Letter: Equalization program obfuscation
By Letter to the Editor on May 18, 2021.
Dear editor, Mr. Cote, once again, uses the standard left wing ruse to oppose anyone who might comment about the net negative fiscal impact the Canadian equalization program continues to have on the Alberta economy in his May 12 letter, “Logic behind equalization outrage does not follow.” Mr. Samcoe’s reference to that fact is absolutely correct. Trying to confuse and distract the reader about the basic principle of this federally-mandated “monetary reallocation” is their only defence against this egregious program. It may have been a well intended program to deal with short-term provincial wealth disparities when imposed over half a century ago but in reality became a permanent fiscal handicap for a few provinces (mostly Alberta) for decades. The simple fact is, and Mr. Cote and his ilk cannot deny that, collectively, Alberta taxpayers have for decades paid tens of billions of tax dollars annually (over 600 billion in total) more to Ottawa than they receive back as federal transfers to their own province. This transfer shortfall then has to be made up by other local taxation means in order to have equivalent provincial infrastructure and services to the beneficiary provinces. I believe it is Mr. Cote who needs more arithmetic class time. Lynn Thacker Bow Island 8-7
Let me guess Lynn Thacker is another one of our fellow seniors who is easy to fool. He/she still believes the lies Ralph Klein created and has been used by these Reformers ever since.
When asked by reporters why Alberta was so broke and Alaska and Norway weren’t, Klein created the lie that it was because we have had to send billions of dollars to Ottawa and Quebec in the form of equalization payments.
Alberta has never paid a penny to anyone in the form of equalization. It all comes out of our federal tax money, so the Alberta Government has no say whatso ever about how it’s being distributed.
Kenney is playing his mind games, just like Klein did, and who is believing them, ignorant seniors of course that’s who they are targeting. The young Albertans aren’t dumb enough.
anyone
So while the Alberta UCP Reform Party continues to give away billions in royalties and increases tax breaks for their rich friends Thacker is dumb enough to believe it’s all Ottawa’s fault just like Kenney wants his ignorant followers to believe.
Thacker is just one more Albertan being treated like a moron and letting Kenney do it. Where’s the intelligence in that?
I am a strong conservative whose late parents and two sisters spent countless hours volunteering for the Lougheed and Getty conservative governments. A brother in law in his spare time voluntarily flew the government plane for them. Lougheed’s energy minister Bill Dickie was a brother in law of one of my uncles. Dad donated around $30,000. to their party and Klein with his health care cuts almost cost him his life. Does that sound like a Liberal to you?
In 2003 a group of six of us conservatives got together and formed SUN seniors untied now. The idea was to travel the province talking to senior groups to explain to them what Klein’s policies were doing to us and going to do to our children down the road.
For our efforts we got called Liars, Traitors, Communists, Leftists, Left Wing Nuts or Closet Liberals and in every case the person doing the name calling was one of our fellow seniors. How would you feel if that happened to you?
With me being from the world of fiancé with ties to the oil industry everything we said would happen has happened. To put it bluntly these phoney conservative governments have deliberately helped their rich friends steal the people’s oil and tax wealth and Lawyers, accountants, oilmen, bankers and the former MLAs we knew from the Lougheed era agreed with us. Even members of Klein’s own family were as upset as we were by what they were doing to us.
Now every time we turn around some fool is calling anyone who doesn’t agree with his level of incompetence a leftist and I can assure you a lot of my senior conservative friends feel the same way as I do.
Ignoring what people are saying about Jason Kenney while they try to defend him doesn’t make them look very smart.
Even Ralph Klein , years ago, accused him of spreading lies and stealing from seniors and he is still doing it and while we try to stop it we find many of our fellow seniors are our enemy. Why are they, when the young people we talk to understand what we are trying to do.
Here is some more reasons why my conservative friends and I are so upset with our fellow seniors.
By the way my title Fedup Conservative was created by a lawyer friend who told me to make sure I told people I was a Conservative.
If you didn’t watch the TV show ” W5 Inactive Oil Wells Abandoned Across Alberta” I would suggest you pull it up on the internet and watch it.
I was involved with this clean up prior to Ralph Klein changing the regulations to benefit his rich friends. Why would I be happy about him dumping a $260 billion cost onto the backs of our children to have to deal with and as this program points out senior farmers and ranchers are sitting on land they can’t sell. It has destroyed their retirement plans.
Ralph Klein told us he had no intention of creating any additional long term health care beds for seniors. He was going to make the system so productive that private for profit companies would take it over and that’s what he did.
When members of our family needed a bed for a loved one we couldn’t get her into a public one. We were told there were over 1,800 people on a waiting list and it was no secret that our hospital beds were being occupied by seniors needing a bed. They found a private one at a cost of $10,600. per month. It was $7,000. for the basic cost and $3,600. for a full time care giver that she needed.
How many of our seniors and their families are going to be able to afford that if they find themselves in that position. I met a man who told me that it had cost him $368,000. for his mother. Another man told me that he had both parents in a home and it had cost him $464,000. and he was still paying the $4,000. per month their income couldn’t cover. Another woman told me that her family was paying $14,000. per month for their loved one.
But that wasn’t the biggest problem. We were told about how badly their relatives were being treated in these facilities because of poorly trained staff and now we have seen what a death trap they have become.
There is no question that the Kenney government has only been interested in carrying on where Klein finished off destroying everything our hero Peter Lougheed stood for and the big question is why are so many of our fellow seniors so willing to let them do it? There is nothing conservative about them.
While oilmen praise the Notley and Trudeau governments for being willing to work with them and help them try to get their products to market by buying a pipeline for Alberta, implementing a Carbon Tax, and buying rail cars guys like Thacker would rather believe the lies of these Reformers and try to destroy what they were trying to accomplish.