Media Power in Politics

[Typhoid]

This thread was sparked by something I heard on the radio this morning.

So I've always had a "People will make an informed decision" stance rather than a "People will go with what they believe is popular opinion".

So many many years ago in British Columbia we had a cascading tax system. Very outdated, very poor for the consumer. That was changed some years ago to a harmonized tax (HST), where not only some (seemingly random) things were tax exempt (baby items, bikes, bread). Lower income people and the elderly were given quarterly HST rebate cheques of (up to) about 150 every 3-4 months to offset the tax.

Now, for the past few months there was debate (raised by restaurant owners) that the HST was bad for business. When really, the only thing the HST was bad for was restaurant revenue,because they couldn't gouge prices and hide them in the tax system. Lo and behold some snazzy radio and TV ads were made saying how terrible the HST is for the economy,and how nobody is prospering with it. So it was put to a simple vote, keep the HST, or go back to the PST/GST.

And the wise wise idiots (aka: general public) in my Province decided it was a better idea to go back to the PST/GST. So now not only does BC have to give back some 30 million dollars (I believe) to the government (that was given to put the tax in place), and not only do the elderly and low income families not receive HST rebates anymore, and not only is every food item ridiculously taxable again, but the BC government now has to re-hire the entire faculty that dealt with the PST/GST (as they were let go, considering they were obsolete), which will cost some significant number in the millions, but our government is now also going to be vastly more beaurocratic.

Praise the power of media.
I weep for the future of my Province.