Saturday, February 08, 2014

This Weekend In Snookland...The Cronification of Everything.

There'sNoMemoryLike
NoMemoryVille


So.

A few (and yes, at this point at least, it is still only a few) media wags are noticing that the man who was appointed by the Snooklandians to run the BC Lottery Corporation has suddenly quit and, even more suddenly (surprise!), has gone to work for those finest of the fine finefolks who are building the Snooklandian-subsidized Casino-Industrial Complex next to right next door to the stadium with the $600 million dollar carpet on top.

Here's the ever vigilant Bob Mackin's lede on this Friday before-the-Snooklandian-long-weekend garbage dump story in The Tyee:

Just over a week after he suddenly quit as B.C. Lottery Corporation CEO, Michael Graydon resurfaced as the president of a company planning to build a casino next to BC Place Stadium.

Graydon will join PV Hospitality ULC, a partnership between Paragon Gaming and its financial backer 360 VOX Corporation, on Feb. 11, according to a news release.

Las Vegas-based Paragon Gaming received City of Vancouver approval in 2011 to move its existing Edgewater Casino licence from the Plaza of Nations to land leased from B.C. Pavilion Corporation...



But here's the thing.

What you are not hearing in the sporadic Lotuslandian 'lectronic news division reports on this story (although Mr. Mackin does mention it) is the fact (i.e. it is not made up) that the fine folks from Paragon had a fix in from even before the beginning.

Specifically, a super-fine fellow, and a previous BC Liberal-appointed head of the BC Lottery Corporation (i.e. the group that is supposed to be working for you and me, not for private casino corporations) named Mr. T. Richard Turner actually had a financial interest in Paragon while he was actually sitting as head of the BCLC before the Casino-Industrial Complex was even a twinkle, allegedly, in anyone's eye.

And, worse, in my opinion, what no one seems to care to remember today is the fact (i.e. it is not made up) that the good Mr. Turner, after he suddenly 'quit' the BCLC and became a principal in Paragon, called up the then Campellerian Minister responsible for BC Place and told him that if we (i.e. the public, not the private casino corporation) did not build a $600 million dollar roof next to their proposed casino that the deal, as already consumated, would likely be off.

More specifically, it is a fact (i.e. it is not made up either) that, at least according to the then Minister involved, that Mr. Turner called him up on his cellphone and said that not building a new retractable roof atop the old marsmallow, a roof that was subsequently paid for by you and me (i.e. not a private casino corporation), could very well be a 'deal breaker'.

And yet, after all that, and the thee million dollar a year public subsidy recently granted to the private casino maker by the Snooklandians,  we are slowly but surely strangling our ferry system (i.e. the system that we, the public, not private casino operators or even Snooklandian Helijet flyers, use) to save a lousy $54 million?

Honestly (and I say this with all snark phasers turned off and their batteries removed and thrown in the ocean)....

Words alone can no longer express my total dismay at this latest development in the BC Liberal's 13-year-long forced march to cronify literally everything that is, or is not already, nailed down/cut down/mined-out/damned-up and/or fracked-to-kingdom-come in this province.

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Up next...How wrong, exactly, was Neil Young when he was right about the state of Tar Sands land reclamation?...


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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, everything.

And, and apparently everyone, especially those who speak in Christied tongues:

http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/article/20140207/PRINCEGEORGE0302/302079967/-1/PRINCEGEORGE03/weaver-the-new-green

Anonymous said...

"By 9:30 on election night, champagne corks were popping in the corporations’ meeting rooms. The fish farmers won, big time! So did the pipeline/tanker gang."

Rafe Mair May 16, 2013 Rafe Mair Online

Oops about the extra "and" above.
SH

cfvua said...

Total agreement here! Keep things quiet and slip away with the jewels while a numbed electorate knows little. standard liberal operating procedure. For the business bastions they say they are, efforts at making honest money in the real world doesn't interest them. Everything has to be subsidized by taxpayers. Laziness coupled with poor business models from dreamer-schemers will bit by bit ruin any economy. Now after wasting a half a$Billion on the roof the rush is to get the dream scheme in place before the next chance to punt the liberals. All promised and preconceived of course!

Anonymous said...

Where is our Jacques Duchesneau?

Oh, I forgot, this is BC, brown envelopes are anathema to the cocktail and golf circuit paper tigers...

SH

"Jacques Duchesneau the watchdog-turned-whistleblower (cponline)

His role: Spent 18 months as head of the Quebec anti-collusion unit in 2010 and 2011.

Admits he was responsible for the 2011 leak of an incendiary internal report, prepared by his unit, to the media. The document was considered stunning at the time, as it alleged widespread corruption in the construction industry, with links to political party financing and organized crime.

The leak of the report pushed the then-Liberal government, which had resisted calls for an inquiry, to create the Charbonneau Commission to examine Duchesneau's allegations.

The former Montreal police chief and one-time mayoral candidate is the corruption inquiry's first high-profile witness. He has since entered provincial politics as a member of the Coalition party.

He tells the inquiry that political party financing is rife with dirty money, and that distinct schemes are being employed across the province to help rig public-works contracts.

Duchesneau concludes that officials either turned a blind eye or just didn't have the staff to properly follow up on files.

He says he leaked his report when he became convinced the provincial government didn't care about its contents."

http://cponline.thecanadianpress.com/graphics/2013/charbonneau-witnesses/#/

chuckstraight said...

Maybe Christy could get David Emerson to explain how these kinds of things work?

Am I jaded?
Just a little.

Danneau said...

As usual, a gut check.