Liberal John McCallum admits Ignatieff's corporate tax hike will cost jobs.

Yesterday on the Roy Green show on the Corus Radio Network, Liberal MP for Markham—Unionville, John McCallum admitted that the Liberals plan to raise corporate taxes from 16.5% to 18 % would cost Canadians jobs.



That's John McCallum ladies and gentlemen, part of the Liberal Team!


Update:  John McCallum apologizes to Peter Donolo for telling the truth about the Liberals plan to raise taxes!  The Liberal Party of Canada, where telling the truth requires an apology.



Past posts on McCallum:

Meet your new Liberal Transport critic.

"I could be sitting here as your prime minister, but I turned it down.."

And you want to be my latex salesman Mr. McCallum

The front runner for Finance Minister under Ignatieff.

John McCallum again on the Roy Green Show. This time talking about Ignatieff signing the 2008 coalition deal. (listen as hilarity ensues)

Utopia can be achieved with 100% taxation.

Or at least that is what the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives would have us believe.


To put it as simply as I can, this study is 100% BS!

Off the top of my head I would like them to explain to me just how a tax cut automatically equals a service cut? It doesn't and if something this simple is wrong it does not say much for the rest of the study.

Does anyone else find it strange that this comes 1 day after Ignatieff stated that he would raise taxes? Update: Iggy has backtracked away from that statement.

Add your thoughts to the comments.

Free Seminar: How to make money with the Liberal carbon tax:

Dear blog reader: Do you want to be rich?

Dear reader this is your chance to learn the secrets that can make your life easier and bring in wealth beyond your wildest dreams all with the help of Stephane Dion's carbon tax. (as a special bonus today I offer a free sneak peek of one of our most basic and popular secrets. One of many that what you will learn by taking part in our exclusive seminar. Keep reading)

Our highly sought after program will teach you all that you really need to know to profit in Canada under such a repressive tax system as the Green Shift. While the rest of the population suffers under the weight of it all, you can come out ahead by applying the simple lessons learned at our exclusive seminar. But you must respond today to ensure entry.

By confirming your reservation now I will guarantee your seat at an exclusive financial seminar to be held in your area in the near future; probably at some seedy hotel out near the airport.


Here is just a small selection of available sessions:

Tax planning: Businesses really do not pay taxes. (at least with their own money)

Sending cash to your brother in law and claiming it as 'Green R&D' (sold out)

Hidden opportunities: Thriving in the black market.

Unfair disadvantage: Selling your stock in Canadian companies before the tax hits.

New business ideas: How to set up a "millions of new green jobs" employment agency.

Specialized training: The believable shoulder shrug.

The Gore: Buying carbon credits from yourself.

Investment Opportunities: Buying farmland, trucks, and fishing boats cheap.

and many many more!


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As promised a sneak peak at our most popular session; Pass it on and then some*.

Everyone is expecting prices to raise under a carbon tax as your own and every other business passes on the increased costs to the consumer; this is expected and should not be a surprise to anyone. (see tax planning session B)

Example A . ' Your Product ' currently retails for $10 and this allows for a $2 profit. With your carbon tax hit passed on to the customer (already expected by the consumer) the new selling price will have to raise to $12.50 to maintain the current profit margin.

So why not take advantage of the expected increases and tack an a few extra bucks for yourself? In our example why not tack on another $1.50 for a new retail price of $14.00?

Your customers will complain and they will not be happy but you now have the option of just shrugging your shoulders, blaming the Liberals and counting your record profits.

*Prerequisite: Believable shoulder shrug.

Remember, this is just a short example of what you can learn at our exclusive seminar. Call now and I will see you soon.

Dion confirms what MHF said about the greenshift.

Stephane Dion has confirmed what Martha Hall Findlay had earlier stated about green shift and its dubious claims of reducing CO2 emissions.

"Findlay said it's impossible to calculate the emission reduction numbers at this point, "because energy prices have gone up so much, we don't know how the shift will affect consumption," she said."

Dion at a speaking engagement in New Brunswick: "He also said they know this plan will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but can't say for sure by how much until they see how industry reacts once it's implemented."

Oh, and just how does Dion think industry will react?

"When asked if those companies will simply pass the costs along to the customer, he said that's likely in the beginning, but will change as companies invest in greener technology to pay less tax."

Sure it will Stephane; because there are plenty of reasons for industry to invest their own money to reduce taxes that are already being passed on to someone else.

Lots of incentive in that plan isn't there?

Update: Dion puts his foot in his mouth again. "Mr. Dion said he would only put $3-billion of each annual surplus toward the debt, making any additional surplus available for spending priorities that may come up as a result of the green shift." h/t KerPlonka

Spending priorities as a result of the green shift? Wasn't this plan promised to be revenue neutral?

A Few Quick Questions on Dion's Carbon Tax

If someone has to pay $1000 a year more because of the carbon tax, but get back $1000 through the proposed 'shifting'; where exactly is the incentive for anyone to decrease their carbon use? Or is that not what this tax is supposed to be all about?


Just how exactly are the many thousands of people who pay NO income taxes in this country going to benefit by tax breaks? How about those who do not even have a SIN#? Or are all of these people somehow magically exempt from paying the increased costs that are going to be passed on by business to the consumer as a result of this tax?


If this tax somehow does what it was intended to do and decreases our country's carbon output; wouldn't it be IMPOSSIBLE for the tax to remain revenue neutral? You cannot give back 14 billion in tax credits or through some type of creative tax shifting if there is not 14 billion coming in via the carbon tax. In theory the carbon tax revenue should decrease every year as we produce less CO2, but yet the tax credits are to remain the same or are to even increase to low income earners and those that pay no taxes. How can this ponzi scheme be maintained? Revenue neutral does not only mean that the government will make no money off of it, it also means that it will not cost the government any money as well.


Good luck with that.


And lastly, is it still part of the grand plan for a Liberal government to purchase carbon credits for us to reach our Kyoto targets?

How many times did Dion say...

that there would be no carbon tax?

Lorne Gunter, The Edmonton Journal

For at least two years now, Liberal Leader Stephane Dion has been clear -- emphatic even -- there will be no carbon tax if his party wins the next federal election with him at the helm.

Of course, he was being disingenuous about that sometimes. For instance, last spring he suggested that instead of a carbon tax, the country's 700 largest carbon emitters might be charged a carbon fee.

On a practical level, there would be no difference. A gouging, punitive, regressive tax by any other name would still be a gouging, punitive, regressive tax.

Still, on a dozen or more occasions, Dion has pledged never to introduce a carbon tax.

In June 2006, during the first Liberal leadership debate, Dion scoffed when Michael Ignatieff said a carbon tax "would do more to address climate change and help us be good stewards of our environment than any other measure." Then, as now, Dion was a passionate defender of the Kyoto accord and even he rejected the notion that a carbon tax could help reduce emissions to the levels mandated by the UN's global-warming accord.

Weeks later, when he released his campaign platform it referred to a tax on the production or consumption of fossil fuels as "simply bad policy."

Also, Dion told the National Post's editorial board in November 2006 (just weeks before he was selected as Liberal leader), if he ever became prime minister he would not even consider a carbon tax, because "for Albertans it's a non-starter."

He claimed in the Globe and Mail to have "always been against" a carbon tax. He had "other ways" to achieve emission reductions -- mostly investment in new energy-saving technologies and tax incentives for individuals and businesses that reduced their carbon footprints.

Dion did say he wanted to establish a link between Canadians' pocketbooks and the environment -- between "your wallet and the planet," in his words -- but not by taking money out of those wallets, but rather by fattening them up with government cash.

Within weeks of becoming Liberal boss, Dion rushed to Alberta to assure the Journal's editorial board, among others, that there would never be a carbon tax if he had his way.

I wrote at the time that I didn't believe him. His plan, regardless of what he was going to call its components, would hit Alberta disproportionately hard and as such amounted to a carbon tax. Dion wrote our editors insisting "the plan I will reveal soon to decrease Canada's industrial greenhouse gases will not include a carbon tax. I have said that I will be the best partner for Alberta and I mean it."

Even this past winter, speaking to an Alberta audience, Dion assured the crowd he had two "bottom lines": "there will be no carbon tax" and the profits earned by Albertans in the current energy boom "will stay in Alberta."

So, of course, what has Dion proposed this week? A carbon tax.

Mayor Miller calls for a ban on private vehicles in Toronto

Top Stories: January 18, 2011

Toronto: Mayor Miller today called on the majority Harper government to ban driving and the private ownership of automobiles in the City of Toronto. "There is no reason for any citizen to drive a vehicle within the City of Toronto". Miller said, "It is a crime to the environment and upon every last breathing creature on the earth to do anything else but take the TTC,"adding later that "We have spent billions of tax payer dollars on the TTC to save you from having to feel the guilt of driving."

Critics of the plan, upon having had their criticism scrutinized and approved for publication by the Ontario Human Rights Commission, noted that the excess costs could bankrupt the federal government which currently pays for approximately 90% percent of the GTA budget. "We cannot expect everyone in the country to pay for the utopia that we all know is Toronto." said a spokesman for the critics, being careful to note that at no time did he bring up the issue of private ownership rights as that would be against progressive thinking and be wrong.

Miller quickly shot back that because of the cost savings to the average auto owning citizen; his plan would free up about $500 extra dollars a month that could now be taxed to pay for the added expenses. Miller proudly exclaimed, "The people will be happy to pay extra money if it means they no longer have to worry about driving or the environmental damage they are causing." A consensus of economists praised the idea and supported the mayors numbers citing that $6000 is actually much less than what your average car owner pays in a year for the privilege of driving. "There is plenty of room there for even more taxes."


Calgary: Ezra Levant was denied parole today after he again refused to admit to the thought crimes he was convicted for in 2008. According to witnesses at the hearing, just before Mr Levant was carried away by prison guards for refusing to comply he gave a nasty tongue lashing to members of the parole board saying that they................

Late Sunday thoughts on timely topics

This is something that has bothered me for some time on the GST debate. We always here that 'economists' like/support the GST, but nobody ever seems to go into why they like it so much.

It is pure and simple; the GST may be the 'perfect tax' when compared to all other taxes out there. If you were trying to design the perfect tax vehicle, I think the GST would fit the description perfectly. Think about it; for the most part the GST collects money that has already been taxed once, and no one escapes paying it. You get to tax money a second time, and everyone including both the wealthiest and the poorest of Canadians of every age group and ability has to pay it. What is not for an economist to love about this. Come to think of it, this might be why the Liberals love it so much as well.

The so called in and out non scandal has not been such a hot topic recently but some Liberals still feel that there is something in it for them to keep it going. Interesting; I think something is in it for them, but when it finally does arrive I doubt that they will be very happy about it. As a person who is much more in tune than myself to what is happening recently told me; Why do you think when the Liberals are done asking questions on this in question period, that the NDP and Bloc do not jump on board and ask their own questions on the subject to nail the government? Hmmm, why is that? More on this to come.

As promised.



Airbus. Why is everyone taking the word of Karlheinz Schreiber to be the gospel truth lately? If there is one person who stands to really gain anything from a long drawn out costly inquiry it is Karlheinz Schreiber. Does anyone else think that this guy might confess to having Jimmy Hoffa in his freezer if he thought it would keep him in this country longer than he should be? He has been fighting extradition to Germany for about 7 years now in an effort to keep German authorities from getting their hands on him and showing the world just how much of an upright citizen he really is. Half of what he says contradicts his own previous accounts, much of it before the courts, and the other half he has conveniently saved for just before he gets Das Boot right out of the country.


The latest is that Karlheinz Schreiber wrote a letter to the PMO possibly containing more details about the entire affair, the PMO denies this but the Liberals think they are on to something and are again outraged. I must say I am shocked as well. How can it be that the PM does not read each and every piece of mail he receives, especially letters from people who are about to get deported and have matters before the courts. I think the Libs must be confused with how things used to be done at the PMO that they forgot that there is now someone else in the big chair who does things a bit differently.

Not that it matters much but something else most seem to forget is the 2.1 million dollars that Mr. Mulroney won in that libel suit against the Liberal government was donated to charity.

I think the PM is doing the right thing by announcing a probe into this matter, and if there is indeed something more to all of it, I think it will be well handled in a responsible way.

Sign o' the times

I have a feeling we will be seeing this one again in an election campaign.

© CPC
In what could only be described as a dumb political move; Dion again demonstrated his lack of political/leadership skills by saying, that if the Liberals are ever returned to power, he might rescind the cuts to the GST made by the Harper Government. Wow! What an election platform plank this will make. Good luck with that one my liberal friends.