Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- David Climenhaga marvels at the fact that the Fraser Institute manages to claim charitable status while serving as an entirely political organization:

The Fraser Institute is serious all right, although its research is not serious in the normal sense of transparency and lack of bias, no matter what it claims. But it surely is political. Indeed, the Fraser Institute is all politics, all the time.

As it turns out, this is important, because the Fraser Institute is also a registered charity, meaning that those Canadians who do pay taxes are in effect subsidizing its purely political operations. Indeed, to go a step further, we are also subsidizing those wealthy individuals, organizations and corporations that bankroll the Fraser Institute's propaganda efforts to work directly against the interests of ordinary Canadians.
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When a charity files its annual income statement with the Canada Revenue Agency, it is always asked: "Did the charity carry on any political activities during the fiscal period." Yet in each year between 2000 and 2010, according to a recent Access to Information request by the Alberta Federation of Labour, the Fraser Institute answered "No."

"Any rookie observer of Canadian politics knows this is nonsense," the AFL wrote in its Jan. 17 submission to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance on Tax Incentives for Charitable Donations. "The Fraser Institute is actively involved in the Canadian political landscape. Any reporting or suggestion otherwise is a sham."

In 2010, for example, the Fraser Institute explicitly communicated to the public calls for laws to be changed, thereby engaging in politics as defined by the CRA.
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(N)ever mind why the media treats the Fraser Institute's dubious findings with such respect, the question most often asked about this organization. That seems obvious enough considering who owns the media.

A better question is: Given its responses to the CRA, can Canadians have any confidence that the Fraser Institute is staying within the 12 per cent of its allowed limit for political activities?

Moreover, it is fair to wonder: Is anyone at the Canada Revenue Agency paying attention or even raising concerns about the Fraser Institute's constant political activities, let alone questioning its charitable status?

- Frances Russell summarizes the anti-social goals of the Harper Cons:

The 2008 federal budget provided a handy compendium of what the Conservatives consider "core" responsibilities -- national defence, public security and the economic union. Period.

Absent is any reference to the pillars of the Canadian postwar state -- equalization, pensions, medicare and employment insurance.

Instead, Conservative "nation-building" amounts to an array of expensive "boutique" tax cuts like the Children's Art Tax Credit, alone projected to cost $100 million in 2011-12. The Frontier Centre for Public Policy reports that more than 70 per cent of these "boutique" tax credits for everything from hockey and dance lessons to tools go to the 25 per cent of taxpayers earning more than $50,000 annually.
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The Conservatives believe Canada cannot afford its public pensions. They commissioned Edward Whitehouse, an economist for the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development to do a study. He reported that Canada "does not face major challenges of financial sustainability with its pensions" and "there is no pressing financial or fiscal need to increase pension ages in the foreseeable future." Nevertheless, the Conservatives persist they are too generous.

The forthcoming assault on pensions and Canada's social safety net is driven by Harper's libertarian "no tax is a good tax" ideology. Not reality.

- Meanwhile, Marc Laferriere calls out Con MP Phil McColeman in particular for fearmongering about Old Age Security with no basis in fact. And Leftdog notes that the Cons themselves claimed to want to defend Old Age Security against exactly the type of attacks they're now planning to inflict.

- Kady highlights the Cons' remarkable position that elected representatives from all parties are to speak only when a majority government tells them to, rather than having any place voicing the concerns of their constituents.

- And finally, Thomas Walkom describes the strategy behind the Cons' fake citizenship oath.