My phone rang last night. It hardly ever rings at night.
The government wanted me to participate in the biggest spin on the HST to date. According to them the audience was massive. Over 26,000 people online in the Interior (I still choose to use Interior over Campbells' rebranding us the hinterlands.)
I sat through their automated instructions and then it started to get real phony. They asked an automated question about how I would like to redistribute the hords of money they were getting from us. Should they use it for things like Health, Education, Blah blah blah? The whole question misses the point. They assume by asking it that (a) we actually want to be ripped off or; (b) they are not going to get rid of it. Or (c) both of the above They did not give us an answer of "none of the above". And the framing of the question and answers tells me only one thing. They can take this back to the public saying that we want the HST and we want the money to go to specific social programs.
As I type this I am sitting here wondering how god damn stupid do they think we are? They must be looking at some odds and are thinking they may have enough people out there to believe this crap.
So I listened through four people who had questions to ask. It struck me that these were not spontaneous but possibly prepared questions. The reason I say this is because I had a million questions to ask and couldn't narrow it down to one only.
At any rate the answers were bogus. The are obviously framed as an election answer and scare tactics.
The liberal government keeps referring to a question of how we are going to pay back the 1.6 billion bribe they got from Harper.
First of all it's not our bloody problem. It's theirs. My answer is to set a special tax on big business who are benefiting from this and pay it back.
Secondly $235 Million was seed money. A gift. Or as I call it, a bribe from the Federal Government to accept this deal. A deal by the way which was only accepted after the Liberal government mismanaged our economy. And don't give me any of this bullshit about how they were surprised about a recession. They saw it coming just as the rest of the world did. But they needed to get elected at all costs and I allege they did it with a lie.
I finally hung up, yelling some of my choicest words into the phone, when it was mentioned very vaguely that the Federal Government would set the tax rates.
And that to me is the biggest problem other than it's a tax shift from the rich to the poor. If Harper wants more money then he will raise the HST rate. Don't think for one minute that when he says he will raise the GST that is true. As it stands we in BC do not have GST or PST. It's HST period. And the Liberals, nor any future government, having given away our right within the province to set our own provincial taxes can't even protest.
Then thre is this from the CBC
By CBC News
CBC News
An independent government report on the HST has concluded the majority of British Columbians are paying more at the cash register since the introduction of the HST, but low income families are actually paying less. But the report says that while many British Columbians are paying more tax now, rolling...
Click here to view this content.
Following is an added comment by a friend who sent me the CBC report:
The independent report was developed by the Liberal government appointed committee. The report acknowledges that the HST is a taxation shift from business to the consumer that is not revenue neutral as claimed and will only increase in the taxes collected from the consumer as time passes.
And then my comment:
The report also uses unproven statements and gives us words such as "likely" to possibly scare us into thinking that we have a problem in cancelling this money grab. As I said at the beginning it is not our problem, it's the problem for the liberal party of BC.
UPDATE: for a good review on the Dinning Report with a link see our friend Gran G at The Straight Goods
UPDATE: for a good review on the Dinning Report with a link see our friend Gran G at The Straight Goods
6 comments:
I would have probably just hung up on them.
They have to be as brain dead as Martyn Brown, not to see the damage the HST has done to the province and the people. They know the HST was designed for big business, and big business only. BC is a province of natural resources, the HST does nothing for the BC people, what-so-ever. It was never meant to. They tried to snow the people saying, the HST would create jobs, well, BC has been bleeding jobs. Where is the money, the two b.sing, Campbell and Hansen promised we would save? The cost of living has gone through the roof. what happened to, Hansen's stacked HST panel? Don't count on the HST referendum either.
We know spring has come to BC, the price of gasoline has gone sky high, as usual. Come summer vacation, gas will go up again.
We will have to look forward to, the rivers Campbell thieved and sold, causing our hydro, to go up 53% higher.
This country is going to be a morass of corruption. Just as BC is a cesspool of corruption. Harper and Campbell are best buddies, after all.
Sorry, my contempt is showing. However, that is exactly how I feel.
Utter bullshit and the manipulation never ends. That average amount of HST is way under from reality.
For those who are interested you can find more information at:
http://honestlyshared.blogspot.com/
Anon 7:12 they know exactly what they are doing. Not only is big business conducting a lying campaign the Liberals are pouring millions and possibly billions into trying to convince us that if we the voter pay all the taxes and business keeps increasing their bottom line then it's a good thing.
As I've stated before so far they have managed to spin this off the real message. It's not that they rolled it out wrong. It's that they rolled it out at all under secrecy and a lie. Now they are twisting this god damn town hall bullshit into "what would you spend the money on?" Jesus H Christ they really do think we are morons. Axe the bloody HST. They have enough money to advertise FOR it. Use that friggin money to get rid of it.
NON 5:36am: EXACTLY
I have to say in all my many years. Never have I ever seen, anyone as low in character as Campbell and the BC Liberals.
Christy Clark is no better than Campbell. She and family, were implicated in, Campbell's corrupt sale of the BCR. Anyone who would support a monster such as Campbell, who thieved and sold this province out, is as sick as he is. And, that includes Harper, who had the gall to chastise the BC people, for forcing his partner in crime to resign. Never mind what Campbell did to the province and the people.
Harper and Campbell are working on projects, that will soon come to light. Especially as Harper has a majority. Harper's dictatorship will become, unbearable.
The $350 is per PERSON. I repeat per PERSON, not per family. MAth net extra rev. to government from the poor and elderly (and t4 earners excluding business owners) about $1.5 billion divided by about 4 million population.
It is a bad tax.
Anon 5:365 PM
You are right. Sorry I missed it.
The biggest thing that pissed me off was the framing of the question they ask while they have you on ignore. "How would you spend the money?" Then they give you multiple answers and none of them is "none of the above. I don't want the tax." And it only took Clark a day after they had the "conference" to say she was getting feed back on the rigged meetings that people wanted to spend it on some such thing. Of course she doesn't get feedback on cancelling the HST, she's not asking the god damn question.
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