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| Montréal, 10 juin 2000 / No 63 |
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by
Scott Carpenter
Got freedom? If you gotta think about it, probably not. And you'd better get used to it too. At least as far as the government of Canada is concerned you'd better. What? Don't believe me? Let's think about it for a moment, shall we? |
| Math
101
Take So. The government of Canada wishes us to believe that it can maintain extensive files containing 60 billion pieces of information on its citizens but that it can't keep track of a meezly one billion doll I smell something here and it ain't roses. If you can manage to keep track of that much detailed and insignificant information you are certainly capable of tracking the path of a billion bucks. After all, what's more important: data that tells us what size of shoe Preston Manning wears or that which makes the world go round – the almighty loonie? To claim one cares more about shoe sizes than that which extends and improves our life is complete and utter nonsense. It also means, in my opinion, that a) someone has their fingers in the cookie jar or b) our governments priorities are screwed up beyond all belief. As for the issue of the data base: there are those in the nation who are arguing that without this information the government couldn't provide us with the Fact: It doesn't. To which these same folks often respond: « What's wrong... have you got something to hide??? Huh, huh do ya Fact: It's none of your damn business. I don't know 2000 different things about myself and I guarantee you this: Anyone who knows that much about you holds a great deal of power over your life; power which they have not earned nor proven they can use responsibly. Canadians have this vision of government as a warm, nurturing, overweight woman suckling them at her breast. In reality government is neither a woman nor nurturing. Government is people. That's right folks – government is other individuals who have the potential to be either malevolent or benevolent while simulatneously holding various degrees of physical power over others. To quote Ayn Rand
The problem with this fact (that civil servants are all individuals) is that we cannot just arbitrarily decide which category each of these individuals fits into: decent person or conniving thief. And since we have no right to put them all to lie detector tests and personality exams (thank God for that) none of them have the right to be privy to any information on your life that you did not knowingly and openly give. You wouldn't give your neighbor that kind of detailed information (he might think you a bit odd if you did) why would you let some pencil pusher in The way I see it there are only two people who deserve to know that much about my personal life: One of them is almighty God and the other is my wife – and not necessarily in that order. No recourse Which brings me back to the problem of the lost funds. One billion dollars is a lot of money. Moreover, it's a lot of taxpayer's money. Money that was taken from people without their consent and used to fund goofy First, let's give the government the benefit of the doubt (and go easy on them) and assume that the average Canuk makes somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty thousand bucks a year (that's way too high but bear with me). That means that the Canadian government stole, then lost a year's worth of wages from 2 It seems to me that a civil suit filed on behalf of these 20 000 hard working men and women might be in order. But wait. How does one decide which twenty thousand Canadians should benefit from this law suit? I dunno. How about instead of sueing on behalf of twenty thousand Canuks we sue on behalf of all the people of Canada? If successful that amounts to about $33.33 per individual in this country. Actually, it would be more if you really think about it Those who don't earn an income would not be eligible to sue. That includes people such as babies, university students, invalids, most children under the age of 16, welfare recipients and so forth. This would bring our total close to a hundred bucks per citizen (give or take a few bills). You wouldn't tolerate someone breaking into your wallet and taking that money so why do we put up with it when it's the goverment doing it? They're people just like the rest of us aren't they? Don't they deserve to be held responsible for this sort of theft as much as the thug on the corner does? Unfortunately, in reality, this lawsuit only creates another problem: Since governments don't actually make money they would have to expropriate the funds needed to pay the taxpayer's successful lawsuit from the taxpayers. In which case we should all just pay ourselves $100.00 and cut out the middle man. You see, not only is the government (other individuals with power) able to invade your private life at a whim but it also has in place the mechanism to steal your hard earned dollars from you without consequence for its actions. Therein lies the big problem with funding government to do things we should be doing for ourselves. When these ministries invade our privacy and commit fraud or theft there is no recourse to charge them much less sue – unless of course you want to sue yourself. So I ask again: Got freedom? I don't think so.
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