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Was firing around a few emails with some other Albertans regarding our surplus for this year... Our provincial suplus will surpass the federal surplus this year, and one thing that Albertans are starting to fear is the federal government wanting some of that... (NEP anyone?) So, in furtherance of that, I've copied some correspondence I've had with some polisci professors and the like:
(the pre-amble to this was the suggestion that we take 2 billion dollars of our surplus (estimated to be 10bil) and re-invest it in Canadian ideas... IE, not spending all of it in Alberta, in order to keep the feds out of our pockets)
"Actually, we could field naval vessels of comparable capability for far, far
less. Even the far more capable Arleigh Burke class AEGIS destroyers of the
US fleet cost only $800 million per. The vast cost difference owes mostly to
construction in Canada of unique ships (unnecessary), with tiny production
runs, and of course patronage contracts.... that is to say, of using the
military as a social program and slush fund.
Besides which, additional frigates get us nowhere. But $2 billion would
allow for the purchase of an LHD ship that could serve as floating hospital,
landing ship, and heliport/Harrier/F-35 JSF launching pad...
and leave enough left over to equip it with helicopters and landing craft.
Reconfiguration of Canadian forces along MEU (Marine Expeditionary Unit)
lines would allow Canada's forces to take full advantage of the capability,
and give those frigates a useful purpose at last by giving them something to
protect.
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ship/lhd-1.htm
If you wanted to think a bit more outside the box...
Alberta could dedicate the money to a specialized chemical/biological unit
and transport, giving Canada a capability that's useful to the USA and UN
and transportable, quickly, anywhere in the world. Recall Iraq, when the
Americans were damn glad to have the Warsaw Pact chem units in theater...
and this is also well suited to epidemic outbreaks and humanitarian aid.
Frankly, I'm afraid the world is going to need this sort of thing in the
coming decades.
Call it the "Norman Bethune Brigade" to appease the left, give it a couple
of dedicated transport aircraft on call (buy commercial cargo class), a
couple of modular and specialized field hospitals (these exist), and chem
decontamination, detection, and protection equipment.
You'd still need to get American C-17s to drop the big stuff in remote
areas, but at $600M each you can't have that without adding another billion.
Then you recruit young doctors and required support staff, and also create a
specialized virtual reserve unit trained in public health emergencies et.
al. (nice side benefit for the provinces, who need more of that).
Alberta's quid pro quo would include more than health care in this case.
It would also demand that Ottawa set up a jointly funded center in Alberta
for advanced disease research and biotechnology - thus augmenting its
growing technology base and making a long term contribution to its economic
clout.
Just a thought."
Another thought we were discussing was opting out of federal heath care. The feds keep demanding we run our health care according to their rules, but considering we only receive about 1.7 billion in heath care transfers a year, we can easily exclude the feds, and pay our health care professionals more money (ergo, getting better doctors, etc)... Also, what about the creation of a provincial police, and removing the RCMP from staffing our rural areas? Food for thought...
T
(the pre-amble to this was the suggestion that we take 2 billion dollars of our surplus (estimated to be 10bil) and re-invest it in Canadian ideas... IE, not spending all of it in Alberta, in order to keep the feds out of our pockets)
"Actually, we could field naval vessels of comparable capability for far, far
less. Even the far more capable Arleigh Burke class AEGIS destroyers of the
US fleet cost only $800 million per. The vast cost difference owes mostly to
construction in Canada of unique ships (unnecessary), with tiny production
runs, and of course patronage contracts.... that is to say, of using the
military as a social program and slush fund.
Besides which, additional frigates get us nowhere. But $2 billion would
allow for the purchase of an LHD ship that could serve as floating hospital,
landing ship, and heliport/Harrier/F-35 JSF launching pad...
and leave enough left over to equip it with helicopters and landing craft.
Reconfiguration of Canadian forces along MEU (Marine Expeditionary Unit)
lines would allow Canada's forces to take full advantage of the capability,
and give those frigates a useful purpose at last by giving them something to
protect.
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ship/lhd-1.htm
If you wanted to think a bit more outside the box...
Alberta could dedicate the money to a specialized chemical/biological unit
and transport, giving Canada a capability that's useful to the USA and UN
and transportable, quickly, anywhere in the world. Recall Iraq, when the
Americans were damn glad to have the Warsaw Pact chem units in theater...
and this is also well suited to epidemic outbreaks and humanitarian aid.
Frankly, I'm afraid the world is going to need this sort of thing in the
coming decades.
Call it the "Norman Bethune Brigade" to appease the left, give it a couple
of dedicated transport aircraft on call (buy commercial cargo class), a
couple of modular and specialized field hospitals (these exist), and chem
decontamination, detection, and protection equipment.
You'd still need to get American C-17s to drop the big stuff in remote
areas, but at $600M each you can't have that without adding another billion.
Then you recruit young doctors and required support staff, and also create a
specialized virtual reserve unit trained in public health emergencies et.
al. (nice side benefit for the provinces, who need more of that).
Alberta's quid pro quo would include more than health care in this case.
It would also demand that Ottawa set up a jointly funded center in Alberta
for advanced disease research and biotechnology - thus augmenting its
growing technology base and making a long term contribution to its economic
clout.
Just a thought."
Another thought we were discussing was opting out of federal heath care. The feds keep demanding we run our health care according to their rules, but considering we only receive about 1.7 billion in heath care transfers a year, we can easily exclude the feds, and pay our health care professionals more money (ergo, getting better doctors, etc)... Also, what about the creation of a provincial police, and removing the RCMP from staffing our rural areas? Food for thought...
T
