City Conversations | Money and Politics
Thursday, May 5
12:30 pm
Room 1600, Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street
.
Can we transform the way we fund elections? What are the alternatives?
To help us sort out this critical element of a democratic society, we’re honoured to have Vancouver Councillor Andrea Reimer, developer Bob Ransford, and UBC Professor Max Cameron, Director of the Centre for the Study of Democratic Institutions.
.
UPDATE: Motion to be discussed in Council on May 3 – 2017 Provincial Ballot Question on Municipal Campaign Finance Reform
You have two options: cap the donations to reasonable low amounts, or use the budget to fund elections.
There’s nothing democratic about a society ruled by billionaires. Billionaires are economic tyrants – bullies – wage slave owners.
Corporations are rightly described as psychopathic entities – economic cancers which grow at the expense of people just trying to have a peaceful decent life.
Try and avoid one of Pattison’s entities – the vile billboards; the garbage ads; the unfortunates distributing crap at Skytrain stations; the stranglehold on food distribution; vehicles everywhere … His fingers are in everything. Oh, he doesn’t sell bicycles.
When is enough enough – when the host is choked. It’s a fun game for billionaires. No way is it a democracy. Our life’s blood is sucked out by raw greed.
Apple is evil ? Microsoft is evil & vile ? BC Hydro is greedy ? Facebook, GM, BMW, Ford, AirCanada, Safeway or Beans Around the World is a slave owner ?
Who employs you ? Who provides software, telephones, transportation or food to you ?
Socialist Cuba, Venezuela or N-Korea is better why ?
One of the critical differences between Canada and the US is cap on donations and the lesser roles of rich folks or corporations, although of course unions need to be held in check, too ! Related post to analyze these differences: http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/f-h-buckley-youre-more-conservative-than-you-think
Why is it Capitalists always reference Cuba or Venezuela when talking about Socialism. Never Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, etc…….
Yes, yes, and yes – some of the worst corporate psychopaths have been tobacco and oil companies. If Pattison could legally post cigarette ads on his billboards, would he? That’s rhetorical. He certainly doesn’t mind selling cigarettes in his “BC’s Own” stores.
Is Apple evil? A more accurate question is: are the people running Apple psychopathically obssessed with money? Well, shareholders have had to sue to get dividends even though there’s so much cash in the kitty they round off numbers in the billions.
What about the co-founder Steve Jobs – they ejected him and only took him back when the company foundered without his vision. Is that psychopathology – to kill off what makes a company great.
Everyone should have access to an IPad – the library model would work. Andrew Carnegie was pathologically obssessed with profits, but managed in his later years do good by establishing the public library system.
Is Microsoft evil – is Bill Gates evil? No matter how much he quacks about doing good with his foundation, he just keeps socking away the billions. He says he’ll give it away when he croaks. I’ll be dead too. Thanks for nothing Bill, you bullshitter.
Foundations are established by the rich to control cash which would o.w. go to taxes. And they get to put there names on things. Pattison loves putting his name on things, just like despots like putting up statues of themselves. Why waste money on taxes when you can use it to self-promote.
BC Hydro – are people running this business evil? Don’t know much about these guys – just that there’s a class action lawsuit about smart meters. Would they dam every river if they could get away with it? US engineers once explored the practicality of detonating an atomic to free water lodged in the mountains. Is that evil?
Air Canada – a bloated turd. So is the CBC.
Are GM and Ford evil? Of course. GM knowingly installed ignition switches that failed – killing people – a part that cost a dollar. Ford did a cost-benefit analysis on the exploding gas tanks on Pintos. They decided it was cheaper to pay for the dead bodies than change the design. Is that evil?
There are many more issues with these two companies – the Corvair and Ford Exploder come to mind. On the subject of cars, let’s not forget runaway Lexuses and Volkswagen diesels. Evil? Corporations are by definition psychopaths.
Safeway – what a repellent corporation. Remember the branch they shut down on Kingsway and wouldn’t allow another food store to open. That’s evil. Ninety percent of what these supermarkets sell is garbage anyway.
Let’s throw in Wal-Mart. People have gone to jail for stealing from this empire. Who knew they had anything worth stealing? The family members of this evil monstrosity have so much money that they could drop hundreds of millions from their pockets and not even notice. But they’re happy when their employees earn so little they have to collect food stamps. Evil?
How ironic that Vision, widely criticized for its acceptance of corporate and union donations, has to go to Christy, the connoisseur of entitlement to private funds, the consummate professional in providing access to the throne for a price, the purveyor of the $20,000 lunch plate and convenient on-camera faux humility, to get permission to altruistically reform political donations at the local level.