The Romulan Republic wrote:
I did not say you are a white supremacist or neo nazi sympathizer. I will neither defend, retract, nor apologize for a position I did not take. I asked if you are a Western separatist, because you expressed sympathy for Albertan resentment toward the Federal government, repeated Western separatist talking points about how the big bad Feds take money from Alberta, and suggested that Alberta should join the US. I noted that there is strong overlap between Western separatist and white nationalists/Neo-Nazis, but I did not call you one.
Do any of you dumb fucks actually read what I say, or do you just see my name attached to a post, and immediately assume I must be lying/hysterical/hypocritical without bothering to comprehend what I'm actually saying? Or are you just lying?
Actually, I think that's
exactly what you were implying; why else would you have phrased things that way? It would have more than sufficed to have asked whether or not I supported Alberta separating without throwing in the whole bit about them being "absolutely bottom of the barrel" and "overlapping heavily with the white nationalist/Neo-Nazi crowd".
How exactly were you expecting me to respond to that? Were you hoping for "Ya, you got me, I'm
totally an Albertian separatist and love 'dem white nationalists /Neo Nazis, long live the Furher!"? Were you expecting me to start wasting my time defending myself from your needless bulls*it? Or were you just trolling and/or being wayyyyy overdramatic, in which case congrats?
To answer your question btw, I don't think Alberta should separate; where perhaps I differ from others is that I acknowledge there
are potential benefits if they left (and joined the US (namely that they would likely get a better price for their oil) , though I feel the consequences outweigh the benefits.
Jub wrote:Maybe if Alberta would have invested in other sources of revenue besides oil perhaps the province wouldn't have such an issue with things like carbon taxes and pipelines. Not to even mention that the methods in use are less than environmentally friendly and that the only thing standing between existing and cleaner methods are greedy businesses and a series of provincial governments unwilling to rock that particular boat.
BC, my home province, doesn't really benefit from equalization payments either having received the second least from transfer payments behind only what Alberta has received. Furthermore, Alberta has increased its incoming transfer payments by a large amount between '05-'06 and '15-'16 according to this paper, see specifically pages 21 to 23 for the information in question. So while you do spend a lot on equalization payments you also get a lot of other funding back and at a vastly increased rate compared to every province which isn't Ontario or Quebec.
As for importing Oil, we'd have to do that anyway unless Alberta has suddenly become a refiner of its own oil, which it hasn't. The plan is to ship the unfinished product to China for refinement so they can sell it back to us, which would still be importing Oil from a 'lovely place' as you put it.
So yeah, don't bring BC into this just because we've said no to your pipeline. We don't need the headaches it will cause us because, unlike Alberta, we're actually committed to being on the right side of climate change.
EDIT: Retracted a section about provincial debt levels and spending as, while Alberta going from 'debt free' in 2004 to a projected debt of $71.1 billion in 2020 is alarming BC can't exactly throw stones in that particular regard.
IMO B.C. and Quebec both may have missed the forest for the trees here.
Let's be clear on this: Albertan oil will continue to ship no matter how much B.C. and Quebec hate the idea. While they may be able to obstruct and/or delay new pipelines being built they have no real authority to prevent Alberta from shipping via existing pipelines and rail. Nor can they stop Alberta from simply expanding capacity to the US (which incidentally is expediating the Keystone pipeline because they know a good deal when they see one). If the goal was to stop Albertan oil from shipping, at best all they did was accomplish
nothing by maintaining the existing status quo.
But it's a lot more than just that. For example, how much revenue over the years has Alberta and Canada lost due to much of that oil being shipped to the US at far below market rates? I don't have any studies off the top of my head, but it wouldn't surprise me if it's
billions of dollars worth- which is billions that didn't go into
our economy, social services, environment etc.
How much is it costing Canadians to import oil, and in particular refined oil products as opposed to doing it domestically? Because I 100% agree that at the very least we should be able to ship and refine our oil for domestic use rather than rely on others. The current status quo is absurd IMO.
What is the impact of shipping more oil via rail (which is what's likely going to happen once oil prices start to rise again) as opposed to if we have shipped it via pipeline? While oil pipelines can leak, IIRC rail safety is not exactly stellar in Canada. Which one is worse?
More importantly, what is going to be the environmental impact in Alberta (and by extension Canada) now that the Conservatives are back in charge? This is a real sticking point for me - if the goal was to ultimately reduce and eliminate Alberta's dependence on an oil economy, why on earth did all the other left-wing parties do their best to throw the Alberta NDPs under the bus??? At least they were
trying to take some steps in the right direction. Now that the Tories are back, "environment" is a dirtier word in Alberta than "tar-sands", and good luck getting them to cooperate on anything. Were the other left wing groups seriously thinking that wouldn't happen? Or were they secretly hoping Alberta would flip again so they'd have their usual boogeyman to target? Or did they simply not see the bigger picture?
Also, how does restricting Alberta (and by extension Canada's) oil really help things on the international stage? Yes, Albertan crude is dirtier - but the market for oil is there, and if we're not selling it someone else will. Is it really worse to sell Albertian oil (especially with the NDP in charge) as opposed to the world getting its oil Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Venezuela, Russia, the US etc? While Canada's far from perfect in environmental and human rights, in comparison to other OPEC countries I'd say we're far from the worst. Are you seriously suggesting that its better for other countries like Saudi Arabia to maintain more dominance? Quite frankly I'd prefer getting my oil from Alberta rather than a country that does things like opress women and execute homosexuals, but maybe that's just me.
My point being that IMO this isn't just a black and white issue, and that I think Albertans do have some genuine grievances with other provinces, though can go a bit overboard.
Btw in case you didn't know I live in Toronto - and yes, I fully support Canada East, even if it only extended to Ontario. The previous Liberal government supported it, and I don't think there's any question that the PC Party would should it be revived. Hell I'd be happy if they built the thing to Toronto and started refining the oil right here as opposed to the status quo.
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" - The official Troll motto, as stated by Adam Savage