Mali PM forced to quit as army strengthens grip

BAMAKO (Reuters) - Mali's prime minister was forced to resign on Tuesday by the soldiers who staged a coup in March, underscoring the military's continuing grip and complicating international efforts to help push Islamists from the north.

Once a beacon of democracy in West Africa, Mali has been mired in crisis since the coup, when ethnic Tuareg rebels and al Qaeda-linked Islamist fighters took advantage of the chaos to seize the northern two-thirds of the arid nation.

Although the soldiers gave way to a civilian president and prime minister in April under international pressure, they have never been far from power and have shown their readiness to stamp their authority on divided and weak politicians.

Cheick Modibo Diarra resigned as prime minister hours after he was arrested trying to leave the country for former colonial power France and was brought to the ex-junta's headquarters at a barracks in Kati, just outside Bamako.

"I, Cheick Modibo Diarra, hereby resign with my entire government," a nervous-looking Diarra said in a short statement broadcast on state television early on Tuesday. Diarra is a former NASA scientist and Microsoft chief for Africa.

Fearing Mali has become a safe haven for terrorism and organised crime, West African leaders have signed off on a plan to send 3,300 soldiers to Mali to revamp Mali's army and then support operations to retake the north.

But Diarra's arrest could discourage international partners from backing the plan until civilian rule is strengthened.

"What is really clear now is that the military junta is the one that is in control," said Gilles Yabi, head of the International Crisis Group's West Africa programme.

"They have the weapons, they have the force and they are taking control of the transition," he said. "It clarifies the fact that the immediate obstacle in the crisis in Mali is now in Bamako and not the north."

France, the keenest of the foreign powers to see action against the Islamists, called on Tuesday for a new government to be set up under interim civilian President Diouncounda Traore.

"These developments underline the need for the rapid deployment of an African stabilisation force," French Foreign Ministry spokesman Philippe Lalliot told reporters in Paris, demanding that the former junta stop interfering in politics.

EX-JUNTA POWERFUL

Diarra was forced to step down during a meeting with ex-coup leader Captain Amadou Sanogo, according to Bakary Mariko, a spokesman for the former junta. Mariko accused Diarra of urging supporters to disrupt talks on the political crisis and said he had failed to liberate the north or organize free elections.

"This is not a coup. The president is still in place but the prime minister was no longer working in the interests of the country," Mariko said.

A soldier in Kati said he witnessed a tearful Diarra being scolded by Sanogo for having brought shame to the country.

The president was due to address Malians later on Tuesday. Downtown Bamako was calm, but the main road leading to Kati was blocked for security reasons, residents said.

Sanogo has been repeatedly accused by his critics of political meddling since he stepped down and was given the task of overseeing reforms of Mali's army.

Even before Diarra's arrest and resignation, support for the military intervention plan was not universal.

Despite France's desire to see military action against Islamist groups that include al Qaeda's North African wing, AQIM, the United States and the United Nations have expressed concern, saying the plan lacks necessary detail.

The United Nations warned on Monday that Mali was "one of the potentially most explosive corners of the world".

"Discussions at the Security Council were already difficult. Now they are even more so," said a Bamako-based diplomat.

Some of Mali's politicians support the idea of a foreign-backed military operation while others, including much of the military, say they need only financial and logistical support.

The arrival of a foreign force in Mali might weaken the sway of the former junta.

Mariko said the Malian army was ready to act even without international help.

"We want the help of the international community but if it has to wait until September or until an undefined date, then the Malian army will act to free its territory," he said.

The European Union on Monday approved a plan to send 250 trainers to revamp Mali's military but stressed that the army would have to be under civilian authority.

As the son-in-law of Moussa Traore, a former Malian coup leader and president, Diarra had appeared to have good ties with the military.

However, tensions became particularly acute in recent weeks, with analysts saying Diarra, a relative newcomer to Malian politics after years abroad, seemed keen to establish a political base of his own ahead of any future elections.

"I am not sad to see him go but the involvement of the soldiers will only complicate things internationally," said Bamako resident Kassoum Togola.

(Additional reporting by David Lewis in Dakar and John Irish in Paris; Writing by David Lewis and Bate Felix; Editing by Matthew Tostevin)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/mali-pm-arrested-trying-leave-country-military-spokesman-032118315.html

johnny damon kirk cameron news 10 hillary rosen j.k. rowling j.k. rowling axl rose

Analysis: Franco-German chill reshuffles cards in Europe

PARIS (Reuters) - A chill has settled over the Rhine seven months after the election of Socialist French President Francois Hollande, reshuffling the cards in Europe's perpetual power game.

The cooling of traditionally close Franco-German relations was partly an intentional step by Hollande to demonstrate that he is not in conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel's pocket but wants to change the policy direction of the European Union.

It also reflects a fraught process of rebalancing power to accommodate Germany's greater political heft and economic clout.

Despite vows of ever closer cooperation that are sure to mark the 50th anniversary next month of the treaty that sealed post-war Franco-German reconciliation, tension is likely to simmer at least until next September's German general election.

Hollande was keen to distance himself from his conservative predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy's exclusive alliance with the German leader, which became known as "Merkozy" because of the dominant role they played in steering the euro zone debt crisis.

Hollande and Merkel have differed publicly over the right mix between austerity and growth policies, the future of the euro area, a European banking union, and industrial policy.

A series of disputes over common euro zone bonds, the EU budget and the aerospace industry have exposed mutual distrust between German and French officials and business leaders, despite entrenched habits of cooperation.

"It's not an easy dialogue," said Bruno Le Roux, parliamentary floor leader of Hollande's Socialist Party. "It was on the wrong track for the last couple of years and the fact that France was in an electoral cycle for a year and now Germany is in an electoral cycle for a year doesn't help."

Le Roux, who is close to Hollande, said the president had set out to broaden the debate about changing the euro zone's course by including countries such as Italy and Spain that are closer to his approach of "integration with solidarity."

That had led Merkel to build bridges with non-euro Britain on issues such as the EU budget, at France's expense.

Whereas France and Germany cut a deal to preserve the level of agricultural subsidies - of which the French are the chief beneficiaries - in the last long-term EU budget, Berlin cold-shouldered approaches by Paris for a similar pact this time.

In last month's aborted negotiations on the 2014-20 budget, Merkel endorsed lower farm spending despite French pleas and backed British pressure for deeper cuts in total EU expenditure.

The chancellor has expressed public concern about the loss of competitiveness of Europe's second largest economy. Her Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble last month asked a panel of economic advisers to consider reform proposals for France.

In private, senior German officials worry about Hollande's ability to secure support in his Socialist party for the bold shake-up of labor markets, welfare financing and public spending that experts say France needs after the anti-business rhetoric of his election campaign.

Berlin has watched aghast the national drama in France over efforts to save 630 jobs at steelmaker ArcelorMittal, featuring threats to nationalize an ageing steelworks shuttered due to chronic overcapacity in the sector.

In German eyes, the furor over Mittal's Florange plant epitomizes a lack of economic realism and a statist intervention reflex that run counter to Germany's business culture.

Berlin policymakers recognize that Hollande is making a gradual turn towards economic reform, but they have still to be convinced of his determination to stay the course if left-wing and trade union resistance mounts.

Franco-German tensions over power-sharing, industrial policy and the role of the state came to a head in the struggle over European aerospace leader EADS.

Berlin prevented a merger between the Airbus parent and Britain's BAE Systems last month, fearing Germany would be overruled by Franco-British defense interests. The Germans then demanded an equal shareholding with Paris' in EADS.

The result was a shake-up of the European planemaker in which the Berlin government paid more than $2 billion to buy a stake matching France's, only to see the role of state shareholders greatly reduced by new governance arrangements.

The Germans were "obsessed with parity because they are convinced the French want to take over the company, just as the French are convinced the Germans want to take it over," said a person involved in the negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The age when Germany was willing to sign the cheques but let France take the lead in Europe - whether to atone for World War Two or to ease the way for German unification - is over.

EADS is a paradigm for wider difficulties in relations, both because of the mutual suspicion and because of Berlin's determination to assert its increased power in a venture in which the French previously had the upper hand.

Hollande argues that each step towards closer integration in the euro zone should be preceded by an increase in "solidarity" - code for Germany doing more to support weaker southern states.

In contrast, Merkel insists there must be greater central control of national budgetary and economic policies to ensure they respect EU rules before any sharing of liabilities.

The Frenchman advocates common euro zone bonds to help pay off those countries' accumulated debts. He also wants joint deposit insurance in which German depositors and taxpayers would underwrite shaky banks in other euro zone states.

Both ideas are anathema in Germany, at least this side of the election and probably for much longer.

Irked by Hollande's perceived attempts to isolate her, Merkel has reached out to other partners to strengthen her hand in European negotiations.

In an essay entitled "After Merkozy, how France and Germany can make Europe work" (*), Ulrike Guerot and Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Relations recount how Berlin lines up support from the Dutch and Finns, fellow north European AAA-rated nations, before dealing with the French.

"We call the French only once we have established a common position among our group of like-minded countries," they quoted a German official involved in financial negotiations as saying.

"And we know that once we start speaking with the French, then the trouble starts."

* After Merkokzy, how France and Germany can make Europe work, policy brief, ECFR.

http://ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR56_FRANCE_GERMANY_BRIEF_AW.pdf

(Additional reporting by Tim Hepher; editing by James Jukwey)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-franco-german-chill-reshuffles-cards-europe-065828922.html

love actually miesha tate vs ronda rousey idiocracy deep impact usssa baseball alex o loughlin the godfather

Beijing targets those who cross the street 'with Chinese characteristics'

Beijing's 'strike hard' campaign aims to tame the anarchy that reigns at crosswalks and intersections. ?Our correspondent's take: 'Good luck.'

By Peter Ford,?Staff Writer / December 11, 2012

Firefighters march in a line crossing the street on Tiananmen Square, next to the Great Hall of the People, the venue of the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, in Beijing, November 14.

David Gray/Reuters/File

Enlarge

Beijing?s finest, ever vigilant on the law-and-order front, have set themselves a challenging new task: to eradicate the phenomenon known as ?crossing the road, Chinese-style.?

Skip to next paragraph Peter Ford

Beijing Bureau Chief

Peter Ford is The Christian Science Monitor?s Beijing Bureau Chief. He covers news and features throughout China and also makes reporting trips to Japan and the Korean peninsula.

Recent posts

' + google_ads[0].line2 + '
' + google_ads[0].line3 + '

'; } else if (google_ads.length > 1) { ad_unit += ''; } } document.getElementById("ad_unit").innerHTML += ad_unit; google_adnum += google_ads.length; return; } var google_adnum = 0; google_ad_client = "pub-6743622525202572"; google_ad_output = 'js'; google_max_num_ads = '1'; google_feedback = "on"; google_ad_type = "text"; google_adtest = "on"; google_image_size = '230x105'; google_skip = '0'; // -->

Subscribe Today to the Monitor

Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of
The Christian Science Monitor
Weekly Digital Edition

A new ?strike hard? campaign, launched last week, is aimed at ?bringing order to traffic and security? at the city?s intersections, according to the Beijing municipal police website.

Good luck to them.

The police appear to have been goaded into action not so much by the anarchy that has long reigned on most Beijing streets, but by an online comment that went viral a few weeks ago.

A blogger remarked ? entirely accurately ? that crossing the road with Chinese characteristics has nothing to do with whether the lights are red or green. The determining factor is how many people are waiting on the curb. Once a crowd has reached critical mass, it moves.

As more and more Beijingers buy cars, and drive them without necessarily bothering to get a license, life for the city?s crowds of pedestrians and its diminishing band of cyclists has grown increasingly hazardous.

Pedestrian fatalities in China are 18 times higher, per 100,000 motorized vehicles, than in the United States, according to Ni Ying, who did her doctoral thesis on the dangers of Chinese crossroads.

?High rates of pedestrian noncompliance and low rates of driver-yielding behavior? accounted for the Chinese statistics, she concluded.

Jaywalking is a national habit that the capital?s police would like to break, but they are not training their sights on pedestrians alone. The goal, says the official website warning, is also to enforce drivers? lane discipline and to stop cyclists crashing red lights, carrying passengers on the back seat, and riding the wrong way up cycle lanes.

This is nothing less than an assault on a fundamental right that all Chinese citizens hold dear: to do precisely as they please on the public highway.

Learning to 'Beijing it'

I walk, ride my bike, and drive my car all the time in Beijing, and frankly it is a miracle that I am still alive. Not least because after living here for six years, I have gone native when it comes to traffic etiquette.

I still recall the sense of pride with which I rode my bicycle the wrong way up a street for the first time, taking a call on my mobile phone. I felt like a true Beijinger. And the quaint idea that I should stop at a red light rather than weave a path through the cars getting in my way is one that I abandoned a long time ago.

I am better behaved behind the wheel of my 1980s Jeep Cherokee (an ideal, bullock-like vehicle in which to navigate the city?s traffic). But even then the frustration of watching other drivers jam up an intersection by ignoring the simplest rules of the road, not to mention elementary courtesy, can tempt me to barge into the melee myself.

In my family, we have coined a verb for the sort of inconsiderate and patently illegal behavior to which my wife and I occasionally sink, such as sailing past a highway traffic jam in the emergency vehicle lane: We call that ?to Beijing it.?

If the city police have their way, that kind of description will soon be history. But I wouldn?t hold my breath.

The Beijing police department is running a little quiz on its ?weibo,? a Twitter-like platform, asking people why they think Beijingers are so careless on the road. The two most popular answers so far are ?a weak sense of the law? and ?low levels of public morality and civic responsibility.?

It will take more than a few traffic fines to deal with those problems, I?m afraid. And I say that as one who, to his shame, knows whereof he speaks.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/U41nuoPcauQ/Beijing-targets-those-who-cross-the-street-with-Chinese-characteristics

dave matthews ambien wwdc heart attack grill madden 13 cover dalai lama tamera mowry

Video: CNBC Fed Survey: QE & the Economy

Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.

Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/cnbc/50160312/

end of the world 2012

NASA surprised to spot ice on Mercury

NASA's Messenger probe enabled researchers to find unexpected materials frozen in Mercury's north pole. Scientists think the materials arrived via comets or asteroids that hit millions of years ago.?

By Irene Klotz,?Reuters / November 29, 2012

This photo shows a 68-mile-diameter crater, large indentation at center, in the north polar region of Mercury which has been shown to harbor water ice, thanks to measurements by the Messenger spacecraft. Scientists made the announcement Thursday.

AP Photo/NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

Enlarge

Despite searing daytime temperatures, Mercury, the planet closest to the sun, has ice and frozen organic materials inside permanently shadowed craters in its north pole,?NASA scientists said on Thursday.

Skip to next paragraph

' + google_ads[0].line2 + '
' + google_ads[0].line3 + '

'; } else if (google_ads.length > 1) { ad_unit += ''; } } document.getElementById("ad_unit").innerHTML += ad_unit; google_adnum += google_ads.length; return; } var google_adnum = 0; google_ad_client = "pub-6743622525202572"; google_ad_output = 'js'; google_max_num_ads = '1'; google_feedback = "on"; google_ad_type = "text"; google_adtest = "on"; google_image_size = '230x105'; google_skip = '0'; // -->

Subscribe Today to the Monitor

Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of
The Christian Science Monitor
Weekly Digital Edition

Earth-based telescopes have been compiling evidence for ice on Mercury for 20 years, but the finding of organics was a surprise, say researchers with?NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft, the first probe to orbit Mercury.

Both ice and organic materials, which are similar to tar or coal, were believed to have been delivered millions of years ago by comets and asteroids crashing into the planet.

"It's not something we expected to see, but then of course you realize it kind of makes sense because we see this in other places," such as icy bodies in the outer solar system and in the nuclei of comets, planetary scientist David Paige, with the?University of California, Los Angeles, told Reuters.

Unlike?NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, which will be sampling rocks and soils to look for organic materials directly, the MESSENGER probe bounces?laser?beams, counts particles, measures gamma rays and collects other data remotely from orbit.

The discoveries of ice and organics, painstakingly pieced together for more than a year, are based on computer models, laboratory experiments and deduction, not direct analysis.

"The explanation that seems to fit all the data is that it's organic material," said lead MESSENGER scientist?Sean Solomon, with?Columbia University in New York.

Added Paige, "It's not just a crazy hypothesis. No one has got anything else that seems to fit all the observations better."

Scientists believe the organic material, which is about twice as dark as most of Mercury's surface, was mixed in with comet- or asteroid-delivered ice eons ago.

The ice vaporized, then re-solidified where it was colder, leaving dark deposits on the surface. Radar imagery shows the dark patches subside at the coldest parts of the crater, where ice can exist on the surface.

The areas where the dark patches are seen are not cold enough for surface ice without the overlying layer of what is believed to be organics.

So remote was the idea of organics on Mercury that MESSENGER got a relatively easy pass by?NASA's planetary protection protocols that were established to minimize the chance of contaminating any indigenous life-potential material with hitchhiking microbes from Earth.

Scientists don't believe Mercury is or was suitable for ancient life, but the discovery of organics on an inner planet of the solar system may shed light on how life got started on Earth and how life may evolve on planets beyond the solar system.

"Finding a place in the inner solar system where some of these same ingredients that may have led to life on Earth are preserved for us is really exciting," Paige said.

MESSENGER, which stands for Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging, is due to complete its two-year mission at Mercury in March.

Scientists are seeking?NASA funding to continue operations for at least part of a third year. The probe will remain in Mercury's orbit until the planet's gravity eventually causes it to crash onto the surface.

Whether the discovery of organics now prompts?NASA to select a crash zone rather than leave it up to chance remains to be seen. Microbes that may have hitched a ride on MESSENGER likely have been killed off by the harsh?radiation?environment at Mercury.

The research is published in this week's edition of the journal Science.

(Editing by Kevin Gray and Vicki Allen)

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/6YYt4iVttuo/NASA-surprised-to-spot-ice-on-Mercury

convulsions john tyler chuck elisabeth hasselbeck fran drescher scarlett o hara pat sajak

Grieving Cowboys rally past Bengals

Bailey's 40-yard field goal as time expires leads Dallas to 20-19 win

By JOE KAY

Associated Press Sports

updated 5:04 p.m. ET Dec. 9, 2012

CINCINNATI - Numb. Grieving. Distracted. The Cowboys were all those things on Sunday, dealing with the death of one teammate and the tribulations of another.

Winners, too, though they hardly felt like it.

Dan Bailey kicked a 40-yard field goal as time ran out, sending the Cowboys to a 20-19 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals that ended a tough afternoon with a little bit of relief and their playoff chances enhanced.

Didn't last long, though. There will be a lot more emotional days ahead in Dallas.

"It's a hard, hard situation we're in," quarterback Tony Romo said. "There's no playbook for this sort of thing in life."

The Cowboys overcame a nine-point deficit in the closing minutes behind Romo, who held his hand over his heart during a moment of silence to honor teammate Jerry Brown before the kickoff. The linebacker died in an auto accident early Saturday.

Defensive lineman Josh Brent, who was driving, was still jailed in Texas on Sunday, charged with intoxication manslaughter.

The Cowboys (7-6) learned about Brown's death on their flight to Cincinnati on Saturday. Coach Jason Garrett told his team that the best way to honor him was to play well in a game with playoff implications for both teams.

One of the visitors' metal lockers at Paul Brown Stadium had a strip of white athletic tape with "53 JERRY BROWN" attached to the top, a wooden stool inside sitting upside-down. Brown's No. 53 jersey was on the sideline during the game - defensive tackle Jason Hatcher held it up after Bailey's kick decided it.

It wasn't much of a celebration by an emotionally spent team.

"I don't remember crying this much other than maybe the day I was born," defensive lineman Marcus Spears said. "With Josh's situation and Jerry being gone, you felt it."

Players couldn't keep the tragedy out of their thoughts during the game, finding their minds wandering on the bench.

"I rarely let my emotions get the best of me," fullback Lawrence Vickers said. "Today they did, but this was the place to do it."

Owner Jerry Jones described his team as grieving when it took the field. It was the second consecutive week that an NFL team was playing a day after losing a teammate. Kansas City beat Carolina 27-21 one day after linebacker Jovan Belcher shot his girlfriend and then himself at the Chiefs' practice complex.

When Bailey's kick ended it, the Cowboys had a lot of thoughts racing through their heads.

"The last 24 hours has really been something I've never experienced," Romo said. "It's something I've never experienced, and I think a lot of guys will tell you that. It's just been a roller coaster of emotions.

"It was a very - and still is - a very difficult thing that this football team is dealing with."

The Cowboys salvaged the game by scoring on their last two drives against the Bengals (7-6), who had won four in a row and had a chance to move into position for an AFC wild-card berth with a victory.

Romo threw a 27-yard touchdown pass to Dez Bryant with 6:35 to go. Anthony Spencer's sack of Andy Dalton forced a punt, and Romo completed four passes on the drive to Bailey's winning kick.

Romo finished 25 of 43 for 268 yards with a touchdown, an interception and three sacks. DeMarco Murray converted a third-and-5 play to extend the final drive and ended up with 53 yards on 21 carries.

Newcomer Josh Brown kicked field goals of 25, 33, 25 and 52 yards for Cincinnati, which wasted an opportunity to move ahead of Pittsburgh for the second AFC wild card.

"That was a tough one today," Bengals defensive tackle Domata Peko said. "We were getting after their offense and doing a pretty good job with their running game, but they got us on their last two drives."

Dallas played a sloppy game until the closing minutes - nothing out of character there - and had a few especially bad moments.

Defensive coordinator Rob Ryan went onto the field and yelled at a Bengals player who had said something to the Cowboys bench, drawing an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Dallas in the third quarter. Dallas also was penalized for 12 men on the field during the drive, which ended with Brown's third field goal and a 16-10 Cincinnati lead.

In the end, a defense that has allowed only three touchdowns in the last four games couldn't hold on. And the Bengals made it tough on themselves by using all three of their timeouts early in the second half, leaving them unable to stop the clock on Dallas' final drive.

Dalton was 20 of 33 for 206 yards with five sacks, one touchdown and an interception that Brandon Carr returned 37 yards to set up Murray's 1-yard touchdown dive in the second quarter.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

advertisement

More news

Watch live: Lions-Packers

Watch Detroit vs. Green Bay in an HD player with DVR style controls, alternate angles, stats, highlights and more. Chat with others during the game.

Joe Robbins / Getty Images

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/50138455/ns/sports-nfl/

faith hill metro north taco bell taco bell Breezy Point Seaside Heights nj transit

Expect perpeptual property tax hikes | Columnists | Opinion ...

Winnipeggers should expect city council to keep picking their pockets clean. (QMI Agency files)

Report an error

It looks like Winnipeg homeowners are now in for multiple years of property tax increases after the city?s finance chairman confirmed there will be another tax hike in 2013.

Coun. Russ Wyatt ? the city?s new tax boss ? also suggested the city has no appetite to curb skyrocketing labour costs at city hall, which jumped 23% in four years from 2007 to 2011. He says the city pretty much has its ?hands tied? on labour costs because of negotiated settlements.

Funny they say that every year, even though they do renegotiate contracts every few years and have an opportunity to sign collective agreements that are more beneficial to taxpayers. But city council doesn?t appear interested in taking on the unions in any way.

No, there hasn?t been a willingness to curb soaring labour costs at city hall for years. Wyatt is now simply making it official.

The other driver behind the city?s skyrocketing labour costs is that the city has added nearly 500 staff to its ranks from 2007 to 2011, according to its most recent annual report.

That?s stunning. The average annual headcount of staff in 2011 was 10,039, up from 9,552 in 2007.

Sure, some of those added staff are new police and paramedic positions, but those represent a minority of the new jobs.

There?s no way the city will ever get its costs under control until it starts dealing with its growing bureaucracy. And since there appears to be no political will to do so, we can expect multiple years of property tax hikes. Maintaining the status quo is always the easiest route for politicians.

Meanwhile, I?ve never heard a city finance chairman concede as early as November that there will definitely be a property tax hike when the operating budget comes down likely in March or April.

These guys are now throwing in the towel that early. Which doesn?t bode well for future years. If the chairman of the finance committee is saying as early as November that there will definitely be a tax hike in March, they?re essentially sending out the message that city hall has fallen back into a period of perpetual tax hikes.

It?s bad news for taxpayers, who won?t receive any real improvements in the services they receive from the city.

They will simply pay more for the same services.

And it?s not just property tax hikes that will force Winnipeggers to hand over more of their shrinking after-tax dollars to the city. Water and Waste has already put us on notice that there will be successive years of substantial rate hikes on our sewer and water bills, on top of the new $50-a-year garbage tax that will also show up on that bill.

And no, not all of the rate hikes will go towards the upgrade of sewage treatment plants and water treatment facilities.

The city takes a multi-million dollar ?dividend? from the utility every year which goes back into general revenues to help fund the city?s bureaucracy, which is really a back-door tax grab.

Between annual property tax hikes and soaring sewer and water rate increases, Winnipeg homeowners are going to find themselves digging a lot deeper into their pockets to fund city hall over the next five to 10 years.

The only thing that would stop that is if we elected a fiscally responsible mayor and council who could implement a responsible austerity program at 510 Main St.

Let?s just say I?m not holding my breath.

SALARIES AND BENEFITS

City of Winnipeg 2007-2011

• 2007 - $539 million
• 2008 - $565 million
• 2009 - $599 million
• 2010 - $623 million
• 2011 - $664 million

?

How do you feel about your property taxes going up?

Source: http://www.winnipegsun.com/2012/11/08/city-council-throws-in-the-towel-on-property-tax-hike

rashad evans jon jones chuck colson death meteor showers 2012 ufc 145 jones vs evans marian hossa