The noise from people bitching and moaning about yesterday's budget is not surprising, but still annoying.
Are you pissed off about the budget?
Looking for someone to blame?
Well, LOOK IN THE FUCKING MIRROR!!!!
The next time you want to rant about the "Fiberals", or Slick Ernie for that matter, take a deep breath and think about the political climate that our lazy-ass approach to politics and government has created.
We are the ones that can't seem to grasp the relationship between taxes and services.
Every winter, there's non-stop complaining about over-crowded emergency rooms. Every fall, there's incessant bitching about the state of our schools. Every spring, people moan about the potholes in our roads. Blah blah blah. We all want more (!), MORE (!), MORE (!) from the government, but they better not raise our fucking taxes!
Why?
Because we've bought the line that its always somebody's else's fault. Its the welfare moms, the nurses, the teachers, the municipalities, the civil servants - there's lots of fat to cut yada yada yada - just don't you dare touch anything that impacts me.
Is there waste in the system? Damn straight. Are there people who abuse our tax dollars? You better fucking believe it. Would simply addressing those problems solve everything? Assuming that you even could eliminate waste and abuse (you can't), that still wouldn't address the fundamental problem that we face - the services that we want cost money.
DUH!
Doctors cost money. Text books cost money. Cops cost money. Road repair costs money. Government services cost money.
In order to pay for those services, the government raises money through direct revenue (user fees) and pooled revenue (income taxes).
We've reached a point in time where its political suicide for a politician to campaign on a platform that includes tax increases, but we similarly cringe at the idea of higher user fees. We shout "NO" to the idea of [spooky voice]"American-style"[/spooky voice] health care and flip-out that little Timmy's Boy Scout troop can't afford to rent the school gym anymore for their Monday night meetings. But we pay our taxes and they are too damn high, surely we should get something back, right? So, we don't want to pay any more, but we also won't elect parties that would radically reduce the size and scope of the government!
With all that in mind, is it possible to wind up with anyone but liars like Dalton & Ernie?
Those on the right would point to someone like Mike Harris and say "look, he kept his promises" and, to an degree, they'd be right. The problem is, however, that the Harris approach only works so long as you have scapegoats to blame and an expanding economy. Its easy to cut taxes and still spend like mad on health care when times are good (and when you can do short-term accounting tricks like selling the 407) but, as Ernie found out, the math quickly doesn't add up once a few surprises (SARS, Iraq, etc.) stall the economy. More notably, once you cut out the obvious fat, you hit bone pretty quickly, and the soccer moms who don't want to pay an extra dime in taxes are spazzing about the wait time to get their knees MRI'd.
As a society, we need to grow the fuck up, have reasonable expectations in the role of government, and actively involve ourselves in the process.
Casting your vote to the slickest liar every four years, and then bitching about the outcome is the problem, not Dalton McGuinty and his Merry Men.
Are you pissed off about the budget?
Looking for someone to blame?
Well, LOOK IN THE FUCKING MIRROR!!!!
The next time you want to rant about the "Fiberals", or Slick Ernie for that matter, take a deep breath and think about the political climate that our lazy-ass approach to politics and government has created.
We are the ones that can't seem to grasp the relationship between taxes and services.
Every winter, there's non-stop complaining about over-crowded emergency rooms. Every fall, there's incessant bitching about the state of our schools. Every spring, people moan about the potholes in our roads. Blah blah blah. We all want more (!), MORE (!), MORE (!) from the government, but they better not raise our fucking taxes!
Why?
Because we've bought the line that its always somebody's else's fault. Its the welfare moms, the nurses, the teachers, the municipalities, the civil servants - there's lots of fat to cut yada yada yada - just don't you dare touch anything that impacts me.
Is there waste in the system? Damn straight. Are there people who abuse our tax dollars? You better fucking believe it. Would simply addressing those problems solve everything? Assuming that you even could eliminate waste and abuse (you can't), that still wouldn't address the fundamental problem that we face - the services that we want cost money.
DUH!
Doctors cost money. Text books cost money. Cops cost money. Road repair costs money. Government services cost money.
In order to pay for those services, the government raises money through direct revenue (user fees) and pooled revenue (income taxes).
We've reached a point in time where its political suicide for a politician to campaign on a platform that includes tax increases, but we similarly cringe at the idea of higher user fees. We shout "NO" to the idea of [spooky voice]"American-style"[/spooky voice] health care and flip-out that little Timmy's Boy Scout troop can't afford to rent the school gym anymore for their Monday night meetings. But we pay our taxes and they are too damn high, surely we should get something back, right? So, we don't want to pay any more, but we also won't elect parties that would radically reduce the size and scope of the government!
With all that in mind, is it possible to wind up with anyone but liars like Dalton & Ernie?
Those on the right would point to someone like Mike Harris and say "look, he kept his promises" and, to an degree, they'd be right. The problem is, however, that the Harris approach only works so long as you have scapegoats to blame and an expanding economy. Its easy to cut taxes and still spend like mad on health care when times are good (and when you can do short-term accounting tricks like selling the 407) but, as Ernie found out, the math quickly doesn't add up once a few surprises (SARS, Iraq, etc.) stall the economy. More notably, once you cut out the obvious fat, you hit bone pretty quickly, and the soccer moms who don't want to pay an extra dime in taxes are spazzing about the wait time to get their knees MRI'd.
As a society, we need to grow the fuck up, have reasonable expectations in the role of government, and actively involve ourselves in the process.
Casting your vote to the slickest liar every four years, and then bitching about the outcome is the problem, not Dalton McGuinty and his Merry Men.
