Pete's Viewpoint

To listen to the BC Liberals this morning about the good old days of the last 16 years is a step outside reality. They're accusing the NDP of taking BC backwards with the new budget. Nothing could be further from the truth. Its because the BC Liberals's mishandling of the real estate market that life became so unaffordable for so many. The NDP are out of touch with families & everyone trying to make a living in BC. With fewer homes being built, govt spending growing faster than the economy & punishing new taxes, BC is falling behind. We need a govt that believes in opportunity for all of BC. #bcbudget #bcpoli pic.twitter.com/BqG1Tvpiye — BC Liberals | Opportunity for all of BC (@bcliberals) February 19, 2019 What's worse, is that the government spending now underway is specifically to repair things neglected by the BC Liberals for their terms in office. From schools, teachers, healthcare, poverty and homelessness; everything was let to slide while they s...

Just when the MSM was about to get serious about some honest reporting, this egg was laid by senior political reporter playing the 'both sides' card. Almost on cue. No Keith. The NDP doesn't get the blame for travel expenses that Craig James and Gary Lenz traded signatures on. It was unknown enough that it took Speaker Daryl Plecas by surprise when he dug around for the information. This 'both sides' narrative is a BC Liberal talking point because they know how ethically exposed they are already; this makes matters worse merely a week ahead of the Nanaimo byelection they're poised to lose. Now with this stink out there, it feeds into the narrative that BC Liberals are the party of crony capitalism and insiderism; so lets throw some mud at the NDP and make them to blame too. Nothing in the #plecasreport implicates the NDP government or any of its MLA's or cabinet ministers. How embarrassing.

"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake." Napoleon Bonaparte I am reminded by the BC Liberals behavior of the Republicans after the roll out of ObamaCare in the USA. They screamed socialism, big government, and a whole lot of other unsavory epithets towards President Obama and the Democrats just for the sin of trying to extend out the universality of healthcare coverage in America. The sin? The individual mandate; where every uninsured American was obligated to seek out insurance. To meet that legal requirement, several states and separately the Federal Government unveiled a subsidized exchange where individuals would be able to purchase a healthcare insurance plan - or subsidized one if they qualified. The Speculation Tax isn't healthcare, but its to address a problem that was left to fester while the last government was still in office. After the BC Liberals deregulated the real estate trade in 2005, handed the oversight to the industry i...

Lets not understate the fact that BC's new speculation tax isn't without controversy. It is. There are some folks unhappy that they're now subject to a tax that didn't exist until now. But lets also discuss why we are here and the big mistake that BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson is making. We are here because of the 2005 legislation passed by the BC Liberals to de-regulate the real estate trade. It became a self regulated industry with significantly reduced government oversight. In fact, oversight passed to the industry itself. Land speculation has been a thing since land has been able to be purchased and sold. It can be a high risk venture, but most often pays off well. By deregulation, rules and oversight to said speculation slipped away and the practice of 'shadow-flipping ' took root in some of the province's hottest markets. In short, it allowed shady realtors to manipulate home sales in such a way to make hundreds of thousands extra in commis...

BC Liberal candidate for the Nanaimo byelection opined about higher education recently. While the thought of a politician injecting himself into what ought to be taught is unsettling, I'll leave that alone for another day. So lets cut to the chase here. While Tony Harris give his thoughts on higher learning, what is the BC Liberal record on tuition fees for Malaspina/VIU? Well. Funny you should ask. In 2001 the cost of tuition for an Arts program was $1240...in 2017? Well that cost was $4346. That's a 251% increase. 176% of that was while Nanaimo had a BC Liberal MLA (2001-05). My 2 bits

It was a fascinating dynamic to watch hard core Bernie fans either refuse to vote, vote Green, or Vote Trump because their guy Bernie Sanders didn't win the Democratic Party nomination in 2016. Eventually, Hillary would win the popular vote by at least 3 million votes, but as it is with our own FPTP system, votes don't determine outcome. Electoral votes did. Strategically, either by fluke or by design, Donald Trump went on to win and become the 45th President of the US. He won smaller conservative states to be sure, but he also won enough larger states to tilt the balance - regardless of what New York or California did. Already, the Warren/Beto/Sanders camps are going to war against each other *inside* the Democratic Party, as the various groups of activists claim that their opponents are 'no different than Trump'. Hogwash. At this point, a moldy piece of bread is an improvement to Trump, but activists would convince you of otherwise. If this keeps up, Trump is on...

One of the more insidious talking points of the anti reform side is that changing to a proportional representation system will give rise to extremist groups. This is bullshit. The electoral system doesn't determine who gets seats, it determines how they're elected. Ultimately, voters choose who gets to represent them. But to the false point being made by the chicken-little movement, consider Alberta for a moment. To consolidate conservative votes into one party in order to beat the NDP in '19, Jason Kenney has formed his UCP movement.  Mathematically, it works. If you take all the right leaning votes that had split into 2 or 3 parties and replace with 1 option (assuming all vote for #1), then you win. The trouble is that among the conservative spectrum in Alberta, they have...issues. I'll pause here for a moment and underline this: not all rational conservatives are extremist in their views . While I don't necessarily agree with their political ...

As if planned this way, Conservative cry-babies react to the Trans-Mountain decision by appropriating the pipeline setback as "western alienation". Spare me for a moment while I try not to throw up. Albertans and pro-pipelines folks are no doubt upset by the Appeals Court to overturn Cabinet approval for the pipeline project, but not because the Ottawa Liberals suddenly turned anti-West.  To be sure, I have never seen such a pro-pipeline party as Justin Trudeau's Liberal Party; so much so that the Natural Resources Minister had to apologize for threatening to call in the military on pipeline protesters. Even Stephen Harper didn't go that far. What Trudeau is guilty of is betraying a central campaign promise. He said that his new government would reboot the approval process as the 'current model' was flawed. He was right. The process was flawed - it is still flawed. That is why the court acted as it did. The problem is that Trudeau didn...

It seems like only yesterday that Premier Rachel Notley was demanding that protesters camped out on Burnaby mountain disperse after having lost another court challenge in regards to #tmx prep work being carried out. The Alberta Premier was loud and clear about her insistence that folks respect the law of the land and do as the courts demand. Well , funny thing about that; no sooner the Federal Appeals Court rules against the proposed pipeline that the good Premier throws a Trump-style tantrum and demands federal intervention. Now, I don't mean to make light of this; the pipeline project being put on hold (possibly stopped altogether) is a serious setback for a province who's primary industry is linked to the fate of said proposal. It wasn't long ago that 3rd party leader, Rachel Notley was campaigning on the notion of more diversification of the Alberta economy. She made serious political mileage in bashing 44 years of PC rule that put almost all of its economic eggs i...

This is going to be uncomfortable for some, but if you voted NDP to "stop fracking" or shut down the LNG trade, then that's an unrealistic expectation and incorrect interpretation of their platform and if you're that person, you have yourself to blame. The NDP, in fact, has supported LNG. When in power in the 90's, they oversaw a significant expansion of the natural gas industry in the north east. It paid off too; billions of dollars in provincial revenue in support of healthcare and education, roads and highways, etc. Good paying, family supporting careers. Where the NDP differed significantly from the BC Liberals is where the Campbell/Clark gov't put so many eggs in one basket. Their policy narrative was that LNG would be bigger to BC than oil would be to Alberta. This is the crux of their imaginary trillion dollar Prosperity Fund™ that never materialized. After destroying 30k private sector jobs in the forest sector because of ill thought out reforms, t...

Voters did not re-elect Christy Clark into another term of government. Voters did not elect the NDP into power. Voters did not vote for any 'coalition' arrangement. Voters elected a minority parliament, and by extension, told said MLA's to work together. NDP learned that lesson. Green Party learned that lesson. One (now former) BC Liberal MLA got that lesson. Christy Clark, Rich Coleman and the rest of the BC Liberal caucus did not learn. After the dust settled that produced the 43-41-3 legislature, two parties figured out that they were going to have to give a little on what they wanted in order to make government work. The BC Liberals had other plans. In one of the most cynical stunts ever, Christy Clark offered up a throne speech that mirrored much of what the NDP and Green Party had campaigned on. Oh, it wasn't because the BC Liberals had a change of heart, it was because they needed to pull at least one opposition vote away from the NDP/Green side to pas...