Last weekend I managed to gain an insight into the minds of the people who keep the Liberals in power from one decade to the next. I was at the barbershop getting a haircut and began chatting about current events with Giovanni, the barber. Giovanni, who calls himself John, has a very extensive knowledge about current events and could hold forth admirably on nearly any subject. The conversation took its inevitable course through world events and ended up with the David Dingwall affair.
From there we proceeded to adscam and corrupt politicians in general. John was very upset about corruption in government, telling me that he abhorred dishonest politicians and then proceeded to flay Brian Mulroney.
"You know he’s-a crook," John proclaimed. "If he was-a honest, then he would not have-a sued the government for five-a million. If-a he was a gentlemen, he just-a would walk away and say’good-a bye’. Instead he make the lawsuit."
It was interesting to note that while acknowledging the problems the Liberals currently faced with their various scandals, John reserved his vehemence for the evil Brian Mulroney and his rotten Conservatives. Never mind that they’ve been out of power for close to 14 years and that the wrongdoing the Liberals have been accused of now brings new revelations on an almost weekly basis, much of it infinitely more sordid than anything Mulroney did while he was in power. It’s those Conservatives that are the real crooks.
at least that’s in the mind of what I call the "life-long Liberal voter".
I now understand why Joe Volpe, the current minister for immigration is so eager to up the number of immigrants by 40% per year from the current 235,000 to 328,000. Volpe announced last week that he plans to release "a comprehensive and transformative [immigration] plan" that "will have long-term implications".
No kidding.
The long-term implications of the plan are that we will have a Liberal government in Ottawa for all eternity. The Liberals have long relied on the immigrant vote to remain in power and this new plan will seal the deal forever.
It’s no wonder that the Liberals refuse to outlaw the Tamil Tigers of Eelam, a group that invented suicide bombing and has been implicated in terrorist acts in Sri Lanka for decades and has been outlawed in most countries around the world. Putting the kibosh on the Tamil Tigers would mean a loss of the Sri Lankan vote that has managed to keep a couple of Toronto’s Liberal MPs in their seats for years.
Volpe has also promised to increase the per immigrant stipend paid to Ontario from $800 to $3,400 to assist in skills and language training programs.
Please don’t get me wrong. I agree that given our low birth rate and aging population, it is of tantamount importance to increase immigration targets. The real problem, however, is who are we targeting.
There’s nothing wrong with having individuals who have a trade, such as John, the barber move here to ply their trade, so long as we do not ignore more pressing avocations.
I firmly believe that individuals with job skills, such as doctors, architects, computer software designers, etc. should get preference over those who are unskilled, unschooled, untrained and unable to contribute in any meaningful way. With Ontario’s high school dropout rate now hovering at around 30%, we have more than enough unskilled workers to handle the drive-through window at the local Tim Horton’s. What we’re desperately short of is qualified healthcare professionals, engineers and others with professional qualifications.
But it’s clear that the Liberals aren’t really interested in bringing in too many educated immigrants and only appear to pay lip service to that concept, rather than actually make it a reality. Problem with educated people is that they tend to be capable of critical thinking, which doesn’t bide well for the Liberals.
So long as we can all join hands, sing ‘Kumbayah" and welcome anyone who wants to move here with open arms, regardless of their ability to contribute, we can feel good about our inclusive tolerance and allow the likes of Martin, Volpe and David Dingwall to continue feeding at the trough.