Senate Passes Trojan Horse Budget Bill

On Monday the Senate voted to pass the omnibus budget implementation bill. They voted against the amendments which would have split the non-budget items from the bill. The vote to pass the budget as-is was 48-44. A number of Liberal senators were absent. If they had showed up, the non-budget items would have been split from the budget bill, and there would most likely be a Federal Election.

In June, when the House of Commons voted on this bill, 30 Liberal MPs did not show up so that the Liberals could allow the bill to pass and avoid an election.

But, what is of importance here is the set of non-budget items that have been passed along with the budget:

• Authorization for the sale of the Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. with no debate or public scrutiny;
• A move towards privatization of Canada Post by removing Canada Post’s exclusive right to collect Canadian mail destined for delivery in other countries;
• Approval for the draining of the Employment Insurance Account, which held a surplus of $57 billion in premiums paid in over the past decade by workers and businesses.
• Weakening of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act by handing responsibility for environmental assessments to the provinces and to the National Energy Board.

A grim day for Canada.

CBC: Senate Passes Budget Bill

Challenging the Commonplace: Update - a message from Ignatieff's Liberal senators

CBC Inside Politics Blog: The budget bill vote: the tale of the no-show senators

CBC Inside Politics Blog: Updated - Senatewatch: the not so magnificent seven

Liberals Keep Cons In Power - Again

Dion and the Liberals Wimp Out - Tells Canadians to Bend Over for Stephen Harper

What Stephane Dion is really telling Canadians by abstaining - "Bend over for Harper, Canada!"

Today Stephane Dion and the Liberals decided to say yes to more bad governing by Harper and the Conservatives by deciding to abstain from voting on the Throne Speech.

By abstaining on this vote, I would say that is equivalent to walking off the job in this situation. We don't pay our representatives to sit idly by while the country needs them.

Canada is suffering under the Harper government and the Liberals decide to allow it to continue when they have the chance to end the suffering.

Will Liberal supporters go along with this, or, will they change their vote to another party next election? In my opinion, Dion has shown poor leadership with this move to support the Harper government - especially after the past year of pies that Harper has thrown in the faces of Canadians.

Canadians, in polls, may say they don't want another election, but they also don't want to see Canada ruined. It's time to kick the bums out and have a new election. With all the dirt that the Conservatives have piled up over the past year, how can they not be beaten in a new election?

The only national leader with any leadership ability here is Jack Layton. Keep at 'em Jack!

Sell-off of Another Canadian Company

The Canadian federal government is on the verge of selling off a significant portion of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. As reported in the Toronto Star "AECL has been the heart of Canada's nuclear industry for more than 50 years and its engineers are considered world class."

Now, I'm not pro-nuclear, but putting our Canadian nuclear power industry in the hands of a large American company, General Electric, that has a history of environmental hazards, war profiteering and media manipulation, is just a recipe for making Canada more un-safe when it comes to nuclear reactors and nuclear waste in Canada. Read more about GE's misdeeds here.

Although the article in the Star states that the sell-off would only be up to 49%, with the controlling 51% remaining in Canadian hands, sell-offs like this have often led, in the history of selling Canadian companies, to selling off the rest, or selling the controlling shares later on.

Currently, nuclear waste is stored underground across Canada, with much stored in Southern Ontario.

For more information on hazards of nuclear power and nuclear waste:

- Sierra Club of Canada - Nuclear Waste
- Greenpeace Canada
- Nuclear Waste Watch
- Politics'n'Poetry - Pembina Institute - Nuke No Solution