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Dreeshen Talks Taxes And Electoral Reform

Published

8 years ago

3 minute read

In Touch with MP Earl Dreeshen

Parliament has returned to session and in the next few months we will continue pushing forward with our priorities as the conservative caucus. Those priories are clear:

  • To be the voice of the taxpayer.
  • To continue to be the only party to oppose the Liberal agenda of uncontrolled spending and deficits that has already led to higher taxes.
  • To hold the Liberals accountable for their misguided and risky economic plans.

 Electoral Reform

On February 1, the Liberals indicated that they would be breaking his election promise that 2015 would be the last election held under our current system. Our party entered the discussion on changes to the electoral system with a principled position: that when you change the rules of democracy, everyone gets to have a say.

The Liberal government mishandled the electoral reform file from day one. With the process in tatters, our leader said late last year that it was time to set the discussion aside, and focus on the real priorities of Canadians. We are glad the government took our leader’s advice to park electoral reform. Our position remains that any change to the way we elect Members of Parliament must only be decided in a referendum.

Taxes Continue to Rise Under the Liberals

Since being elected on a platform of “cutting taxes for the middle class”, Justin Trudeau has continued piling new taxes onto Canadian families. He is bringing in a new carbon tax and a CPP tax hike. He already slashed tax-free savings accounts, and eliminated tax credits for kids’ soccer and dance classes, as well as textbooks. He’s even considering taxing Netflix. An idea the Liberals floated recently was to tax Canadians’ health and dental benefits. Given the visceral and widespread condemnation of the idea, it’s not surprising that Trudeau on Tuesday appeared to be backing away from it.

It’s time for Justin Trudeau to get serious about lowering taxes, especially as Donald Trump moves forward on a massive tax-cutting program in the United States. 

Mobile Office Update

Our next Mobile Office will be in Sundre at the Greenwood Neighborhood Place on Tuesday February 7th from 10am-12 noon. Please feel free to bring any questions, comments or concerns to my staff at that time.

Sincerely your Member of Parliament,

Earl Dreeshen

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Digital ID

Lawmakers advancing digital ID in effort to establish mass surveillance

Published on October 6, 2024

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Digital ID Schemes Make Strides in Congress Despite Rights Advocate Opposition

It’s one of the “commandments” of global organizations like the UN, and the World Bank, to name but two, and also those less official ones like the WEF and the Gates Foundation: the digital ID.

And in the US, lawmakers have for years been struggling with the concept, heavily criticized by rights advocates for its ability to take mass surveillance to the next level.

On the one hand, the lawmakers have (or are supposed to have) their existing laws and constitutional protections in mind, but on the other, new legislation is cropping up both from Democrats and Republicans that signals a more or less slow creep towards the ultimate digital ID goal.

At the state level, the push is mostly focused on mobile driver’s licenses.

But the proponents of the schemes – who insist that the unprecedented centralization of personal information will provide for more trust and security – want things to start moving faster at the federal level, too.

One of the main cheerleaders here is Congressman Bill Foster, a Democrat. In September, he reintroduced a bill that, if adopted, would produce something called, the Improving Digital Identity Act.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

That, in turn, would set up an Improving Digital Identity Task Force, which would operate as part of the president’s Executive Office, whose main task would be getting rid of physical credentials in favor of digital ones.

Meanwhile, the act wants the government to look into all the ways it could provide solutions for Americans to prove their identity on the internet.

This isn’t the only legislative effort Foster has been involved in lately, particularly on the “reintroduction old proposals” front; in June, he and Congressman Clay Higgins, a Republican, worked together to make sure the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) submits a report to Congress informing its members “on its use of digital identities and their potential impact on homeland security.”

That one has made its way through a relevant committee but is yet to clear the House.

Like many of his digital ID-championing peers, Foster likes to talk about the promised positive side of things: less fraud and identity theft, and safer transactions.

He even managed to work the “deepfakes menace” into the message, claiming that this is another thing a future, deeply controversial digital ID system would be able to take care of.
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Censorship Industrial Complex

Hillary Clinton Calls for Stricter Online Censorship as Establishment Fears Losing “Total Control”

Published on October 6, 2024

By

From Reclaim The Net

In an interview with CNN, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed her pressing need for social media companies to enhance censorship measures, suggesting that failure to do so would lead to the loss of “total control.” This declaration aligns with broader concerns expressed by figures within the Democratic Party regarding the control of information online.

Clinton’s remarks come in the wake of substantial changes in the space of online expression, notably influenced by Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter in 2022. Under Musk’s stewardship, the platform, now rebranded as X, has championed a more laissez-faire approach to content moderation. This stance has facilitated a pushback against what some perceive as misleading mainstream narratives, particularly evident in the recent coverage of FEMA’s reported mishandling of hurricane relief efforts in North Carolina, Georgia, and Tennessee – a narrative that the government is calling “misinformation.”

During her conversation with Michael Smerconish, Clinton criticized the existing legal framework that she believes enables unchecked content dissemination. “We should be, in my view, repealing something called Section 230, which gave platforms on the internet immunity because they were thought to be just pass-throughs, that they shouldn’t be judged for the content that is posted,” she explained. “If they don’t moderate and monitor the content, we lose total control,” Clinton argued, using the think of the children argument.

She argues that this perspective is outdated and that without active moderation from platforms like Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram, and TikTok, the consequences extend beyond mere social and psychological impacts to encompass real-world harm.

Adding to the discourse, John Kerry recently echoed similar sentiments at a World Economic Forum sustainability meeting, bemoaning the obstacles the First Amendment poses in controlling information flow. “It’s really hard to govern today. The referees we used to have to determine what’s a fact and what isn’t a fact has been eviscerated to a certain degree,” Kerry stated.
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