I agree with you there Ebbie, I could have just as easiily pointed to Shell but in this instance, the loudest published protest came from a US company.

A lot of Canadians and Americans believe that those international mega corps should be totally unfettered. Considering mega-business has more money and power than most small countries and relatively little or no moral responsibility as entities, despite massive amounts of budgeted PR to claim the contrary, they need to pay their fair share for their actions and utilizing a country's resources.

In this country that fair share, in the form of taxes, has been in constant decline since the early 1960's with the lower or middle income earners saddled with the fiscal responsibility for an ever increasing portion of the pie. The argument being that in order to be competive our taxation system should more closely parallel the US as far as business is concerned.

If you suggest even a small dip into mega-profits in order to sustain the society whithin which they operate, you are up for attack. One usual come back in this country is to suggest that if there is a problem with funding services for citizens, that should be handled by cutting back on those services.....but how dare you even suggest that our profits be touched, you Commie!

Somehow I always find myself trying to remember first principles:

"The purpose of government is to protect the weak from the powerful."    Hammurabi