  a government that administers better, administers BC Liberal policy better, a government of .....?

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B.C. Premier John Horgan had a clear message for his B.C. NDP at year’s end.




"If we’re going to be a government that governs for all British Columbians, we have to set aside our activism and start being better administrators,” he said in an interview with Global BC’s Keith Baldrey to cap off an eventful 2017 for the NDP leader.

https://globalnews.ca/news/3919804/john-horgan-year-end-interview/

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That's John Horgan talking in a year end interview with his new adviser Global BC's Keith Baldrey..

The Site C decision....John Horgan in an interview with Alaska Highway News stated that Site C power will be used to electrify BC's northern gas fields...to be more precise, to use Site C hydroelectric power to aid BC's gas frackers...to enable the natural gas frackers to use $12 billion dollar Site C power rather than use diesel generated power for fracking(Fracking process takes a great deal of water and power to shatter shale).....

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AHN: Let’s talk natural gas quickly. I understand you have a trade mission to China in the new year, as well as meetings with LNG Canada. What are your priorities?
JH: I’ve been to Kitimat earlier in the fall. I met with LNG Canada officials as well as Kitimat LNG. You will know Kitimat is a community that welcomes industrial development. Kitimat LNG was the first out of the gate actually to start advocating getting the first export permit and are still working diligently to await the turnaround in prices so they can proceed.
LNG Canada, again, a large project that includes Shell Canada, three offshore companies, KoGas, Mitsubishi, and PetroChina. So when we visit Japan, Korea, and China in January, I intend to meet with those three companies and talk to them about their continued interest in a final investment decision on LNG Canada. We want to make sure that we can get our natural resources to higher-priced markets. The advent of hydraulic fracturing has meant North America is awash in gas and that’s driving the price down, making it difficult for producers in the Peace to succeed.
We’re fortunate to have a lot of liquids, particularly in the Montney, which has allowed projects like AltaGas’s propane export facility in Prince Rupert to be built. I visited that site as well. So, I think there’s a bright future for natural gas in the Peace and in British Columbia, but we want to make sure we’re meeting our climate objectives. We’re serious about reducing our emissions, I know the industry is as well. That electrification (of gas fields)is part of that,


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This is what the Peace River valley looked like before Site C dam




Activism......Activism comes in many forms....activism to stop Site C, activism to stop Kinder Morgan, activism to stop Taseko mines, activism against Imperial Metals there's also social and human rights activism....

The fight to raise disability rates, welfare rates, the battle by teachers and their union for kids, for class size and composition...

"activism" from the BCTF that lasted over a decade reversed the draconian changes Gordon Campbell and his BC Liberal government made to how we educate and instruct children..

It wasn't the BC NDP Party that funded or contributed to that decade long court challenge, a challenge eventually won through "activism"....John Horgan's new government isn't changing the teachers' win, or bringing the teachers' win in...John Horgan is merely administering what was returned to the curriculum last year....An Activist teacher's union won that battle..

"Activists" in the 70's stopped the clearcutting of old growth forests...Activists changed things for the better....in British Columbia, in 2017, almost 2018, under John Horgan's NDP  "activists are no longer required"

Kinder Morgan.....

BC NDP party ...besides chatter in our legislature when they were opposition...BC NDP have not expended any money to stop Kinder Morgan's "tripling" of capacity, along with a 7-fold increase in tanker traffic..."Activists" in Burnaby, activists from all over have been fighting Kinder Morgan's expansion...including Burnaby Mayor Derrick Corrigan..

LNG and Kinder Morgan are connected....John Horgan's New Year's trade mission to Asia(China) is all about bitumen and LNG exports...John Horgan is leveraging Kinder Morgan's bitumen exports to China with B.C. LNG....as in..Sign longterm BC LNG deals and you get both...Kinder Morgan bitumen and LNG..

John Horgan going to China, to convince the Asian nation to buy B.C. LNG..and Horgan, while peddling liquid gas is going to tell the Chinese he's going to stop Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion??? considering it's Chinese buyers who have booked Kinder Morgan's expanded bitumen exports...China is the offtaker of Kinder Morgan's increased export capacity...Does anyone believe Horgan has a chance in hell of selling British Columbia LNG to China while blocking bitumen/tar oil...?

John Horgan to sell LNG to China must use Kinder Morgan bitumen as bait....

We lose every big environmental battle under Horgan..

I don't recall John Horgan telling NDP progressive voters that if he won power, or was PROPPED UP AND PLACED IN POWER that he was swinging the NDP Party to the right..

One might wonder about Andrew Weaver's opposition to Horgan's rightwing swing...Andrew Weaver will of course oppose, however, Andrew Weaver gave John Horgan a free pass on Site C, and as mentioned before in a recent Straight Goods post, Andrew Weaver won't rock the vote until after a referendum on electoral reform, ...and if the referendum fails?, considering now that Horgan is chasing BC Liberal rightwing voters?, considering now that Horgan's "New Party" isn't going to campaign for changing our electoral voting system..With BC Liberals on full frontal assault against electoral reform, with John Horgan chasing those same BC Liberal voters...With Bill Tieleman leading the NO ELECTORAL REFORM CAMPAIGN....With John Horgan this week telling the CBC in a year end interview that if this upcoming electoral reform referendum fails, BC will not revisit the issue...

John Horgan just revealed the hand he's playing on electoral reform...when this referendum fails, his party won't make it an election issue in 2021, in other words, how important is PR or any electoral reform to John Horgan when he's prepared to give up on it...The first B.C. referendum on electoral reform in 2005...Changing to PR garnered OVER 50% of the vote(The threshold for changing our electoral system was set much higher in that 2005 referendum..60% was required)...here is what Horgan said about electoral reform in a year-end CBC interview....you'll notice there is no fire in Horgan's belly...

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Last chance?

B.C. voters turned down two previous referendums on electoral reform in 2005 and 2009.
Horgan said the referendum will likely be B.C.'s last.
"I think we will have exhausted the public's interest in this issue," Horgan said.
_____________

Clearly John Horgan has no "real" desire for electoral reform.. In 2005, 57.7% of the electorate had voted in favour of reform, including a majority of voters in 77 ridings out of 79.......So, in 2005 the majority wanted change, the threshold was set too high...in the 2009 referendum, the referendum was rigged..and Bill Tieleman(recognized as the voice of the NDP, a NDP pundit and lobbyist) led the campaign against electoral reform..over half of BC voters reported being not even aware of a 2009 referendum.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Columbia_electoral_reform_referendum,_2009

NDP spokesman in 2018 Bill Teileman campaigning against, with Horgan yawning his way through, with BC Liberals screaming no...with Postmedia pumping up the NO CHANGE campaign..

John Horgan and Justin Trudeau(remember Justin Trudeau's election promise on changing our electoral system, that was the first election promise Trudeau broke) have made a deal on Kinder Morgan, John Horgan's NDP Government will only give tepid lip service in opposing the project...John Horgan will use the meme...(Kinder Morgan and pipeline expansion is Federal Jurisdiction, legally I can't stop it) 

Horgan thinks he can sidestep grassroots opposition against his government over Kinder Morgan going through by claiming his hands were tied...just like he did with Site C...

Site C ...John Horgan had the power to stop Site C...as for stopping Kinder Morgan, he has no real power and since Horgan no longer has the fire in his belly to stop it, since he's chosen to swing the party to the right...Horgan believes he can deliver LNG, create a BC LNG industry where the BC Liberals couldn't...And that is where John Horgan believes he can make-up for losing BC's progressive voters, by replacing them with BC Liberal rightwing voters..

That is a "fools' errand".....John Horgan, in my opinion won't garner those votes...not unless he changes the party name because the name NDP is a dirty word to rightwing voters..

John Horgan has sent clear message to the party grassroots and "activist" base that he is taking the party to the right..

The "progressive" in John Horgan's Government has quickly turned into the regressive, to a 1950,s...to 1990's mindset..

Using the $14 billion dollar Site C hydroelectric energy produced to aid and abet the hydraulic fracking process(producing methane emitting fossil fuel for export)...

When the world is thundering towards cheap renewable power(s) John Horgan is embracing the fraud known as "Clean LNG"...

https://www.ecowatch.com/tesla-australia-battery-2520491667.html

https://www.ecowatch.com/electric-vehicle-news-2520451145.html

Even if a massive surge in electric car use happened it wouldn't require BC hydro to acquire new power..

Technology has already rendered Site C obsolete...BC NDP's new vision under John Horgan is to embrace the past, as in the 1950,s...methinks Horgan should really consider the early 2000,s too..in particular.. 2001...

Burning LNG...if it's so clean why does BC's Clean Energy Act prohibit British Columbia from using natural gas or LNG to produce electricity...

The pathetic word play, word salad our BC Government is engaging in....

BCUC could not consider using natural gas or LNG(Burrard Thermal) for producing power in their review...BCUC had to consider the costs of replacing Site C power(not needed power) with "other" forms of non-fossil fuel generated power...

And now..John Horgan has drank the LNG Koolaid...Site C power being used to Frack, and power up a natural gas/LNG industry, an industry so dirty that BC's own "Clean Energy Act", an act that John Horgan cites regularly, a BC Government Act that prevents it's use for power generation in BC..

That is too funny...

The meme John Horgan is going to use to justify his drive to make BC a LNG power will be...

(BC LNG will clean up China's airshed)

The same bullshit Christy Clark uttered...Site C power, the amount of power Site C will produce is not enough power to electrify the gas fields and 1 large coastal LNG liquefaction plant...

A great deal of power is required to do hydraulic fracking, but an even bigger, more enormous amounts of power are required to actually liquefy the natural gas...LNG liquefaction plants worldwide use natural gas to produce power for liquefaction..the reason being, is it not practical to build massive 12 $billion dollar hydroelectric dams for each and every large LNG liquefaction plant...

Site C power...as advertised by BC Hydro and the BC Government..."Site C will produce enough power to run 450,000 homes"...What BC Hydro and or the Government won't tell you is..

Site C will produce enough power for 1 large LNG liquefaction plant and one LNG plant only..

So...Site C power is to prop up a BC LNG industry...So John Horgan..What happens if we get a second, or third, or fourth LNG liquefaction plant?..are BC Taxpayers/BC Hydro ratepayers going to build more massive dam projects...not likely..

Two large LNG Liquefaction plants alone will cause BC's greenhouse gas emissions to rise by roughly 40%...

So, Premier Horgan is going to word salad us grassroots and progressive voters...Horgan is going to try and sell us this inane bafflegab..

When John Horgan and Trudeau sign LNG and diluted bitumen deals with China..

Horgan's "plan"..if BC's LNG industry does take off, each and every new LNG project beyond the first one(if it happens) as Site C is only enough power for one plant...Each additional LNG Liquefaction plant that is NOT provided BC Hydro taxpayer subsidized(free power) will increase BC's total greenhousgas emissions by 20%..one project, 20% increase in provincial emissions....

  
Without a Site C power supply for each and every LNG plant, BC's emissions skyrocket...

Site C power...Site C being pushed forward, a subsidy for an non-existent LNG industry...a subsidy being paid for by BC Hydro residential ratepayers...

So..Under John Horgan, he continues with the LNG fantasy..a fantasy that if comes true..any pretense of reducing provincial and Canada's emissions is over, how many more massively expensive hydroelectric projects can BCers afford to build?...We can't afford to build Site C, let alone more dam projects..

John Horgan in his interview with Alaska Highway News...Horgan stated that he has met with LNG Canada(Shell) CEO Andy Calitz...that's true..but what Horgan isn't saying about those meetings with LNG Canada and the BCLNGA is...The other list of demands LNG Canada has made, and expects before they make a final investment decision..

Andy Calitz/LNG Canada wants.....They want Canada(as in the federal Government) to remove the "dumping duties" they have imposed on Chinese and Korean steel products....Why does Andy Calitz and the LNG industry want these duties removed?..Because these BC Coastal proposed projects will have entire LNG plants, mainframes and near every component shipped to BC by barge,..and then assembled, in other words..Dumping duties imposed by Canada trade officials to protect Canadian steel industry must be removed....Race race race to the bottom...enjoy the John Horgan downhill slide into regression....Canadian manufacturers will be near completely shut out of any LNG industry....The LNG industry want dumping duties removed, they claim they can't afford to press forward on LNG projects if forced to pay Canadian Federal Government imposed duties..

Full-Stop..

If the LNG industry can't afford to pay duties on dumped steel projects how are we to believe there will be any profits for the owners of the resource(BCers)

Andy Calitz, CEO of LNG Canada wants more that that...Calitz wants reductions in local taxes, provincial taxes and federal taxes, they also want an exemption from any carbon tax increases and more...

Remember the LNG taxation framework the BC Liberals brought in, not the first framework LNG legislation(7%) that John Horgan's NDP opposition Party along with all the BC Liberals voted for, all voted yes..  not that framework, i'm talking about the BC Liberals second LNG taxation framework Act they brought to our legislature...after the LNG industry thoroughly rejected the first LNG framework..BC Liberals tore it up and gave near everything away..a framework so bad that every BC NDP MLA stood up in our legislature, called it a "generational sellout"..reduced it to 1.5%..

Every BC NDP MLA voted for it anyway, despite their diatribes, they pleaded and urged BC Liberals to vote against it..BC Liberals rammed it through..NDP echoed the BC Liberals ..like Lemmings..

Andy Calitz....CEO of LNG Canada wants that second LNG taxation framework ripped up and removed....Calitz wants the Australian LNG taxation model...That's the model where LNG companies never have to pay taxes, ever, a framework where they can fast-track plant build cost writeoffs...a framework where LNG companies can writeoff interest on offshore shady loans against any Australian taxes...

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......In addition to meeting one-on-one with Mungall last week, Calitz said he planned to meet with Premier John Horgan next month.
Asked if the Green Party’s opposition to the LNG industry concerned him, Calitz said it didn’t and pointed out that the official opposition – the Liberals – are fully supportive of an LNG industry.
The combination of the NDP (MLAs) and Liberal (MLAs) who support an LNG project and a new mega industry for British Columbia is good enough for me to move forward in British Columbia,” Calitz said.
The biggest hurdle for the project may be the question of tax competitiveness. The new NDP government plans to raise B.C.’s carbon tax from $30 per tonne to $35 per tonne, starting in the spring.
Calitz made it clear that it’s not carbon taxes per se that are the big concern. Rather, it’s the full suite of taxes, from the municipal to federal level, that need to be considered.
“There should be a tax on carbon,” Calitz said. “It’s not the first increment of $5 per tonne that scares me, but somehow we need an indication from the government as to where that will go.
We need the government of British Columbia specifically, but also the federal government, to take a last look at the fiscal tax competitiveness of Canada for an LNG project.
“This is an important but also a sensitive matter. We do not seek any form of subsidy at all. We pay our full tax burden. One of the conditions of the new government is that there should be a fair return and benefit for British Columbians. We will do that. We need them to look at the full complexity of federal, provincial, local and other taxes that we pay to say, ‘Does this still make sense? Is this still competitive?'”
One of the biggest criticisms from the industry’s standpoint of the former Liberal government’s tax and royalty regime for LNG was a special LNG tax, which companies in regions like the U.S. and Australia do not pay.
Asked if that LNG tax was something LNG Canada needs addressed, Calitz indicated it was.
“That is a subject we are discussing with the government,” he said.
Calitz said LNG Canada will submit a “decision support package” to all four companies in the joint venture in support of a final investment decision sometime in 2018.

_________________________


Here goes John Horgan.....Chasing unicorns, racing to the bottom....Will Andrew Weaver stop John Horgan....nope, Weaver will do nothing to harm, or bring down the Horgan Government until AFTER electoral reform referendum..

Anyway...As for Andy Calitz wanting BC, and Federal Canada to adopt Australia's LNG taxation model....Who wouldn't...Australia and Australian taxpayers are getting royally screwed..legally screwed through tax avoidance loopholes....Chevron and Shell have become masters of avoiding taxation..

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Chevron’s tax schemes: piping profits out of Australia?











The report was produced by the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) and endorsed by the Tax Justice Network – Australia.
Chevron’s tax practices, and those of other corporations, have huge implications for the living standards and public revenues to fund essential services in countries across the globe.
With US$197 billion in market capitalisation, Chevron is the world’s third largest and most profitable Oil & Gas Company – yet, Chevron has:
  • stashed over US$35 billion in un-taxed revenues in off-shore accounts
  • at least 600 shell companies -and likely hundreds more- registered in Bermuda and Delaware
  • set aside AUD$350 million to settle a tax avoidance lawsuit with the Australian Tax Office (ATO)
  • set up a new tax scheme, currently being audited, to reduce its tax bill by AUD$35 billion or more
  • amassed credits to avoid royalty payments on the Gorgon project, the world’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, for the first 8 years of operation or longer
  • had operating revenue in Australia every year since 2011 of over AUD$2.5 billion, but managed to receive over AUD$30 million in tax refunds
Additionally, Chevron’s own annual report reveals that tax filings have not been approved by the United States government since 2008; in Nigeria since 2000; Angola since 2001; Saudi Arabia since 2012 and Kazakhstan since 2007. Chevron is unable to estimate the tax it may be required to pay given the ongoing examinations by tax authorities in countries around the world.
Chevron’s Gorgon project in Western Australia -which also includes Shell, Exxon and several Japanese energy companies- is crucial to Chevron’s future growth and will make LNG Australia’s largest export.
The current ATO lawsuit against Chevron involves a high interest AUD$2.5 billion scheme between a Chevron subsidiary in the US state of Delaware -one of the world’s most used tax havens- and Chevron Australia between 2004 and 2008.
In 2009 Chevron created a new high interest AUD$35 billion ‘credit facility’ between Delaware and Australia. The result of this scheme is to reduce profits in Australia, where they might be taxed, and generate profits in Delaware, where they are not taxed. While operating revenues in Australia have increased by 15% since 2011, interest charges to the Delaware company have increased from 26% to 62% of operating revenue. As a result, profits in Australia have decreased by 83%. In 2014, Chevron Australia’s related party interest charges were more than five times greater than profits. It would be difficult to argue that this is not an intentional scheme to reduce profit and avoid taxes in Australia.
The tax avoided by Chevron’s latest scheme could be larger than Australia’s 2015-16 federal budget for education or more than half the budget for health.
Chevron’s aggressive tax avoidance schemes require much greater public scrutiny as billions of future tax revenues are at stake.
It is time to take action to level the playing field and make sure that companies like Chevron are paying their fair share.





http://www.world-psi.org/en/chevrons-tax-schemes-piping-profits-out-australia

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So fellow progressive voters...John Horgan will not admit the truth that Site C BC Hydro ratepayer funded project is being pushed forward to woo an LNG industry..an industry that wants to import entire LNG plants from China and South Korea to BC...an LNG industry that wants all three levels of government to reduce taxes, an industry that wants BC's "generational sellout" LNG taxation framework ripped up and removed, an industry that wants BC to adopt Australia's LNG taxation model, a model so full of holes, loopholes that big LNG will never pay their fair share..

This is what Andy Calitz and LNG Canada want from John Horgan...This is what they WILL RECEIVE FROM JOHN HORGAN'S GOVERNMENT....

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Everyone is a loser in Australia's LNG Boom


The LNG debacle provides a good test case of what's gone wrong. Australia is on track to overtake Qatar as the world's biggest exporter of shipped gas by 2019 -- but getting there hasn't been a success for the government or petroleum companies.

Canberra's revenues from its Petroleum Resource Rent Tax fell 60 percent to their lowest level since 1999 in the year through June 2016, despite a 50 percent increase in gas export volumes.

 Petroleum tax and royalty revenues per oil-equivalent barrel came to about 4.2 percent of the local price of crude -- the lowest share since 1990, and well below the 25-year average of 10.4 percent.

The dip is unlikely to be a blip. Thanks to the way the government allows expenses to be deducted before a project makes a taxable profit, it could be decades before the country starts to receive a better return on its mineral wealth. The vast sums spent building Australia's LNG projects have created a tax shield of carried-forward costs that was worth A$238 billion ($182 billion) in 2016, with the figure rising each year 5 percent faster than the yield on government debt


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Activists ....we are no longer welcome in John Horgan's political party...

John Horgan believes he is going to succeed where Christy Clark failed...John Horgan is bringing an LNG industry to B.C. regardless of the cost, the human cost, the ground water cost..the cost to the treasury, or to BC Hydro ratepayers..

John Horgan has shifted to the right...activists and issue savvy progressive voters are nothing but canon fodder for Horgan..

So fellow BCers...

John Horgan rolls the dice, sacrificing progressive voters in hopes of gaining traditional BC Liberal/Conservative rightwing voters..

Those of us who fought for fairness, fought for an intelligent government, those of us who tooted the one-time progressive BC NDP political party's horn for a longtime are now...

Garbage...stinky garbage bound for the refuse can..

Lastly....John Horgan hasn't blinked an eye on China's latest big moves in BC..buying up Site C's main builder..Aecon..and a few days ago..a Chinese holding company just bought one acre in Vancouver for $245 million dollars..

China now has it's teeth into Site C and...China has their teeth firmly clenched onto John Horgan's ass too..



Now that government activities under Horgan's NDP is already stinking up a storm...John Horgan wants you progressive, First Nations and "activist" voters to plug your noses and shut the hell up...




P.S.....Merry Christmas everyone....May your New Year be....Wonderful!

The Straight Goods

Cheers Eyes Wide Open 





Wednesday, March 21, 2018

I AM BRAINWASHED. YOU ARE BRAINWASHED. WE ARE BRAINWASHED....Part IV




I AM BRAINWASHED. YOU ARE BRAINWASHED. WE ARE BRAINWASHED. PART FOUR:  The Hosing of History: James Laxer (1941-2018).


James Laxer was an attractively warm Canadian who made important Canadian history in the 1960s and 1970s … and then slipped into the political shadows (relatively) until his death on February 23, 2018. His large Obituary in the Globe and Mail (B20, Mar. 12, 2018) appears to be an attempt by the Central Canadian NDP Aristocracy (in league with its Globe and Mail Reactionary colleagues) to re-write history where they cannot erase it.

In the last sixty years one major across-parties attempt was made to throw off Canada’s status as a subservient, colonial-lackey.  If successful, it would have reconstructed Power in Canada and would have recognized ordinary Canadians as the primary holders of Canadian wealth …  so that the population today (and environmental policy) would be enlightened, informed, and progressive (as well as in significantly better health).

Put very briefly … Canada’s Centenary (1967), amid  deepening (cultural, diplomatic, military, economic, educational) colonialism awakened a very large cross-section of Canadians.  They responded with organization and political (not NGO!) constructions: the Waffle Movement in the NDP, The Committee for an Independent Canada (Libs./Cons.) … even The Canadian Liberation Movement (semi-Maoist)… and more.

The international imperial powers, working to contain Canada’s huge land mass in their treasury, intended no real independence for Canada!  And (for instance) quietly and with the approval of Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, they removed the cost-free lending power of the Bank of Canada (to all Canadian governments for major “living-condition” improvements: called “infrastructure” and social construction) in 1974.

The present government, led by Justin Trudeau, is in the process – as a continuation of that imperial policy - of handing Canadian roads, bridges, hospitals, energy undertakings … and doubtless, eventually, educational developments into the hands of private, profit-driven (foreign) entities.

Globe and Mail Obituary writer Lisa Fetterman doesn’t, exactly create “fake news” in the James Laxer Obituary.  She creates “alternate history”, succeeding (as always with the Globe and Mail) in trivializing, under-reporting and, to (in my mind) misrepresenting … to the point that the large Obituary of Jim Laxer is a warm, wet, soggy, sentimental, sloppy, almost-unrecognizable Brainwash to make absolutely certain that no Canadian connects the dots and realizes that the politics of those years must be re-engaged seriously if there is to be any self-respecting future for Canada and Canadians.

To begin: the headline is a liea brain-wash - “NEW  DEMOCRAT FOUNDED HARD-LEFT MOVEMENT”.  The (nick-named) Waffle Movement in the NDP was a fairly modest internal attempt to return the Party (in its Canadian traditions) to a platform of Canadian independence and to a number of “socialist” (local, community, and State) decisions to manage Canadian wealth.  [The 1968 “Watkins Report” on Foreign Ownership of the Canadian Economy - set up by the Liberal government - had revealed to Canadians their economic (unregulated) lackey-relation to the USA]. We must remember, too, that, earlier, a Conservative government began the creation of the CBC; and a Liberal government created the ‘free to Canadian governments’ Bank of Canada lending power!

“HARD LEFT” indeed! Of what? 

The Waffle was a movement in the NDP to turn the Party away from its growing role as a collaborator with corporate manipulators (which it has proudly solidified) … and to focus on the needs of Canadians and on their power to make crucial decisions free of U.S. dominance (including the dominance of U.S. Unions in Canada. See further on….)

Stephen Lewis is quoted giving the Party-Line that has brought the NDP to its present vacuous, reactionary irrelevance. Stating a simple falsehood with superb self-confidence, Lewis says: “the problem…was not so much the issues as the fact [the Waffle] represented a party within a party, thus diluting [the NDP] message….”  [And so, in fact, he admits, that at the heart were “the issues”; that is, the “message”, which the NDP Right was not about to debateor change.]

Many Constituencies didn’t think the Waffle Movement was a Party within a Party … but, rather, a breath of fresh air.  (The Ontario Waffle had national significance, illustrated by the fact that James Laxer was a major contender, against David Lewis, for national Party leadership in 1971.) The matter of “the Waffle in the NDP” was put to a vote in the Orange Hall at Orillia in 1974.  Was the Ontario Waffle a separate Party?  Should it be thrust out of the NDP? The delegates gathered … looking as though they might present a majority in favour of keeping the Waffle in the Party.  And then….

And then into the room came the appointed delegates to the Party, appointed from U.S. unions in Canada – enough of them to give the Lewis Aristocracy the Hard Right vote they sought … to run the Waffle group out of the NDP.

Lisa Fitterman manages, somehow, to quote only Right Wing male NDP’ers on politics, (interviewing throughout, of course, only males) even calling the man I consider a lifelong anti-nationalist, Gerald Caplan, “Dr. Caplan” to give him “muscle” in the Obituary.  (In fact, the Waffle was on the front lines in its insistence upon equality of gender representation on all executive bodies.) Nothing of that from Lisa Fitterman….

She does not tell her readers that Stephen Lewis made his great entrance into international humanitarian activity as the result of an appointment to the UN by solid right-winger, Conservative prime minister “Lyin Brian” Mulroney! 

She doesn’t mention that – at his great acceptance speech in Winnipeg as leader of the NDP – Ed Broadbent’s most passionate words were in support of U.S. Union dominance in Canada!  Nor, of course, that, later, his appointment as a long-employed, high-profile Human Rights Officer was made by – you didn’t guess it – good olde “Lyin Brian” Mulroney.  The boys (and girls) on the Right … look after each other.  They are “a Party within almost every Canadian Party” now.

Regrettably, in 1981 Jim Laxer -  the Obituary reminds us - “reached a rapprochement with the NDP, serving as the party’s research director”.  Some of us deeply regretted that move; but social pressure – a form of brainwashing - is very, very hard to resist. Many, many people succumb to social pressure … and few can resist it, alas.  Jim Laxer was one of the finest Canadians … his surrender reveals just how powerful social-pressure-brainwashing can be!

Not very long after the debacle of a meeting in the Orange Hall at Orillia, I met Jim Laxer on the street in Ottawa.  We met warmly … and chatted.  Jim was living in Toronto by then, and so his appearance in Ottawa meant he was travelling with a purpose.  I asked him why he was in Ottawa.  He replied that David Lewis (NDP Party Leader in the House of Commons) wanted a meeting with him.  “What about?”, I asked.  Jim didn’t know.

“And you, leader of the Waffle, are going alone to meet him?” I asked.  That was true.  I told Jim he should not, at that point, meet David Lewis unless with a few other ‘responsibles’ from the Waffle … for every legitimate reason.  Jim Laxer didn’t agree with me … and went to a private meeting with David Lewis….

No one, it seems, knows what was discussed at that private meeting.  Perhaps … David Lewis’s son, Stephen Lewis, knows.  But we may be sure that, as a member of (what I call) the Central Canadian NDP Aristocracy”… Stephen Lewis will never tell ….

[Robin Mathews was a member and ‘culture critic’ for the so-called “Waffle Movement in the NDP”.]


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The Straight Goods

Cheers Eyes Wide Open

Tuesday, March 13, 2018

Premier John "Prince of dithering and self-doubt" Horgan




Written by Grant G


"a good plan today is worth more than a brilliant plan tomorrow" .....For John Horgan, neither is true, there is no good plan today and as for tomorrow, tomorrow will have to wait while Premier Dithers hands out more homework assignments to his chosen "consultants" ....the delayers, the make cover for premier Dithers' decisions....

In other words.....if this is leadership or vision...as they say.."Houston, we have a problem"

16 years BC NDP languished in opposition, 16 years to formulate a plan for a prosperous British Columbia, 16 years of griping about everything....including "a generational sellout to LNG cartels"

Blessed be the bold, behold the coming of a new progressive direction for British Columbia....then suddenly I awake from last night's dream only to realize nothing has changed in our province..

Premier Dithers(John Horgan) has neither the conviction of conscience or the courage to bring progressive change to a democracy and leader starved British Columbia..

Broken NDP election promises, too many to count, progressive ideas coming from this propped up band of lemmings...rather than being too many to count, there is nothing to count as nothing progressive has been put forward..

Site C....Boondoggle, no justification, brutal economics and ultimately, BC Hydro will be bankrupted and require a taxpayer bailout, more likely it will be sold to the private sector, Gordon Campbell's goal of liquidating BC's provincial assets will eventually come true..and I don't see John Horgan doing a damn thing to change this inevitability...

Being the one who wrote glowing endorsements on John Horgan before most even knew his name...being the one that personally brought John Horgan to power....to say "disappointed" is an understatement...

Site C....John Horgan once handed the reigns of power became afraid, his powerful pre-election speeches, his thundering pre-election diatribes in our legislature, all the answers his side professed to have at the ready, needing only to be granted a chance to lead B.C.....the chance was granted, the opportunity presented itself and what happened next, and maybe it was expected, maybe me, and all BCers should have known better....John Horgan was the proverbial deer in the headlights, spooked, afraid of everything and unfortunately for BCers...John Horgan froze, panicked, Premier Dithers did more than step up to the batters' box and strike out swinging...Premier Horgan didn't swing the bat, he just froze, Horgan was motionless as softball pitches floated over the plate, begging to be crushed for a homerun...Premier John "dithers" Horgan was so afraid of hitting a sitter pitch foul he didn't swing at all, hoping and praying that the pitcher would grant him a freebie walk to first base...that didn't happen......John Horgan thus far.....Struck out badly without even taking a swing and let team British Columbia lose!

British Columbia does not have a housing crisis, British Columbia has a housing/rental affordability crisis


1) Premier "Dithers" real estate measures.....Dithers is targeting domestic shadows, he refuses to address the real problem, that being Asian money movers have created a domestic disaster for local wage earning citizens, ...yearly salaries can't come close to buying into BC's Asian money dumpster..

Rather than banning foreign buyers....rather than targeting blind trusts, numbered companies, banning real estate being bought under corporate shields...or provincial nominations, or targeting Quebec's immigrant investor scam....Premier Dithers did nothing but target local buyers, target Canadians...Target the honest...

Properties over $3 million, why should school taxes double?...two houses side by side, expensive area, one homeowner let his property decay, let repairs and upgrade renos lapse, that homeowner assessment remains flat...the other landscaped their property, new windows, etc etc, one homeowner spent money, created jobs and helped the overall economy...their assessment peaks above $3 million...the good homeowner is now punished with a $12,000 dollar extra tax....

Targeting people who own a cabin, people who own property where workers aren't looking for rental homes...charging those Canadians who contributed, now forcing those to rent...or to pay..how does that help with the affordability crisis?...it doesn't...Carole James, as much respect as I HAD for her is now gone too...Finance minister Carole James is offering up to Canadians caught up in this ill-conceived tax on second properties a non-refundable tax credit....a tax credit that does most of these dual homeowners no good at all...homeowners with meager incomes won't qualify for any tax rebate...and believe me, this speculation tax is illegal, lawsuits will be forthcoming...

Furnished vacation homes, forced to rent, forced to pay...Do people put their possessions in storage, another cost...move their stuff back n forth...I believe the government has to prove what a speculator is...and if people haven't sold in years and years, or ever...Canadians owning two residents shouldn't be punished...This speculation tax/asset tax/envy tax will be the death knell of Horgan's minority government...Horgan pulls the tax in it's entirety or adios..

When is speculation considered a crime?...our capitalist society is predicated on "speculation" ..those who play in the stock market, speculating away, speculating that the market will rise, or fall...when a stock market/commodity market "speculator"s portfolio rises above $3 million, is it taxed differently, do new rules apply to those who are successful...if the Premier Dithers' government is prepared to tax speculators...are they also prepared to bailout out, and or hand cash over to those who speculated and lost?...

People who own second homes, those who pay two sets of property taxes, those who don't use civic services, yet still pay full property taxes....who will make homeowners whole again who are forced to rent and their homes are trashed, or when renters decide not to pay and squat in a home, knowing it takes months to legally evict deadbeat renters and squatters, who's on the hook for those costs...insurance liabilities, smokers stinking up other people's homes...who pays...?

Premier John Dithers Horgan and Gregor in the hands of developers Robertson....empty homes tax..

These useless fucking politicians, Christy Clark..Gordon Campbell, Gregor Robertson and now it appears, John Horgan...These traitorous politicians feasted on foreign cash, took tens of $millions from developers, they not only stood by watching, doing nothing while our real estate market soared beyond the reach of domestic Canadian workers....These same lackluster politicians are now puking new tax rules that mainly target Canadians....Gregor Robertson is running for the hills..he fucked up badly and knows he is political toast...Vision party and Gregor are guilty of aiding and abetting the economic destruction of Vancouver ....

BC's housing market....a teardown rancher on east 21st street for $1.4 million....if that property was reduced to $900k....it's still out of reach for the majority..

Andrew Weaver is right....Foreign buyers ban and the loopholes they use need to be the target...Not those who work, live and pay in Canada....and a non-refundable tax credit ain't worth a hill of beans to the majority of Canadians..and, anyone hit with double taxation, those who have to pay double school taxes, those who aren't rich enough to absorb the $$$ hit will merely pass the cost onto those who may be renting....ultimately making a bad situation worse...adding to the affordability crisis.

Unfortunately, John Horgan's housing measures are an orange version of communism..

2) Renters grant...another bad idea, another election promise abandoned.....

3)$10 dollar a day daycare...as I told Premier Dithers pre-election....you won't be able to deliver, children need to be cared for by quality people, quality people need a liveable wage..a liveable wage in B.C. is minimum $60k per year....$10 dollar day care can't happen unless government pays for it, meaning the taxpayer pays...the same tapped out, now double house taxed, carbon taxed, big energy gouged at the pump taxed, BC Hydro taxed(for boondoggle Site C) taxed....

The need of daycare is directly related to housing.....if the family didn't have to spend the majority of their income on housing....subsidize daycare so developers and Asian money can keep home prices beyond reach...daycare, affordable daycare is a laudable goal....average housing costs threefold over one's income is a crime..should we stop crimes, or pretend we can afford laudable goals?

Premier Dithers indeed...

GHG reductions, 7 years of carbon taxes, no noticeable reduction...bring on more carbon taxes and bring on LNG to blow our emissions off the chart....??

LNG.....The big fraud...LNG isn't clean, politicians merely want to accept the clean LNG lie, it's easier to act(?) stupid than to actually do something...(eh Christy Clark..)

John Horgan and his NDP Lemmings all hollered to the heavens about the BC Liberals' LNG framework....a "generational sellout" they screamed....and now...

Shell...LNG Canada is musing about building their $30 billion dollar LNG plant....Shell Canada want to build in BC...however...The entire LNG plant is to be built in South Korea and China and barged to B.C....LNG Canada is wanting all steal dumping duties imposed on Asian steel removed....facilitating a cheaper build....Shell Canada want immunity from the carbon tax increases, while local BCers, while the general public pays even more carbon tax, while Shell (LNG Canada) blow our GHG emissions off the chart, they will pay nothing while BCers pay more and more for rising emissions.....that is too sick Premier Dithers! bafflegab much?,

In theory i'm in favour of a carbon tax, but if industry is granted permission to spike our provincial emissions upward...and Horgan plans on increasing our carbon tax...paying more carbon tax while GHG emissions skyrocket.....if Horgan is prepared to treat the public as gullible fools...Horgan's NDP government will find itself moving rather quickly back to opposition benches...perhaps after another 16 years of griping as opposition the NDP will figure out how to govern honestly!

There's more, that foreign built barged to BC LNG plant....LNG Canada want to be able to write-off in its entirety on a fast-tracked basis...That BC LNG tax....LNG Canada want that removed too..

Need more...LNG Canada want to use $billions in deep-well credits(already in hand) to avoid paying any royalties too...

LNG Canada...Andy Calitz(CEO) is of the mind that the income tax paid by gas frack workers in BC's northeast is all the province needs in the way of LNG/gas revenue....meanwhile our water is abused, toxins pumped in the ground, earthquakes triggered, earthen dams everywhere, animal, caribou land sliced and diced and BC's GHG emissions skyrocket....

All this noise being made by big energy bastards....Believe me, it's true....Shell, a worldwide conglomerate...making idle threats around the world...because as we speak, Shell is working every country for free gas, for better deals for them...Shell at this very moment is threatening to not invest in anymore Australian LNG projects unless they get cut a better deal...

 https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/australia-will-miss-next-wave-of-lng-developments-shell-warns/news-story/44169887d0e2838a9ee5a605a34ea3d5

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  I remind you.....Australia isn't seeing any tax revenue from record LNG exports....

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With US$197 billion in market capitalisation, Chevron is the world’s third largest and most profitable Oil & Gas Company – yet, Chevron has:
  • stashed over US$35 billion in un-taxed revenues in off-shore accounts
  • at least 600 shell companies -and likely hundreds more- registered in Bermuda and Delaware
  • set up a new tax scheme, currently being audited, to reduce its tax bill by AUD$35 billion or more
  • amassed credits to avoid royalty payments on the Gorgon project, the world’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, for the first 8 years of operation or longer
  • had operating revenue in Australia every year since 2011 of over AUD$2.5 billion, but managed to receive over AUD$30 million in tax refunds
Additionally, Chevron’s own annual report reveals that tax filings have not been approved by the United States government since 2008; in Nigeria since 2000; Angola since 2001; Saudi Arabia since 2012 and Kazakhstan since 2007. Chevron is unable to estimate the tax it may be required to pay given the ongoing examinations by tax authorities in countries around the world.



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Everyone is a loser in Australia's LNG Boom


The LNG debacle provides a good test case of what's gone wrong. Australia is on track to overtake Qatar as the world's biggest exporter of shipped gas by 2019 -- but getting there hasn't been a success for the government or petroleum companies.

Canberra's revenues from its Petroleum Resource Rent Tax fell 60 percent to their lowest level since 1999 in the year through June 2016, despite a 50 percent increase in gas export volumes.

 Petroleum tax and royalty revenues per oil-equivalent barrel came to about 4.2 percent of the local price of crude -- the lowest share since 1990, and well below the 25-year average of 10.4 percent.

The dip is unlikely to be a blip. Thanks to the way the government allows expenses to be deducted before a project makes a taxable profit, it could be decades before the country starts to receive a better return on its mineral wealth. The vast sums spent building Australia's LNG projects have created a tax shield of carried-forward costs that was worth A$238 billion ($182 billion) in 2016, with the figure rising each year 5 percent faster than the yield on government debt


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British Columbia having an LNG export plant is important why?....The bottom line for British Columbia...

There is no point having a LNG plant if the province doesn't make money...to allow this reckless money loser...for the sake of a handful of gas fracking jobs....an industry that will make BC's GHG reduction targets a sick joke, an industry requiring taxpayer welfare...

Well people....Premier Horgan(Mr. Dithers) will no doubt hire some NDP party lackies to conduct a review, a review that will give Horgan comfort and cover...

Right Johnny Dithers?....Here's another bit of cover for you Premier Dithers....a security blanket courtesy...

The Powell River Persuader.




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Like the picture atop this post....Too bad we didn't elect a Dave Barrett like premier that was prepared to be brave and with abandon leap headlong into the future..but alas we elected....Dithers.


The Straight Goods

Cheers Eyes Wide Open