If You Really Want To Halt The Sell-Off Of British Columbia...

.....There Is Only One Thing To Do.

Give money to the NDP.

Seriously.

Why?

Well, the Political Party fundraising numbers for 2008 are out and Geoff Dembicki, in The Tyee has a nice succinct summary up.

First, when it comes to the total dollars donated by individuals, the Dippers and GordCo were pretty much in a dead heat at $2.3 million.

Second, when it comes to cash from Labour organizations, the NDP was way ahead with about $527,000 (ie. about a quarter of what was donated to them by individuals) compared to the Liberals $3,000. Now this disparity, of course, is enough to give some Watercarriers all the ammo they need.....

But.

Here's the third, really big thing.

Corporate donations go like this:

LINO**-licious Liberal Party of B.C. - $4.7 million......New Democratic Party - $0.04 million.

Now.

Did you get that?

The LINO's received more thant twice as much money from Corporations as they did from ALL of the Citizens of British Columbia.

Again, twice as much.

So, when somebody like, say, Plutonic (Private) Power Corporation Chairman Donald McInnes pays out more than $50,000 for, as he defines it, "a seat at the table", ask yourself the following:

"Whose table, exactly, was Mr. McInnes paying to sit at?"

To be honest, I do not know the real answer, especially given the lack of transparency around the mostly covert corporate consultations of very fine Liberal Party-connected folks like Patrick Kinsella.

But I do know one thing for sure.

Which is that the table most definitely does not belong to you or me.


OK?


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I've down-loaded the massive, non-machine readable pdf files from the Elections BC website and will be going through them on the weekend looking for goodies I can add to the Public Affairs Bureau's Easter Egg hunt (although I'm saddened by the realization that many of my visits from the PABst Blue/Red Ribbon Brigade look like might actually be from creepy-crawlie Spider Bots.....). What I will really be looking for is the number of invividual donors to each party (ie. vs. the total number of dollars donated).....
The Tyee's piece on Mr. McInness'/Plutonic Power Corp's contributions to the BC LIberal Party by Colleen Kimmett (and the comments) is worth reading for all kinds of reasons, including the fact that the Goodship Watercarrier appeared to be complicit in an apparent on-air act of obfuscation.
*UBP = Union Busting Party.
**LINO = 'Liberal In Name Only'
Image at top of post is from the 'Citizens For Public Power', whose table I'd be happy to sit at anytime.
If you like, you could even work to help democracy on Election Day, May 12th. Pay is 200 bucks which, I suppose, you could even donate to the party and/or the cause of your choice (way better than laying out for the latest Nano, I reckon, when the old one will do just fine - I still have an original shuffle because I just don't need more than 512 songs at a time). Details can be found on the Elections BC Website, or you can call 1-800-661-8683.


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