In recent days, the Liberal Party of Canada has made a couple of statements indicating they think that the Government of Canada should be spending MORE of our tax dollars on new programs. Considering the problems we are having funding the programs we already have, this is hard believe – except that these are Liberals who believe more government has got to be a good thing.
First, Marc Garneau, MP for Westmount-Ville-Marie (Montreal), calls on the government to waste more money, either directly or through regulations that will force companies to spend money on something not justified by economics, on a “plan for the digital age”. One of the scariest is:
Canada must set an ambitious goal of 100% connectivity for all Canadians. including Canada’s rural and remote communities;
Who exactly is going to pay to install high-speed internet connectivity to small outposts in the North? Are the rates for those people going to cover the costs? I doubt it – it will be born by taxpayers or by customers in more populous regions through higher rates. If the market doesn’t demand it, the government shouldn’t be wasting money on it.
The second statement that I find laughable is this statement:
we must create an environment of competition that accelerates investment in next-generation fibre and wireless digital networks;
Does this mean that the Liberals want the CRTC to stop interfering in this area and that TOny Clement’s override of the CRTC allowing GlobaLive (WIND Mobile) to operate in Canada even though the CRTC ruled it violated the ridiculous Canadian ownership regulations? I highly doubt a Liberal government would reduce the powers of the CRTC to accelerate competition… Craig Smith’s letter to the National Post today sums it up nicely:
Government involvement simply distorts the market and balloons the deficit which, in the long run, harms the very companies responsible for the innovation due to higher taxes.
In the second case of Liberals proposing to waste money is Michael Ignatieff proposing nationalized, universal early learning and child-care programs:
We will find the money, because it seems to me an excellent investment. I am not going to allow the deficit discussion to shut down discussion in this country about social justice.
This sounds like a pledge to raise taxes or run an increased deficit – because there aren’t enough other programs to cut to get this money from that Liberals would touch. All I can say is kiss the military goodbye if this guy ever gets into power.
Of course, the real problem here is that creating yet another government program, run by unionized bureaucrats, is not going to efficient or effective. The National Post editorial says “there is a whiff of social engineering”. Stand a little closer – it stinks to high heaven of social engineering. Here are things such a program will do:
- Encourage parents to work and have two incomes
- Encourage single-parent families
- Indoctrinate our kids with whatever socialist rhetoric the government deems fit to pour into their little minds. If you’ve been in a public school lately, this already happens so don’t tell me it wouldn’t happen in government run preschools.
- Put out of business all of the private daycares, dayhomes, and pre-schools that currently make profits and provide incomes to a lot of people. Is someone who runs a small daycare and makes the equivalent of $30+/hour going to accept a government run job at a reduced wage with union dues, where they don’t have the control? I don’t see why they would.
The last one is particularly painful – you are going to close profit-making daycares that pay taxes and have employees who pay taxes with government run centres, this costs money twice. First the profitable businesses close, and the government needs to raise taxes on everyone else to pay for such a program. It is a waste of money. More government is NEVER the answer.
With Ignatieff’s proposal, I half expected him to say:
Let us open residential schools and take children from their parents to ensure they are well taken care of by the state.
Of course, we all know that was a bad idea, so why is putting our children into government run pre-schools a good idea?
1 comment
Cynical Bard says:
4 February 2010 at 11:48 (UTC -7 )
In the letters in the Post today about Lawrence Solomon’s article on teaching AGW in Universities, one professor quoted an individual student who had been shown Al Gore’s movie in public school SEVEN TIMES.
Does not this qualify as indoctrination?
Especially considering that a British court ruled that the movie is not fit to be shown in schools because of technical errors. And that was BEFORE the revelation that most of the IPCC data is “cooked”