Encana Shows A Little Pimp Hand To Alberta

Canada's most profitable company in 2003 and 2004, Encana, doesn't want to give its fair share back to it's number one cash cow, the province of Alberta. The Alberta government -- hardly a bunch of lefties -- recently noted that the oil industry has fallen shy a couple of billion dollars of what the should rightly have paid back into the province.

Encana has no problem with spending money -- they have loads of it -- if it involves bulldozing some of historic downtown Calgary to make room for a hideous, Borg-inspired eyesore with their name on it. There's all kinds of tax breaks to be had when it comes to producing an eyesore -- which Calgary already has enough of.

Randy Eresman, Encana's CEO, has said that Encana's coughing up its fair share "will have immediate and long-term impacts on working Albertans" and that "We would greatly regret seeing these job opportunities evaporate."

Screw you, Randy. Go dig more holes in Wyoming if that makes you happy. You and I both know where North America's biggest petroleum reserves are. And since you've been in the oil business for so long, you seem to have forgotten how the free market works. So, a reminder:

A has something that B wants. A sets the price. If B doesn't like it, he can go shopping for it from C or D. In this specific case, A equals "Alberta." B equals "oil companies." C and D are other parts of the world that don't have as much of what you're looking for, and/or will charge you more for it. It's a classic model, like prostitutes and clients. That model works just fine for eveyone until the pimps start acting up, and the hos forget that they are the product, and they should set the price. That's how honest business works

Eresman was born and raised in Alberta, but suckling at the teat of petroleum apparently makes brothers of greed-heads everywhere. It's just a shame for him that oil can't be outsourced like labour or cheap Wal-Mart flop flops that save you money but cause a rash.

So, allow me to gently rephrase the Our Fair Share report for you: You want some of this? If you don't, there's another drunken, moneyed sailor on shore leave right behind you. Stop wasting my time. You here to do business, or just gawk at our fishnets?