Pubic Interest Alberta is at it again. They have done some very interesting work on education and the challenges of low income levels that many have to cope with in Alberta.
Now they are digging into the democratic deficit issues in the province. I urge you to check out their site especially the topic of “Democratic Renewal.” They are holding pubic meetings on the concerns over how well our democracy is functioning in Alberta. It will be worth your time to take an evening and engage with some fellow citizens on the health of our democracy.
We have to do something to overcome the serious cynicism of the citizenry (and to annihilate abstract alliteration ;-). PIA is a group of interested citizens who are volunteering time and talent to create a place and space for this important conversation to happen. I urge you to take advantage of the opportunity.
I will be video taping an interview with University of Alberta Political Scientist, Dr. Steve Patten and former Alberta Teachers Association President, Larry Booi about this initiative this coming week. The videos will be posted on Policy Channel later next week at http://www.policychannel.com/.
Saturday, March 03, 2007
"We Live in Exponential Times"
I continue to track a few names on the WWW, including “Dave Hancock.” As a result I came across the link to Chris LaBossierre’s Blog. While he has some good thing to say about Dave I was also attracted to a YouTube link in one of his postings he called “Shift Happens.”
It frames an absolutely fascinating perspective on how fast and furious our world is changing. It is 6 minutes so the typical ADHD blog surfer may suffer some minor DT’s from “mouse” withdrawal having to stick to a single page for that long. I assure you it is worth the time to watch the whole thing.
It frames an absolutely fascinating perspective on how fast and furious our world is changing. It is 6 minutes so the typical ADHD blog surfer may suffer some minor DT’s from “mouse” withdrawal having to stick to a single page for that long. I assure you it is worth the time to watch the whole thing.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
PC Leadership CampaignDisclosure Doesn't Cut It!
The disclosure of PC Leadership donations just does not cut it. Larry Johnsrude of the Edmonton Journal has a good analysis and he closely reflects my sentiments. The Progressive conservative Party has not done itself “proud” by having no rules around campaign contribution limits and disclosure. The candidates have done the best they could under the circumstances but the fact remains the PC Party created the circumstances.
Anonymous donations of any size are inappropriate in an open and transparent modern and mature democracy. Now put this under the pressure of a very competitive campaign context of a political party leadership. The system assured that nobody really knows anything about what is going on in the campaign and there is no obligation to account.
Under the circumstances what can you expect except what Stelmach and Hancock did by way of disclosure? Dinning is on board and Oberg will fess up shortly. Norris says he has disclosed already but needs to do it formally as a final wrap up if he expect to run again. Dr. Morton is a no show on campaign contribution disclosure and that is simply not acceptable in this day an age.
The Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta, (PCPA) of which I am a proud member, blew it. Instead of giving Albertans a sense of openness and transparency in the process this time, we have cast suspicion on the participants. In 1992, when we last selected a leader, the one person one vote model was a shining example of how we were an open process party inviting citizen participation.
We did not have very stringent fund raising rules around political donations in those days. Now we do. The PCPA ought to have adopted the same rules for political contributions applicable at election time and applied them to the 2006 leadership campaign. We did not change with the times and we should have.
After all we (including me) made big deals that we were not just electing a party leader but also a Premier. We (including me) made a big deal about how open, inclusive and accountable we were being as a party. We were letting any citizen who wanted to vote on our leader and for their Premier “in” on the PC Party's decision for a $5 spot to join the party.
We would welcome risking the loss of control over the selection of “our” party leader to the general population for the good of democracy. Damn we were being good. Right? Over 140,000 ordinary Albertans bought into that reality and showed up, ponied up and voted. Special interests formed and many showed up. Many more who were rumored to be “showing up” didn’t, and the rest, as they say, is history. Well that good will the party earned and deserved, has been squandered over the lack of adequate campaign contribution disclosure rules.
Now we have a pall over the process and the participants because of the immediate cash needs of many campaigns, including late comers like Stelmach and Hancock. They needed to collect money, lots of it and very quickly. So anonymous donations were accepted, simply because they were allowed and the need was great. Not good enough but that was the reality.
Here are the key questions we have to come to grips with on the level of disclosure from what we have seen, so far, and on a voluntary basis. Hancock has 7 no-names and one for $10K. Stelmach has about 80 individual contributions plus other unidentified sources amounting to about 1/3 of his total campaign budget. We don't know the distribution of the anonymous contributions. Are they all in the $1000 range or are their some big whoppers in there too? We need a breakdown to be as least somewhat reassured no one is apppearing to try to buy access and influence.
Hancock, Stelmach and others benefited from significant “fundraising” events that are reported as anonymous too, including the events in Edmonton and Calgary to cover some candidate’s campaign deficits. For the record, I am in for $500 of that “fundraising” group. My $500 ticket had a stub with a place for a name, which I filled out and turned in at the door on the evening of the event.
I fully expected that as a condition of attendance I would be seeing my name disclosed on a contributor list. It has not been so I am telling you my contribution now. I made no other financial contribution to any campaign, including Hancock, but donated hundreds of hours of volunteer time to the Hancock campaign over 6 months and about 60 hours to the Stelmach campaign in the last week.
I am not usually on the fund raising side of campaigns but I have picked up a few of the "realities" over the years. Most anonymous donations come from four main sources. First those who belong to other parties, usually higher profile types, who will support another party’s candidate on the quality of his or her character but they don’t want the publicity that would result from disclosure.
Secondly we have people who have made an “undying pledge” to support one candidate but given the nature of their business, often the government portion of which is significant, they feel they have to "hedge their bets" and support virtually anyone else they think will have an outside chance. The “also rans” contributions are almost always anonymous.
Thirdly are true benefactors, usually individually wealthy citizens. They make larger donations but do not to want to be hounded by other charities or fundraisers, including those outside of politics, for money. They don't need to buy access or influence, they already have it.
Occasionally you get some “rube” who thinks they can buy access to power this way by a big anonymous donation, but they are few and far between. That, however, is the central problem. They can’t buy the access and influence in reality, but we tend to think they can and therefore all anonymous donors all fall into the latter scuzzy category in the public’s mind.
I don’t blame the candidates for this fiasco, but they deserve some of the brunt and they are wearing it now. I mostly blame the PC Party of Alberta, my party, for this mess. We are supposed to be the good guys who are best able to manage and govern the province and be the best group to deserve and be granted the Alberta citizen’s consent to be governed.
Well we fell way too short on the issue of campaign contribution disclosure this time. I will be looking for the new legislation Premier Stelmach has promised to clean up this stupidity and it best be done sooner than later…and it better be good!.
Anonymous donations of any size are inappropriate in an open and transparent modern and mature democracy. Now put this under the pressure of a very competitive campaign context of a political party leadership. The system assured that nobody really knows anything about what is going on in the campaign and there is no obligation to account.
Under the circumstances what can you expect except what Stelmach and Hancock did by way of disclosure? Dinning is on board and Oberg will fess up shortly. Norris says he has disclosed already but needs to do it formally as a final wrap up if he expect to run again. Dr. Morton is a no show on campaign contribution disclosure and that is simply not acceptable in this day an age.
The Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta, (PCPA) of which I am a proud member, blew it. Instead of giving Albertans a sense of openness and transparency in the process this time, we have cast suspicion on the participants. In 1992, when we last selected a leader, the one person one vote model was a shining example of how we were an open process party inviting citizen participation.
We did not have very stringent fund raising rules around political donations in those days. Now we do. The PCPA ought to have adopted the same rules for political contributions applicable at election time and applied them to the 2006 leadership campaign. We did not change with the times and we should have.
After all we (including me) made big deals that we were not just electing a party leader but also a Premier. We (including me) made a big deal about how open, inclusive and accountable we were being as a party. We were letting any citizen who wanted to vote on our leader and for their Premier “in” on the PC Party's decision for a $5 spot to join the party.
We would welcome risking the loss of control over the selection of “our” party leader to the general population for the good of democracy. Damn we were being good. Right? Over 140,000 ordinary Albertans bought into that reality and showed up, ponied up and voted. Special interests formed and many showed up. Many more who were rumored to be “showing up” didn’t, and the rest, as they say, is history. Well that good will the party earned and deserved, has been squandered over the lack of adequate campaign contribution disclosure rules.
Now we have a pall over the process and the participants because of the immediate cash needs of many campaigns, including late comers like Stelmach and Hancock. They needed to collect money, lots of it and very quickly. So anonymous donations were accepted, simply because they were allowed and the need was great. Not good enough but that was the reality.
Here are the key questions we have to come to grips with on the level of disclosure from what we have seen, so far, and on a voluntary basis. Hancock has 7 no-names and one for $10K. Stelmach has about 80 individual contributions plus other unidentified sources amounting to about 1/3 of his total campaign budget. We don't know the distribution of the anonymous contributions. Are they all in the $1000 range or are their some big whoppers in there too? We need a breakdown to be as least somewhat reassured no one is apppearing to try to buy access and influence.
Hancock, Stelmach and others benefited from significant “fundraising” events that are reported as anonymous too, including the events in Edmonton and Calgary to cover some candidate’s campaign deficits. For the record, I am in for $500 of that “fundraising” group. My $500 ticket had a stub with a place for a name, which I filled out and turned in at the door on the evening of the event.
I fully expected that as a condition of attendance I would be seeing my name disclosed on a contributor list. It has not been so I am telling you my contribution now. I made no other financial contribution to any campaign, including Hancock, but donated hundreds of hours of volunteer time to the Hancock campaign over 6 months and about 60 hours to the Stelmach campaign in the last week.
I am not usually on the fund raising side of campaigns but I have picked up a few of the "realities" over the years. Most anonymous donations come from four main sources. First those who belong to other parties, usually higher profile types, who will support another party’s candidate on the quality of his or her character but they don’t want the publicity that would result from disclosure.
Secondly we have people who have made an “undying pledge” to support one candidate but given the nature of their business, often the government portion of which is significant, they feel they have to "hedge their bets" and support virtually anyone else they think will have an outside chance. The “also rans” contributions are almost always anonymous.
Thirdly are true benefactors, usually individually wealthy citizens. They make larger donations but do not to want to be hounded by other charities or fundraisers, including those outside of politics, for money. They don't need to buy access or influence, they already have it.
Occasionally you get some “rube” who thinks they can buy access to power this way by a big anonymous donation, but they are few and far between. That, however, is the central problem. They can’t buy the access and influence in reality, but we tend to think they can and therefore all anonymous donors all fall into the latter scuzzy category in the public’s mind.
I don’t blame the candidates for this fiasco, but they deserve some of the brunt and they are wearing it now. I mostly blame the PC Party of Alberta, my party, for this mess. We are supposed to be the good guys who are best able to manage and govern the province and be the best group to deserve and be granted the Alberta citizen’s consent to be governed.
Well we fell way too short on the issue of campaign contribution disclosure this time. I will be looking for the new legislation Premier Stelmach has promised to clean up this stupidity and it best be done sooner than later…and it better be good!.
Stelmach and Hancock Disclose Leadership Campaign Contributions
I see from media reports that Stelmach and Hancock have both disclosed their campaign contributions and Dinning's is on the way. Some will suggest the word disclose might best be put in quotes given the anonymous donations are still there. I see a number of comments on this Blog and others are coming directly to me asking for my thoughts on the PC Leadership Campaign fund raising disclosure.
I have posted on this issue during the campaign and will do so again later today. First I want to review the disclosures and put some context around money and politics. Expect something to be posted tonight on this topic.
I have been out of town - visiting the good folks in Vulcan Alberta - yes those same folks who revere and celebrate Dr. Spock of Star Trek fame. In fact their town motto is "Science and Trek." I was talking to them about the impact of the Alberta SuperNet and how they perceive they can use it. Vulcan is a very interesting community in southern Alberta and I learned so much about them from this workshop I did but more on that in later postings.
For those outside of Alberta, the SuperNet is a provincial wide fibre optic network that has been installed in all our hospitals, schools, municipal offices and public libraries in every Alberta community. Everyone in Alberta is now potentially connected on this huge "data pipe" and we are now starting to design and discover how that will change the nature of our province and how we relate to each other and the world.
In the meantime a friend forwarded this email - which I presume is a spoof - but with Dubya...you never really know! In any event it is a perfect example of "framing and defining" a politician...and pretty funny at the same time.
A letter from a US colleague….
Dear Friends,
I have the distinguished honor of being on the committee to raise $5,000,000 for a monument to George W. Bush. We originally wanted to put him on Mount Rushmore until we discovered there was not enough room for two more faces. We then decided to erect a statue of George in the Washington, DC Hall Of Fame.
It was a quandary as to where the statue should be placed. It was not proper to place it beside the statue of George Washington, who never told a lie, nor beside Richard Nixon, who rarely told the truth, since George could never tell the difference.
We finally decided to place it beside Christopher Columbus, the greatest Republican of them all. He left not knowing where he was going, and when he got there he did not know where he was. He returned not knowing where he had been, and he decimated the health of the majority of the population while he was there, and did it all on someone else's money.
Thank you, George W. Bush Monument Committee P.S. We have raised $1.38 so far.
I have posted on this issue during the campaign and will do so again later today. First I want to review the disclosures and put some context around money and politics. Expect something to be posted tonight on this topic.
I have been out of town - visiting the good folks in Vulcan Alberta - yes those same folks who revere and celebrate Dr. Spock of Star Trek fame. In fact their town motto is "Science and Trek." I was talking to them about the impact of the Alberta SuperNet and how they perceive they can use it. Vulcan is a very interesting community in southern Alberta and I learned so much about them from this workshop I did but more on that in later postings.
For those outside of Alberta, the SuperNet is a provincial wide fibre optic network that has been installed in all our hospitals, schools, municipal offices and public libraries in every Alberta community. Everyone in Alberta is now potentially connected on this huge "data pipe" and we are now starting to design and discover how that will change the nature of our province and how we relate to each other and the world.
In the meantime a friend forwarded this email - which I presume is a spoof - but with Dubya...you never really know! In any event it is a perfect example of "framing and defining" a politician...and pretty funny at the same time.
A letter from a US colleague….
Dear Friends,
I have the distinguished honor of being on the committee to raise $5,000,000 for a monument to George W. Bush. We originally wanted to put him on Mount Rushmore until we discovered there was not enough room for two more faces. We then decided to erect a statue of George in the Washington, DC Hall Of Fame.
It was a quandary as to where the statue should be placed. It was not proper to place it beside the statue of George Washington, who never told a lie, nor beside Richard Nixon, who rarely told the truth, since George could never tell the difference.
We finally decided to place it beside Christopher Columbus, the greatest Republican of them all. He left not knowing where he was going, and when he got there he did not know where he was. He returned not knowing where he had been, and he decimated the health of the majority of the population while he was there, and did it all on someone else's money.
Thank you, George W. Bush Monument Committee P.S. We have raised $1.38 so far.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Alberta's Tobacco Reduction Strategy is in Trouble
There is lots of good news coming out of the Budget Update. The surplus is up and the spending in under control. Stelmach has brought some much needed fiscal discipline back to this government in the short 3 month he has taken over the leadership.
Some serious concerns on the revenue side are being reported. Not that the revenues are down, they are not. The concern is the increase in tobacco tax revenue of some $40M over budget.
Indications are, according to Action on Smoking and Health this increase is due to higher sales volumes that are in fact caused by price discounting by manufacturers.
Alberta as a Tobacco Reduction Strategy that called for a 50% reduction in tobacco shipments between 2001 and 2011 but only a 15% reduction has occurred since 2001 and there have been repeated sales increases since 2003. The performance success on this health indicator is in serious jeopardy. Stats show that tobacco is the leading avoidable cause of 3,400 premature deaths in Alberta every year.
For the last several years, tobacco revenues have been repeatedly underestimated by Alberta Finance and these increases are a disturbing reminder that the Alberta Tobacco Reduction Strategy is not meeting its stated objectives. The performance measure for tobacco shipments is 2528 million cigarettes for FY2011 (four years from now). The total shipments for FY2006 were 4380 million cigarettes. This means that tobacco shipments need to decline by over 40% within the next four years in order to achieve the ATRS 10-year performance target. This reduction would require a Herculean effort by the Alberta government.
Dave Hancock, the Minister of Health and Wellness is calling for a total ban on smoking in workplaces and public places, something that was tied many times before but never got passed Ralph Klein, the former Premier.
Here is hoping this is an idea whose time has come under a new Premier.
Some serious concerns on the revenue side are being reported. Not that the revenues are down, they are not. The concern is the increase in tobacco tax revenue of some $40M over budget.
Indications are, according to Action on Smoking and Health this increase is due to higher sales volumes that are in fact caused by price discounting by manufacturers.
Alberta as a Tobacco Reduction Strategy that called for a 50% reduction in tobacco shipments between 2001 and 2011 but only a 15% reduction has occurred since 2001 and there have been repeated sales increases since 2003. The performance success on this health indicator is in serious jeopardy. Stats show that tobacco is the leading avoidable cause of 3,400 premature deaths in Alberta every year.
For the last several years, tobacco revenues have been repeatedly underestimated by Alberta Finance and these increases are a disturbing reminder that the Alberta Tobacco Reduction Strategy is not meeting its stated objectives. The performance measure for tobacco shipments is 2528 million cigarettes for FY2011 (four years from now). The total shipments for FY2006 were 4380 million cigarettes. This means that tobacco shipments need to decline by over 40% within the next four years in order to achieve the ATRS 10-year performance target. This reduction would require a Herculean effort by the Alberta government.
Dave Hancock, the Minister of Health and Wellness is calling for a total ban on smoking in workplaces and public places, something that was tied many times before but never got passed Ralph Klein, the former Premier.
Here is hoping this is an idea whose time has come under a new Premier.
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