Monday, December 14, 2009

The Friends of Blacked-Out Documents Society of Canada


Image: Harper's supposed "proof" of tax leakage

Today I would like to acknowledge the members who comprise The Friends of Blacked Out Documents Society of Canada. May their names and deeds go down in infamy.

Canadians can be divided into two groups. Those who require proof of things before they accept them as true and those who do not and are happy to take things completely for granted.

The income trust tax was based solely on the allegation that income trusts cause tax leakage. This concept has never been proved, and yet had been disproved many times by every reputable independent group that ever looked at it.

Meanwhile we have a government in office that touted that it would be the most transparent and accountable government this country has seen. So much for that, as their only proof of tax leakage was 18 pages of blacked out documents, that upon realizing these documents revealed more of the truth than they had bargained for, immediately demanded them to be returned.

I guess transparency under Harper can be considered a limited time offer at best?

Such standards do not phase that peculiar group of Canadians known as the The Friends of Blacked Out Documents of Canada who held steadfast in their creationist beliefs that income trusts cause tax leakage, preferring the government’s dogma to facts and preferring ignorance to knowledge.

These people’s blind trust in their government is completely undermining the ability of Canadians ever having any hope of having a good government and permitting truth to be the basis for this country’s actions and policies rather than outright lies, for example in the case of the income trust tax or the case of the possible torture of Afghan detainees handed over by Canadians.

Friends of Blacked-Out Documents Society of Canada are clearly motivated by what Ignatieff has termed “Soviet zeal”. The Soviet zeal in which blind dogma and blacked out documents trump the needs of a democratic people and hard evidence.

Members of the Friends of Blacked Out Document Society are:

Grand Marshall and Wizard:
Sheila Fraser, Auditor General of Canada

Heads of Political Action Committee and Co-Wizards: Jack Layton, Judy Wasylycia-Leis and Pat Martin of the NDP (Naturally Duped Party) of Canada

Junior Wizards in Waiting, and those with zeal for Canadians not knowing the real truth about anything, lest it upset the commercial self interests they act on behalf of:

Audet, Michel: Finance Minister, Quebec
Baker, Michael: Finance Minister: Nova Scota
Boudreau, Victor: Finance Minister, New Brunswick
Brodie, Ian, Former Chief of Staff to Stephen Harper
Carney, Mark: Governor of BoC, formerly DoF (and architect of false argument of tax leakage) and Goldman Sachs
Chevreau, Jonathan: Financial Post
Clark, Ed: CEO of TD Bank
Crawley, Phillip: Publisher, Globe and Mail
Corcoran, Terrence: Financlal Post
Dancey, Kevin: Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants
D’Alessandro, Dominic: Former CEO of Manulife Financial
D’Aquino, Tom: Former Head of CCCE and a Director of Manulife Financial
Desmarais. Paul Jr.: Power Corporation
Dodge, David: Former Governor of the BoC and Flip-Flopper extraordinaire
Duffy, Mike: Formerly of CTV, and now an unelected Senator
Elitzur, Ramy: Rotman School, University of Toronto
Ernewein, Brian: Department of Finance
Field, Art: National Pensioners and Senior Citizens Federation
Gleberzon, Bill: CARP
George, Rick: CEO of Suncor, and Vice Chairman of CCCE
Goar, Carol: Toronto Star
Greenspon. Ed: Former Editor Globe and Mail
Hamilton, Bob: Departmemt of Finance
Hepburn, Bob: Toronto Star
Kane. Michael: BNN
Lang, Amanda: CBC and formerly of BNN
Lynch, Kevin, Former Clerk of the Privvy Council
MacClellan. Shirley: Finance Minister, Alberta
Manley, John: Incoming President of the CCCE
Martin, Don: Calgary Herald
Martin. Lawrence: Globe and Mail
McGuinty, Dalton, Premier of Ontario
McNish. Jackie: Globe and Mail
Mintz. Jack: Economist who sits on corporate boards, but has the gall to present himself as “independent”?
Morgan, Gwyn: Former CEO of Encana
Murphy, Mitch: Finance Minister, Province of PEI
Normand, Denis: Department of Finance
Nixon, Gord, CEO of RBC and Chairman of CCCE
Oberg, Lyle: Finance Minister, Alberta
Olin. Jeffrey: Desjardins Securities Inc.
Olive, David: Toronto Star
Pape, Gordon: CARP Magazine
Poschmann, Finn: C.D. Howe Institute
Reguly, Eric: Globe and Mail
Robson, Bill: CEO of C.D. Howe Institute
Selinger, Greg: Finance Minister, Manitoba
Thomas, Marshall: Finance Minister, Newfoundland
Thomson, Andrew: Finance Minister, Saskatchewan
Sabia, Michael, CEO of Caisse and former CEO of BCE, and Former Director General of Tax Policy in Ottawa.
Simpson, Jeffrey: Globe and Mail
Sorbara, Greg, former Minister of Finance, Government of Ontario
Stackhouse, John: Editor Globe and Mail and Former Editor of aptly named ROB
Stelmach, Ed: Premier of Alberta
Taylor, Carole: Former Finance Minister of BC, current Director of TD Bank
Wente, Margaret: Globe and Mail
Willis, Andy: Globe and Mail
Wright, Robert, Former Deputy Minister of Finance

If I have missed any Junior Wizard members, please let me know, as we like to keep this Hall of Shame up to date. These people’s efforts on behalf of thwarting Canadiand democracy while advancing their commercial interests should not go unrewarded or overlooked.

9 comments:

Dr Mike said...

We need one more class---the Pseudo Wizzards with Brown Fingers (PWBFs for short)

These are all the people who have stood around with their fingers up their butt while this whole fiasco took place--this group includes all of the Con MPs , the Dipper MPs , The Bloc MPs & most of the Liberal Party of Canada.

This includes my MP Joe Preston of London-Middlex-Elgin riding who is a franchise owner of an income trust & who still did nothing---he did a 2-hander.

Dr Mike

Louis Mix said...

This abuse of Canadians and the detaining of Canadian investment in the oil industry and other 'trust-worthy' business is a contempt against Canadians started in Alberta by Alberta Finance Minister Shirley MacClellan in March 2006.

So the double-taxation of income trusts held in retirement savings was in the works long before Oct 2006.

Anonymous said...

Diane Urquhart could be included.

After all, she was no shrinking violet when it came to the income trusts' deception and for a while it seemed as if she and Judy WasSillyAsGeese were conjoined twins.

Also, she does pass herself off as an independent analyst/researcher.
Diane had more faces than Mount Rushmore.

With at least six user names when the rules stipulated one per person, it brings into question the validity of her "research".

Carswell

Anonymous said...

Jane Taber would be one that needs to be included.

Fillibluster said...

Jane Taber known the limits of her stupidity. To my knowledge she was never dumb enough to say that income trusts cause tax leakage.

But I wonder how that would have been possible. If you have specific knowledge of her doing so, please let me know, and I will add her to the Hall of Shame and a member of the Friends of Blacked-out Documents Society of Canada.

Thanks,

Brent

Anonymous said...

Don't forget O'Flaherty's spin doctor, Dan Miles.  If ever we needed a smoking gun and mirrors as evidence of deceit concerning the income trust file, look no further than this article:
 
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/spincycles/transcript-miles.html

GL

Anonymous said...

An intersting parallel. The small but crutial difference however is that the Finance Minister reluctantly admitted to the Finance Committee that he didn't include defered taxes from RRSPs in his tax leakage calculations because he (and I'm paraphrasing here) 'has a responsibility to the taxpayers of today not tomrrow.'

Kind of stupid way for a Finance Misniter to look at things because most of us are the same taxpayers be it today or ten or twenty years from now. none the less Flaherty Flaherty did essentially tell Canadians what is under the blacked out portions of that document.

Fillibluster said...

Anonymous:

The other crucial difference is that Flaherty used the exact same argument (but in reverse) to say that he was okay with the leveraged buyout of BCE?

The other difference is that no one, not a single politician or a member of the press said in response to Falherty's argument-du-jour that you cite, the following:

"Well if that's the case Jimbo, you idiot, then why did you provide the means for pension funds to buy these devalued trusts, take them private and pay no 31.5%? By doing so, you have taken your alleged problem caused by income trusts held 38% by tax deferred accounts (ie RRSPs and pension funds) and made it 2.63 time worse (100/38), by having them owned 100% by pensions funds. Are you a moron or what, Mr Flaherty, or do you think that BS answer of yours is able to fool us into blind submission?

2.63 times worse, you moron fool of Finance Minister.

Its a good thing you don't practice medicine as all your patients would be 2.63 times worse than when they entered your operating table."

And if you were so committed to your concept of having "a responsibility to the taxpayers of today not tomorrow.", then why are you running Canada's largest ever deficits, you hypocritical jerk? Who the hell do you think is going to pay for those deficits to fund today's programs if not tomorrow's tax payers?"

Nothing that Flaherty ever says holds up to even the most superficial level of scrutiny. Too bad the politicians the press are incapable of prviding even superficial scrutiny, as they haven't a clue about finance or even simplest concepts of finance. Globe and Mail reporters provide soem of the best examples. They rival the NDP for sheer stupidity and love for blacked out documents.

Brent Fullard

Anonymous said...

Brent,

I would like to respectfully submit Ralph Goodale and John McCallum to the Heads of Political Action Committee and Co-Wizards section. This is in recognition that they actually KNOW the truth but chose and continue to choose to do nothing. If this section isn’t appropriate then perhaps you would consider adding a new section called: “Those with Heads Up their Butts” I have just the picture for that section.

Randy