Tax Freedom? Yeah, Sure

The Fraser Institute is not a so called "economic think tank", but an advertising agency for globalized corporate dictatorship, fraudulently describing itself as a "charitable" organization, with $25,000, tax deductible, yearly memberships.

Over the years FI publications advocated the sale of all Crown lands, all rivers and lakes, even the oceans, as "environmental protection measures", the sale of Canada Post, all hospitals, the privatization of all publicly owned and controlled services, all schools and replacing them with a "competitive" voucher system, the removal of all taxes from businesses, the abolition of the Canadian Dollar in favour of the U$, the elimination of all labour laws and the minimum wage, etc. etc. a la Milton Friedman, the Chicago School and the Cato Inst. where most of the FI policies originate.

Anybody who pays the slightest intention to what the FI says is either a gullible fool, or a crook.

Nobody likes to pay taxes, but why is it that people only complain against taxes, but never against the obscene profits of some corporations, especially when they're taken out of the country, without any benefit to Canada?

As an independent businessman of 49 years standing, I'm not against profits. But profits are over and above legitimate earnings and are also a form of taxation. Is then there no limit on when profits become a legalized theft and robbery?

Will this simple fact ever sink in?

Ed Deak.

Perhaps what we're talking about is <i>corporatism</i> vs <i>socialism</i>, where at one extreme the biggest corporations run the show and at the other extreme only the government runs the show. Both extremes have been proven through historical lessons to be very bad and unstable. <br><br> What seems have worked best is a compromise situation, with a government regulated "free market" that's not really free, but is supposed to be fair and balanced with the concerns of society as a whole. That's the ideal anyway, however what appears to be happening is that corporatism is assuming a growing power base, while socialism is being used by powerfull corporatists to expand a certain class of corporation (their own) at the expense of all others, and at the expense of society as a whole. <br><br> The basic problem is how our governments are chosen and run. They are easily manipulated when the biggest corporations end up having more money than anyone else - they effectively run the entire country through control over the economy, and through control over all of the main media outlets, therefore, they can pretty much do as they please unless safeguards are put in place so that their wealth (which is stolen for the most part) is limited and tightly regulated. <br><br> I don't agree that we need more government or more regulation to solve the problem, because government regulations are the main reason we are in the current mess that we see. <br><br> For example, one of the worse things to happen, is the change in law whereby corporations have been given the same rights and legal status as those of real live human beings. The other thing that is very bad, is the inverse, where real live people have been burdened with the limiting rights and restrictions afforded to the corporation - we have become a commodity owned by the state, which is itself a commodity of the corporatists, therefore we are all corporatist owned slaves by definition of the law. <br><br> To the naysayers who may be reading this, look up the definition of "person" in the <a href="http://lois.justice.gc.ca/en/i-21/246527.html">The Interpretation Act</a> and see for yourself what we have become in the eyes of government. <br><br> An excellent Canadian documentary on the subject is <a href="http://www.thecorporation.com/">The Corporation</a>.

I agree with your assessment, rearguard, and have long supported the idea of a mixed economy designed and protected for and by the public.

I believe in private enterprise and have suffered enough to make it a reality for myself. But not in so called "free enterprise", which, like most things c alled "free" is a fraud and con job.

On the other hand, as I've mentioned several times before, an economy should run on the principles of a road system, where everybody's property and life, regardless of size and power, is protected and enforced by impartial laws.

Which means public control and accountability to the public. This is what democracy is supposed to be about, not special preferences for special sectors.

As far corporatism vs. socialism is concerned, all these 'isms have long overstayed their welcome and mean absolutely nothing. Whether it is corporate, or ideological mono and oligopolies that hold the rains, makes little difference.

Any and all, even the best sounding ideologies and religions can be and have been distorted into mass robbery and murder, therefore we can no longer afford to have economies ruled and directed by any of them, regardless what they call themselves and what they claim their policies are.

Ed Deak.

I tend to view political ideologies in the same way that I view most organized religions - they are useful and effective tools of mass manipulation.

For example, the gift of "democracy" is used to justify a war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and if that's not enough (which it clearly is'nt), we must also fight off Muslim extremists because they are religious fanatics who hate us for our freedoms. That's what the 9/11 attacts were for, as well as the followup bombings, the fake terrorist alerts, and several arrests of people who are made to look as if they are real terrorists then quitely released.

The majority of Muslims so happen to live in areas full of oil and gas, but that rather incriminating fact is rarely mentioned.

Really, the only "ism" that applies is not an ism at all, it's plain old psychopathic greed.

Ha ha ha, yes, and then there's those crazy cowboy canucks living on top of one of the world's last greatest oil reserve - the Alberta Tar Sands.

I wonder if the Americans will simply buy it, or roll the panzers north? May we all live in interesting times...

The problem with the tar sands is that the extraction process requires vast amounts of energy to extract, making it extremely costly at the very least, but in all likelyhood totally impracticable. I won't bother mentioning the devastating cost to the environment, since such a thing never factors into the equation. Currently the oil is being extracted using natural gas which is heavily tax subsidized. The tar sands concept is fundamentally flawed, but has made a few megalomaniacs very rich anyway.