winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Health-care hypocrisy

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Health-care hypocrisy: "Health-care hypocrisy



Why is Prime Minister Paul Martin silent on the growing moves to privatize health care in Quebec, which even his own party in that province now supports?
Quebec already has more private medical clinics than any other province in Canada -- including Martin's favourite whipping boy when it comes to medicare, Alberta.
Martin can't plead ignorance about the huge number of private clinics in Quebec. His own doctor runs one.
Last weekend, the Quebec wing of the federal Liberal party endorsed a resolution calling for the expansion of private health care in that province as a way of combating unacceptably long waiting lists for medical treatment. "

When will the bubble burst?

There is a natural financial correction every 25 years. Do you remember 18% interest rates in the 80's . Those in priveledged monopoly positions with their inflated wages -those normally protected from economic realities will feel the pain. Beware you are heading for a painful and rude awakening. Question your ability to sustain or survive your existing life style. The question to ask yourself is:

• Inflated salaries means inflated living costs- can you afford or sustain your 4000 sq ft house or palace for 2-if your real salary or personal revenue is reduced dramatically . (Conserve and save - lower your consumption habits and expectations.) CYA.
• Can we sustain inflated salaries and wages when we compete with the rest of the world?
• Check what a policeman, teacher, judge, jailgaurd, doctor, nurse,other workers are paid in China or India -the reality check .
• Are you worth the money when those in China produce the same products for 10% of what you produce?

Do you really believe that a corrupt and bloated "over tax it" government that has failed in economics 101 can help you? The fall of the " roman empire" is a economic reality. Greed and everyone for themselves will continue to prevail at great personal cost for those that pay for the misadventures of over inflated non performancers. If you can't compete you will perish.

Be aware , forearmed and forwarned - get ready for the unpleasantness of economic reality.

winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Hospital admits mistakes made

winnipegsun.com - Manitoba - Hospital admits mistakes made: "We need to have a health-care system that is held accountable,' said Gerrard, adding the bill would ensure measurable outcomes are in place and agreed-upon recommendations are implemented.
Another bereaved daughter was in the legislature gallery yesterday afternoon, also asking for accountability from the health minister.
Mimi Raglan's mom -- Frances Raglan -- was mistreated at Riverview Health Centre and died after being discharged in October 2001.
'It's outrageous there has been no apology to us. My mother was clearly put on the wrong treatment plan,' said Raglan.
Health Minister Tim Sale acknowledged the error and apologized for the family's grief but wouldn't commit to remedial action. "

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - We've heard it before

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - We've heard it before: "What an insult to the intelligence of Canadian voters. For starters, to suggest that his party is the only one capable or caring enough to implement social policy change is arrogant in the extreme. Then there's the troubling fact that they have had well over a decade to make progress and in that time have managed to do very little to fix health care, or the conditions on reserves or day care or offshore revenue sharing. "

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - End the immigration charade

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - End the immigration charade: "And while Volpe says a hike in immigration is needed to meet Canada's labour needs, the fact is we already have far too many foreign-trained doctors and engineers working as cab drivers because the feds, after 12 years, still haven't figured out a sensible way to recognize their credentials. "

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Harper on right track

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Harper on right track: "That means keeping government at a reasonable size and acting as a catalyst, instead of an impediment, to business growth. It means a commitment to balancing the federal budget by learning to live within our means, not by taxing us half to death. It means tax breaks for individuals and corporations, in recognition of the fact that we'd like to make our own choices about how our money is spent. It means creative solutions to our health-care system instead of the kind of tinkering we have seen in recent years that has frustrated medical professionals and the general public alike. "

National Post quick facts on the gomery report

Can you believe that it took this long to discover that those in power have an absolute disregard for public funds? Do we have the right to be a country when such blatant "criminality" is permitted and condoned by our "leaders ". Trust be dammed PR

National Post: "Gomery Report

Mary Vallis
National Post"

Hamilton

Water water everywhere and not a safe drop to drink! safe water should be a canadian right - why not fix it -enough meetings - why not just fix it .

PR We have lots of people with talent to do so- get rid of the administrators who do not have the will or brains to act.


Hamilton: "More water woes near Walkerton

Keith Leslie
Canadian Press"

People make the difference

Osprey Media Group Inc. - Brantford Expositor: "Father's wish of accessible home for disabled daughter comes true
Expositor Staff

By Vincent Ball
Local News - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 @ 01:00

What do you get when you mix more than 300 volunteers with national donors, corporate sponsors and about 80 local partners?

The fulfillment of a father�s dream.

�Every day for the last 15 years I�ve had a dream of building an accessible home for my daughter Amber,� Fred Pelzer said. �For the last three weeks, I�ve been living that dream.�

Thanks to Habitat for Humanity Brant, Fred, his wife Connie and their four children � Amber, Freddie, Matthew and Madison � will be able to live the dream for years to come.

They are the recipients of the first accessible home built by Habitat for Humanity Brant. It was constructed on land donated by Empire Communities in West Brant, with help from an army of volunteers backed by a lengthy list of corporate donors. "

innovation for health

Yahoo! Mail - respondfeedbacknow@yahoo.ca: "A Burst of Fresh Air
Deep-sea divers have long known the benefits of hyperbaric oxygen treatment (HBOT) -- a method for efficient delivery of pure oxygen -- to treat those with the 'bends,' a condition that can occur as a diver rises to the surface and the changing pressure causes nitrogen gas bubbles to form in the lungs, tissues and bloodstream, leading to a potentially lethal blood flow blockage. Today, doctors use HBOT to treat a number of other conditions -- carbon monoxide and cyanide poisoning, wounds that aren't healing properly, serious burns, soft tissue and bone infections and certain complications from radiation therapy. While everyone agrees about the usefulness of HBOT for these conditions, there is another usage that is generating much debate -- the practice of using HBOT to address neurological problems, including brain damage from strokes.
About HBOT
HBOT administers 100% oxygen (versus the 21% that is in the air we breathe) in a chamber with an air pressure considerably greater than the air around us. The pressure dramatically raises the number of oxygen molecules entering the bloodstream -- by as much as 2,000%. The vastly increased oxygen level allows the oxygen to reach bone and tissue that it normally can't reach, where it may accelerate healing. The oxygen also can enhance functioning of white blood cells, the infection fighters, which may improve aspects of immune system function. It is the ability to heal tissue that has neurologists evaluating HBO for use with stroke patients. Harry T. Whelan, MD, medical director of the Froedtert & Medical College Hyperbaric Medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin, is "

Citizens for an Alternative Tax System

Citizens for an Alternative Tax System: "Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations, sets forth four signs of a bad tax system:
1. A large bureaucracy for administration. Did you know that the IRS, with over 150,000 employees is the largest tax bureaucracy since ancient Rome? Its tentacles reach out and have hold on over 200 million people.
2. A system that puts taxpayers through 'odious examinations...and exposes them to much unnecessary trouble, vexation, and oppression.'
3. A system that encourages evasion.
4. A system that obstructs the industry of the people, and discourages enterprise which might otherwise give 'employment to great multitudes,' i.e. jobs. That obligates people to excessive payments and thereby takes away the funds that would promote commerce, industry and employment. "

National Post More consumer choice -more gov't revenue

http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=3ff93967-ccc1-4421-967b-a1511a54e360

National Post: "The government of Alberta, which privatized its retail outlets a decage ago, profits more from provincial liquor sales than Ontario or Quebec, a new study has found.
The Montreal Economic Institute compared the three provinces' liquor industries and concluded Alberta's private retail system not only racks up greater profits for the government, but has also spawned more outlets and a greater number of products for consumers to choose from."

Hamilton Post Will government greed kill Stelco jobs ?

http://www.canada.com/hamilton/news/story.html?id=493c2a17-a647-4d1e-98d6-1e0825b44adc&page=2

"The province has at the very least been extremely opportunistic in delivering this blow to Stelco," apparently hoping that in all the confusion surrounding Stelco no one would notice the province dealt "a death blow" to Stelco and is "playing chicken with the lives of Stelco's employees and others . . . to cover up its own regulatory failures," the bondholders allege.


The group also outlines a series of complaints it has with Stelco's restructuring process and plan, including:

-an "excessive" downpayment of $400 million into the pension deficiency

-a $100 million convertible not issue, which is "extremely expensive, to the benefit of Tricap alone"

-a failure to search for competing financing proposals

-the intentional exclusion of Stelco's creditors from negotiations on the restructuring plan

-Stelco's attempt to boost the fee it will pay to UBS as a financial advisor, and a request to hire BMO Nesbitt Burns for further services


Also on Friday, Alex Morrison of Ernst & Young, the court-appointed monitor in the case, said voting creditors which "likely represent over 50 per cent, by dollar value, of the claims . . . have all indicated that, if a vote were to be held today, they would vote against the plan."

News | canada.com network

News | canada.com network: "Dingwall to resign, wants to clear his name

Alexander Panetta
Canadian Press


September 28, 2005



CREDIT: CP, Tom Hanson
David Dingwall, president and CEO of the Canadian Mint and former Public Works minister.

ADVERTISEMENT



OTTAWA -- The head of the Royal Canadian Mint has resigned amid allegations of ethical misdeeds, making him the fifth Crown corporation boss to leave in controversy since Paul Martin became prime minister"

National Post

National Post: "Canada taxes business investment more heavily than any other competing nation except China -- and taxes on Canadians' personal investment income can reach 80%, according to a study released yesterday"

Macleans.ca | Top Stories | Politics | Federal health minister tiptoes around Alberta's study of private insurance

Macleans.ca | Top Stories | Politics | Federal health minister tiptoes around Alberta's study of private insurance: "Federal health minister tiptoes around Alberta's study of private insurance
JUDY MONCHUK
CALGARY (CP) - Canada's health minister refused Monday to be drawn into a debate over Alberta's examination of private health-care insurance.
'Alberta has basically said they are reviewing the situation and I don't think it's appropriate for me to make any pre-emptory comments,' Ujjal Dosanjh said Monday. Dosanjh - buoyed by a new poll which shows Liberal fortunes soaring over Stephen Harper's Tories federally and even rising in traditionally anti-Liberal Alberta - did not seem to want to say anything that might rock that boat."

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Registry shooting blanks

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - Registry shooting blanks: "In late 1994, when then-justice minister Allan Rock unveiled the gun-control program, he declared, 'this tough new gun-control program will improve public safety and send a strong message that the criminal misuse of guns will not be tolerated.' Eleven years later, the Liberals are suddenly worried about gun crime because their electoral heartland has been blitzed by gun violence.
In a more sane country, Toronto would realize the gun registry has been exposed as an expensive waste of money and would punish the Liberals for lying to them by voting them out. And the Grits would shut down their useless registry and put the money into actual police officers fighting crime.
Sadly, neither of these things is going to happen. These lessons will go unlearned."

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - A miserable failure

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - A miserable failure: " political wag once described former federal Conservative leader Robert Stanfield as the 'greatest prime minister Canada never had.' It was an acknowledgement that, while the quiet Nova Scotian possessed the intelligence and the acumen to lead the country, he was done in by political manoeuvring and never had the chance to prove himself. "

Hamilton

TORONTO -- The dozen years an Ontario man has languished in jail for raping and killing a four-year-old girl is just one more painful reason Canada needs a better system to deal with wrongful convictions, his supporters said Tuesday

"It's very upsetting after the number of wrongful convictions that have happened in this country," Dalton said.

"The list is getting very long."

Lockyer said Canada needs an independent tribunal to review claims of wrongful convictions such as one set up in the U.K. eight years ago.

It has already found more than 50 murder convictions were unjustified.

"All we have now is a sort of a piecemeal examination of a case here and case there primarily brought forward by our organization," said Lockyer. "It's just not good enough."

Lockyer said Ontario has been "the worst province" when it comes to dealing with such cases and that promises made after the notorious wrongful murder prosecution of Guy Paul Morin have gone unkept.

© Canadian Press 2005

winnipegsun.com - Editorial - About that gas tax ...

Sometimes it's just plain sickening to watch how the oil and gas industry works. It will be weeks or months before the full devastation of Hurricane Katrina is felt and oil production in the ruined Gulf of Mexico area can begin to get back on track.

But the resulting gas price hike? It happened instantly, hitting us here in Canada faster than Katrina did -- and harder. This, even though the gas being sold was refined and distributed long before Katrina developed.

True, in light of the horrendous human misery in New Orleans and throughout southern Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, gas prices may seem a small matter, and griping about them rather unseemly.

No more unseemly, however, than the fact that the tragedy of Katrina has been a bonanza for gas companies -- and government coffers.

There's little we can do about the market forces now driving the price of oil. But the sudden windfall in taxes -- particularly for Ottawa -- is another story.


As Canadian Taxpayers Federation federal director John Williamson noted this week, one-third of the price of a litre of gas is taxes -- and the GST is charged on top of all the other taxes, meaning a sudden spike like this is highly profitable for the feds.

The CTF has repeatedly called on Ottawa to reduce fuel taxes three ways:

1. End the GST tax-on-tax -- a savings to the consumer of, on average, 1.5 cent/litre.

2. Scrap the dishonest "deficit elimination" tax (the government hasn't had a deficit in eight years, so why are we still paying this?), for another 1.5-cent reduction.

3. Cut the federal gas tax itself by 2 cents, bringing the total price reduction to 5 cents/litre.

Cynics argue, of course, that a nickel per litre either way won't make much difference. Finance Minister Ralph Goodale himself has refused to cut gas taxes, suggesting gas companies would just hike their prices accordingly anyway (which they deny). Meanwhile, the feds now portray their gas gouging as noble, saying big cities need their new gas tax transfer (only a fraction of the billions raised).

Nonsense. The CTF is right on this. It's blatant overtaxation, and the feds' excuses don't wash anymore. Our roads and infrastructure may be crumbling, but the feds are rolling in gas tax revenues -- up 18% over a decade ago. Small wonder they have no intention of helping consumers fight high gas prices.

Talk about sickening.