Saturday, July 26, 2003
Governance by fictional corporations
Todays report in the web version of the Guardian - which allows no linking to stories as far as I can tell - contains the most blunt explanation of Binns wacko conservative / socialist intrusions into the economy:
“Despite the obvious value of the courses, Frank Butler, P.E.I.’s deputy minister of tourism, said government faces an ongoing battle to defend spending money on golf. He said Golf Links P.E.I. was actually created as a result of public criticism the government continually encountered for having a direct hand in golf: “With the budget process the way it was, every time we wanted to buy a golf cart or whatever, we had to go to Treasury to get permission to do that,’’ said Butler. “And the perception out there in the public’s eyes was that we were buying golf carts rather than desks for classrooms or beds for hospitals or whatever. From our perspective, or what we were saying to the Treasury Board, is give us $4,000 to buy a golf cart and in two years it is paid for and in three years it is making money for us. There’s no hospital bed or school desk that will do that.’’
Wouldn’t making the voodoo economics of this be the logical central platform for any opposition - that is if the opposition has yet decided whether it needs policies.