Manitoba | Provincial Politics

[TimeFadesAway]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

I mean, present me with a credible alternative.

Exactly. Parties like to opine about 'bloated government' but then refuse to specifically outline exactly what they would cut. It ends up being just empty rhetoric.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not thrilled with the current situation. But as the cuts in the '90s demonstrated, the 'savings' are not always as high as one might think. When you cut a civil servant, you lose the money you'd get back from them in taxes and the economic activity that person (and their family) generated, a good portion of which comes back in the form of taxes. So while initially it appears you are saving a fair bit of money, once the loss of income is factored in, the savings are substantially reduced.

[TimeFadesAway]

Originally Posted by Urban recluse

Must be similar to a battered wife syndrome. You keep going back to the NDP even though they are abusing taxpayers, and lying to you.

So do you then leave the husband who is beating you for the ex-boyfriend you had before your husband who beat you up so badly it put you into hospital?

[Bluenote]

Personally I am sick of the Ndp and City.
All this — about property tax freeze is a crock of —. My house in 1995 was valued at $77000. Today that same house is valued at $450000. They tax it on the $450000. So please show me where the decades of tax freeze are? They are making 8 times as much taxes off me then they did in 1995.
When I look outside my street hasn't been fixed in 60 years. My sewers in 60 years. They don't prune the elms here unless it's for removal. They cut the park behind my house 3-4 times a year. Usually when we complain.
They have raised frontage fees seems like every 5 years. I may also add I live in the Kingston Row area so it's not like it's a neighbourhood not full of high end homes.
I expect for the amount of taxes we pay something in return.

And one thing I dislike about the NDP is the lack of ever doing any of the promises they claim. Where is the Hwy 16 / Hwy 1 fancy interchange he used last election? I don't even think he got stakes in the ground. Oh I forgot he uses the perennial floods as an excuse every year. Maybe this year he will use a drought as an excuse.

[Urban recluse]

Originally Posted by TimeFadesAway

So do you then leave the husband who is beating you for the ex-boyfriend you had before your husband who beat you up so badly it put you into hospital?

That dude is gone though. You are not voting Filmon back in; he and Pallister do not share the same ideologies.

Besides, you would have to wait 8 hours to see a doctor in the hospital thanks to the NDP's incredibly poor job at improving Manitoba's health care system.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Bluenote

Personally I am sick of the Ndp and City.
All this — about property tax freeze is a crock of —. My house in 1995 was valued at $77000. Today that same house is valued at $450000. They tax it on the $450000. So please show me where the decades of tax freeze are? They are making 8 times as much taxes off me then they did in 1995.
When I look outside my street hasn't been fixed in 60 years. My sewers in 60 years. They don't prune the elms here unless it's for removal. They cut the park behind my house 3-4 times a year. Usually when we complain.
They have raised frontage fees seems like every 5 years. I may also add I live in the Kingston Row area so it's not like it's a neighbourhood not full of high end homes.
I expect for the amount of taxes we pay something in return.

Are you seriously paying 8 times as much in property taxes as compared to 20 years ago?

Sure the assessments go up, but normally mill rates are adjusted so that the tax take only goes up marginally. The only way I'd imagine most people would be paying that much more is if they demolished their house and built a spectacular new one on the site.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by Bluenote

And one thing I dislike about the NDP is the lack of ever doing any of the promises they claim. Where is the Hwy 16 / Hwy 1 fancy interchange he used last election? I don't even think he got stakes in the ground. Oh I forgot he uses the perennial floods as an excuse every year. Maybe this year he will use a drought as an excuse.

That project was put on hold as there were other, more pressing concerns. To pretend though that the roads haven't gotten 100x better in Manitoba is very misleading.

[cheswick]

Originally Posted by Bluenote

Personally I am sick of the Ndp and City.
All this — about property tax freeze is a crock of —. My house in 1995 was valued at $77000. Today that same house is valued at $450000. They tax it on the $450000. So please show me where the decades of tax freeze are? They are making 8 times as much taxes off me then they did in 1995.
When I look outside my street hasn't been fixed in 60 years. My sewers in 60 years. They don't prune the elms here unless it's for removal. They cut the park behind my house 3-4 times a year. Usually when we complain.
They have raised frontage fees seems like every 5 years. I may also add I live in the Kingston Row area so it's not like it's a neighbourhood not full of high end homes.
I expect for the amount of taxes we pay something in return.

And one thing I dislike about the NDP is the lack of ever doing any of the promises they claim. Where is the Hwy 16 / Hwy 1 fancy interchange he used last election? I don't even think he got stakes in the ground. Oh I forgot he uses the perennial floods as an excuse every year. Maybe this year he will use a drought as an excuse.

The value of your property only determines what share of the taxes you pay. The only way they'd be making 8 times as much on your property would be if no one elses property values increased.

[Tacheguy]

Manitoba and Winnipeg have the same fiscal problem. It isn't bloated bureaucracy; it is bloated salaries and benefits. Compare the salary of a Winnipeg police officer to an RCMP officer for example. It is obvious which one is supported by a union.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by Tacheguy

Manitoba and Winnipeg have the same fiscal problem. It isn't bloated bureaucracy; it is bloated salaries and benefits. Compare the salary of a Winnipeg police officer to an RCMP officer for example. It is obvious which one is supported by a union.

The RCMP generally make more money (except after 5 years - but still generally make more) and Manitoba has some of the lowest paid civil servants in the country.

http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/salary-and-benefits

[Tacheguy]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

The RCMP generally make more money (except after 5 years - but still generally make more) and Manitoba has some of the lowest paid civil servants in the country.

http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/salary-and-benefits

After five years the base salary of a Winnipeg constable is 97,000.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by Tacheguy

After five years the base salary of a Winnipeg constable is 97,000.

And up to that point, RCMP officers make more.

[biguc]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

Based on the promises from the other two, I know they're lying more - that's the thing. I don't want to vote NDP. I don't have a choice from what I see now.

You're traditionally an apologist for incumbent governments though.

The advantage of democracy is not that it delivers better government, only that it delivers different government. Corruption and entitlement fester in the NDP at every level simply because they've been in power too long.

Their worst crime is how they've ignored and downplayed the crisis in CFS, even going so far as to lie to the public about how they count kids in care. And their lies didn't even come close to covering up the fact that nearly 1/3 kids in care in all of Canada is an aboriginal kid in Manitoba. This situation is so outrageously bad I used the word 'crime' above without a hint of hyperbole, and I sincerely hope that after the NDP loses power, there will be a deep investigation into how things got so fucked up, which will land the people in this government who have been literally killing kids in jail.

This is THE election issue. You can spin deficits and bureaucratic weight all you want, but you can't spin dead kids. You can't spin a child protection service that apprehends kids at ten times the rate of the entire rest of the country.


Yet the party has been gallingly callous about it. Keri Irving Ross works up some crocodile tears here and there, but nobody does anything about it. Nobody cleans house on an obviously broken system. They just let it chug along, racist and morbid, ruining families and killing kids. Part of the proud tradition of residential schools and the '60s scoop.

[biguc]

What do you guys think of the Wab Kinew debacle?

I like Wab Kinew, but I find it funny and oh so typical that the NDP that howled for that douche Jamie Hall's head and refused to accept his apology are completely down with Wab's apologies, even though they amount to the same cliches about satire and having a dark sense of humour.

[Tacheguy]

Originally Posted by biguc

What do you guys think of the Wab Kinew debacle?

I like Wab Kinew, but I find it funny and oh so typical that the NDP that howled for that douche Jamie Hall's head and refused to accept his apology are completely down with Wab's apologies, even though they amount to the same cliches about satire and having a dark sense of humour.

It strikes me as racist in a way to hold Kinew to a lower standard than would be applied to a non-aboriginal candidate. I like him too but he should be out imo.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by biguc

You're traditionally an apologist for incumbent governments though.

Sure, generally. Towards the end of the Harper government, I couldn't do that anymore. I actually don't want to vote NDP. I have no choice as I see it right now.

[biguc]

I hear you about how bad the alternatives are, but I'll give anyone a chance to — up for 4 years over four years of the NDP definitely — up. The NDP needs a time out to do some soul searching before they're fit to govern again. It's not like they have anything amazing in the works anyway.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by biguc

I hear you about how bad the alternatives are, but I'll give anyone a chance to — up for 4 years over four years of the NDP definitely — up. The NDP needs a time out to do some soul searching before they're fit to govern again. It's not like they have anything amazing in the works anyway.

And the campaign may change my mind. The federal campaign made me feel the same at the beginning. I was stuck with the Conservatives because. The Liberal platform turned out to be better. It wasn't hard for me to change my mind in the end (even though I wrestled with voting NDP about midway because of Mulcair). On the other hand, two issues very important to me had personal assurance from my MLA/Minister of Agriculture when he stopped by my store today. The NDP do need a time out. That said, there needs to be someone credible to replace them. At the moment I don't see it. Maybe that will change in the next month and a bit.

[Tacheguy]

Originally Posted by biguc

I hear you about how bad the alternatives are, but I'll give anyone a chance to — up for 4 years over four years of the NDP definitely — up. The NDP needs a time out to do some soul searching before they're fit to govern again. It's not like they have anything amazing in the works anyway.

I remember the first time Harper got elected. I voted for him because the Libs had become lazy and corrupt. I figured how much harm could it do, especially if it was only a minority government? Ten years later I realized how much harm it can do. You can't leave governing to people who hate the idea of government..

[biguc]

And I was just going to say that I'd take an anarchy over more NDP...

Speaking of Harper, though, we all know he wasn't really that bad at first. During his minority years he was pretty benign and lulled us into thinking he was ok, and he had replaced a corrupt and entitled Liberal government, so why not?

Of course, with that majority term he became the corrupt and entitled — we all happily kicked into the trash. I wouldn't be surprised if Trudeau is still kicking around in ten years, into a third term, we'll have all grown to hate him, and we can repeat the cycle all over again.

[jmt18325]

Unsurprisingly, given the concerns I've raised here, the NDP is gaining ground in Winnipeg:

http://www.winnipegsun.com/2016/03/13/ndp-gain-support-in-peg?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter