Premier Rachel Notley pulls Alberta out of federal climate plan over Trans Mountain ruling
CBC News
‘Albertans are angry, I am angry,’ premier says of Thursday’s federal court ruling
In a dramatic announcement Thursday evening, Premier Rachel Notley said she is pulling Alberta out of the national climate-change plan to protest a federal court ruling that quashed expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline.
The ruling by the Federal Court of Appeal poses a threat to Canadian sovereignty and economic security and leaves the country hostage to the whims of the White House and U.S. President Donald Trump, Notley said.
Vancouver Mayoralty candidate Steffan Ileman calls Carbon Tax a scam to exploit the well-intentioned and gullible environmentalists
“We have no doubt that every one of us living on this planet is interested in protecting it in his or her own way. While some scientific guidance may be necessary,we do not need a civic religion or church to tell us how we ought to live. The worst thing that has happened to environmentalism is that it has been monetized and profited from by the so-called green capitalists and then governments, preying on the goodwill and gullibility of some people. Carbon Tax is an example of how environmentalism can be turned into a scam for politicians to earn undeserved points for “protecting the planet.”
What politicians omit from the public is what they teach in Economics 101, a concept called elasticity of demand. Put simply, elastic demand is for goods and services that we can do without if necessary. Inelastic demand is for goods and services that we cannot do without, like heating our homes, driving or riding to work, and having necessities transported over long distances in a country like Canada. It is only common sense that people cannot do without energy to heat their homes, drive or ride to work. Canada has some of the highest taxes on energy products in the world. In fact, this is the only country whose citizens pay more for fuel than the markets they export to. The more you tax fuel, the more it will bite into their income and standard of living, since they cannot stop buying fuel to live normal lives. As for carbon emissions produced by industry, there is no doubt that the tax will be passed on to consumers making life more expensive for most Canadians. It will hurt especially the low and middle income earners. If you really believe that an industrial operation is damaging the planet, why don’t you just shut it down and see what happens instead of using consumers as helpless pawns in your game. Carbon tax will not save the planet. It will just make life more difficult for most Canadians. Pretending that the carbon tax is a genuine environmentalist protection is a fraud perpetrated by governments exploiting the well-intentioned and the gullible with half truths…”
Residents priced out of hot markets in Vancouver and Toronto real estate hoping for housing crash: poll
National Post
Expensive real estate is the top concern for residents living in and around Vancouver and Toronto, with the majority of people hoping prices will fall by at least 10 per cent, according to two new polls.
The surveys published by the Angus Reid Institute found that 54 per cent of Greater Toronto Area residents are concerned with housing affordability, a stark jump from 36 per cent in 2015, when residents thought transit was the biggest challenge facing the city. In Metro Vancouver, housing was listed as a top priority in both 2015 and 2018, increasing from 55 to 65 per cent in the latest poll.
New Vancouver Civic Party targets non-resident foreign ownership as main culprit for Vancouver Real Estate prices
Restore Vancouver leader and Vancouver Mayoralty candidate Steffan Ileman says this intrusion is tantamount to ethnic cleansing of Canadians from Vancouver, emphasizing that his definition of Canadian includes citizens and immigrants of all ethnic backgrounds. He says he will do everything legally possible under the city’s jurisdiction to reverse this trend, such as prohibition of non-resident ownership of Vancouver Real Estate and a moratorium on development permits except rental property. His solution for Homelessness in Vancouver is collective farms, a concept that has been proven to work in Israel. Restore Vancouver’s main platform is the establishment of a digital referendum system, but the party offers solutions to various problems such as high rents and renovictions.
Why is BC NDP dragging its feet on “Renovictions” ?
Editorial
It seems there are two victims in the Vancouver housing crisis, those priced out of the market and those outside the rent control system facing outrageous non-affordable rents. But wait, there’s a third class of casualties, now: those evicted from their homes under the excuse of renovations. A new word has been coined for the phenomenon whose main objective is to evict tenants under control so the suites can be rented at higher prices, supposedly “at the market value.” After all the obvious market manipulations and interference it’s the bad joke of the year to call the market a free market, but there are so many gullible people who would believe anything fed to them through the media. The NDP government has softened the blow a little bit by extending the notice for a renoviction from 2 months to 4 months, but stopped just short of legislating a real deterrent that would stop this social charade in its tracks: tell landlords that they have to take back the same tenants “at the same rent.”
However, the government is more interested in protecting the profits earned by ejecting tenants out on the street than protecting the victims thrown to the hyenas outside city walls. Vancouver Centre MLA Spencer Herbert says “Landlords have to earn a return on their investments.” Since when has BC NDP adopted a right-wing Libertarian philosophy? Actually, this is not the first time that we heard the MLA’s office speak like the right wing. If you’re a senior citizen worried about health care you wouldn’t want to know how our NDP MLA’s office thinks. This is not a true to character or balanced stance for a party that prides itself on aiding the downtrodden and the underdog.
Is the Federal Government willing to sacrifice NAFTA or the auto industry to protect dairy producers?
Editorial
Two things have become clear throughout NAFTA negotiations between Canada and the United States. Donald Trump will not budge unless he obtains concessions for access to Canada’s dairy industry. Liberals won’t budge from protectionism in dairy since most producers are in Quebec and the province is too important to them at the next election, especially since the Conservative leader has vowed to protect the industry from free competition with the U.S. As the dissenter Maxime Bernier has thrown himself out of the Conservative fold, there is no challenge to Canada’s protectionism in dairy. When NAFTA fails or the auto industry receives a 200-percent tariff from the U.S. the government will blame Trump’s intransigence and America First policy. Is the federal government correct in opposing competition from U.S. dairy farmers? Is it in the best interests of Canadians to protect Quebec’s dairy profits? Before you answer, go to your supermarket and look at the prices for chicken and dairy products.
Beauty and the Cheese.Thanks for the expensive cheese and chicken, Minister
Does Donald Trump have a point ?
Opinion
One of my travel agent friends once said “You can work your a– off to sell the best stuff in the world and you won’t sell a damn thing in Canada, even if you give it away. But you sell sh– and you’ll find buyers in the U.S.” How true. It seems that Americans live to buy and sell, and no matter what you’re selling you’ll find a buyer in the United States. Bless them, they are the number 1 mercantile nation in the world, a nation of compulsive consumers and creative entrepreneurs, and nobody comes even close. What would our standard of living be if we didn’t have Americans as our neighbours and trading partners. Everyone who has something to sell must sell to Americans or die. Look at Communist China. They came out of the depths of bankrupt Communism, poverty and hunger and prospered in a couple of decades thanks to Americans’ voracious and insatiable appetite to buy cheap junk. The French and Germans owe their post-war prosperity not only to the Marshall Plan, but Americans’ appetite for classy-sounding brands sold to them at premium prices. Do Mercedes owners in Beverly Hills know that what they are proudly driving as status symbols is the commonest brand for taxicabs throughout Europe?
Trump does have a point. For too long it has been a one-way street between United States and the rest of the world. To build its political role as the leader of the free world the U.S. practically opened its markets wide to everyone with nominal customs duties while the rest of the world did not reciprocate or even applied protectionist policies. Canada was no exception before the Free Trade Agreement and NAFTA. In fact, NAFTA was superfluous for Canada since most Canadian goods entered the United States duty-free or at nominal duty rates.
This brings me to another point I want to make. Is Donald Trump unwittingly Canadian consumers’ best friend? Imagine buying cheese, milk and chicken and hopefully wine (hear these words Mr President) at American prices without having to travel across the border.
Canadian consumers’ best friend?