May 2015 Provincial Election Thread v2

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by robaur

And then there's this stereotype of NDP being Anti-Oil...but all I see in the news is how Notley is being Pro-Oil.

Seriously.....what? Might want to check that one a wee bit closer. Start with her chief-of-staff.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Dan02

Even as a Liberal supporter the shear volume of those emails in amazing.

I will say they've been showing remarkable restraint lately, it's been over 48 hours since my last call to action.

Yeah I almost canceled my membership a couple of times, especially when Trudeau's wife sent a long blathering email about how Canada was back because her husband was so cool.

But I like receiving their information, it keeps me informed.

[MelBridgeman]

2006 - Debt paid in full, almost what 15 billion in the bank? Services "gutted"
2006-2015 - some of that 15 billion gone , very little debt, highest paid Government workforce by a long shot in the country
2015 - it's the PC's fault ....(true check the last 9 years)
2016 - continues to blame the PC's for these troubles but also continues on their high spending policies
2019 - 50 billion in debt

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by transplant99

Seriously.....what? Might want to check that one a wee bit closer. Start with her chief-of-staff.

Not enough time in the day.....I'll add another one, attending a ONTARIO NDP fundraiser in ONTARIO for 10K a plate - when the ONTARIO NDP party is against ENERGY EAST

not too mention attending a fundraiser, which I believe she spoke at....during well the worst economic time in 30 years

[Slava]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

2006 - Debt paid in full, almost what 15 billion in the bank? Services "gutted"
2006-2015 - some of that 15 billion gone , very little debt, highest paid Government workforce by a long shot in the country
2015 - it's the PC's fault ....(true check the last 9 years)
2016 - continues to blame the PC's for these troubles but also continues on their high spending policies
2019 - 50 billion in debt

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

Not enough time in the day.....I'll add another one, attending a ONTARIO NDP fundraiser in ONTARIO for 10K a plate - when the ONTARIO NDP party is against ENERGY EAST

not too mention attending a fundraiser, which I believe she spoke at....during well the worst economic time in 30 years

I'm not defending the anti-pipeline angle at all, but its almost like these two bolded parts of your posts are related in some way.

[Derek Sutton]

All the Notley talk and not one mention of today's presser with Ceci regarding the budget. It seems they are slightly off on their projection of a 5 billion deficit by roughly 5 billion dollars, the deficit for the next budget will be 10 billion. All due to slumping oil prices and nothing to do with their rampant spending and crazy promises.

[Resolute 14]

Well, in fairness, "NDP doesn't math" is as much news as "sun rises in the east" is.

[Fuzz]

Curious how much of this is due to new spending that they have control over, and how much is due to already committed spending, and decrease in oil revenues. What I'm getting at is how much of this is an NDP created problem ,and how much would exist no matter who was in government?

[Resolute 14]

Its both. The NDP was predicting, IIRC, $50 oil, on average, for the year. Maybe $45. Between that layoffs eating the tax base, that will increase the deficit no matter who is in power. OTOH, the NDP still plans to spend like drunken sailors, and losing things like their protectionist booze tax are NDP initiated mistakes.

[Fuzz]

What kind of spending is accounting for the big increase? The big things I can think of are the Cancer Centre, and the Ring Road, and the Ft McMurray twinning project, but I would think all of those would go ahead no matter who is in charge.

Not defending NDP in any way, I'm just curious what parts of their spending are making it so bad, and what could reasonably be cut? The Wild Rose always says we have a spending problem, but it looks a lot more like a revenue problem. Excess health spending is a legacy of the PC's that there isn't really a quick fix for.

[CaptainCrunch]

Well the budget will be interesting, I had it pegged at closer to a 15 billion dollar deficit to be honest, but a $10 billion dollar deficit isn't good news.

I would expect there's no spending cuts to the government itself, and that will be disappointing.

[Slava]

Its definitely not good news, but lets say the Wildrose had won. Would the budget be in much better shape because while we would've held the line on spending or made some cuts, but they wouldn't have increased taxes either. In other words spending down from where we are and revenue down as well. So I don't know (and no one does), but it could well be a net zero kind of thing. I honestly don't think that any party could've balanced the budget at this point without some severe pain for all Albertans.

[Resolute 14]

And there it is. Slava's patented "Defend the government by deflecting the topic" argument.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

And there it is. Slava's patented "Defend the government by deflecting the topic" argument.

I'm not defending the government, and I've noted (likely in this monster thread) that I'm not thrilled with a bunch of stuff they've done fiscally. I love how this is somehow deflecting anything though. We're talking about the budget, and I post on that topic, and somehow I've deflected away to another topic? I'm a magician I guess.

[Jacks]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

What kind of spending is accounting for the big increase? The big things I can think of are the Cancer Centre, and the Ring Road, and the Ft McMurray twinning project, but I would think all of those would go ahead no matter who is in charge.

I haven't verified but I don't think those things are even included in the deficit figure. They don't count infrastructure spending anymore, now it's called "investment".

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Not defending NDP in any way, I'm just curious what parts of their spending are making it so bad, and what could reasonably be cut? The Wild Rose always says we have a spending problem, but it looks a lot more like a revenue problem. Excess health spending is a legacy of the PC's that there isn't really a quick fix for.

They need to tackle public service costs but they have already said that they won't touch that at all.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Slava

Its definitely not good news, but lets say the Wildrose had won. Would the budget be in much better shape because while we would've held the line on spending or made some cuts, but they wouldn't have increased taxes either. In other words spending down from where we are and revenue down as well. So I don't know (and no one does), but it could well be a net zero kind of thing. I honestly don't think that any party could've balanced the budget at this point without some severe pain for all Albertans.

why should that matter Slave? The Wildrose isn't the government, they're not running in an election right now, their job is to oppose the budget and point out the problems and shortfalls about it.

I doubt any government could balance the budget right now, that's a given, but at the same time, you can't go around spending like a drunken moron without balancing your spending with cuts. The Government is the biggest cost sink in the budget, especially when you look at the bloat and the poor delivery of service even though we pay a lot more per person for it then any other province.

The day and the age of the solutions being "Throw more money at it" are over, and the NDP is going to have to eventually piss off their voter base.

[CliffFletcher]

When Alberta had the highest private sector salaries and the highest government revenues in the country, paying its public sector employees more than everyone else was justifiable. Since it's looking like private sector and salaries and government revenue are going to be down for years, and may never recover to where they were during the hyper-boom, public sector salaries have to come down too. They can still be paid well. Just not as incredibly well as they - and private sector employees - were paid in this province before the bust.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by Slava

I'm not defending the government, and I've noted (likely in this monster thread) that I'm not thrilled with a bunch of stuff they've done fiscally. I love how this is somehow deflecting anything though. We're talking about the budget, and I post on that topic, and somehow I've deflected away to another topic? I'm a magician I guess.

Dude, you are pathologically incapable of engaging in a discussion about the government's - both PC and NDP - budgetary practices without relying on "But, Wildrose!" as the basis of any comment. It is a deflection tactic, and you do it every time.

[northcrunk]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

When Alberta had the highest private sector salaries and the highest government revenues in the country, paying its public sector employees more than everyone else was justifiable. Since it's looking like private sector and salaries and government revenue are going to be down for years, and may never recover to where they were during the hyper-boom, public sector salaries have to come down too. They can still be paid well. Just not as incredibly well as they - and private sector employees - were paid in this province before the bust.

Great points. I would add the public service pensions are a major problem too.

[chemgear]

Debt and out of control spending numbers are like Bettlejuice. If you ignore it and don't say the numbers out loud, they won't actually show up and be real.

http://calgaryherald.com/news/politi...elief-in-sight

The deficit is expected to hit the astonishing total of $10.4 billion in 2016-17. The federal shortfall, also ballooning, is now estimated at $18.4 billion.

A province with four million people, in other words, is likely to have a deficit more than half as high as the entire country, which has 35 million people.

Any way you jiggle this picture, it shows a province in dire trouble.

Next year’s deficit projection is so politically toxic that Finance Minister Joe Ceci refused to state the total on Wednesday, resorting instead to a little math problem for reporters.

The minister said: “I think I said a lot in this one sentence — Our deficit could be as high as $5 billion more in the next fiscal year than what we expected in the October budget.”

That budget predicted a $5.4-billion deficit in 2016-17. Ceci had just added $5 billion to the forecast.

Still trying, the reporter said: “My math is really bad … what did you say in the budget?

Ceci: “It’s a lot. It’s a hell of a lot. Thank you very much ….”

Ceci simply wouldn’t utter the total: “Ten point four BILLION dollars.”

One asked him: “Why won’t you actually say that number?”

But a whopping new levy is coming: the $3-billion carbon tax scheduled for 2017. Details will be unveiled in the April budget.

How on earth does this economy absorb a $3-billion extraction, even if money is returned in one fashion or another to encourage green industries?