Friday, May 05, 2006

Stephen Harper Eats Babies

A couple of days ago in the Globe and Mail, this story ran. Horray for hackers! Sadly the commentary afterwards left a lot to be desired, the pro-harper camp proving just how much of a sense of humour our new conservatives possess. The sad truth of it is however, that Harper, through his new system of freeing up taxes on the welltodo and increasing taxation on the lowest income earners in the country means he really is eating babies metaphorically. The poor can't afford to feed themselves while the upper classes continue to live a life of excess. How can it be seen to be reasonable to increase a tax on lower income groups and decrease it for higher income groups? It makes no sense to me. Everyone is applauding the reduction of the GST, by a whole 1% but wouldn't it be better to take it off things like electricity and telephone service as these really are essentials in this day in age? You can't really survive todaywithout electricity and you can;t get a job without having a phone, hell you can't even get EI or Social Service without having a contact phone number and yet there is a 7% tax on both services. Sorry, now a 6% tax on those services.
Yes a large purchase will show that one percent, but how about everyday small purchases... not every sector of society can afford to buy a $600,000.00 house, or a $60,000.00 car or even a $30,000.00 car.
Another point... why is the personal tax deduction limit not equal to the poverty line? If anyone who is making under $16,000 a year is living in poverty by national standards, why is the personal deduction limit $7700? The Harper government is busy pretending to care about the people of Canada but all they really care about is the upper eschalons. Those who need the system the most are left behind in the wake of Conservative big business agendas. And people seem to be buying into it becase they will save one cent on the dollar. Enjoy the babies Mr. Harper, I hope you choke on their bones

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