With 2014 on the horizon, we can look forward to a year jam-packed with political failure and fatuity. Same old same old. But perhaps a couple of new year’s resolutions might help. Click here to read the rest.
Memo to: E. Scrooge From: J. Marley Re: Branding
Dear Ebenezer, I’m happy to report that Scrooge and Marley have enjoyed another year of record profits. By lending sums people can’t repay at rates they can’t afford and hiring only a miserable skeleton staff we are making money in ways only Charles Dickens could imagine.
It never ceases to amaze me how little politicians know about government. Take Canada Post ... please. Everyone was apparently caught flat-footed, or flat-brained, when it announced service cuts, price hikes and a huge unfunded pension liability. It’s a government monopoly. What were you expecting? Click here to read the rest.
You know what I like most about government? Short list, you may be thinking. But about my favourite bit is where they punch you out and insist it’s a massage. Click here to read the rest.
The taxpayer sat scared and squirming in my second-best chair. “Ya gotta help me, gumshoe,” he said. “My faith in government’s missing. Haven’t seen it in ages. And my wallet’s gone, too. I think maybe they run off together.” Click here to read the rest.
So what exactly is this quaint throne speech ritual? Just one more chance for carefully focus-grouped, insincere, pompous PR that further reduces our ability to control politicians. What else would it be? Click here to read the rest.
To put this U.S. government shutdown in perspective, forget for a moment that all right-thinking persons know Republicans are ignorant fanatical bigots and imagine it was happening in Canada. Click here to read the rest.
Almost 20 years ago, Bill Clinton said “The era of big government is over.” He was lying, of course. But for a reason: To convince voters he wasn’t too dumb to grasp that painful experience over at least three decades had proved big compulsory bureaucratic state programs weren’t just wasteful but actively harmful. So why do politicians go on creating them in response to every problem, real or imagined? Click here to read the rest.