Comments on The Burd Report: What did the LHIN say yesterday - Yes Yes Yes

Here is Conrad Black's piece. I was remiss in ...

2010-03-21T12:17:39.333-04:00

Here is Conrad Black's piece. I was remiss in not providing the link. http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=2704624

"I'll take a good idea any time from any source, and so will plenty of others."

I have no idea who the "plenty of others" are and I suspect that this is just another throwaway phrase by those who feel the need for a comfort blanket of affirmation.

I already know that you have a deep animosity towards capitalists, rich and wealthy people and Conrad Black in particular. One needs only to read back in this blog over the past year plus to know what your prejudices are towards this man. Your deference in this regard is uncovincing.

Nevertheless, I read the article and found it to be an illuminating comparison between the USA and Canada and other health systems in the world.

BTW, all of your recent postings have been very readable and informative. They are largely cliche-free, which makes for a good read, at least for me.

Don't be such a tease, Mr. Keeler. Tell us wha...

2010-03-20T17:27:09.707-04:00

Don't be such a tease, Mr. Keeler. Tell us what Mr. Black had to say about health care, then we can decide whether we agree or not.

I'll take a good idea any time from any source, and so will plenty of others.

Thanks Deb. There's some good generalities pro...

2010-03-20T12:03:39.018-04:00

Thanks Deb. There's some good generalities proposed which seem worth exploring.

This morning I stumbled onto Conrad Black's commentary about health care. He presents some very clear proposals for improvement which have the benefit of specificity.

Oh I know, I know, if it's written by Conrad Black, the bullfrog of the pond, then automatically it can be dismissed as right-wing, white-skinned yahoo blowhard mush. Alas. And he's a capitalist, which means he is evil, evil, evil, in the catch-basin of progressives. Yawn.

What are the other ways to raise revenue? Why, let...

2010-03-20T11:22:55.362-04:00

What are the other ways to raise revenue? Why, let me tell you, my son, and may I remind you I was part of the public consultation program of the Fair Tax Commission back in 1992/93, so I do know something about taxation in Ontario.

First, we need to restore corporate taxes back to earlier levels. Not so much we have to listen to the capitalists crying all over us, but enough to ease the pressure off middle and low income individuals.

While we're at it, we can close tax loopholes that allow corporations and the wealthy to wiggle out of paying their fair share.

Turning to the public service, without cutting wages of average workers, who are the bulk of them, we can cap the overly generous salaries of the top layers, and eliminate most of the private sector consultants who famously bleed us dry doing the work we hired those lazy top guns to do themselves. (Never mind E Health, does anyone remember the antics of Andersen Consulting computerizing government under the tories? That was the lead event that inspired consultants in the first place).

Now, we look at government budgets and trim the perks and the waste down to size, the kind of perks that only the top layers receive that aren't counted as income. You know, supplied vehicles, fancy expense accounts, lavish conferences in warm places, too many free upscale meals to count; that kind of thing. Politicans should be included in this type of cutting too, they have many tax free perks the rest of us could only dream of.

Certainly we can stop government advertising too. While the federal tories are the worst, I see too many ads that appear to promote the province but are really shilling for the party in power. Utter waste of our tax dollars.

I could go on and on, having only scratched the surface here, but I am told blogs aren't like books so I will stop now. But you get the idea.

I was in Windsor last week and I stopped in to the...

2010-03-20T07:47:52.445-04:00

I was in Windsor last week and I stopped in to the giant Ceasar's Casino -and I do mean 'giant'. I guess because of its size it has to be full of suckers not to look empty. Well, it wasn't full of suckers and to me it looked empty.

So. Is the money for health care overall (not just our little corner of the province) going to come from casino gambling? Not from what I saw it isn't.

Deb has a great instruction: "let's tr...

2010-03-19T11:19:15.243-04:00
Deb has a great instruction: "let's try to find other ways to raise the revenue.

OK. At the current moment, I have no ideas for a way to raise the revenue. But that's me. How about the other readers; suggestions? Deb? Anyone?

What "other ways" are there?

Who said anything about privatized services? I...

2010-03-18T18:00:31.264-04:00
Who said anything about privatized services? I'll bet the face painting Olympic millionaire show alone would cover health care for sometime. It was one of my first cuts of publicly funded items.

If we make the fatal mistake of cutting health car...

2010-03-18T12:22:41.602-04:00
If we make the fatal mistake of cutting health care services to the bone, anonymous and his pals will be more than happy to step in with privatised services to pick up the slack.

This is a standard technique of the right. First, you starve public services until they barely function, then you decry their ineffectiveness and use that as an excuse to justify private care.

Our governments, provincial and federal, just turn their gaze away from the private care we already have and allow it to flourish by their failure to protect the Canada Health Act.

Instead of deciding public health care is too expensive, let's try to find other ways to raise the revenue. Once lost, we will never get our services back.

And in closing, let me add that as long as employers continue to slash benefits for their workers, unionised or not, fewer and fewer of us will have the extended health care to pay for private care.

The time is fast approaching when we MUST make the...

2010-03-18T11:00:33.750-04:00
The time is fast approaching when we MUST make the tough choices on what is publicly funded. One would think that frontline Health Care would be at the top of the list. Please someone make the list and let people decide what we can and cannot afford before we loose it all. I'm sure there a number of incredibly expensive Government programs out there that we can live without. We need to look at public funding in totality and focus on front line priorities. Tough decisions though as we have created a publicly funded victimization industry.