Let Your Voice Be Heard!

Along with 82% of British Columbians, I am proudly opposed to the introduction of the Harmonized Sales Tax in our province. In pursuit of this, I participated in the BC NDP's campaign calling on BC Liberal caucus members to "stand up for your constituents." Originally, this was only intended to be sent to seven MLAs by the party. They were considered vulnerable to succumbing to public pressure about coming out against the HST. As we all know, they didn't state their opposition to this regressive tax, it was here that I stepped it up a notch.

Considering that the Executive Council at the time of the discussions between the federal and provincial government were the true sculptors of this tax, I sent messages to all members of the Cabinet of British Columbia along with the seven vulnerable members. I did this everyday for a little over a week. I got some people supporting me including disgruntled voters of Ida Chong and Don McRae. Eventually, Carole James began to follow me, along with the appropriately named "Recall in the Fall". Then though, the hate mail arrived. Some individuals told me I was starting a "spam campaign" and that they "got the point".

I found it humorous in the manner in which they told me it was a spam campaign. I was fully aware that what I was doing was borderline harassment, and was in every respect a spam campaign. I was glad that they understood my intentions, but they had missed the entire point of this initiative. I was not trying to get the attention of ex-Liberals searching for a right-wing alternative, I was attempting to get the attention of the Liberals MLAs that crafted Bill 9 and supported it. Still, I would like to know which is worse: an anti-HST supporter harassing Liberal MLAs every day, or paying 7% more on many goods and services after Canada Day?

At the end of it all, I was flagged for spam, and am now suspended from entering the site. Despite this, I am pleased with the results I received. I set out to let the BC Liberals know my opposition to how the HST was introduction, and what is means for every British Columbian, and I achieved that. Granted, I would have liked to have seen some governing party MLAs drop like eagles from the caucus, but "Recall in the Fall" has plans concerning those members who choose not to go the way of Mr. Lekstrom.

Overall, I know I angered some British Columbians in my small, personal quest to pressure the centrist turned conservative party that rules our province to change their mind on the issue of this new tax, and for that I am sorry. But there is a bigger picture to all of this. Speaking out against anything really in the world, leaves you open for criticism and that can be scary. What you must remember though is that if you don't say it, who will? Part of a democracy means accepting others thoughts and beliefs, you may not agree with what others are saying, but in the beauty of freedom of speech, they must tolerate your beliefs, just as you must tolerate theirs.

Ladies and gentlemen, I encourage you all to let you voice be heard on any issue. Let others know how you feel, for you are not alone. If you are opposed to an action proposed by your government, let your family, friends, and neighbours know. Who knows, you might even convince others to join your cause. Let others know if you support a government action regardless of whether or not a majority of your colleagues are opposed to it. Let them know what allows it to be acceptable to you, that they are refusing to see, or are viewing in a different way. Allowing your opinions be known is truly good for the soul, and in essence could help change the world. There is one other thing I can assure you: if you make your personal beliefs be known, you will in the words of Katy Perry in her latest single California Gurls, "be glad you did."

The Spring Session in a Nutshell

This session started with a short and boring throne speech outlining the government's priorities for the next four months. FightHST began to prepare for the first initiative in eight years; members of the legislative assembly got a little rowdy every day, and then came the resignations. Kash Heed resigned as Solicitor General and Minister of Public Safety over an investigation into his election campaign in 2009. Then the inquiry ended, and he was reappointed. Then we found out that the judge had assisted his campaign personally in a financial matter, he then resigned once again and remains a backbencher to this day. Then the HST hatred heated up. Bill 9 was passed in the Legislature after invoking closure on it. The Finance Minister even announced a public campaign to educate the public following the anti-HST campaigns apparent blatant misinformation. Luckily, that was shot down by Elections BC. Then the recession came to an end, and recall was embraced as a true potential to defeat the Harmonized Sales Tax.

So as you can tell from the size of that paragraph, a lot happened. But there are also some really great quotes coming from this session too. Some of them are funny; some make you cry a little inside, and some poke fun at the Liberals themselves. Either way, I hope you enjoy them:

10. "I would love to sit down with the minister and explain the failings of that environmental assessment." - Vicki Huntington

9. "I'm not a big fan of direct democracy." - Terry Lake

8. "How about telling the truth?" - An honourable member

7. "That member deserves a golden shovel." - Mike de Jong

6. "In light of 30-foot waves on the north coast, hundred mile-an-hour winds, and a couple of fault lines, won't the minister... advise the federal government to maintain the moratorium?" - John Horgan

5. "How can she justify spending millions of taxpayer dollars on executive salaries while cutting vital programs for children in this province?" - Carole James

4. "I'm getting a sermon on generally accepted accounting principles from a government that wants to do away with them." - John Horgan

3. "What day is it today?" - An honourable member

2. "The HST in revenue-neutral." - Colin Hansen

1. "God help us!" - An honourable member

Resignation or Impeachment

Recall is approaching for the BC Liberals, and they soon will have to make a decision. Will they continue to support the HST throughout their own recall period? Will they resign like Blair Lekstrom? Or will they be forced from public office?

When things get really bad for politicians, they have two choices: they can either leave office based on their own terms, or they can be forced from office. If any of you ever have the privilege to hold a public office and are forced to resign or be impeached, resign. Leave on your own terms, not someone else's.

Back there in the 1990's, Paul Reitsma resigned during the verification process of his recall campaign, knowing that the process had collected more signatures then were required for his removal. Did I mention he too was a Liberal? I would expect the same thing from this group of Liberal MLAs, to wait until the last possible moment, and then jump from the already sinking ship that is Mr. Campbell's party.

Considering that plenty of recall campaigns are likely to begin on November 15th, I would expect plenty backbenchers and a few cabinet ministers to have some fascinating press releases in early 2011 concerning their political futures.

Whoa, Nelly!

Right after the 2008 federal election, the government announced that the next election was scheduled to occur no later than 2012, no one believed it, including myself. Considering there were four parties, three of them possibly forming a coalition, and an anxious Conservative Party waiting for a majority, there was no way the 39th Parliament was going to last until 2012. That was 2008, but today in 2010, as we now know, that Parliament has survived the test of time. I am convinced that the next election will in 2012, right as scheduled. Why? Read on and you'll find out.

Conservatives want a majority. They've made that obvious since their 2006 minority victory. I can't blame them, when there is a threat nearly every other day to bring down the government, without an agreement with another party, it's stressful. While it is stressful though, Harper knows that the Liberals are doing awful in the polls lately, and if they wait long enough they could replicate what happened in the 1988 election by 2012. The Conservatives are going to wait until 2012 for an election.

The opposition on the other hand, is not popular with the public. Since the last election Liberals have only been able to pull off slightly better NDP numbers in the region of 26%. No one wants to go into an election with an unpopular leader, and numbers saying you could easily become the third party. The Liberals are going to wait until 2012 for an election.

The NDP and the Bloc don't want an election for the same reason as the Liberals, polling numbers are at the same level as they were two years ago, or are below last elections popular vote shares. The NDP and the Bloc are going to wait until 2012 for an election.

It would be nice if this were the case, a minority government lasting for four years has never happened from what I can remember. Still if anyone is going to drop the writ, it will have been the Conservatives that caused it. So don't get your election face on quite yet, volunteers can relax, but fundraising, fundraising must continue.

Blair Be Gone!

I came home today to find out that Blair Lekstrom had not only resigned from cabinet but also from the BC Liberals caucus. Plenty of things shoot through my head after learning of this: was it because of the Clean Energy Act? Was it the Site C dam project? Was it the BC Hydro advertisement campaign? But I was wrong; he resigned because of the HST.

Way back there on April 29th, Bill 9, the law that introduced the Hated Sales Tax passed 46-36 with the BC NDP caucus and Vicki Huntington opposed. You will note that Mr. Lekstrom the then Minister of Energy, Mines, and Petroleum Resources voted for the introduction of the Harmonized Sales Tax. Today though he has announced he will leave the governing party's caucus to sit as an independent with the member for Delta South.

I've met Blair Lekstrom, he is a good man. He cares for his constituents in Peace River South, he wants them to enjoy British Columbia for all that it has to offer them, and his stand against the HST, is best for the people of Peace River South. His stand against the HST takes courage. He says that the government should engage in "a series of discussions" regarding the provinces tax policy.

The member from Peace River South's actions is a big win for the BC NDP, the FightHST campaign, and possibly the BC Conservatives. Considering that Mr. Lekstrom will most likely vote with the NDP and Vicki Huntington on a bill in the future concerning the Harmonized Sales Tax, which gives us now 37 votes to the Liberals 48, a small increase, but an increase nevertheless. The Premier, who expects and demands loyalty among his caucus, must realize that this is a big political blow on top of his already imploding party and personal popularity.

Mr. Lekstrom knows that by doing this he can avoid recall in November, and while not a minister anymore, considering that his beliefs are to the right of centre, I wouldn't be surprised if he brought back the Conservatives to the Legislature in 2013. Get ready for the seating plan to change.

Politics; you never know what's going to happen.

Say "No" to the Liberal Democrats!

CBC has informed me that there are "secret talks" going on between the Liberal Party and the NDP. I would take this with a grain of salt, but still it is a possibility. The Liberals want to merge thanks to their dismal public opinion numbers at about 25%, and apparently our continued "failure" to form government has forced us to hold discussions. This new party supposedly called the "Liberal Democrats" would be the sole opponent of the Conservatives.

As a New Democrat, I nearly shit my pants after I read this. The NDP is committed to social democracy, and merging with the Liberals, a bunch of centrists who flip-flop over issues every other day goes against everything Tommy Douglas stood for. This defeats the purpose of our whole existence. Our predecessor the CCF grew from Liberal and Conservative resistance during the Winnipeg General Strike. They didn't care for us, so we formed are own party. We then grew to become the NDP because the Liberals, still too concerned with business rather than people, didn't care for everyday Canadians.

The worst part of this though is that if this is true, it is not only destroying the NDP's and the Liberals history, but we are admitting defeat. If we merge, we are admitting to Canadians that social democracy is unachievable in this country. That is simply not true. We must continue to spread the message to every Canadian from the Pacific Northwest to the north, to the Atlantic seaboard.

To end I would like everyone to know that I would rather be a member of a party that doesn't win elections but has stayed true its roots, then a party that wins plenty of elections but has no soul. I know I'm not alone when I say that too.

Municipal Fallacies

The Union of British Columbia Municipalities determination that corporate votes should not be allowed for any elections is a great victory for all British Columbians. But the report has many other strong points, and has raised questions about local government and their role in citizen's lives.

Campaign finance limits are a great start. For too long, wealthy mayors have been able to outspend their opponents thereby putting them at an advantage; requiring the disclosure of third party advertising during elections would also be very beneficial for candidates during local elections.

The most intriguing portion of the report though in my opinion, is about the length of term for local candidates. Currently it is three years, thus those elected in 2008 will be running once again in 2011 for re-election. If we were to do what the report recommends, then the term would be extended to four years like provincial elections. To be fair, this would save a considerable amount of money, but like every other level of government set election dates do allow for governments that are unpopular to stay longer then they should, and those that are popular to stay for too short a period until we all march back to the polling station. Granted, it is much more difficult to determine when a municipal government has lost the confidence of the electorate that elected them in comparison to provincial governments.

This recommendation got some hype beyond the denial of corporate votes in the media. Some editors suggested that along with four year terms, there should be term limits for local politicians. Now those who said this had points that mayors in some cities have held their position since the 1990's, and ran unopposed nearly every election since then. They claim that a change of faces would encourage voters to hit the polls more so then the same person hanging around in his or her office for longer than a decade. Perhaps what they need to remember though is that voters show up for elections when they feel that their vote can make a difference. If the mayor is running unopposed, votes for council members might appear to be pointless. What we need are issues that engage the public in discussion allowing everyday citizens to affect the government they elected.

To end, most editors that suggested term limits for local politicians pointed out that young voters feel especially left out of the municipal government loop. To curb this trend, maybe what we need is someone to listen to the people of his or her municipality, someone who is willing to put the citizens, not the businesses first, and someone who truly cares for their community, and wishes for future generations to embrace a better world then we could ever imagine.

You Have to Believe We Are Magic

Song references, I love 'em.

Recently, the possibility of Gordon Campbell permanently leaving the office of the Premier has finally been realized. Besides his plummeting personal popularity, and the well-being of his party, some "experts" claim that reaching a third-term is achieved by few and thus he should, if I may quote one editor "not tempt fate." It's true that few Premiers have reached three mandates in office. Because I enjoy making lists, the following is a list of British Columbia's first ministers who achieved three consecutive mandates to govern this great province.

-Sir Richard McBride (1903/1907/1909/1912)

-Duff Pattullo (1933/1937/1941)

-Wacky Bennett (1952/1953/1956/1960/1963/1966/1969)

-Bill Bennett (1975/1979/1983)

-Gordon Campbell (2001/2005/2009)

The point is this rant is to stress that the electorate doesn't wake up one morning and claim "You're time is up!" to the governing party. McBride resigned because of his poor fiscal planning; the same thing happened to Wacky Bennett along with broken election promises. Duff Pattullo wasn't a fan of coalitions and resigned in protest, and Bill Bennett resigned to allow the province to embrace Bill Vander Zalm. They all lost their position because of their own doing. The voters didn't escape the post-election hype that consumes all of us; they realized the errors in the governing party's ways and demanded a change.

Politicians don't lose their minds after twelve years in their office. Indeed what does happen though is an ego develops, and with that comes the belief that they are unstoppable. As we all know though, we have the lovely invention of recall to remind our leaders of where they can slip back to.