I guess we know what the $1.13 billion Order In Council was for;
Just as we get set to vote tomorrow, $250 energy rebate cheques are being sent to criminals behind bars, who already got to cast their vote in the comfort of their cells, heated by our tax dollars.
“Linda, this makes me sick,” sniffed a correctional officer, who was on the line complaining he had just distributed cheques from Canada Revenue Agency (formerly Revenue Canada) to four inmates at a provincial detention centre, located north of Toronto.
One inmate had been at the detention centre fighting deportation since December 2004, after he was transferred from a federal prison where he had served his sentence.
He has 23 convictions, including armed robbery and drug offences.
This officer, who’s worked for Ontario’s ministry of correctional services for 16 years and asked not to be named for fear of being disciplined for speaking out, went on: “I’m delivering money to criminals that’s been stolen from me and other hard-working taxpayers in Canada.”
I haven’t seen a rebate cheque, nor have I heard of any going out in Saskatchewan.
Maybe they’re just targeting key ridings…
It’s like crack, you just can’t stop. Even worse, it won’t end tomorrow. It will go on for another year as everything comes out of the nooks and crannies of Ottawa. OT: If the CBC is SWTE would the BBC gig be ITLD. (In The Lion’s Den)
Perhaps I should get arrested for something so I’ll get an energy rebate cheque. As a law abiding citizen, I will probably be last to see one, if I ever do.
I can’t wait until this election is over. I can’t decide whether it’s more of a three-ring circus or a train wreck. In any event, no matter how it sickens me, I can’t seem to look away.
The way Paul Martin took over the federal Liberal Party in BC and Canada will likely cost him the 2006 election.
By Bill Tieleman
Published: January 18, 2006
TheTyee.ca
“Be careful that victories do not carry the seed of future defeats.” – Ralph W. Sockman
To understand why the federal Liberal Party might be about to lose the 2006 election, you must go back in time to June 23, 1990.
That’s the date of the Liberal leadership vote that saw Paul Martin come in a distant second to Jean Chretien and marks the start of an internal party war that has never truly stopped.
Nowhere has that war been fought as fiercely as here in British Columbia. And it will soon rage again as those who succeed in toppling Chretien in 2003 to install Martin as prime minister pay the price for not only political failure, but their arrogance and vicious tactics that alienated many party members.
The results of the federal Liberals battling among themselves will soon be clear, as the “natural governing party” that has been in power for most of the past 100 years is relegated to opposition and Martin is forced to resign the prize he spent 13 long years chasing.
An incoherent and stumbling campaign, a severe shortage of experienced political staff, volunteers and money, and an abundance of bad blood between the Martin and Chretien camps has left the Liberals lurching towards disaster.
BC’s big Liberal losers
Among the impending big losers in B.C. are such key federal Liberal players as:
* Mark Marissen, Liberal Campaign co-chair in B.C., prominent federal lobbyist and husband to former B.C. Liberal Deputy Premier Christy Clark, a former Ottawa Liberal staffer before entering provincial politics in 1996;
* Bruce Young, the Earnscliffe Strategy Group’s Vancouver office corporate lobbyist and occasional staffer in the prime minister’s office;
* Erik Bornman, the former Paul Martin aide and one-time Liberal operative nicknamed “Spiderman” for his late 1990s break-in to B.C. party headquarters, where a membership list allegedly resided. Bornman, an ex-provincial lobbyist who is now a UBC law student, will be a crown witness against David Basi and Bob Virk, the two fired Campbell Liberal ministerial assistants who go on trial April 24 for breech of trust following the dramatic 2003 police raid on the B.C. Legislature in connection with the sale of BC Rail;
* Jamie Elmhirst, Liberal Party President for B.C. and provincial lobbyist, active also in the Campbell Liberal Party. Elmhirst and partner Brian Kieran had a police search warrant served at their Victoria offices in the Basi/Virk case, likely because of Erik Bornman’s role in their firm until the raid;
* Bill Cunningham, the Burnaby-Douglas Liberal candidate, former party president in B.C. and a ranking federal government staffer in B.C.;
* Bruce Clark, Christy’s brother, a Liberal executive member in B.C. and Martin fundraiser whose home was searched by police in the Basi/Virk investigation;
* Sharon Apsey, the Party’s Regional Vice President for BC and a key backroom operator instrumental in Martin’s takeover, as well as a Gordon Campbell provincial Liberal with ties to cabinet minister Ida Chong.
‘The Godfather’: David Anderson
Two things tie this group of federal Liberals together: their involvement in taking over the federal Liberal Party while Jean Chretien was sitting as one of the most electorally successful Liberal prime ministers ever and their connections to David Anderson, the retiring Victoria Liberal MP and former cabinet minister who served as a political godfather to them all.
Ironically, Anderson’s longtime and often secret support of Martin, even while he sat as Chretien’s Environment Minister, went spectacularly unrewarded, when, in 2004, Martin unceremoniously dumped him from cabinet.
But when the Martinites began their long march to power and plotted to get rid of Chretien, it was David Anderson who provided them financial and moral support. Marissen, Bornman, his brother Ray Bornman, Elmhirst and others all found jobs in Anderson’s ministries or government with his help at various times.
The other connection is through the University of Victoria federal Liberal organization, a constant recruiting ground where promising operatives like Basi were found.
‘Cancerous presence’
To call the battle the Martin forces launched to take over the federal Liberal Party in British Columbia vicious would be an understatement.
The most damning comments one can find about Paul Martin and his B.C. takeover team are not found on Conservative or New Democrat websites – to get the measure of the malevolence, check out the words of former Chretien Liberal activists. >> much more
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/01/18/VictorySowedDefeat/
Maybe the Libranos are “softening” the attitudes of the inmates they may/will be sharing a cell with. $250 a month buys a lot of protection in prison…particularly if you are not partial to the sexual proclivities of the residents.
Are the checks monthly? How many years?
😉
My mother, who does not recieve a Guaranteed Income Supplement from the gov, this week gets a $125 one time Guarantee Income Supplement cheque out of the blue. Coinicidence? Any other seniors out their mysteriously recieving extra government cash?
Just another reason to NOT vote Liberal.
Hope it resonates with a few more people and they realize there’s a pattern to stuff like this wrt the Liberals.
Thanks, Linda and the Sun for printing this. Is this on either the TV news or any of the big MSM? Just wondering…
I bet I won’t get a heating rebate check. After all, I’ve never committed a crime. Remember, in “Liberal” Canada, crime pays, so… no check for me, I’m law abiding.
Perverse, these “Liberal” values, aren’t they?
January 23, just throw the Librano crooks out. Vote Conservative.
Both my mother and grandmother received this rebate this past Wednesday. It is no coincidence. The Liberals will stop at nothing to stay in power.
Tell me if this sounds familiar:
PM doles out riches to rural poor in reality TV stunt
By Jan McGirk in Bangkok
Published: 19 January 2006
With his popularity badly flagging, Thailand’s Prime Minister has taken to the road with a flurry of television cameras to star in his own reality show.
After pitching a tent in a back garden in At Samart village, Thaksin Shinawatra has launched a programme entitled Back Stage Show: Prime Minister – the basic premise of which is to throw money at the problems of the rural poor who bolstered his landslide victory last year and to eradicate their poverty in just five days. It’s a peculiar combination of I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here and The Apprentice, with a few Yes, Minister reruns thrown in for good measure.”
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article339567.ece
My mother too got a cheque – I mentioned to her about the coincidence – she even called Revenue Canada as she didn’t believe it – she makes less than $20,000 per year in pension and old age security and last year she was clawed back because she made too much money???? Now, apparently she gets this $125 – when she called she was told that it would be reviewed every three months? hmmmmm – wonder what the reveiw would have found for the next set of cheques????
My riding is a tight race in London West. I have not seen or heard of any energy rebates in my area or among my employees.
If they are targeted to specific populations, then this is scandal number what?
Don’t forget only Nationa daycare registry gets this check in Ontario. Screw all the parents accept the ones who have assimulated to Liberality!
If Mark Burnett can produce a reality series to successfully find a lead singer for INXS, just think what he could do for the Liberals? I mean, who among the Liberal leader wannabes, is actually credible, given that they were all aware of the slushfund, the mismanagement of funds, the never-ending abuse of taxpayer moneys, their contempt for the democratic process, etc. Really. A new reality series, made in Canada. Ratings winner for CBC or CTV, I’ll bet.
To be (slightly) fair, I received one of these $250 cheques. I thought I heard the deal was $125 for singles, and $250 for families, if you also received the GST rebate.
Now, when the hell did this little perk get debated? I don’t recall hearing anything about this before the cheque arrived. It’s not like it was pre-announced or anything. Why, oh why, cannot people see through PM’s unhinged attempt to grasp power, no matter what it does to our country? There were reports from Toronto folks complaining about Harper’s attempt to buy their votes, after some of the early CPC announcements (leaving aside the fact that some of these same people were complimenting PM when he more or less admitted to doing the same kind of thing), but when PM, through an undebated order actually does this, no furor ensues. I love getting the money, but it feels like somebody robbed a bank and passed me some $$$ to make himself feel better about doing it.
Oh yeah, and what the hell is the deal with prisoners getting the cheques? I’m livid about that part of it. A) let them suffer until they’ve done their time, B) they don’t freaking pay heating bills, so it making absolutely no sense to give a rebate to them.
and as there prolly isn’t any “work details” happening, you’ll be gratified to know those prisioners can also claim AND recieve UI for those days of no work. Rebate cheques…and UI…
Nope… nuthin’ wrong with this picture!!
It will be interesting to track if the “inmate vote” actually puts the Liberal Party over the top in any ridings, because 45,000 votes certainly add up in a hurry.
I’ve heard the energy rebate cheques went out in Saskatchewan this week, at least to those who receive a child tax credit.
This hasn’t come out of the blue – we heard about this energy rebate last year. Someone needs to review Bill C66, the Energy Costs Assistance Measures Act, (passed in Nov. 2005) to see how prisoners qualify. I can’t find it on-line.
Obviously it isn’t for seniors alone, but still doesn’t explain why someone in prison would receive a chq.
Last week, single seniors received $125., so couples must have rec’d $250. Since I don’t receive the supplement, I don’t qualify.
This sickens me….they forfeit their rights, and the government gives them back…poor paul bernardo (sp? like I care), I wonder if he had to stop watching satellite TV in order to vote?
that is just the same BS that I have seen as a former EE of the FED Govt….during my 12 year stint with Canada Customs I have encountered hundreds of unemployed persons coming back from a warm Jamaican, Mexican, vacation only to find out they were on EI..hell I could not afford such a vacation and I worked…we would photo copy these docs and alert the EI office. who would immediately cancel their FREE bi-wkly cheques..BUT an end was put to that as unemployed vacationers complained we were invading their privacy???what about our TAX PAYERS $$$ being dolled out to someone who evidently was not actively pursuing a job and us tax payers paying for a tax payer paid vacation….ALL employess were warned if this practice of ours did not cease….we would get FIRED.good old Liberals..what else can you expect……..
ShaneO
-it makes sense if your buying votes not fuel,
this just shows that the civil service is part of the problem- the Liberal parasite has it tenticles reaching through every level.add 30% administration costs to all of these perks for processing them through Ottawa.
even the prisoners expect to be “entitled to their entitlements”
Kate: There are definately energy rebates going out in Sask. to regular citizens. The rebates may be based on income, I’m not sure, but I’ve seen them.
Being in the lower income bracket, I received my Liberal energy rebate this past week.
I profusely thanked PMPM, and promptly went out and voted for Stephen Harper in the advance poll!
lefties have their knives out now…
http://www.stakesaretoohigh.com/
My husband works very hard to support a family of 5, and I stay home with our physically disabled son.
It P*sses me off that, some lowlife criminal is in jail getting a “heating rebate”, when good law abiding citizens, Canadian families, are struggling to make ends meet.
I hope if Harper wins the election tomorrow, the first thing he does, even before reducing the GST, is to put a STOP payment on all the cheques sent to correctional facilities.
This makes me sick!
Kyla wanted to know what number this would be if it’s another scandal.
Maybe it’s “known” scandal number 219. In reality, it could be, say, number 43,565. Damned if I know…
This info regarding these rebate cheques is here:
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/benefits/faq_ecb-e.html
“The Energy Cost Benefit is a one time tax exempt payment intended to help low income families with children and low-income seniors with the effects of high energy costs.”
“Payments under the Energy Cost Benefit (ECB) will be:
$250 per family receiving the National Child Benefit Supplement (NCBS);
$250 to senior couples receiving the Guaranteed Income Supplement; and
$125 to single seniors receiving the Guaranteed Income Supplement. ”
Of course, the timing is impeccable.
Two points:
1. I’m ticked. I didn’t get a cheque. I’m a senior citizen with the usual minimal income. How come, Paul. Did you already know I’ve voted?
2. Hopefully the new government under Stephen Harper will institute some changes in the Federal Prison system, including the abolishment of this sort of B.S, removal of a lot of the other perks prisoners get, and stiff (much stiffer) sentences. We can hope!
Mike
Robert thought connecting dots this way may have been a joke.
One could read the latest Jan 23rd Kevin Steele, *Married to the Mob* at Western Standard.ca
or
Andrew Coyne *How Scary*…*Frightster*…*This is scary*. also current Jan. 22nd.
These are respected thinkers.
Calgary: Immigration review board lets US citizen handgun smuggler with known arrest warrent go free into the streets of Calgary.
WHY? http://BendGovernment.blogspot.com
TG
Robert thought connecting dots this way may have been a joke.
One could read the latest Jan 23rd Kevin Steele, *Married to the Mob* at Western Standard.ca
or
Andrew Coyne *How Scary*…*Frightster*…*This is scary*. also current Jan. 22nd.
These are respected thinkers.
Calgary: Immigration review board lets US citizen handgun smuggler with known arrest warrent go free into the streets of Calgary.
WHY? http://BendGovernment.blogspot.com
TG
It will be plenty warm where Paul Martin and his abortion-loving Liberals are headed.
OK, so we stop their rebate cheques, and their UI, and maybe swap those big fancy colour tv’s for smaller b/w models which show subliminal Conservative campagne ads? Just relishing the endless possibilities of the fun that could be had :~D
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/
Check this out: Proof the Paulie is loooosing it!
Front page, His next job, applying for “so you want to be a rock star?”
This is one more reason NOT to vote for Paulie, he’s mentally unstable!!!!
Linda Williamson’s “218 Reasons not to vote Liberal”.
Toronto Sun Sunday Jan22′ 2006
http://www.torontosun.com/News/E…405861- sun.html
Just click on news, it’s the top story.
A single person gets $125 rebate so one speculates $250 is for a married couple.
One could also suspect that the cheque should have gone to the spouse at the residence or apartment.
If $250 is the correct rebate amount, then at least one province is getting double the rebate amount that British Columbia gets.
If that is true, [something I doubt], then no one in B.C. should ever vote Liberal. TG
Bruce, Thank you for the link to the Toronto Sun
218 REASONS NOT TO VOTE FOR THE LIBERALS!
We’re not making this up!
BEAUTIFUL!
Off TOpic but… Lets take a look at the The great National Nanny Centre Program brought to us by those wild guys in the Liberal Party.
Across Canada we have approximately 3 million children under the age of six.
Assuming that each of the state run Nanny Centres houses 50 children we need a minimum of 60,000 Liberal Nanny Centres.
Each Nanny Centre would require a staff of at least 6 unionized state child care takers earning at least $45,000 a year in order to keep up with their brothers and sisters in the other state run facilities amounting to a little over $16,200,000,000 in salaries alone.
Add to that the need for a future national subsidy program to cover the cost of getting Johnny and Sally to the state run Nanny Centre and you could easily be looking at a $20,000,000,000 per year government expenditure.
Factor in heat, electricity, maintenance general operating expenses and there goes the surplus.
The Liberals have yet to tell us how much our dear Ma & Pa popcorn and beer lovers will have to fork out each month in order to have their children brainwashed into thinking Paul Martin was one of Canada’s greatest national heros.
Sorry to be off topic but this is my last chance to say anything before the election. As I believe the conservative party probably follows you Kate I’d like my last say. Been a conservative all my life (except when I voted reform)Didnt vote once when Mulroney screwed us. Mr Harper, be advised I will vote for you tomorrow but head this warning. If you increase taxes or especially the debt you will have some serious explaining to do to get my vote back. If there is no serious investigation into government corruption forget the explanation, it will be your last term. Conservatives have a low tolerance of BS and will turn on you if you dont deliver. If no one of importance goes to jail your work to unite all of us will be in the dustbin. Mulroney ruled during boom times, increased debt, taxes and patronage. I put sweat in his campaingn. When he betrayed us we reduced him to 2 seats. I am sure you are honest, just wanted to give you the opinions of several fellow conservatives. If you burn us we will we will drop you as we did Mulroney.
CBCPravda in full throttle save the Liberal mode now. all the headlines are Bloc.against Conservatives.
first order of duty , kill CBC and its billion dollar subsidy. sell it to FOX
With their pre-election spending spree, plus the emergency 1.3 billion in “emergency” rebate/inmate spending, it’s looking like the libs conceeded defeat long ago and have gone out of their way to spend all of the taxpayer’s money so that there is nothing left for the conservatives when they form the government.
liberal=criminal
On Junuary 23, Choose your Canada…
And kick the bums out!
An interesting article in today’s Ottawa Sun by a columnist who is a former CCF MP and friend and confidant of Paul Martin Sr….
The fall of the Martin’s
Douglas Fisher says that Liberal grandee Paul Martin Sr. saw in his son a chance to redeem his own crushed leadership hopes
Re the CBC:
The headline
“Duceppe critical of Conservative cabinet offer”
is a prime example. Even my NDP voting wife thinks it’s misleading. Makes it sound like Harper is offering Duceppe a cabinet post.
F(*&^ I hate the CBC!!!
I think I smell something very fishy in BC. Around 11:00 we were going through channels and noticed that there was no sound on BCTV(5). Lunchtime CBC CTVNET(47) and CPAC had Paulie on in Richmond. (Gag!) Thought that I would check out BCTV(5) for local news. To my “suprise” Craig Oliver was interviewing Stephen Harper on Question period, still no sound.(I don’t know if this was a live interview) A few minutes later on BCTV(5), they go to an interview with Jack Layton, guess what? the sound was working again. I was just wondering if anyone else happened to notice this. ODD, VERY ODD
Worked fine here in Victoria.. but the lack of serious questions and probing of Martin continues to show the bias of all the media. Even the quaestions to Layton about teaming up with the Liberals to ‘further the NDP agenda’ were not persued to an answer. The hidden motive behind those questions, was .. “in the case of a Tory Minority Govt, will the NDP-Liberal co-allition be formed to be presented to the AG and keep the Tories from forming a minority govt”. After all, it has happened before in Ontario.
MaryM – If true, that is some third-world, tinpot dictator methodology.
Marym; yes, I noticed the same thing on CTV here in kelowna.
Btw, one local senior who got his $125 rebate questioned the timing of the delivery,(front page article in local paper) just a few days before the election, Damned cynic!
Wow, a justice system which works exclusively for the benefit of the criminals. What a surprise. Actually I’m not surprised, this is entirely expected and it fits in with everything else your government does.
Like I wrote elsewhere yesterday, the Nanny State is not for the benefit of decent people because decent people have need no nannies. The Nanny State is a government by and for the benefit of criminals and all-round lazy, dishonest, stupid people. They are wholeheartedly behind the Nanny State because it beats working, it beats saving, it beats taking risks and it beats being responsible.
The reason why a Nanny State can last so long is because the longer it exists, the more people are convinced they too are helpless and in need of a nanny. “What about my subsidy/cash rebate/interest-free loan/EI cheque/equalization payment/arts grant/MRI machine”, they whine, and the louder they whine, the more decent people put down their tools and take up the chorus.
Since not a single politician in this campaign has even uttered the words “Nanny State” or “Trudeaupia” or “welfare dependency” or “culture of defeatism”, there is of course no chance whatsoever that any improvement will take place in the next few years. All we heard this time around was the regularly-scheduled crescendo of whiny cries of “more for me” from the usual special-interest groups, and if anything even more pandering and equivocation than usual from the gutless and self-interested politicians.