29 October 2004

Choice? You Mean I Have A Choice?

Another day, another election. Oh, joy. More campaigning. Just what I needed to make my day complete.

It's not that I'm against the concepts of democracy, or rule by the consent of the governed. It's not that I don't believe that we, as citizens, need to make our voices heard in order to preserve rule by consent of the governed. Instead, what's disturbing me is the fact that this is the third bloody election this year and I find myself growing weary of the constant campaigning.

It probably wouldn't be so bad if the outcome of the coming election weren't a foregone conclusion, but it is and that fact makes the whole process seem kind of ... useless ... somehow. But it isn't useless, not if you believe in democracy, not if you believe in rule by consent of the governed. Elections are never useless. Elections are the only real political voice your average ordinary every day citizen has in this day and age.

And yet I find myself wishing that there was even an outside chance of some uncertainty in the outcome of the election. It would make things more interesting. And it would also provide some element of entertainment as we sat there and watched King Ralph justify to the public all of the reasons why we should ignore all the rotten things he's done and give him another chance to run the province.

The problem is one of perception. The Klein Tories are riding an emotional and political high right now because Alberta's debt has been cleared. We are now the only province in Canada that is completely debt free. Of course, we're not debt free: some maneuvering between the government and the banks have allowed the Klein Tories to spread a convincing fiction that we're debt free, but even the small shreds of debt that we have left are minuscule when compared to the whopping deficits other provinces are saddled with. People see headlines like that and they start thinking that maybe these people are doing something right after all, so there's no reason not to let them continue doing it, right?

I have no problem with the result that the province's debt has been slashed to almost nothing. What I do have a problem with, what I've always had a problem with, is the way in which it was done.

King Ralph's approach to destroying the deficit can best be described as a strategy of slash and burn. The first thing he did when he took orifice was to cut spending on health care and education, and he cut them to the bone. The health care and education establishments objected. So did the citizenry. Klein's response was that we should learn to manage our money better. Fine words, but the establishment took them to mean something totally different. Alberta Health and Wellness, because they perceived that they weren't getting enough money from the government, immediately started passing the cost of health care on to Albertans. For the first time in our lives we had to worry about Health Care Premiums.

I don't remember ever having to worry about health care premiums until Premier Klein came to power. I don't remember my parents ever having to worry about health care premiums until Premier Klein came to power. I don't remember having to worry about filling out subsidy forms every year to reduce my amount owing, nor do I remember ever having to pursue Alberta Health and Wellness to make sure they don't lose the damn things, which they invariably seem to do and which requires me to send the damn things over and over again until they finally get through. I've sent my 2004 subsidy forms twice now. My subsidy still hasn't appeared on my Premium bills. I'm beginning to think that it never will.

The Education system responded by jacking up the cost of going to school. Universities, Colleges, Technical Schools, and other post secondary institutions had the highest tuition increases. When I went to the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology I paid just over five thousand dollars for books and tuition for one year. I'm afraid to look at what the same program would cost me now for fear that the amount will spark a coronary.

Passing the costs of essential services onto the citizenry does not fiscal responsibility make. It's a cop out, a means of applying a fiscal band-aid but otherwise ignoring the problem. Fiscal responsibility involves looking at every aspect of your operation and asking yourself if it's really necessary for you to spend money on this item, or that aspect, or this phase of our operation? Can we save ourselves some money but increase the value of our services buy applying some careful cuts here and here, but increasing our allocations over here?

That's not just fiscal responsibility, that's good business. But it's not what they're doing.

The deficit is gone. The books are balanced, but we've closed hundreds of hospital beds. Waiting times for medical procedures are the longest they've ever been. Tuition is the highest it's ever been. This is what they call progress. This is what I call beating a dead horse.

The legacy of the Klein government can be summed up in one paragraph: “You want the budget balanced? Sure, I can balance the budget for you. But there's a price. You see, I'm going to cut every single program not just to the bone, but to the marrow, and I'm going to take every single red cent of that money and put it towards the deficit. You want more money for your essential service? Bill the taxpayer. That's what they're there for.”

I have no problem with the idea that it costs money to run the country. I have no problem with the idea of paying taxes. I do have a problem with the notion of fighting inflation by pouring more money into government services. I have a problem with the idea that the vast majority of the money we pour into government services goes towards paying a standing army of bureaucrats instead of actually providing the damn service. I have a problem with the idea of spending money on holding committee hearings and writing reports when the only thing that the committee has to say for itself is that the program needs more money, but they're not sure where to get it. I have a problem with Members of Parliament and Members of the Legislative Assembly voting themselves endless pay raises and endless pension increases when we have homeless on our streets and working poor drifting from hostel to hostel because there's nowhere near enough low cost housing to go around. I have a problem with politicians spending endless amounts of money on political junkets, money which the government reimburses to them, when there are working families out there who are damn near starving because they can't afford to put decent food on the table.

The really sick part of the whole thing is that it doesn't really matter what I think. The Klein Tories are the only game in town, so they're going to be the ones voted in. The Liberals are political eunuchs at best. The New Democrats have never been a serious contender and, God Willing, they never will be. The Progressive Canadian Party doesn't have any provincial level candidates that I can find. There's an Alberta Separatist party (shades of the Parti Quebecois) but I seriously doubt that people are going to pay that much attention to them: There's no profit in Alberta separating from Canada. The Social Credit party served Alberta well for a lot of years, and if there was a SoCred candidate in my riding I would probably vote for him in a heartbeat, but the Social Credit Party doesn't exist anymore. Pity, that.

Despite my misgivings and my ambivilance I'll still do my part. I'll stumble out into the cold on Election Day and cast my ballot, secure in the knowledge that I did my part to preserve the democratic process in Alberta, even though my vote is about as meaningful as a politician's promise. Well, at least I'll preserve my right to complain.