Top Ten Reasons to Keep the Canadian Wheat Board

Great Plains Examiner;

“It shouldn’t have been this way,” he said while piling sandbags in front of his neighbor’s house. “For most of the spring there were sandbars over the whole damn river.”
The period between March 20 and May 6 has been difficult for the Army Corps of Engineers to explain. During that span, the Corps’ water managers kept river levels low and stockpiled near-record amounts of water behind the three upper basin dams on the Missouri River, despite evidence that the Rocky Mountains were holding a lot more snow than normal.
The reservoirs were so full by early May that they couldn’t contain the late-spring rainfall that pounded Montana and the Dakotas.

h/t Gary M.
Related – The purposeful flooding of America’s heartland;

But after about thirty years of operation, as the environmentalist movement gained strength throughout the seventies and eighties, the Corps received a great deal of pressure to include some specific environmental concerns into their MWCM (Master Water Control Manual, the “bible” for the operation of the dam system). Preservation of habitat for at-risk bird and fish populations soon became a hot issue among the burgeoning environmental lobby. The pressure to satisfy the demands of these groups grew exponentially as politicians eagerly traded their common sense for “green” political support.
Things turned absurd from there.

(h/t Ron in Kelowna)

On Wednesday, News Talk Radio will host a Saskatchewan Day of Caring, a 12-hour radiothon to raise money for flood victims.

I predict it’ll go well.
More photos of the flooding in the Oxbow-Alameda area in SE Saskatchewan here.

We don’t need no stinking giant fans;

Saskatchewan has overtaken Manitoba as the No. 1 place in Canada for oil and gas investment, based on the opinions of petroleum executives and managers in the annual Global Petroleum Survey, released today by the Fraser Institute, Canada’s leading public policy think-tank.
But Saskatchewan fell just short of finishing among the top 10 jurisdictions globally, ranking 11th overall in the survey of 136 jurisdictions. Last year, it placed second in Canada and 17th in the world, out of 133 jurisdictions.

The 2011 Fraser Institute Global Petroleum Survey

(Andrew Dennis segment)

The problem with a five word solution: Ronald Reagan. Air traffic controllers.
Via

Bing.com states that this is a photo of Prairie Dogs in Montana. Perhaps I need to get new glasses, but it sure looks a whole lot like a glimpse inside the House of Commons … at the Members of the Media Party!

h/t Atlantic Jim

It looks like I picked a good week to head to California, judging by the foot of water I drove through at Minot in early June;

The highest flows ever recorded on the Souris are approaching a city whose defenses are destined to be over run. Can the city hold?
Dikes currently in place, recently improved greatly to combat high flows, are now expected to disappear under the traveling torrent. The amount of water flowing with a vengeance down the Souris River Valley is forecast to inundate Minot to a level seven to eight feet higher than the catastrophic and benchmark flood of 1969.
Saddened with that horrific knowledge, officials announced during a late afternoon press conference Monday that very little can be done to stop the powerful onslaught. Massive secondary dikes that were built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to save much of the town from the previous high on the Souris this year fall far short of defending against the impending and rapid rise of the Souris.
[…]
Dalrymple, who conversed with Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall on Monday, said he received assurances from the Canadians that all that could be done to prevent high flows was done. Additionally, said Dalrymple, the citizens of Estevan are already enduring flooding hardships that may soon be experienced in Minot as well.
[…]
The flows currently rolling rapidly toward Minot, and even more water projected to follow, is of such volume that it is beyond the comprehension of NWS computer modeling.

I’d like to hear from those of you in the Estevan-Weyburn and surrounding areas in the comments. I know we have lots of readers there.

Why did the board accept its Director of Education’s resignation in one motion, then hire him back in the following motion for the same pay and position?

h/t Sean

At Siemens Says;

Gerry Ritz, the federal minister of Agriculture and the Canadian Wheat Board says if the CWB establishment wants in then please come to the table now, don’t fold your tent and go home. That would be unfortunate.

Some price comparisons…

Sometimes I feel guilty about the crushing debt our generation is passing on to the next. Then I read about the Saskatchewan Student Strike Over Teachers Strike. Whatever!
h/t Derek

SDA gets results.

Canada’s agriculture minister said Wednesday that the country’s Conservative government will probably introduce legislation this autumn that will allow the Canadian Wheat Board’s marketing monopoly on wheat and barley to be ended in 2012.

Moving forward…

If you believe that decriminalizing wheat is a bad thing, but that decriminalizing drugs is a good thing – you might be a liberal.*

And there will be plenty of that. CWB Monitor;

Last night, in the federal election, 67% of the rural voters in the CWB Designated Area favoured the Conservatives whose platform included giving farmers the right to choose who they sell wheat and barley to (in other words, making use of the CWB voluntary by removing the single desk monopoly). Provincially, Conservatives won handily in all three prairie provinces; 70% in Manitoba, 57% in Saskatchewan and 76% in Alberta. By all accounts, a resounding endorsement of the Conservative platform. Even though the other federal parties argue that, because the Conservatives have only 40% of the National popular vote, 60% voted “against” Harper and his Conservatives, that can’t be said in the CWB designated area. With 67% of the rural vote, it can be said that only 33% don’t agree with the Conservative platform.

This makes for a fun read. (pdf) “PAGC missed its deficit recovery target for the fifth straight year caused by the recurring problem of overexpenditures in First Nations Government and Administration. […] Although most program areas attained a balanced budget or surplus, overspending in First Nations Government ($672,378) on discretionary expenditures such as donations, sector meeting per diems, promotions and travel, and in Administration ($466,283) on per diems, promotions, travel and community events, added up to more than the annual deficit.”

Under monies loaned to First Nations (page 105), Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation is carrying a deficit in the amount of $500,000. It’s alleged that despite the PBCN Council members [last term’s members] asking what the loan was for, they were unable to get the information from the Prince Albert Grand Council.

Flashback to 2005;

Over a four-month period last winter, 1,500 cheques were written from the $3.7- million trust account of the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation (PBCN), despite orders from the band’s trustees to freeze all spending from the account.
This spending spree occurred on the watch of longtime Chief Ron Michel, who last month was voted in as chief of the powerful Prince Albert Grand Council.

In December of 2010, Melvin Napolean Merasty and George Kevin Sewap were charged with theft and fraud over $5,000.
More background at Harold Linklater’s blog.

Now is the time at SDA when we juxtapose!
Springtime in Saskatchewan, without harm reduction.

Springtime in Saskatchewan, with harm-reduction….

Related! “The first place Saskatoon city council should go to find the $50,000 needed for a study on panhandlers is to the provincial government.”