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Archive of posts tagged broken promises

just around the corner

a recent wall-to-wall conversation sparked over facebook with an old school mate about the upcoming elections. now, in all fairness i won’t hold it against him that he’s involved with the liberal party…we all choose our paths…anyhow, long story short, i started to throw various comments at him in regards to the elections and some of the decisions made by the current provincial government.

may 12th is approaching quite fast. it’s election day in bc…for the right to govern this tourism province into the olympics (or better yet…during the olympics). as russell peters put it last night at the juno’s (yes i watched 15 minutes of them…and essentially only saw the introduction…which was enough i’d say…)…the winter olympics were awarded to the only canadian city that doesn’t have a winter…

anyhow…looking on the information webpage about the elections, i’m a bit stunned as to the number of political parties registered in bc. we even have a sex party, a work less party…and by now you all are aware of the marijuana party. i wonder what their mandates are…and probably i’m a bit to lazy to look into it…simply because i’m certain they won’t get that many votes…so might as well waste my time reading the mandates 0f the parties that are expeced to battle it out for the right to ‘lead’ us through the olympics.

so, the way i see things for the last 9 years since the liberals have been in power…and yes this is subjective…first shock i had with them was the ‘unfreezing’ of the tuition fees around 2002…this after it was promised the tuition freeze will last. so over the following 3 years…my tuitition essentially doubled…now, without going into how that got paid…i’ll simply say…thanks campbie!

then, there were healthcare cuts…funding cuts to the education system….school closures…and essentially increase in class sizes in highschool/elementary…so yes…thanks campbie! oh and let’s not forget the carbon tax…yes it’s ‘neutral’…but looking at it it’s hard to see how it doesn’t actually benefit the big corporations more than it benefits the small ‘people’…like the common folks. argue all you’d like…but the tax cuts to the big corporations…are essentially based and can be done because the larger share of the incoming dollars are based on taxation of the common folks. yes, you’re paying for it out of your gas purchase (last i recall it’s about 5.7cents/liter this year…to increase in the following years).

some of the latest…well let’s see the plan to make a prison in the middle of burnaby? in close proximity to not only a high school, but a education institute, numerous businesses, residential areas…and oh yeah…close to public transport. correcting myself, they only looked at 58 sites not 80 as i stated in a previous post, but how come out of 58 sites…one chooses the middle of a city to place a prison? the reasons…it will be easy to transport the prisoners to and from courts by public transport…thus cutting emissions….what about public safety? so yes…thanks campbie for thinking of the public on this one…

another mindblower…is the decision to replace the portmann bridge - the highway 1 bridge connecting surrey to coquitlam…essentially…in order to expand the bridge they want to build a new one…why not just add a few lanes to the already exisiting one…and instead of wasting all that money…put them to better use…like fixing pattulo…which had a few fires as of late.

a tuition increase for university is about to pop up any time now…however…voting on it will probably not occur until after the elections…so…if you’re planning to go to school in this ‘economic crisis’ you’re about to pay more starting next fall….thanks campbie!

on that note…remember the proposal from translink on how to increase their profit margin? well…the voting on that probably won’t happen until after the elections…

now, i’m sure there’s more things that can be mentioned…i just simply won’t waste my time anymore…given the politics over the last decade in the province have been on how to increase profit for the big corporations at the loss of the common folks…anybody know an obama like candidate for these elections?

edit: so at the 6pm news…here’s some more developments…currently british columbia has the second to last minimu wage ($8/hour). it’s been frozen at that since 2001…yup…that’s right 9 years…ever since the liberals came into power…so thanks again campbie! on top of that…the mandate for the new campaign…does not include an increase to minimum wage…better yet…the current premier doesn’t even wanna hear about it. and since we’re on the subject…let’s add another stat that was given on the news…at this point british columbia has the highest teenage poverty (a stagerring 16%)…if i recall correctly, the canadian average stated was around 7%…so thanks again campbie!…thanks for looking after the common folks…

let’s not forget…the current premier…tried to use his stature as a provincial premier while on vacantion in hawaii…after he was caught driving under the influence of alcoohol…he tried to get out of it by telling the officer…’i'm the premier’…abuse of power anyone?

new bridge…

in order to decrease congestion on hwy 1…our province’s will charge a $3 fee for crossing each way. let’s put this in context a bit…i am talking about the proposed new bridge for hwy, instead of the undersized portmann bridge. last i recall, they proposed an expansion to the current bridge…something i’d agree would probably help the congestion. now it seems, a new bridge is in order! i fail to see how that decision came about? given the next bridge over (patullo bridge) is not only about half the size of the portman, but has recently suffered two fires, it looks as if it’s going to crumbly any day now (new west bridge is falling down…falling down…), and esthetically…it looks like crap!

so, to cope with the price (recent reported figure was about $3 billion) of building a new bridge…a toll fee will be added. yes, $3 each way…i guess the morning starbucks for all those drivers coming westbound will just have to be forfeit. how is this going to decrease congestion? well, one way comes to mind…most people won’t drive over the new bridge…yes, they’ll probably either skytrain (i guess that’s the only ‘good’ outcome out of this) or use the other bridges…i can only imagine the extra gridlock coming from surrey towards either new westminster or richmond. let’s not forget, the other bridges take drivers way out of the way, increase the amount of stopping at red lights, drive slower, and most likely cause a nice pattern of a ‘stop-&-go’ traffic….in simpler words…at least based on my current understanding of the situation.. it will definitely increase combustion emissions. so…decrease congestion on hwy 1 (with apparently the intention of decreasing our carbon footprint) will probably not happen.

let’s return to the $3 toll…so, hwy speed around these parts is 90km/h. driving to work at that speed (one would only wish) and the have to stop at the bridge, take out the $3 and pay the fool that works there. i guess it will increase job opportunity in this financial crisis by 6 jobs? maybe? oh well, at least the goverment is creating jobs (oh wait…our unemployment rate is just over 7% at this point…about a year and a half ago…was around 3.5%). that’s not going to create congestion though, require everyone to stop, take the coins out (and probably receive change given we don’t have a $3 coin) and then start up again. thus, forcing people to stop will decrease congestion…our liberals never fail to impress us with their logic… probably some people will decide it’s too much, and if they won’t want to take other routes…which will not only waste more time and gas…but indirectly increase the chance of accidents (hey…look at that icbc will probably have an increase in profit for the next few years…yet again)…

they’ll probably skytrain. damn, but wait there’s only 1 line out of surrey…park-and-go around the stations is usually limited if at all available…and the skytrains (even though they run quite often) are usually pretty full. again, thumbs up to the liberals…try to force people to use another undersized public service (ahh…and there we are again…translink will probably profit from the increase as well)… but wait, if people will refuse to pay, refuse to drive out of their way…or simply refuse to use public transit…they’ll probably have to either move closer to work, find work close to home…or work from home. moving closer to work (thinking they might move towards vancouver)…will probably…actually most likely help increase home prices…stunning!…financial crisis, lowering home prices, banks losing since people are not buying…and the liberals find a way to indirectly ‘suggest’ that we should move closer to work…i’m just waiting for the environmental pitch for the move…b/c i’m sure it’s coming…

so…yet again…elections coming up…shortly…the liberals find another way to help business prosper…make another decision with ‘the public’s interest’ in mind…and i’m just ‘guessing’ here…that they’ll win again come spring?