Doug's Blog

I have heard two perspectives from the media in the last few months about the upcoming provincial budget and what should be done.  It seems that they want to get politicians to choose one side or the other.  Spend lots of money and run a deficit or cut and slash and burn like the '90's.  Ok, I admit the messages haven't been coming clear from us either, but neither of those is either a smart or realistic option.  In this blog, I will lay out some foundations that I think budget decisions should be made on.

The realistic option will rest somewhere in the spectrum in between.  You will say, "Of course, Doug."  But it isn't so obvious these days as hysteria over the economic slowdown seems to have gripped our press, our public, and some governments.  This, despite the fact that this crisis is not (yet, anyway) as bad as the 'dirty' thirties, or the crisis of the 80's even.  Those were downturns that saw everything stand still, that saw unemployment of 15 to 20% of the population, that say outrageous inflation approaching 20%, and saw massive government spending as a stimulus.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am fully aware of Keynesian economics.  I have always said that the largest problem with democracies is that the election cycle does not coincide with economic cycles.  We should save during high economic tides, when inputs are high and the cost of building is also high, and then spend it during low economic tides, and then we could build a lot of infrastructure and invest in education and such at times when everyone else is pulling out to save money, and we could do it at bargain basement prices.  This would be the time to spend money and slash taxes.

Think of it this way: Everyone who invests knows to buy low and sell high, but very few people actually do. Most people buy in when prices are high because they want a piece of a good thing, but then when the bottom falls out they hurry to get out of a bad thing and end up selling low.  People should have been selling at the high prices two years ago, and right now, or soon, they should be buying in at these low prices, because even if they go lower, they will come back stronger than ever when everything comes back.  The government is no different.

I believe the government has a lot of important jobs, but four pillars are the cornerstone of responsibility for all governments.  1. Infrastructure - we build the rails, road, and runways that the economy was and is built upon.  2. Education (K to 12 and Post Secondary) - we are responsible for educating the workforce of the next generation that will drive the economy. 3. Low/Reasonable Tax Levels - the government does not make jobs, business does, and reasonable tax levels are needed to attract business and allow them to employ more people. 4. Low Regulations - regulations impede business function and productivity and must be kept as minimal as possible while still keeping order and safety features in place.

I don't really like the word 'stimulus' since it gives the wrong impression of what the investments that government makes are about. If money spent in these times was a 'stimulus' then if spending $5 billion is good, $10 billion must be better, and $84 billion must be wonderful.  Why not make it perfect and spend all you can borrow and finance?  What Keynes meant was that governments should spend money in hard times, but not for the sole sake of a stimulus, but for the sake of getting more infrastructure and education completed at more competitive rates on which the economy can build when it bounces back.  Ideally, governments should have cash in the bank to do that, but unfortunately there is only one jurisdiction in Canada that has managed to do that.  The difference in the spending is no different in action, but it is very different in intent and purpose, and I believe that is critical as a foundation to the action undertaken.

In this climate, steel prices have plummeted, labour costs are down, construction costs are down, and companies are looking for work.  Some universities, such as famous MIT and Harvard, are letting go professors who are some of the brightest minds in their fields throughout the world.  What should the government do?  In these times I would say invest in education and research positions and build those roads, railways, runways, schools and hospitals that we will need for the next twenty years.  It will be much cheaper to build them now than five years from now since the price of the brains and the buildings will only go up, eventually.

This province has saved $7.8 billion in a Sustainability Fund, as much in a Infrastructure Fund, and even more in multiple other research and innovation funds.  We are in a position to capitalize unlike any other jurisdication.  Canada has the strongest economy in the world with projected growth of 3%, and Western Canada is the strongest part of Canada.  Now is the time to work and we have available resources to do so.  That doesn't mean that we have to blow the wad, however.  It means we can stay even and ride the slowdown out for a couple of years.  You should also note that we spend more money per capita than our two closest neighbours by 37%.  Surely, spending almost $40 billion on 3.5 million people leaves some room for trimming or fine tuning the spending.  Even if we only found $1 billion in current spending to redirect to the pillars of government responsibility we would be investing more in the future, not less.

Of course, I can't answer every question or concern on the matter, or completely flesh out my comments.  In fairness, thousands of books have been written on the matter, and none is complete in itself, and this is just a blog.  I hope it helps give you a sense of where I am coming from, and I look forward to the debates to continue on Facebook, Twitter, and blogs across the province.

That's it.  That's all.

Every year I write an article to be posted in the, "Explore Wainwright & Buffalo Country" tourism brochure.  A copy of the article I wrote in mid to late 2007 is posted below, word for word as I wrote it then.  Its not meant to be an 'I told you so . . . ', just a little serious thought from two years ago that seems to have had some merit.  Do with it as you please, but please note two things: first, you can't turn back time so smart decisions are needed now to manage the economic downturn, and second, my comments below were not directed at government . . . they were directed at all Albertans.

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I have been reflecting upon a quote from Dwight D. Eisenhower, "A people that values its privilege above its principles, soon loses both."  I found it interesting, particularly because of my trip to Guatemala in the spring to help build houses for the poor.  It is there that I became acutley aware of just how good we have it here.  In fact, if you have a roof ovr your head, a bed to sleep in, and food in a refrigerator, you are rigcher than 75% of the population of the rest of the world.  The other part of my interest in the quote comes from the dismay I felt when I returned to find so many angry people complaining that their lives were so awful in this province.

Everywhere I go I hear about how the government nees to spend more.  Everything . . . I am lead to believe, is short-funded and short-changed and needs to be fixed, built, financed and supported right now.  There seems to be the impression that the almost $200 billion spent in the last seven years was not enough, but if we had just collected that $6 billion more, everything wold be okay.  And if we could collect and spend $1.4 to $2 billion more than the almost $40 billion a year we currently spend, it wold meet all of our healthcare, education, infrastructure and savings needs.  Is this really about addressing our needs though, or is this more about addressing our wants.

The government of Alberta needs to get its spending in check and save for the future, so that we can even out he violent revenue cycles inherent in resource based economies like ours.  We are spending more than any other jurisdiction in North Aberica at almost $11, 000 per person.  That's no small change in a world where if you have a bank account, money in a wallet, and change in a dish someplace you are in the top 8% of the world's wealthy.  Yet we continue to focus our attention on getting more and having more.  Indeed, many young people are making incrediblemoney in this hot economy but they are still living paycheck to paycheck because they buy more and more of what they think they need, when in reality they are really buying the 'toys' they want.  If we don't all get this under conrol, surely we will all be parading new bumper stickers that say, "Whoops, I did it again."

So Albertans and the government need to ask themselves, is this really about howmuch we collect, or is this about how much we spend?  Or mayb the better question is not around how much we spend, but around how much we expect and demand.  Maybe we need to quit starting our sentices with, "In a province as rich as this . . .", and then go on to deman the government provide more.  Maybe we need to remember and recognize the meaning of JFK's immortal words, "As not what your country can do for you, as what you can do for your country."  Maybe we need to realize that we are always building for the future that this is not what we can get from others and the government, but rather what we can give back to build for the next and future generation.

I think we need to forgo some privileges and try not to forget just how good we have it.  We need to go back to our principles of hard work, self-relieance, and fiscal prudence.  We need to do this now before we lose both and wind up with nothing but memories of another boom gone bust.  We need to do this now before we are forced to undergo another painful round of cuts and slashes as we did at the end of the last boom.  If we don't, we will desrve the fate we get adn we will have no one to blame for it but ourselves.  Know this: even if I am the only one, I will continue to speak this message for the sake of my son Austin's future and the futures of all Alberta's sons and daughters.

You may have noticed that there was a quote on my facebook page status that said, "real fredom, real strength, real bravery comes when we realize that who we are is more than what we do."  I put that quote up there and left it for a few days because I had a personal realization that has transformed me tremendously.  This may actually be something you will laugh at and wonder to yourself, "Doug, how could you not have known that already?" That's ok with me. 

I have been an MLA for seven years this April.  I have worked very hard throughout the constituency, throughout the province, and within the Legislature of Alberta.  I came in wanting to ensure that this Province was successful for the next generation, namely my sons, and consequently all of the sons and daughters of Albertans, who are our future, and I still have that as my goal.  I have always taken the job seriously and I always will, but somewhere along the way I lost sight of myself and began to see the job as me, and me as the job.  It didn't happen overnight or all at once, it was obviously a slow progression.

The symptoms weren't so much an attitude change since I have spent all of my time as a dedicated servant of the people of my constituency and this province.  The sypmtoms were, well, a loss of me and my identity.  I tried to be everything to everyone for all things (not to get re-elected, but because I sincerely wanted to help each and every soul).  I quit writing poetry, I quit drawing, I didn't spend much time gardening, I lost track of all of my friends back home, and, well . . . I gave away all of the other things I loved and believed in besides my job to help people in the constituency and the province.  That was fine and I was fine, as long as my job was fine.

So, you know what happened . . .

Ok, here is where it gets personal so stop reading if you don't want some hard personal facts.  I was still doing well, still working hard, still trying to keep some balance, mostly because my wife told me to, until a little over 2 years ago.  All MLA's had to chose who the next Premier would be.  I chose, and I lost.  I was ok with that.  We were chosing a captain of the team and we are all still on the same team.  I was ready to support the Premier then, and I do believe in and support our Premier still.  Where the problem really came in is that I had elements of my job, avenues that I used to help Albertans, removed from me. That really hurt.  It wasn't personal, its just the nature of change in a job like this.  

It was painful to have elements that were so important to me, that I identified with my very existence, removed from my job description.  I reacted, however, as though those elements of my job were being removed from me, from my very soul.  I will admit it sent me into a tailspin, it sent me into a depression, or a funk that I had an awful time trying to get out of.  I was given new tasks and jobs after that, but I still felt like something had been . . . amputated, I suppose, and that I wasn't a complete person.  I got out of my funk after a few months, but something was still missing.  I guess I felt the bigger the job, the more important the task, the bigger my life would be, because, as I mentioned above, I was my job and my job was me.

Reading the quote that 'we are more than what we do' was an epiphany for me.  I realized, finally, that I am not my job, and it is not me.  I am more than my job.  My family, my poetry and drawing and gardening, my motorcyle rides, my philosophical discusses over a beer, my constant quest to try things new, my music, and so many other things are who I am.  My job is part of it, but not all of it.  I am more than what I do. 

Now, that doesn't mean I won't work as hard, or be as dedicated to helping people in the community, the constituency, or the province, or that I won't still strive to be the best MLA possible.  Quite the opposite is true, in fact.  I think this realization makes me a better MLA, a better man in general, and a more complete person, like I once was.  It allows me to focus on what is important, to not burn myself out, to hold on to all of the stuff that is really important and let some of the other stuff go.  I have regained my perspective, my priorities, my purpose, and my passion with a renewed sense of humility.  I will leave you with one last quote, "Our bodies are where we stay, our souls are what we are."  Its good to have mine back.

That's it.  That's all.  Hope your day goes well.  Happy New Year.

Welcome to 2009! This is going to be an interesting year for sure.  I was inspired to write this blog after reading Archie McLean's article in the Journal today called, "Constituents can interact directly with PC MLAs through new website".  It was a great interview with many different people, which focused on the new websites set to be launched next week called Mypcmla.ca, and focused on the New Web.  There were a lot of good quotes from a lot of good folks, but one line in particular stood out to me.

The very last line of the article said it all.  With my apologies to Archie for not asking permission, given the short notice, it read: With technology changing so quickly, Wason said the site's launch is just the beginning of its evolution. "Even I don't know where this is going to go."  Very telling quote indeed.  Now, Archie McLean is one of the media's new media gurus.  You can read Archie's full column in Thursday's Journal, and you can hear his podcasts on the Journal website, or you can go to iTunes and subscribe to 'lej out loud', as I do.  Troy Wason has made his living, or personally I think a life, as a social media guru. Archie pointed out that technology is evolving and Troy said, "Even I don't know where this is going to go."   

Seven years ago, when I was first elected an MLA, I knew I needed and wanted a website to help with getting out information on what I was doing.  That was it.  I wanted to post 'stuff' to the internet for people to see.  Since that very first website in my very first campaign I can admit that I am on my third officially re-engineered and re-developed website.  My first website was really good and I got a lot of compliments about it.  But the Web has evolved so quickly over the last 7 years that I went from Web 1.0 (posting information) to the newest site that you are on right now, which is approaching a Web 2.0 phase of its evolution.

I admit that I don't have a full blog on this site yet, where people can post comments directly to my posting, but I will get there.  This site really fully launched only 5 months ago and already I, and the great people at Vital Effect Web design in Camrose, are working on the full blogging capabilities, RSS feeds, and podcasts.  Talk about evolution.  THAT is the point to evolution.  It changes quickly and no one knows where it will go, or what exactly will be successful.  Evolution, whether that of the species or that of technology, is not linear.  It is a composition of millions of small changes that occur, a few surviving and growing, and then millions of small changes happening again, with only a few surviving and growing, and then again it happens.

Remember Beta and VHS?  Only VHS survived (it was the marketing only because Beta was really better quality), but soon it was replaced by DVD's, which have been replaced by BlueRay, which itself is already almost obsolete because you can now order equal quality movies online as soon as they come out and store them on a hard drive which can feed right into your TV.  Now the evolution is already occurring on the types of sites and mediums for ordering and keeping movies on hard drive.  The evolution is exponential. Archie couldn't have said it more simply or more perfectly.  Evolution.

If you asked me what my website will look like in three years . . . I really couldn't tell you.  Smarter men and women than I, have made some great forecasts but even they admit that they can't be sure (right, Ken?).  Perhaps three years from now the websites will all be designed for handheld communications devices and laptop computers will become as obsolescent as desktops are now.  Or perhaps no one will 'read' the internet anymore, but listen to it.  Perhaps all websites will be full interactive and the Web 1.0's will wonder why they get no traffic.  Perhaps that is a decade out, but who knows?  The evolution is growing exponentially.  Just think where we came from 7 years ago; stagnant 'information only' websites to . . . well, Web 2.0. 

This, I can say . . . if you told me 7 years ago that I would be using this newly designed website that I am already upgrading 5 months after its release, and that I would also be using Facebook, Twitter, Revver, Youtube, Google Video, Yahoo Video, MySpace, Flickr for pictures, LinkedIn, and now, just new tonight, Digg.com, and that I would have videos and blogs and podcasts all posted for the world to see, I  would have said . . . well, I would have said, "huh?".  Actually, if you asked me three years ago, when I first forayed into Facebook, I would have still said, "huh". 

What the future will bring will be fun and exciting.  Some new communication tools will die on the vine, and some will bear fruit, and still others will take over the garden.  All I can say is that Archie is right on.  Technology is quickly evolving, meaning that the pace is accelerating and that it is just like evolution, not linear, but multi-dimensional with some great winners and some tragic losers.  And Troy is also right, and humble, when he says, "even I don't know where this is going to go."  Show me who does for sure and I will show you the next creator of the next great social medium, and the world's next billionaire.  All that you can bet on for sure is this: social media is here to stay, it will change the way EVERYTHING is done, and those who don't get in (it's never too late to get in so long as you don't give up) will surely go the way of the Dodo (read: extinct).