Stop The Presses: Liberals Want Money

Just got an email from Liberal Party President, Mike Eizenga. He wants money.

I'm tellin' ya, the Liberal Party is really a shell of it's once proud former self. I mean, why can't they get their money the old fashioned way: STEAL IT!

They must be getting nervous. He wrote the following:
Stephen Harper is threatening our progress. We need your support to make sure he doesn’t get a chance.

You can make a real difference today. We need every Liberal in Canada to donate now. You will receive a tax receipt for your contribution – and join thousands of Canadians supporting the Liberal Party’s campaign for Canada.

The truth is, they're not only well short on donations compared to the Conservatives, they're also short on donors. Close to $4 million separates the two parties, but the telling tale is the difference by tens of thousands in the individual donor column.

What interests me most about this is the timing. There is natural disaster on our minds. People have died. Many are destitute and in need of a lot of help. It may be in a different country but its effects are as far reaching and more immediate than the Tsunami and have as lasting an impact as 9/11. Money was raised in Canada then and it's being raised now. But, here's the kicker.

When you make a political contribution, you're eligible for a 75% tax credit. Charitable donations claims work on a confusing sliding scale and your credit is not near what the political contribution ends up being.

So, there you have it. It's up to you. It depends on whose head you want to keep above water.

Big Stink Makes No Scents

Another mind-boggling, head-shaking, face twitching proposal came a-belching from the brain of Ottawa City Councillor Alex Cullen last week, when he offered up a notion to possibly ban perfumes and colognes in public places.

Such a ban, Cullen said, could be "the new frontier after pesticides". The new frontier. So now we have former mayor and first apprentice to the Ontario Health Minister, Jim Watson, prancing around the province rehearsing the chorus of "Fat's The New Tobacco", promising to fight the evil obesity in vengeful defiance of his own proclivities to pudge out and, now, we have the "little social engineer that could", Clowncillor Cullen on a mission to outlaw Obsession, boldly pronouncing his new frontier.

To make sure I heard him correctly, I decided to look up the definition of frontier.

n 1: a wilderness at the edge of a settled area of a country

That didn't tell me a lot, so I decided to look it up in a thesaurus. I found the following synonyms:

backcountry, backwater, backwoods, boondocks, boonies, bush, hinterland, outback, outskirts, sticks

Yup. An accurately chosen word, indeed.

Now, I can be just as put off as the next guy by a carelessly overscented individual, but this new frontier thing has the more offensive stench of a City Council with whacked out priorities. Surely, they can better spend their time and our money on more important issues like, say, better services for the taxes we pay.

But, I must admit, I am just as concerned as Health Play-Minister Watson about fat being the new tobacco. What really worries me is all that second-hand fat I'm taking in.