Sunday, May 06, 2007



Interesting Editorial in The Telegram.

Desperate times make for desperate solutions indeed. I have had quite a few desperate times since 1989 and quite a few times i have found solutions. Sometimes they could be called desperate solutions. Maybe the author of the piece may have had a few in his life and had to do the same. I found it an interesting read and the ordinary little guy like myself can only read about such things because he really has no say in those matters daily. My only logical solution comes around very seldom and all i can do then is to mark an X.

How to hide resource revenues print this article

The Telegram

From a New York City classified ad: “I work at a very prestigious nail salon in New York, with an A-list clientele. I have a collection of nail clippings from various clients such as Cameron Diaz, Gwen Stefani, Beyonce and Scarlett Johansson. My son who is in seventh grade is in desperate need of a math tutor. I live in Manhattan and I would be willing to meet at a mutual location with my son. I will be willing to trade my collection for four one-hour sessions. Serious inquiries only, please.”

Desperate times make for desperate solutions, like bartering away your nail collection.

And talk about desperate times: Saskatchewan is facing the same bad news about resource revenues and the federal government’s new equalization program as Newfoundland and Labrador. So that province is now officially looking at a little bartering of its own.

In order to keep from having resource royalties drive down its equalization benefits, the prairie province is looking at foregoing royalties in exchange for having oil and gas companies, and other resource companies, build roads in the province.

The idea is a simple one: instead of having royalties go to the province’s general revenue fund where they’d be counted against equalization, get the companies to “contribute” infrastructure instead. The province is looking at a suggestion from equalization expert Thomas Corchene, who wrote about the concept in an essay for Policy Options magazine.

“Why would any province continue to collect any royalties,” the article suggested. “Why not reduce them to zero and require energy companies to make compensatory contributions to hospitals and universities?”

It’s not that far-fetched: already, Hydro Quebec undertakes projects like a 2001 $200-million effort to beautify communities by hiding electrical lines around historic sites and scenic views. The beautification process lets Hydro Quebec keep a little of its money off the profits side of the ledger, and, presumably, allows the province to hide the profits and protect its equalization payments.

Finance officials in Saskatchewan told the StarPhoenix that at least two provinces, Manitoba and Quebec, already use resource loopholes to hide hydroelectricity profits from the equalization equation.

It makes for fascinating, if not depressing, consideration. Imagine — our fellows in Confederation feel they have to find a way to short-circuit equalization calculations, simply because the federal government can’t seem to find a way to live up to pre-election commitments.

Who knows? Perhaps our provincial finance department is busy trying to figure out if it can do exactly the same thing. In fact, we got a whole Happy Valley-Goose Bay hospital out of Voisey’s Bay Nickel, and the money involved probably didn’t show up in any equalization accounting.

We all live in the same house, and we’re seriously considering hiding away money from each other while we battle about just what’s a fair share for our living expenses.

These are desperate times indeed, when we have to consider hanging on to money by our fingernails — or bartering those fingernails away to get a better deal.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

i disagree krista. i say free paris!

ARNY FREE PARIS NOW

I knew you was whacked but not that whacked

Table Mountains said...

it was done in jest. i tried to stir it up. your going to have to get a subscription to the downhomer. if you want,i'll go in and start a subscription fundraiser drive thread for you. : )

Anonymous said...

“t was done in jest. i tried to stir it up. your going to have to get a subscription to the downhomer. if you want,i'll go in and start a subscription fundraiser drive thread for you. : )”

Now that is funny, you know as well as I do Junior and Grant would not want to see me in there, I would not take the bullshit like Buck and some of the other yanks who want to placate everyone so they can be accepted.

When I read some of the bullshit that is posted, I go to myself where in the fuck do these people get their info from? my guess is a fucking comic book…..you know as well as I that I would last only about 5 minutes before the boot would come…..here is a great video for you…. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEMVwZRJ-UQ make sure you turn the speakers up on this one

Anonymous said...

http://www.mydeo.com/videorequest.asp?XID=21994&CID=92294

http://www.mydeo.com/videorequest.asp?XID=17726&CID=88361

A couple of great videos that I made last year.

Anonymous said...

Pretty strange. last report showed we had 15,423. I finally got in and made another vote and it nows shows us having only 14,858.

How many time do you have to vote in order to make Gross Mourn one of the 7 wonders of Canada....when people vote numerous times that is stacking the deck and makes it nothing more than it is, just another park.

Table Mountains said...

now come on.you know as well as i do.there are many ways to win an election. sure if it was done right gore would be in the white house now instead of winning academy awards.

Anonymous said...

How many times do we have to re-hash this one...."now come on.you know as well as i do.there are many ways to win an election. sure if it was done right gore would be in the white house now instead of winning academy awards."

As we all know a state wide recount was done by three liberal news papers the New York Times being one and Bush won the popular vote in Fla on all 3 recounts, not Gore...get over it and move on...maybe take some time to read the Fla and US Supreme court decisions and enlighten and build on your knowledge as what goes on in the States and how things are done, as opposed to the way you think it should be done..

Table Mountains said...

your going to have to buy a subscription.

Freddie L Sirmans, Sr. said...

Just browsing the internet, very interesting.

Anonymous said...

Posted: Tuesday, May 22, 2007 at 05:20 pm
Hey Judy, I contacted CBC and they said they removed the results for a couple of reasons:

1) First to speed up the link and;
2) Second so the results would not be biased. (Don’t you think it is a little late for that. The CBC must have been reading this thread )

I thought the poll would be finished May 30, 2007, however when asked, they said it was finished on May 25 (this Friday

Now this shit is funny you think maybe they caught on to the scam that you Newfies were pulling off.

Anonymous said...

Posted: Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 09:58 pm
Wow so all this extra effort that we have been putting in with the extra votes may not have been doing anything for us in the first place. Nahanni has now gone ahead by 2,493 votes. That's a whole of extra NFLDERS that are going to have to get in there and vote. I can't see it happening. Me for one will just keep on hitting the vote button until the contest is over. A great effort by all!

Now this is funny, see what happens when you try and pull an Al Gore, hanging chad and dimples do not count as well as voting numerous times, Gros Morne is where it should be and probably a little further down the list.....remember cheaters never win....they always wind up in the losers section...now that is funny

Anonymous said...

Some more funny shit

"this contest is certainly not running properly..Sleeping Giant had to have mulitiple votes for sure and the NAHANNI votes didn't skyrocket by single votes...finally got on VOCM and encouraged folks back home to vote and now the systems down..wouldn't ya know it...NE,,you have been working so hard at this and proving that it can be rigged...you're right the contest should be scrapped and a better voting system put in place....it will be interesting to see what becomes of this..the main page says it's extended until May 31th.//"

The above statement is about some of the funniest shit I have ever read, you people accusing someone else of rigging the votes when you have spent numerous hours at the PC posting multiple votes yourselfs...don't you think the other people of Canada have the same rights as you Newfie's...hell if you can vote numerous times why can't they????...it's nice to see ole' Gros Morne go down the tubes I get better scenery out of my front door than that place...tried to pull a Al Gore and it back-fired....heee...heeee...heee...I love to see grown people cry