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Notes from a Garage

With John Gardiner

Wanton stupidity at Queen’s Park; doing the math; and making people feel better

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

You know, you’ve really gotta question the intelligence level of Premier Dalton McGuinty and the provincial Liberal party. Surely, they’re not as stupid as they seem to be. Yesterday, Finance Minister Dwight Duncan introduced legislation to bring in the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST), effectively combining the federal GST and the provincial PST. Now, this may be the best thing to come along since the proverbial sliced bread – but it is completely and totally wrongheaded to lay it on the people of Ontario in the here and now! Why? Because no one in the entire province – except the provincial Liberals – wants the gall-darned thing. People are really steamed about this – there is a huge public outcry against it. Why, oh why, Mr. McGuinty are you going to shove this down our throats? What you are doing is handing the next provincial election to Tim Hudak and the Tories. And Mr. Hudak has already declared himself a big fan of former Premier Mike Harris – remember him? Remember the slash and burn tactics of Mr. Harris and get ready for more. The longer I live, I guess the less I’ll understand why political parties do things that are this stupid. And it’s really frustrating for those of us who try to support a liberal point of view. Listen, if there’s anybody out there in Liberal Land reading this, and you care at all about liberal principles, e-mail this to Premier McGuinty. Tell him that no matter how good this is for Ontario, he needs to back off. The people don’t care how good it is for Ontario. And the province surely doesn’t need the money – make some cuts to some of the ludicrous government programs and departments that make up the government. Heaven knows there’s so much waste in government it’s, dare I say, scandalous. Oh well, there go the Liberals……

Large corporations do interesting math. General Motors announced yesterday that it’s going to start paying back some of the government money it borrowed when it collapsed last spring. It announced it’s returned to profitability. It only lost $1.7 billion in the last quarter. How the heck do you return to profitability while at the same time losing over $1 billion. Strange, but true and I may have to have economist guru Philip Shaw explain this one to me. I mean, I’m glad that General Motors is feeling confident enough about its financial picture to start paying back the government, but this type of story just convinces me that there are some real “voodoo” economics going on in the world of high finance. And it means that somehow us little guys don’t stand a chance. Let’s face it – if you could declare yourself profitable while losing a few hundred thousand dollars, you’d likely be in better financial shape too – although I’m not sure how. Man, this is a confusing story……what in the world is going on?

I have told many people in my life that I am a writer, plain and simple. It’s about all I do well. Can’t fix things or build things or do mathematics or science – just have a bit of a talent for writing. And this past week, I have received two e-mails that tell me I have to keep at it. First, from an old friend who suffered an unimaginable tragedy in the spring when her daughter died suddenly and, then, from the sister of a good friend who passed away a couple of months ago. Both of these folks said that my writing has helped them through a difficult time in their lives – it has somehow made them feel better. And that’s what I try to do as a writer – make people feel better and perhaps better understand the difficulties they face in life. I wish there was some way to protect everyone in life, but there isn’t – can’t even protect myself very well. But if I can bring even a small amount of understanding and solace to the people who read my work, then I have done my job…..

Speaking of creative writing, I’m back at it for the first time in quite a while. I have been holing up each evening and whenever else I can find time to work away on a new book – and it’s quite a departure for me because I’m writing some science fiction. I’ve always been a big sci fi fan, and have dabbled a bit with writing it, but this is the first time I’ve ever really waded right in. It’s been fun so far and I think it’s going okay, but a long way to go…story’s about a failed writer from 1960’s earth who gets cloned and brought back 800 years in the future….I’ll keep you posted..

Out of time for another week and hope things are going well for you and yours…..Weather has been great this fall and more in store this week….take care and remember….”Hew to the line; let the chips fall where they may.”



John Gardiner is a 25-year-veteran of the community newspaper business, but he is also a prolific writer of moralistic short fiction he refers to as "emotional thoughtscapes" or "adult fables". Samples of his fiction can be found at:

He has also produced a noteworthy piece of humanist philosophy which can be found at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~aboiten/ad502.htm He welcomes comments on his work.