Big LOLs!

So today the Supreme Court of the US ruled in favor of President Obama and stated that the Affordable Care Act was constitutional.

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obama’s healthcare law on Thursday in an election-year triumph for him and fellow Democrats and a stinging setback for Republican opponents of the most sweeping overhaul of the unwieldy U.S. healthcare system in about a half century.
Source: Reuters

They did strike down one portion that said the Federal government can’t withhold funds from the States if they don’t expand Medicaid, but overall it was a big win for Obama. Too bad they didn’t go father back in 2010 and institute the public option but in any case, it’s still a big improvement from the ridiculous system they had in place previously.

As expected the Republicans are up in arms about it and I rather like what Senator Rand Paul said…

“Just because a couple people on the Supreme Court declare something to be ‘constitutional’ does not make it so. The whole thing remains unconstitutional,” the freshman lawmaker said in a statement. “While the court may have erroneously come to the conclusion that the law is allowable, it certainly does nothing to make this mandate or government takeover of our health care right.”
Source: Politico

Um actually it does mean it’s constitutional, that’s what the Supreme Court of the US said and it’s the law. Only way it’s not constitutional is if the top court in the US decides at a later date that it’s not loser. Are you like me and tired of hearing Republicans talk about “the best health care system in the world”, yes the American system does offer the best treatments if you’re rich but if you’re a working stiff or worse, poor then it sucks balls badly compared to other developed countries.

I’ve already posted many times about how the US is worse than many other countries but feel like posting this video again because it’s still relevant.

For profit health care sucks, there’s absolutely no incentive for the pharmaceutical industry to cure anyone because then they lose patients… The US system is designed to keep everyone sick and on drugs so everyone in the health care system can make money. You also hear the Repulicans talk about repeal and replace, they all scream about the first but have absolutely no idea how to do the second. When pushed, the typical Republican response is super vague and talks about a bipartisan (the Democrats did try to get them involved but they wanted no part of it) deal. What exactly would you do? Wish for health care access to improve? Let the free market fix itself, yeah it’s done a great job so far and in the financial sector too… What a bunch of BS!

Finally I want to close with this retarded link (some are sarcasm but others are legit) which shows Americans on Twitter saying they’re going to leave the US and move to Canada due to the ruling. LOL I guess those dumbasses don’t know we have universal health care up here and pay a lot more in taxes…

Funny funny stuff, one side is trying to move the country forward while the other side is pulling back, wanting to go back to the stone ages… It’s also pretty sad that I probably know more about the ACA than the average American.

From the mind of a former GOP aide

Yes I’m a Canadian but US politics is just so much more interesting than the stuff we see, that and whatever happens down there affects the rest of the world too unfortunately. I stumbled upon this and found it quite fascinating to read.

Those lines of dialogue from a classic film noir sum up the state of the two political parties in contemporary America. Both parties are rotten – how could they not be, given the complete infestation of the political system by corporate money on a scale that now requires a presidential candidate to raise upwards of a billion dollars to be competitive in the general election? Both parties are captives to corporate loot. The main reason the Democrats’ health care bill will be a budget buster once it fully phases in is the Democrats’ rank capitulation to corporate interests – no single-payer system, in order to mollify the insurers; and no negotiation of drug prices, a craven surrender to Big Pharma.

But both parties are not rotten in quite the same way. The Democrats have their share of machine politicians, careerists, corporate bagmen, egomaniacs and kooks. Nothing, however, quite matches the modern GOP.

To those millions of Americans who have finally begun paying attention to politics and watched with exasperation the tragicomedy of the debt ceiling extension, it may have come as a shock that the Republican Party is so full of lunatics. To be sure, the party, like any political party on earth, has always had its share of crackpots, like Robert K. Dornan or William E. Dannemeyer. But the crackpot outliers of two decades ago have become the vital center today: Steve King, Michele Bachman (now a leading presidential candidate as well), Paul Broun, Patrick McHenry, Virginia Foxx, Louie Gohmert, Allen West. The Congressional directory now reads like a casebook of lunacy.
Source: truthout: Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult

I copied and pasted a bit more than I usually do but I found it fascinating. The article is from last year but still relevant considering today’s policitlca climate in the US. I definitely fall under the “liberal” spectrum in the US but then again President Obama would be considered a Conservative in my country. Socially I’m definitely left leaning, I’m pro gay marriage, pro choice, pro environment but fiscally I’m pretty conservative. Still listening to the Republican party preach fiscal responsibility is pretty ridiculous, yes Clinton started the housing deregulation but it was the GOP that took it and ran off the damn financial cliff!

The rise of the tea party just boggles the mind too, the good ole US of A is the only developed country in the world without universal health care… I know Americans love to tell everyone that they have the best health care in the world blah blah blah and my usual counter is simple. The US scores very poorly compared to other developed countries in cost/care ratio, infant mortality rate and life expectancy. I’m relatively young and healthy, I don’t need health care now but I’m glad my taxes support a system that won’t bankrupt me should I get sick.

Supply side economics is also a crock, it doesn’t work and the US’ wealth inequity is growing larger and larger… Corporate profits are up and the rich get richer much faster while everyone else gets poorer. Heh I like the chart that shows China’s income inequity (ranked 81st) is better than the US (ranked 93rd).

As I watch the US train wreck, it scares the heck out of me seeing as Canada is going down the same route… Got to give the GOP credit though, they know how to play the game of politics much better than the left.

Election Day!

Today the people of Ontario vote for their next provincial government. Who will you be voting for? Personally provincial politics doesn’t interest me much but it’ll be interesting to see who will be in power that’s for sure.

So the Conservative government did lie…

Too bad the auditor general’s full report on G8 spending didn’t come out before the federal election as that probably would have changed things quite a bit. They lied plain and simple, lol thinking back to when the campaign was on and how Mr. Baird was talking about how the fake “second draft” of the report exonerated the government from any wrong doing. What a crock of shit that was.

Stephen Harper’s government misled Parliament and skirted spending guidelines as it sprinkled tens of millions of dollars across Muskoka to provide a G8 legacy, an independent probe has concluded.

The federal Conservatives passed off the $50 million G8 Legacy fund as part of an $83 million investment to reduce border congestion when they sought Parliament’s approval for funding, a report from the Auditor General of Canada said Thursday.

The result was that members of Parliament were kept in the dark about the Harper government’s dispersal of tens of millions of taxpayers’ funds, the audit concluded.
Source: The Star

And I particularly “liked” this part, yeah what a team…

Depicting a slush fund without using those words, the audit reveals that more than 200 projects were initially hand-picked by a small team of insiders, led by local MP Tony Clement without the usual screening by federal government officials.

Officially, it was known as the “2010 G8 Summit Liaison and Implementation Team.”

In fact, this “team” was Clement, the mayor of Huntsville and the general manager of the Deerhurst Resort, where the summit would take place, according to the audit.

For a party that likes to rant and rave about how it’s economic stewardship, I’d like to remind everyone that the Conservatives spent Canada into a deficit even before the 2008 market crash. I wonder if the AG will be looking into the G20, I’m sure there was a lot of wasted money there too. It’s such a shame the Canadian electorate has such a short memory, come next election this will probably be a distant memory… We deserve the government we elect because people are stupid.

Conservative majority it is

So 40% of Canadians voted Conservative in the federal election and they receive a majority mandate. I’m sure there will be a lot of complaining in the future as my views are ideologically different from the Conservatives, let’s see if they push the social agenda now. I doubt Harper and co will directly assault health care (he is for private health care) but they may reduce funding and let the system crumble apart instead. I do think that they may press the abortion issue, after all the PM does not have to worry about his government falling easily and I’m sure gay marriage is on the radar.

I’m sure one of the first thing they’ll do is remove the public subsidy to political parties, the PM tried that when he was in a minority position and now that he has a majority, there’s nothing to stop them. Good thing for the Conservatives, they have a lot of rich constituents who give a lot of money to the party. Great our government now can be held hostage to special interest groups that donate to political parties and politicians like they are in the US.

On the bright side I might get a tax cut and who knows, with the loosening of gun laws in Canada perhaps the rules around airsoft may be relaxed too. Got to look at the positive too right… On a more serious note, I am happy that there is a true federalist party in Quebec now, with 4 seats the Bloc is pretty much history, hopefully.

Social Conservative Agenda

I’ve always said the Conservative Party of Canada only represents social conservative views (not fiscal, look at their shitty financial management) and I find the comments from this back bench Conservative candidate quite disturbing.

MP Brad Trost, seeking re-election in Saskatoon-Humbolt told a pro-life supporters convention on the weekend that their petitions helped deny funding to Planned Parenthood because it supports abortion.

“I cannot tell you specifically how we used it, but those petitions were very, very useful and they were part of what we used to defund Planned Parenthood because it has been absolute disgrace that that organization and several others like it have been receiving one penny of Canadian taxpayers dollars,” Trost said.

Interrupted by applause, Trost went on to tell the audience to step up their efforts. “You should know, they’re still trying to get their snout back in the public trough,” he said.
Source: The Star

I truly believe that there should Mr. Harper receive a majority government we’d see a more overt social conservative agenda. It’s already happening at the edges and worst of all, you can’t compromise with these people because anyone who does not share their views is a sinner. How can you compromise with that…

Yeah it’s scary!

Cutting corporate taxes does nothing…

Meh the debates were kind of blah, so I’m going to skip that to talk cutting corporate taxes… I mean the corporate taxes in Canada are about half of what it is in the US, if that doesn’t already spur investment I don’t think cutting it a few more points will. Considering the federal government’s fiscal shape I also feel that it’s an inappropriate time to cut taxes, I mean if we’re swimming in money sure but to cut simply for ideological reasons is down right stupid (like the GST cut, yeah I am happy it’s lower but it was a bad fiscal move).

There’s a great article about this in The Toronto Star, looks like Statistics Canada shows corporate tax cuts don’t help…

Historical economic data from Statistics Canada reveals business fixed capital spending has dropped slightly as a percentage of GDP and as a share of corporate cash flow for almost three decades, according to the study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, an Ottawa-based non-partisan, non-profit research agency.

The decline came despite continuing business tax cuts that have slashed the combined corporate federal-provincial corporate rate from 50 per cent in the 1980s to 29.5 per cent in 2010, according to the study, which The Star obtained and the centre will release this morning.

Geez you figure if you look at how things are in the US, people would figure that the trickle down theory is bogus… Btw the tax breaks the Conservatives have been pitching help those more with higher than average median income, just wanted to be clear.

Coalition goverments are 100% legit!

Woo I love election season but I guess I’m the only one. In case you heard otherwise (how could you not…), I wanted to mention that coalition governments are a legitimate option despite what Mr. Harper says. In fact all minority governments (his included) are coalition as the governing party requires the help of one of the opposition parties to pass confidence motions. The party that wins the most seats has the first opportunity to set up a government however should they fail to reach a majority consensus in the house of commons, it’s perfectly in the right of the runner up to try and gain the confidence of the house.

Mr. Harper tried this in 2004 when then Paul Martin’s Liberal minority was on the verge of collapse, that and he was in support of this ideal well before that time too. The Toronto Star (which frankly is very left leaning yes) has a good piece on Mr. Harper’s coalition argument and these are just the facts…

Stephen Harper, in a 1997 TV interview: “The way the Liberals, I think, are eventually going to lose office, whether it’s in this election or the next one, is they’re going to fail to win a majority . . . . But what will be the test is whether there is then any party in opposition that’s able to form a coalition or working alliance with the others. And I think we have a political system that’s going to continue to have three or four different parties or five different parties, and so I think parties that want to form a government are eventually going to have to learn to work together.”

Sigh when I ask my coworkers about their thoughts on a coalition government, it’s sad that the negative attack style political ads are working… As Canadians you have a responsibility to educate yourself about our parliamentary government and political parties. Look past all the party/media spin and see what these people stand for.

I’ll be frank myself, I do not like the current brand of Conservatives as they conflict almost 100% with my political beliefs. They’re social conservatives (I’m pro choice, for gay marriage, am against the death penalty, etc) but spend like drunken sailors and this is an important thing to remember, Mr. Harper’s minority government was already in deficit before the 2008 market crash! I could go on and on about what I think went wrong in the last few years but lol I have to work.

It’s a shame, as a Liberal supporter I do not like Mr. Ignatieff either I wish he would make a stand on something and stick by it. Mr. Harper to give credit where credit is due, is head and shoulders the best player of politics of all the leaders. He knows the game well…

This is not an April fools joke either.