How Does The BC Liberal Party Keep Getting Away With This Stuff?

TheCronificationOf
EverythingVille

_____

Update: A lowly blogger has already started to do the job on Pay-To-Play that the proMedia has so far proved not capable of doing...Here.

_____

Is that not THE question of the last fifteen years here in British Columbia?

But, by way of illustrative example, how about we just focus the here-and-now for the moment.

So.

How, specifically, are the BC Liberals getting away with these super-secret hook-ups between big money donors and their leader, who doles out our resources, our treasure and longterm contracts that we have to pay for, to whomever she (and they) please?

Well.

Below, I will attempt to show you how they getting away with it in just three easy steps.

****

First, the following is the lede of Rob Shaw's latest in the Vancouver Sun:

B.C. will not be following Ontario’s lead in banning political donations from corporations and unions, says the province’s finance minister.

Mike de Jong said Monday that the provincial government will not introduce legislation that would ban big money from politics, or set limits on donors. Instead, he argued that B.C.’s existing laws on fundraising, reporting and fixed election dates — combined with a new pledge from Premier Christy Clark to move toward real-time disclosure of donors — is sufficient for public confidence in the system.

“Not that there isn’t room for improvement, (but) it’s fairly transparent compared to the way it once was,” de Jong said in an interview. “The conversation ultimately comes around to … is the government contemplating adopting the kind of ban that others are talking about on corporate donations and union donations? We are not.”...


Second, the following is (an almost real-time!) tweet from Gary Mason of the Globe and Mail:

Third, is the next paragraph in Mr. Shaw's VSun piece:

...B.C.’s rejection of political finance reform comes amid renewed pressure in other provinces to remove the influence of large donations on politicians and political parties. Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne pledged Monday to speed up legislation to ban corporate and union donations, after the Toronto Star reported her party had placed $500,000 fundraising targets upon her ministers, raising the prospect they could be soliciting money from businesses and people that they regulate...


Do you see what I did there with a little bit of red pixel dust?

And do you see what our local proMedia herd is NOT doing?

Which, of course, is what the BC Liberals, and their finest-of-the-fine donors are counting on.

______
As for last week's distracto-babble from our fine premier on the fantastic improvements that 'real time' reporting will bring to the world of publicly supported influence peddling...Well...The Dean of the local legislative press gallery, Mr. Vaughn Palmer, has already given his approval to that (scroll down to the last two paragraphs).


.