Nice to see you again.

It has been a while. 

It’s not that I lacked the interest in politics but rather it’s been such a boring time for them.

Stephen Harper has his, Commons Majority, Senate Majority and his Supreme Court Appointment Majority, The Progressive Conservatives in Ontario have blown not one but two elections since, and a divided right in Alberta resulted in the majority of voters opting for Conservative politics but securing an NDP majority for their troubles. 

To start with Alberta I would like to welcome every NDP supporter across the country to the FPTP bandwagon, we have been expecting you! 

Watching the commentary from the election has been interesting; 40% of the population voted NDP whereas 52% voted for the Wildrose or PC parties respectively. Come October when the next Federal Election is scheduled do folks really feel that Alberta (Save for Edmonton) will go Orange?

Especially when you consider that turnout was around 58%.

It’s a nice story, it takes out any momentum that Justin Trudeau and the Liberals had with their middle class tax cut following by their middle class tax hike via the CPP reform but in perspective Alberta is still largely CPC country and as the only party who seemingly doesn’t want to shutter the oilsands I don’t see that changing.

Ah Ontario;

I have to admit I am very proud of the Progressive Conservatives in Ontario, it would have been so easy to elect the 3^rd place finisher in the last leadership race to become leader and forget all the lessons we learnt from the John Tory era of being unable to out Liberal the Liberals but the grass roots rose up and elected a Conservative.

I am still surprised, the seemingly clueless “party elders” of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario wanted one leader and got another and with a party base that was so depleted after years of failure I am shocked that Patrick Brown wasn’t able to just win but almost able to double the size of the party in the process.

After hearing Mr. Brown speak a few times I am impressed with the passion but now is the time to give alternatives. It’s easy to be against Liberal Policy given how utterly terrible it’s been over the last decade but it’s not easy to fix.

I look forward to Mr. Brown hopefully taking a page from the old Common Sense Revolution and going riding to riding and figuring out what Ontario needs rather than dictating what the Government thinks Ontario needs.

Then we roll into Federal Politics;

Which I will touch on eventually but the one thought I have been unable to shake over the last few weeks since the Liberals announced their additional forced CPP contributions;

What happens when someone with a fully paid CPP passes away?

At present if I were to pass away my spouse would be fully entitled to any savings and investments that I had accumulated to date outside the scope of the CPP;

With the CPP as written the "Surviving Spouse" at 65 is entitled to "60 per cent of the contributor's retirement pension, if the surviving spouse or common-law partner is not receiving other CPP benefits"

http://www.servicecanada.gc.ca.....sion.shtml

It’s a very interesting potential cash windfall for a Liberal Government, as I am required to pay into the program but there is no guarantee I will or my family will ever even see a dollar of it? 

With all the retirement tools available to Canadians be it the tax delaying RRSPs or the tax avoiding TFSA I am puzzled as to why the Liberals who are seemingly concerned with the well-being of folks in their retirement years wouldn’t simply force us to utilize an existing program which would assure we actually get to keep the money we pay in?  

It would be interesting to see how many Canadians over the last decade would have been screw out of their Federal Pension based on the conditions associated with passing it onto their spouse or family.