Alberta Politics & Government Thread 4.0

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by Cappy

Dude, how do you think other countries work?

The US has federal transfer programs as well.

I have highlighted the problem with your post.......

[puffnstuff]

Last week in her prepared remarks dani said it was PM Trudeau's "disastrous open border immigration policies".

Yesterday she was in the legislature and said PM Trudeau "drove people away from this province."

She needs to make up her mind.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

The UCP are not a libertarian party. They are the party of Evangelicals.

They are Authoritarian Libertarians. Layering Evangelicals on top of that just gives them the confidence that they also have God on their side, bestowing certainty and legitimacy to their evil. It's all delusions, of course, but that's why they should be never put in positions of power.

Authoritarian libertarianism uses a rhetoric of freedom and liberty to advocate and enforce policies of control, forcing everyone to abide by what in-group authorities determine is correct behavior and belief. I don’t think the rhetoric is necessarily insincere. My favorite example of authoritarian libertarianism is how the Massachusetts Bay Colony defended its practice of punishing, expelling, and sometimes hanging dissenters as consistent with the "freedom of conscience" guaranteed in its charter.

https://www.patriciarobertsmiller.co...do-what-i-say/

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by puffnstuff

Last week in her prepared remarks dani said it was PM Trudeau's "disastrous open border immigration policies".

Yesterday she was in the legislature and said PM Trudeau "drove people away from this province."

She needs to make up her mind.

Well she is consistent. Blame Trudeau for everything.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

The UCP are not a libertarian party. They are the party of Evangelicals.

I have traditionally seen it the opposite way historically.

Canada does have a much more moderate median church than the US and even where there is an evangelical tradition it is more inwardly focused than the explicitly authoritarian system over the past 50 years of the US.

I think the UCP is more of an authoritarian party, in that they believe so strongly in their political ("free market", "small government") world view they feel the need to impose it on others forcibly. And evangelicals also having a very rigid world view, that dictated they know better than others and should work to correct the world views of others, became a natural ally.

Their beliefs in scare quotes because we have all see how good they are at actually implementing their espoused views, I some how believe it is what they believe they believe. But I just haven't seem them reach the point of actually working towards what they seem to think they believe in.

[Torture]

Was looking on the Water not Coal website last night and there is already 323 signing events just this week. Going to blow the 177k signature requirement out of the water.

https://www.waternotcoal.ca/

PS if anyone wants to sign that petition to ban coal mining on the Eastern slopes of the Rockies and is near Mount Pleasant/Tuxedo inner NW part of the city, I am signed up as a signature collector. Send me a PM.

The Government of Alberta shall prohibit through legislation all coal exploration and mining activities within the Eastern Slopes of Alberta’s Rocky Mountains, other than mines that are in actual production as of January 1, 2026. For clarity, this prohibition includes Northback Holdings’ Grassy Mountain Project and Valory Resources’ Blackstone Project as well as any projects to expand any producing mines.

[DJones]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I'm not looking to blow your mind. Others have explained how it works, but you keep insisting you know better. Higher tax revenue comes from high income earners contributing more, skewing per capita numbers. It's those earner's who's dollars go. Not Alberta. Not you, or me(unless, as I said, you are fortunate). Individual CANADIANS paying CANADIAN taxes. And they are only able to earn more hear because the magical luck of resource deposition. Not from working harder, or being better, or deserving it more.


You feel these extra dollars should come back, despite you never earning them. You haven't justified why it is a just and right reason, you just claim it is yours. It's not, it's Canadian who paid it, as per their responsibility as a citizen. It's no more your money than it is Alberta's.


Now, in the wacko world you imagine, their income will drop, for all the reasons everyone with a brain understands and has explained over and over(please don't make me do this again). So they'll be making less, meaning less tax income, but also because based on stated philosophies, Alberta will have an entirely flat tax, at a lower rate than federal. Good for those already well off, I guess. And why should it even go to you if it is made in Calgary and Ft McMurray? Isn't it more their money than yours? Why should Carstairs get an even cut? And why can't you see how stupid this all is? #### me.


Also, my previous post aobut MAID is EXACTLY why I want experts deciding #### in Ottawa, because this province is run by a bunch of feckless ####s who can't imagine the life situation of someone who isn't born on third base who has been gifted their positions in government, and make decisions based on thr stupid loudest voices in the province, who are also completly unqualified to draw conclusions about anything more complicated than an hour glass.

Explain to me why incomes would drop if we sent less money to the feds. Why would our incomes drop if more tax revenue stayed in Alberta? Why would incomes drop if the feds were completely removed from all provincial jurisdictional spending?

No one has explained that worth ####. It doesn't even make sense.

MAID wasn't even a federal decision. It was a supreme court decision. Once again your entire point encompasses that you do not want Alberta to make decisions for itself. I get it, you seem to strongly dislike where you live. But wow is that a wild logic to throw away your communities managing themselves.

[DJones]

Originally Posted by Cappy

Dude, how do you think other countries work?

The US has federal transfer programs as well.

Majority of countries are small.

US, China, Russia, India. They would all be much better off falling apart. The only advantage they have is military.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by DJones

Explain to me why incomes would drop if we sent less money to the feds. Why would our incomes drop if more tax revenue stayed in Alberta? Why would incomes drop if the feds were completely removed from all provincial jurisdictional spending?

No one has explained that worth ####. It doesn't even make sense.

MAID wasn't even a federal decision. It was a supreme court decision. Once again your entire point encompasses that you do not want Alberta to make decisions for itself. I get it, you seem to strongly dislike where you live. But wow is that a wild logic to throw away your communities managing themselves.

Because once there are new trade barriers in every direction, profits will drop, companies will leave, labour will be in excess, incomes will fall relative to benchmarks (probably not in reality, we just won't keep pace with OECD wage inflation). This isn't really theoretical, it's well documented in Quebec and the UK.

And as you already know many have already explained this to you many times.

[DJones]

Originally Posted by Wolven

So again, you are looking at the situation backward.

First issue you are backward on: The middle man is the province. The Federal Government of Canada is the primary organization and it created the province of Alberta to handle a subset region of the country in a more focused way. If we wanted to abolish an unnecessary middle man then we should abolish the Alberta government.

Aside from being "closer to the issues", the Alberta government adds very little value to the equation. The Federal Government has the currency, has the trade relationships, has the military, has the larger population to bring together to deal with big issues or to pool our resources to get advantages in procurement. In every regard, the Federal Government of Canada brings more value to Albertans than the Government of Alberta.

The job of the Government of Alberta is to handle regional issues of the province with more focus on behalf of the Federal Government and the Citizens of the region. Just like how the Municipal government handles the regional issues of the cities with more focus on behalf of the Provincial Government and the Citizens of the region. The one constant element in all three levels of government is that we are given the ability to elect a representative in each level of government (in the City you get to vote for both a councilor and a Mayor whereas in the Province and Country you only vote for your local representative).

Having said all that, if you want to get down to eliminating unnecessary governments then we could probably just roll BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba into a single Canada-west province that is geographically too big but at least then would have a population more on par with Ontario and Quebec.

Yes, provinces were created because no one could agree on the best course on things when it was a million people hunkered around the St Lawrence. Even back then, they were #### that guy. I don't want them deciding things for me haha.

They then gave those provinces the constitutional control over all of the important things a government does. Health/Education/Infrastructure. That's all I care about. I would absolutely shred to pieces everything else on the budget. Defense, monetary and trade delegations of course are important but countries a tenth of the size of Canada seem to handle those just fine This whole conversation came from me saying I want the feds removed from all provincial jurisdictional budgets items. Not a single one of you has acknowledged me saying that 5 times. You just say that's greedy and go on weird tangents about what you heard some separatist say one time. Like that's great, I think most separatists are morons too. We don't need to separate, we just need to absolute neuter the federal governments tax collection strengths. We don't even need to change the constitution, constitution agrees with me, we just need more provinces to do more than beg for more money.

Get rid of FPTP, get a regional based senate, some stronger constitutional powers protecting provinces. Boom, the country is unrecognizable and better for it.

Second issue you are backward on: What "decision making" do you think you have? You have no more or less decision making power with the Federal Government in Ottawa than you have with the Provincial Government in Edmonton or the Municipal Government in City Hall. Aside from voting for a representative, none of them are wondering "What does DJones thinks about this issue?" and it doesn't matter how close to the building you get.

And that is a wild thing to say. I have met my city councilors dozens of times, they know my name, I have their phone numbers. I work with them, I know their employees. Half of them I knew before they became politicians. I can go to a meeting every week and get face time with them.

My MP wished me happy birthday. We've been in several different non-profit groups together. We know the same people, we go to the same events.

I've never met my MLA and I've never even seen a federal Liberal MLA in person. Which I've never really thought about before but I think it may be true haha.

So yes, I 100% do believe that representation is increased the smaller the government. Suggesting otherwise seems short sighted at minimum to me.

Following that, I think using technology to enable more direct democracy is the real way to give power back to the people. Only one party would be willing to flirt with electoral reform or direct democracy and their colour certainly isn't Red or Blue.

Can't disagree, would be a great idea. But what happens when 70% of people in one province go one way and 70% in another province go another way...

Just decide based on who has more people, or as I've said endlessly. Let people choose on their own. 40 million people do not have to agree with everything.

[DJones]

Originally Posted by #-3

Because once there are new trade barriers in every direction, profits will drop, companies will leave, labour will be in excess, incomes will fall relative to benchmarks (probably not in reality, we just won't keep pace with OECD wage inflation). This isn't really theoretical, it's well documented in Quebec and the UK.

And as you already know many have already explained this to you many times.

Why would their be new trade barriers? Are these provinces not seeing Trump? No politician should talk about tariffs and trade barriers for a generation after Trump haha

Where are these companies going to? Do they hate paying provinces more money instead of the feds? Why would they care in the slightest.

[Fuzz]

Yup, what #-3 said, and has been said before. Sorry, I meant tax income specifically, but also individual.


And you are wrong on MAID. Completely. If you believe what Smith is doing is compliance with the Federal MAID regulations, you are entirely incorrect, and also not inline with the SC decision. The SC ruled the original law was unconstitutional, because it was too limiting in it's wording. Currently there is an exemption that prevents people with only mental illness from accessing MAID until 2027, giving them time to review. You know, with experts.


So now Smith is going far beyond that temporary limitation(which in itself protects the charter breach, so not great), proposing other limitations, which I guess is easier if you defund the disability advocacy groups fighting you.


Now, I don't know about you, but I've seen enoguh people go through the stages fo dying ot have a pretty good idea where I would like the care we provide to the animals we love so much, and I'd like to be able to put that in writing, as the federal MAID legislation allows, to make my own choice ahead of time, should I not be able to in the moment. You may disagree, but you don't have the right to take that away from me. Not in Canada. And it's of zero interest to anyone else, so I don't know why anyone else should think they have a say.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by DJones

Why would their be new trade barriers? Are these provinces not seeing Trump? No politician should talk about tariffs and trade barriers for a generation after Trump haha

Where are these companies going to? Do they hate paying provinces more money instead of the feds? Why would they care in the slightest.

Companies are going to go where all of the systems of trade, employment, currency, courts are the same as they were before. Who wants to deal with all of what being a new country entails?

I swear, nobody on the pro-separate side looks at any of these details. They have this illusion like it’s like some clean amicable break and we’re suddenly just not paying federal taxes anymore but everything stays the same.

[edslunch]

Any chance we can move off the Alberta vs Ottawa taxation topic for a bit?

[Wolven]

Originally Posted by DJones

Yes, provinces were created because no one could agree on the best course on things when it was a million people hunkered around the St Lawrence. Even back then, they were #### that guy. I don't want them deciding things for me haha.

They then gave those provinces the constitutional control over all of the important things a government does. Health/Education/Infrastructure. That's all I care about. I would absolutely shred to pieces everything else on the budget. Defense, monetary and trade delegations of course are important but countries a tenth of the size of Canada seem to handle those just fine This whole conversation came from me saying I want the feds removed from all provincial jurisdictional budgets items. Not a single one of you has acknowledged me saying that 5 times. You just say that's greedy and go on weird tangents about what you heard some separatist say one time. Like that's great, I think most separatists are morons too. We don't need to separate, we just need to absolute neuter the federal governments tax collection strengths. We don't even need to change the constitution, constitution agrees with me, we just need more provinces to do more than beg for more money.

No. What we need is for the provinces to work with the Federal government instead of picking a fight with them. If the country wants to move toward universal heathcare / dental care / pharma care / whatever care, it is not the role of the provincial governments to fight the program.

For example, the Feds moving ahead with the daycare program and Alberta decides to fight against it instead of implementing it then Alberta gets less money. Smith cries about how she should get the money with no strings attached so she can spend it on other stuff and leave the citizens of Alberta without this daycare program that is being implemented everywhere else. Thus we end up not getting this funding for months/years and then the UCP point to how we are getting less money to rile up the dummies who are not aware that it is actually the UCP's fault. They rage at "Ottawa" when they should be raging at the incompetence (or the intentional neglect) of the UCP.

The government that should be neutered is the provincial government. They should be acting as a partner organization or a child organization that is collaborating with their peers and the parent organization.

The current provincial government demonstrates that we need stronger guardrails to be built around them to prevent their corruption, which means the Federal government likely needs to intervene to bring back ethics and accountability in the Alberta government. I honestly believe that the provincial ethics commission should be removed from the province's authority and stood up within CSIS.

Originally Posted by DJones

Get rid of FPTP, get a regional based senate, some stronger constitutional powers protecting provinces. Boom, the country is unrecognizable and better for it.


And that is a wild thing to say. I have met my city councilors dozens of times, they know my name, I have their phone numbers. I work with them, I know their employees. Half of them I knew before they became politicians. I can go to a meeting every week and get face time with them.

My MP wished me happy birthday. We've been in several different non-profit groups together. We know the same people, we go to the same events.

I've never met my MLA and I've never even seen a federal Liberal MLA in person. Which I've never really thought about before but I think it may be true haha.

So yes, I 100% do believe that representation is increased the smaller the government. Suggesting otherwise seems short sighted at minimum to me.

Cool story bro. I would bet that if you polled the population you would find that you have more access than 99% of the population. Imagine if 50,000+ people had that kind of access to the councilor, or the MLA, or the MP. It is unsustainable. The only way to give everyone that amount of access would be to have a bigger government with each representative covering a smaller number of people.

I am glad we agree on Electoral Reform. I do not agree with a regional based senate but I do think senate reform is required and should likely start with it being an elected position with finite terms. The job of the Senate should be to implement what is best for all, not what is best for "my people" or "my region". There may be some differences in the requirements of the different regions, but they are not that drastically different.

Originally Posted by DJones

Can't disagree, would be a great idea. But what happens when 70% of people in one province go one way and 70% in another province go another way...

Just decide based on who has more people, or as I've said endlessly. Let people choose on their own. 40 million people do not have to agree with everything.

You keep trying to create these wedges where you think "other" groups want things that you do not. It is far more likely that people who live in Ontario want most of the same things that you do:
- Best in world health care that increases Canadian's quality and length of life
- Best in world Education to empower our future generations to greater things than our past generations accomplished
- A culture that embraces progress and advancements so that we can lead the world in food / environment / energy / science and all of our people feel safe and respected
- Infrastructure delivered in a reliable and cost effective way (roads, transit, water, power, internet, etc)
- Perhaps some forward thinking things Universal Basic Income to soften the blow to society as AI takes over increasing sectors of the workforce.
- Other social programs and safety nets.

In each of the foundational issues, you likely want the exact same things as every other Canadian, or every other person in the world. With the exception being the Conservatives and Corporatists who actually do not want these things because it interferes with their desire to accumulate power and wealth.

The entire UCP agenda in Alberta is to destroy these public services you claim to be most interested in. They want people dumb, broke, and stressed out to the point that they cannot put up a fight as they take away our rights and freedoms. They want people like you to cry about Federal taxes and fighting Ottawa instead of pointing at their corruption and how they are actively stealing your money to give to coal companies or MHCare.

In short, you seem to be buying into the Culture War instead of focusing on the Class War. Some of what you say makes me think you want to be in on the Class War, but then you get distracted by the noise of proximity or region and trying to make conflict with other regular people that you should be aligned with.

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Any chance we can move off the Alberta vs Ottawa taxation topic for a bit?

I'll give it a go.
New bill introduced to move closer to a provincial police force that nobody has asked for.


https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmon...cing-9.7104301

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by Lubicon

I'll give it a go.
New bill introduced to move closer to a provincial police force that nobody has asked for.


https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmon...cing-9.7104301

I thought the province was running a big deficit? Seems like a good time to spend money unnecessarily.

[Wolven]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Any chance we can move off the Alberta vs Ottawa taxation topic for a bit?

Sorry, had to go back in for another round and it took a while to write up my response.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Any chance we can move off the Alberta vs Ottawa taxation topic for a bit?

I’ll try.

I think that the Alberta government should ban work from home.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by GGG

I’ll try.

I think that the Alberta government should ban work from home.

Not even possible.

Now back to the tax conversation!