Wynne’s Socialist Largesse
Alexis de Tocqueville is proved right once again, that the tyranny of the majority lies inherent in any democracy. Our erstwhile Premier, Kathleen Wynne, has just brazenly approved an across-the-board 7.5% pay raise for government provincial employees, with not even a concession on their part, a veritable largesse, courtesy of the over-burdened taxpayer, held in ransom by said government to those who live off his avails. Here is the text from the National Post article:
The Ontario Public Service Employees Union workers would get 1.5 per cent on July 1, then one per cent on Jan. 1, 2019, and another one per cent every six months for the life of the deal. The approximately 35,500 workers and correctional staff represented by OPSEU are employed across the public sector, from administration and enforcement to social work, IT and laboratory staff.
Count them if you can: That is thirty five thousand workers, across the board, getting a pay raise that almost no one in the private sector, which is the primary sector that actually produces real wealth, could ever dream of. Freed from the constraints of market forces, indeed from reality itself, the likes of Ms. Wynne are quite brazenly free to buy votes for the upcoming election. Which of these thirty five thousand will ever choose to vote for a more economically conservative government, insofar as such still exists in this Dominion, that would dare to trim back their exorbitant wages, benefits, job security, sick leave and pension plans?
Here is Warren “Smokey” Thomas, head of the aforementioned union:
“I’m kind of shocked the government actually made us any kind of an offer,” Thomas said. “It’s no secret that my union and myself, my executive board, we’re always in a battle with the government … We’re at odds with them on a lot of fronts.”
But, Thomas said, the offer contains a number of positive changes with no demands of concessions for members, and no matter the motivation he’s looking for the best deal for the workers.
Well, that’s one way of putting it, but it’s not quite the best deal for those who pay for their perks. Tocqueville warned of this, that once a certain percentage of the population work for the State and can manoeuvre its levers of power, they will hold the other half other populace, the half that pays their wages, in perpetual slavery, sowing the seeds for revolution. For how in this milieu will the Liberals ever get un-elected, unless some significant proportion of the thirty five thousand find the gumption and the wherewithal to somehow seek the common and future good, and not their own immediate gratification? And we must add to this number all the other State employees, teachers, professors, physicians, nurses, police officers, military, and the myriad of bureaucrats, counting quite literally in the millions, all of them currently receiving and promised ever-increasing unrealistic emoluments. We must also not forget the refugees, welfare recipients, those who live on reserves, and on it goes.
The Liberals have bought their votes for years to come, even until kingdom come, unless something rather drastic happens, like economic collapse (see Venezuela). We can hope that people wake up before then, but, given our current indoctrinating education system, into which even well-meaning Catholics, for various reasons good and bad, entrust their children, I for one don’t hold much of that diminishing virtue.
The worst aspect of socialism, as the Church has always taught, is not so much its economic unrealistm, which is bad enough, but what it does to the human spirit. Being reliant upon the nanny state, as all too many Canadians are, for everything from health care to education and many things in-between, enervates and infantilizes the human spirit, making us weak and pusillanimous. It also causes a deep and abiding envy, even hatred, between those who feed off the avails of others, and those who are forced to provide them, as the chasm and the entitlements those in the ‘in’, and those not, gets wider and wider.
I find it difficult to convince people of this truth, for even good and orthodox Catholics often do not see the inherent dangers, even evils, in our socialist system, errors that Our Lady of Fatima warned would spread throughout the world, surreptitiously. All too many are far too dependent upon the State, and many young people I meet would just love to get on the government gravy-train while the gettin’ is good. What they have difficulty seeing is that this entails the real and present danger of a loss of freedom, initiative, drive and the capacity to take risks and strive for greatness. People still desire these goods, but how to put them into practice in the stultifying atmosphere in which we live? Even the physicians currently in court to protect their conscience rights against cooperating in the murder-suicide that is ‘medical assistance in dying’ would not have to be there were not the entire medical apparatus, including, let us be honest, their multiple six-figure salaries, not under the power of the State.
It is well past time for some pushback, to gain back our freedom and resolve, which will require some risk, hardship and the exercise of virtue. So gird up thy loins, and, as the Lord said to Joshua, ‘be strong and of good courage’, for God, truth and goodness are on our side.
Carney’s Amoral Majority
After five defections – euphemistically described as ‘crossing the floor’ – and three by-elections, Mark Carney and his Liberals how have their coveted majority. One wonders what bowls of pottage were offered in back-room deals. In the archaic monarchical system that is the Dominion of Canada, this majority allows the newly-minted Prime Minister to rule[…]Continue reading→
Saint Kateri , Canada’s Protectress
This was the title given to Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, by Pope Benedict XVI, when he canonized her on October 28th, 2012, along with six others, in Saint Peter’ Square (she had been beatified by Pope John Paul II back in 1980). With Saint Joseph as our protector, along with the Canadian martyrs, we seem to[…]Continue reading→
A Tale of Two Benedicts
A grace-filled Holy Week to all our readers! As we await and prepare for the Resurrection about to dawn upon us, we might keep in mind two Benedicts: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, requiescat in pace, elected on this day in 2005; and today’s commemoration of the mystic pilgrim, Benedict Joseph Labre, who died on this[…]Continue reading→
My Name is Bernadette
April 16th is a propitious day, for besides the anniversary of Father de Valk’s death, who founded Catholic Insight in its print form decades ago, and the commemoration of the ‘two Benedicts’, mentioned in accompanying posts, today we also recall Saint Bernadette Soubirous, the young visionary to whom the Virgin Mary appeared numerous times at[…]Continue reading→
Saint Lydwina of Schiedam and Suffering Joyfully
Saint Lydwina of Schiedam (1380 – 1433) was one of the countless and glorious ‘victim souls’ in the history of the Church, those whose lives are filled with suffering, often of an unimaginable intensity, but who suffer joyfully. She was a fifteen-year old Dutch girl, out skating one day, when she fell and broke one[…]Continue reading→
The Glorious Martyrdoms of Martin and Maximus
As we enter into Eastertide, we recall on this 13th of April Pope Saint Martin I (+655), one of the noblest, if most tragic, of the successors of Saint Peter. Born in Umbria, Italy, he was of noble lineage, with great intelligence combined with charity and love of the poor and the Church. While still[…]Continue reading→
Saint Stanislaus of Szczepanów
We celebrate Saint Stanislaus today (+ April 11, 1079), in light of this Easter Octave, a bishop and martyr who accepted the episcopacy only at the direct order of Pope Alexander II. He proved a wise and courageous leader of his flock, put to death by his own king, Boleslaus, for rebuking the monarch’s ‘immoral[…]Continue reading→
Saint Gemma Galgani
On this April 11th, in 1903 – the same year that the Italian Guiseppe Sarto was elected Pope later that summer as Pius X – a lovely, young Italian woman died, by the name of Gemma Galgani. She lived a brief life of 24 years, as did a number of other young saints, including Pier[…]Continue reading→
An Ideological and Improper Translation
I noticed something odd with the psalm reading at Mass the other day. Our bishops’ conference here in Canada has decreed that the Mass in English – Novus Ordo – use the ‘NRSV’, the ‘New Revised Standard Version’, an ‘updated’ translation of the original RSV, first published in 1952. This ‘new translation’ has the tendency[…]Continue reading→
Saint Jean-Baptiste de la Salle: A Teacher for Teachers
Jean-Baptiste de la Salle (1651 – 1719), a French nobleman, ordained a priest, founded the first order in the Church’s history entirely without priests, and this came about almost by accident. I say ‘almost’, for, of course, there are no accidents with God. Destined for ordination from an early age, Jean-Baptiste never looked back, even[…]Continue reading→