NO MORE POST ELECTION COCOONS

New Brunswickers Historically Go Back To Sleep After Elections

But perhaps at no other time in our history has it been so important that we not disengage this time!

Just because the election is over does not mean it’s time to go back to sleep. The battle may be over but the war rages on. All the election of 2010 succeeded in doing was to blatantly reinforce the old adage that the more things change the more they remain the same.

Never before in the annals of New Brunswick history has the word “Change” been so recklessly applied as a campaign slogan. The irony of it all is that change is needed. Just not in the way the campaigners so dubiously intended.

The change that is in such dire need in New Brunswick is in disclosure, accountability and truth. Our politicians and our media must be pressed to tell us what is really going on in this province. The people of New Brunswick must press on in this struggle to discover the truth behind the closed doors of Fredericton.

But this process will probably never begin if we go back to sleep after the 2010 election. History has shown that our politicians will withdraw from the temporary and flimsy engagement that they display during campaigns. They will retreat to the administrative cocoon that is Fredericton and lock the doors behind them. The New Brunswick people cannot afford to let history repeat itself this time.

The people must fight for real accountability from their politicians and their media. They must press hard for that change. Because there will be no change unless the people fight for it.

The people should demand to know the truth behind the finances of New Brunswick NOW! They must demand ABSOLUTE TRANSPARENCY. There are many signs throughout the world that are pointing to dire economic consequences that the people of New Brunswick should be informed of. One of those warning signs can be observed in the following story about the International Monetary Fund’s world economic outlook. It should be realized that the IMF, no doubt, has its own agenda in the world – yet still, the following story cannot be ignored. On the contrary, its sentiments must be considered and applied in a New Brunswick context, for the people of this province.

For example, the following IMF story talks about seeing a pattern – first in Ireland, now in Greece and Portugal – where cuts are failing to close the deficit as fast as hoped. Austerity itself is eroding tax revenues. Countries are chasing their own tail. Frankfurt is talking up its exit strategy. It risks repeating the error of July 2008 when it raised rates in the teeth of the crisis. One has to conclude that the European Central Bank is washing its hands of the PIGS, dumping the problem onto the fiscal authorities.

The economists of New Brunswick can wax poetically about these kinds of things but just consider the following thoughts for a moment. David Alward promised to “dust off the Jean Guy Finn Report.” But what if that means that small rural communities and villages in this province are going to be dubiously and falsely empowered to become more autonomous? And what if a by-product of that false autonomy really is a “down-loading or a dumping” of our fiscal problems on to the backs of our small rural NB communities? Just consider that possibility for a while.

The mainstream press is long dead in this province. But where is our beloved CBC? Does it not have the resources available to tell the truth anymore?

It’s time to come out of the cocoon!

Lekhaim from the Gristmill