On the eve of an upcoming election, Yukoners pretend to prepare to make their decision on who will lead this territory for another round.
Times are great and the choice is clear… you’ve got to vote grey.
It is that party that used to be blue. You know, the conservatives. The guys that brought you the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board and made all small contractors become CORE Certified while cranking up Workers’ Compensation, Health and Safety Board enforcement.
The guys who hit the federal stimulus lottery and take all the credit for mining development and exploration, as if it has nothing to do with commodity demands. As if it was them who used their savvy political prowess to rocket gold up to $1,500 an ounce.
Yes, the loyal, trustful, hardworking, small-business people from the Yukon Party.
I am a new member, and I, too, like to party.
I know you’d like to believe you’ve got a choice. But if the Liberals or NDP won a majority, Harper would not only take away the gravy, he’d take away the hot oil.
Do you want to eat frozen potato sticks or poutine?
Giving either of these jabronis power is like sending an eight-year-old boy into Canadian Tire with $10,000 and telling him to get everything you need to live in the bush for a year. Yes, you’ll have all the best fishing gear, a cheap quad and some warm clothes, but it will be frustrating building a cabin with composite hockey sticks and sweet automobile decals, knowing chainsaws, drills and hammers were an option.
It is officially time to give up the dream of a fair, free, accountable, organized but not outrageously controlling world for my kids to grow up in.
Time to give up the complaining and criticizing of government employees and let “The Big Machine” (as my good friend Currie Dixon calls it ) roll coal down the highway. (Don’t worry Dixon, you’re still the right man for the job. And, hey, if you don’t win, there’s still the next 60 years and 15 campaigns to look forward to.)
The Big Machine is the very efficient tool our government uses to deal with local problems. It’s simply the concept that they have real issues, on too large a scale, for the public to understand.
And, unfortunately, selling our energy assets and lobbying for federal money use up all the fuel it has.
Issues such as land availability, predator control, big corporate companies taking over construction markets, exercising control of the Looney Tune marathon at city hall, or, my favourite, getting bang for your buck on social housing projects simply interfere with the big picture.
When Ralph Klein finished his reconstructive surgery in Alberta, I don’t recall him starting an Alberta Housing Corporation and mandating it to build social housing in small communities for $420,000 a unit.
And why would the Big Machine care about the hippies in tent city? Look at all the pretty townhouses, condos and trailers selling for $300,000, or more. Winter will take care of those whiners.
Developers are making money and business is great. Great if you’ve got land.
But the Big Machine doesn’t give out land, not even in Teslin, Carmacks, Ross River or Watson Lake. Ask anyone from the rest of Canada if they know what a land lottery is. They look at you like you’re from another planet and say, “Government owns land?” Because in the real world the government gives it to the people for pennies and lets nature take its course.
I imagine this Big Machine as if Dennis Fentie had bought a brand new 2012 Chev 2500 Duramax Diesel, fully loaded, with $20,000 in accessories. Then handed the keys to his 16-year-old-son Darrell Pasloski and said, “Here you go, boy. There’s two strippers and a 26 of tequila in the back seat. Go pick up your buddies, throw them in the box and have some fun, but don’t do anything stupid.”
If you have any brains at all, hop in the back with me and my new friends.
We’ll do doughnuts in the middle of tent city and party till this glorious economic bubble bursts.
Seriously though, vote for the Yukon Party, dummy.
Clayton Thomas
Teslin