Politics is the organization of dissent — Jacques Rancière

The Gandalf Group recently reported that the three most important issues for Canadians are the state of the health care system, the price of gasoline and, tied for third place, the increase in crime and the quality of primary education. Health care, the price of gasoline, education, and crime have one common element: top-down control. Big governments and self-serving bureaucracies control health care, education, and public safety. Big corporations and self-serving speculators control the price of gasoline. Governments hanker to be corporations and corporations hanker to be cartels.

My duty is to speak out; I have no wish to be an accomplice. — Emile Zola

The easiest way to avoid having to answer questions is to prevent questions from being asked. The Community Charter gives municipal councils carte blanche authority to ask questions, to seek the citizenry’s opinion by any means from a casual survey to a full-fledged referendum and on any subject from the colour of dog tags to the development of the most valuable real estate in town. Councils avoid asking citizens for their opinions through formal processes because the Charter gives councils the power to make all decisions. Having and exercising power is exhilarating. The council of the City of Powell River must have been high on power when it decided to save money on a referendum only to spend more on a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP) to silence opponents.

As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State, “What does it matter to me?” the State may be given as lost.  -  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Municipalities throughout British Columbia will be mailing out tax notices in a few days. This will trigger a second wave of discussions about taxes; the first wave followed council debates on the annual budget (financial plan). There is more ritual than substance to property tax discussions. In most communities the municipal share of property taxes makes up less than half of the bill. What’s more, council does not control the allocation of the tax burden imposed on individual property owners. Your share is not determined democratically; it is determined by the real estate market. Your share of the cost of snowplowing next winter is determined by the profits your neighbours made when they sold their property last year.

You can say reasonably “I want five shillingsworth of salmon”; but it is ridiculous to say “I want five shillingsworth of money”. — George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw published The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Socialism, Capitalism, Sovietism and Fascism in 1928. Shaw explained the essence of financial markets long before bankers invented derivatives and other impossible to understand (and manage) financial transactions. Shaw’s explanations are as valid today as they were then. Shaw described the money market as “that mysterious institution where your investments are made for you … with its chronic ailment of Fluctuations that may at any moment increase your income pleasantly without any trouble to you, or swallow it up and ruin you in ways that a man can never make a woman understand because he does not understand them himself.”

Can we get along? — Rodney King

When it became known that Premier Campbell would be coming to Nelson to give a talk to the annual convention of the Association of Kootenay Boundary Local Governments, it was suggested that his visit had something to do with Nelson’s efforts to build good relationships with regional, provincial, and federal politicians. I do not think so. The reason for the Premier’s visit has nothing to do with Nelson and its relationship with politicians. This is a nostalgia trip for the Premier. He is one of many career politicians for whom city hall is the bottom rung on the ladder to success. If the Association’s convention had been held in Yahk, the Premier would not have come to Nelson; he would have gone to Yahk.