"Where Are Ontarians?"

Oh yes, the Ontario budget. Which the government has presented, almost completely snubbing the Drummond report that was to have inspired it to practical heights of decision-making to extract the province from its truly dismal financial position. According to the Liberal plan of self-rescue, the $15.2-billion 2011 deficit will stand still in 2012, and spiral downward by several billion the following year, in a gradual diminution until 2017-18.

We should live so long, as that sweet old saying goes. But perhaps not under a Liberal government.

Ontario's net debt this year is $260-billion. Servicing that debt is roughly analogous to the amount allocated for the entire provincial higher education budget. Which is to say almost $11-billion in interest payments alone, the third-highest expense in the provincial budget. And that represents a whopping $19,250 debt for every one of us Ontarians.

What did we do to deserve this unenviable status? Why, we brought Dalton McGuinty to power.

And then, gluttons for punishment, and in the face of all the wasteful scandals and half-baked favourite projects that lost money one after the other, voted him back in again, for three successive terms. Aren't we proud of ourselves? What's that old adage; we get what we deserve? Do we really deserve the position we are now in, with a growing debt and deficit and shrinking economy?

Once the engine of the federal economy, now reduced to having become a 'have-not' province. So that this year the federal government will see to apportioning hand-outs under the equalization program, with Ontario receiving three billion of its own back, in an envelope-under-the-table tryst with regrettable ignominy.

So, over to the public service sector that has benefited so handsomely over the eight-year period of government-union negotiations. A unionized wage freeze. The imposition of a further two-year freeze on executive compensation in the public sector, Queen's Park included. Public service pensions will be henceforth topped up by public servants themselves to a greater degree.

In their greater-than-thou-Drummond wisdom, full-day kindergartens will proceed full speed ahead. Who said that Ontario doesn't deserve a publicly-funded day-care operation? Like it or not, it's here. The estimated $1.5-billion it costs is just another fact of life; the Liberals have thus decreed. And for those well-off middle-class families who send their young to college and university, that 30% rebate will continue.

The middle class won't wince too much at that, so it's over to those on welfare to tighten their belts a little more, because welfare payments are set to be reduced, and that's that. The downtrodden don't tend to be as vocal, as impressively indulged as those that have, nor do they vote quite as vigorously as perhaps they should.

Sure, the public health drug formulary will be altered, so that retired singles making $100,000 annually or couples earning $140,000 annually, will have to pony up more of their own funds for drugs; roughly $680, annually. As though with that kind of retirement income they might find it difficult to come up with that sum to acquire the prescription drugs they require to prolong their lives.

The Conservatives are fuming. The NDP, not so much, though they should be. They will do anything to forestall the potential of the Conservatives being voted in as the next government should this one fall. Not on their watch, though. "Where are Ontarians? Are they happy with the budget or are they not happy with the budget? Do they want to go back to the polls or not?"

Are you offering?