THE TRUTH IS IN THE CASH REGISTER

We are at war.

Who knew?

What will be the largest peacetime security operation in Canadian history?

Not the visit of President Obama to Ottawa next month.

No.

It will be the Olympics, of course.

Now the tab for all those 12,000 police, private security folk and members of the armed forces who happen to not be dying in Afghanistan during those 17 days was originally underestimated at $175 Million.

Anyone who knew anything about these matters, like the FBI, fell down laughing at these first numbers.

Clearly this was a typical G. Campbell snow job.

So.

What is the real cost?

Security costs rise five-fold to $1-billion

Imagine how pleasant it might have been if someone had mentioned this six years ago when we were so lucky to be awarded this bonanza.

Total Bah Humbug!

PPP, Your self

Is there a pattern here?

First the Olympic Village and now the Port Mann Bridge.

Turns out the private company that is supposed to be in partnership with Kevin Falcon and the Provincial government to twin the mighty bridge, turns out they may just be running short of bucks.

So, guess what?

I know, you fingered it out, didn't you?

We - that is you and me who pay taxes on everything - we will provide the Macquarie Group a loan for one third the costs of this little project.

Heck, that's only hundreds of millions of dollars.

Now that budgets and deficits and bailouts are routinely quoted in billions and trillions of mind-numbing dollars, what's a paltry $700 Million tween friends and buds?

Gordon Campbell, more than any other public figure I can think of, has trumpeted for years now the glories of P3's or Public-Private Partnerships or, as I like to call them, PPPs or Pee,Pee, Pees.

Nice idea in a bread box somewhere in a kitchen long ago and far away maybe.

But here in the real world what keeps happening to these mighty alliances over and over again with frightening regularity is that the Private guys run mysteriously out of juice and we the taxpayers rush in to save the day. How nice of us.

Minister Falcon assures us - and don't we feel assured by his assurance? - that alles is gut because the tolls will pay for the bridge.

Uh-huh.

The Curious Case of BENJAMIN BUFFOON

THE RONETTES - BE MY BABY