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Take it from me, someone who left the U.S.... Harper shows all the signs of Bush & co... a flagrant disregard for the laws and norms of society and a feeling of entitlement... this combined with an allegiance to big business and multinationals = a situation ripe for abuse. I hope Canadians have the sense to vote liberal this election.
I'm not sure how you see the sense of entitlement in him. His opponents after all call themselves the "natural governing party" - That would be the Liberal party.
Not only that, there really isn't the allegiance to big business that people claim. The Liberal party has been in debt up to their eyeballs since large corporate donations were banned. The Conservatives, however, have thrived since then - Meaning that Harper's party thrives off hugely loyal grassroots support.
If you're referring to the proposed tax cuts as some sort of cozying to big business, you're wrong again, I think. It's worth knowing that our corporate taxes are actually quite high (and for large corporations will remain higher than corporate havens like Sweden and Finland - actually higher than most of the Western world). I think they do pander very much to the Conservative base though. However, that base is primarily small to medium businesspeople (keep in mind that farmers and ranchers are corporations too).
Anyway, you've essentially advocated voting for a party that still insists it's only natural they govern, and that can't make ends meet without massive corporate donations to end an era of entitlement and corporate allegiance? I'm not sure I follow the logic on that one.
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Originally Posted by lucknow
Canadians don't usually wake up about the conservatives until they really screw up. Like Harris in Ontario and Mulroney in Ottawa.
Canadians don't wake up until any political party screws up - because it's not exposed until after they do. And we forget quickly after the fact.
And frankly, the whole contempt issue strikes me as somewhat partisan and overblown (the cabinet ruling, not the Bev Oda ruling).
Given that two, increasingly detailed reports were provided (one prior to the contempt committee and one to the committee directly) it doesn't appear there was really historical grounds for a contempt ruling. The house has the right to demand production of documents should they be deemed necessary. However, in this instance when reports were produced in regards to government crime bills the opposition declared the figures they contained absurd and proceeded with the contempt ruling.
This, then, seems to have gone beyond the house's right to order production of documents. There is no codified rule stating that once produced the house must like them. That's traditionally why we vote on them.
However, given the state of parliement, once the committee on contempt had opened proceedings (and it was opened prior to the tabling of said reports), there was no reason that they could not find the government in contempt, as the committee was opposition controlled.
In regards to Bev Oda (who may have been found in contempt had the government not fallen) I think she probably was, and I'm a little surprised that the government defended her as much as they did, given their history for distancing themselves from those who've made less grevious errors Helena Geurgis for example).
I can only assume that the government felt that the opposition may have some dissenters on either the contempt/budget (whichever came first) and her vote would be valuable, or that she was an easy seat to retain in the inevitable election.
I'm glad you brought up the issue of Geurgis. As of this moment Harper and his henchmen have not proven one single bad act by this woman. That's contemptous to me. Shutting down Parlament twice when the government was in trouble, that's so arrogant and again contemptous of all Canadians. Spending over a billion dollars to host the G20? That's not contempt that just stupidity.
Conservatives, the self appointed guardians of the public purse strings?????????????
The largest deficit in Canadian history under these morons. Typical conservatives, giving out tax breaks while cutting social spending and breaking the deficit record to boot. PFFFFFFT is all I can say to these losers.
I'm glad you brought up the issue of Geurgis. As of this moment Harper and his henchmen have not proven one single bad act by this woman. That's contemptous to me. Shutting down Parlament twice when the government was in trouble, that's so arrogant and again contemptous of all Canadians. Spending over a billion dollars to host the G20? That's not contempt that just stupidity.
Conservatives, the self appointed guardians of the public purse strings?????????????
The largest deficit in Canadian history under these morons. Typical conservatives, giving out tax breaks while cutting social spending and breaking the deficit record to boot. PFFFFFFT is all I can say to these losers.
I brought up Geurgis precisely because of that. She was jettisoned at the first hint of wrongdoing (proof of which never emerged). Evidently, you missed my point regarding Bev Oda.
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I wish people that harp about prorogation would take the time to read even a little Canadian (let alone British) history. I really do.
Macdonald prorogued parliement in 1873, to avoid the pacific scandal. King asked for prorogation in 1926, but was refused. Trudeau progroged parliement in 1972 to avoid an auditor general's report - not to mention the war measures act, let's not even get into that) Chretien prorogred parliement in 1993 to avoid handing over a report to parliement (wait - isn't that supposed to get you held in contempt)
No one is saying Stephen Harper is a saint. However, it's ridiculous to judge him apart from those other 4 (two of whom are held to be among our best). Actually, as a leader, he very much resembles 3 of those 4 (not sure about King, not all that familliar with him)
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In regards to the financial matters:
You claim they reduce social spending - however from 2009 to 2010, spending on federal programs increased from $99 billion to $112 billion, and social transfers (health care, etc) increased from $46 billion to $50 billion. That's a total increase of $17 billion in social spending.
And yes, you're correct in some ways - the conservatives wanted no part of the stimulus package that was eventually rolled into the 2010 budget. However, as they were not ready to fight an election, they had no choice but to give in to opposition demands for it. This stimulus accounted for some $60 billion in spending over 2 years, along with about $7 billion in tax cuts. So, that's $54 billion that was not initally written into the budget by the gov't. If we split that in half, we're left with a deficit for 2010 of about $4 billion.
It's harder to predict what would have happened in 2011's budget without this forced hand spending. If we take revenues at face value, we're sitting at about $23 billion in the hole. While not exactly commendable, it's not exactly cringe worthy either, given the economic state of the world.
As an aside - I bet you weren't aware that they also presided over the largest budget surplus in Canadian history - it's true. $14.2 billion in 2007.
Actually - another interesting aside. In 2010 Canada had a lower deficit/GDP ratio than all but 6 OECD countries. So, essentially, in a competition to keep deficits down, we placed 6th in the developed world, and at 5.2%, were well below the 8.3% average.
I wouldn't argue with your take on the G20 costs.
However, it should be fairly clear that your fiscal accusations of the Conservatives are baseless, not to mention your total lack of understanding of parliementary procedure.
Also: no one remembers that a succession of Liberal governments (while not alone in this regard) continually rolled our CPP contributions into general revenues, thereby using them willy-nilly for anything other than pensions with Paul Martin being more than willing as a finance minister to behave this way. Paul Martin gets elected PM and it's: "my heavens the CPP is in arrears and must be topped up so all you contributers gotta pony up additional funds". Is there nothing morally wrong with that picture? How about the sponsorship scandal under Chretiens watch? That guy almost lost us Quebec and while we might debate the loss as being good or bad it was nevertheless his sleeping at the wheel that almost got us in the ditch with a 51/49 vote. Arrogance and stubborness know no party lines.
This election was unnecessary and created solely by means of the opposition parties demanding things that they knew would doom Harper if he acquiesced to them. The Bev Oda and Helena Guergis debacles will bite him, as they should, but should not be viewed as only happening with conservatives.
Liberals have the distinction of being the worst respecters of a viable military and being present and accounted for when they brought in Tri-service amalgamation, I can personally attest to how that began the terrible process of denuding our ranks of skilled and highly trained people in all branches of the military. The last few years have seen the government having to play catch-up in a whirl-wind of spending brought on from our embarrassment at having to beg and borrow everything from ammunition, body armour, desert cammo gear, to heavy lift aircraft to get our meager stuff to where it's been desperately needed to fulfill even a minor role in our U.N. peacekeeping role. Iggy and Taliban Jack screaming we LOST our seat on the UN committee through our lack of political savvy have it arse backwards, we lost that through years of not having anything to contribute OTHER than moralistic tsk's - tsk's during those committeee meetings.
We're finally getting back to where we were before the mid 60's and it's happening in SPITE of years of Liberal neglect.
Is Harper an arrogant arse? Yep, but I don't want a PM whose my new best friend, I had no use for Trudeau and his arrogant antics either but, giving the man his just due, he was a very astute politician who garnered much respect for Canada on the world stage while at the same time p***ing off a lot of Canadians.
I brought up Geurgis precisely because of that. She was jettisoned at the first hint of wrongdoing (proof of which never emerged). Evidently, you missed my point regarding Bev Oda.
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I wish people that harp about prorogation would take the time to read even a little Canadian (let alone British) history. I really do.
Macdonald prorogued parliement in 1873, to avoid the pacific scandal. King asked for prorogation in 1926, but was refused. Trudeau progroged parliement in 1972 to avoid an auditor general's report - not to mention the war measures act, let's not even get into that) Chretien prorogred parliement in 1993 to avoid handing over a report to parliement (wait - isn't that supposed to get you held in contempt)
No one is saying Stephen Harper is a saint. However, it's ridiculous to judge him apart from those other 4 (two of whom are held to be among our best). Actually, as a leader, he very much resembles 3 of those 4 (not sure about King, not all that familliar with him)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
In regards to the financial matters:
You claim they reduce social spending - however from 2009 to 2010, spending on federal programs increased from $99 billion to $112 billion, and social transfers (health care, etc) increased from $46 billion to $50 billion. That's a total increase of $17 billion in social spending.
And yes, you're correct in some ways - the conservatives wanted no part of the stimulus package that was eventually rolled into the 2010 budget. However, as they were not ready to fight an election, they had no choice but to give in to opposition demands for it. This stimulus accounted for some $60 billion in spending over 2 years, along with about $7 billion in tax cuts. So, that's $54 billion that was not initally written into the budget by the gov't. If we split that in half, we're left with a deficit for 2010 of about $4 billion.
It's harder to predict what would have happened in 2011's budget without this forced hand spending. If we take revenues at face value, we're sitting at about $23 billion in the hole. While not exactly commendable, it's not exactly cringe worthy either, given the economic state of the world.
As an aside - I bet you weren't aware that they also presided over the largest budget surplus in Canadian history - it's true. $14.2 billion in 2007.
Actually - another interesting aside. In 2010 Canada had a lower deficit/GDP ratio than all but 6 OECD countries. So, essentially, in a competition to keep deficits down, we placed 6th in the developed world, and at 5.2%, were well below the 8.3% average.
I wouldn't argue with your take on the G20 costs.
However, it should be fairly clear that your fiscal accusations of the Conservatives are baseless, not to mention your total lack of understanding of parliementary procedure.
Very typical childish excuse for bad behaviour. Na na na na na, the other guy did it too. I understand Canadian ParliAmentary proceedure quite well. Well enough to know that the present government does not respect it at all.
Ya right, Kicking Gurgis out of the government at the first hint of wrongdoing!!! Another total contempt of the people of Simcoe who ELECTED her to office. Harper who has convicted fraudsters working in the PM office? Give me a break!!!
The very worst thing about the government of Stephen Harper is their complete lack of care and attention to the Province of Ontario. For that reason alone I'd never support him. Ontario is the economic engine of Canada. How goes ON goes the rest of the country no matter what the pipsqueaks from the rest of the country think.
Very typical childish excuse for bad behaviour. Na na na na na, the other guy did it too. I understand Canadian ParliAmentary proceedure quite well. Well enough to know that the present government does not respect it at all.
Ya right, Kicking Gurgis out of the government at the first hint of wrongdoing!!! Another total contempt of the people of Simcoe who ELECTED her to office. Harper who has convicted fraudsters working in the PM office? Give me a break!!!
You missed the entire premise of my post. Proroguing parliament is not actually bad behaviour. I wasn't finding other cases of rule breaking, I was pointing out other cases where the Prime Minister used a legitimate parliamentary procedure to avoid a problem. You've decided arbitrarily that it's disrespectful and bad. You have yet to provide anything to back up that claim. Where exactly within parliamentary procedure does it state that it's not allowed?
Oddly enough, even if you still dispute the legality of prorogation (and I'm not sure how you can) the blame lies not with Stephen Harper, but with Michaelle Jean. As stated above, King asked for prorogation, but the Governor General denied the request. So, in the end shouldn't you be blaming the Governor General for granting it?
As for Helena Guergis, the people of Simcoe are still represented by her and can elect her to office again should they choose to do so. I beleive she's running as an independent right now, and looks good to win.
Quote:
The very worst thing about the government of Stephen Harper is their complete lack of care and attention to the Province of Ontario. For that reason alone I'd never support him. Ontario is the economic engine of Canada. How goes ON goes the rest of the country no matter what the pipsqueaks from the rest of the country think.
If Ontario is truly the economic powerhouse you claim, then please return the transfer payments that Alberta, Saskatchewan, BC and Newfoundland sent. These 'pipsqueak' provinces would prefer not to prop Ontario up.
Also, I suggest you get in touch with Saskatchewan, because they certainly haven't got the message that they're supposed to falter when Ontario does. Saskatchewan didn't have a recession to speak of - their economy kept growing right through it, despite the economic hardships in Ontario.
Lucknow: Ontario WAS the economic engine manufacturing-wise and was continually contributing more than others to the transfer payment scheme for years. In that regard we have agreement that Ontario has taken many hits as it is now considered a "have-not" province. Jobs moving offshore have taken our standing right into the basement so resource rich provinces such as Alberta are now the boomers. You can say what you like about our (Ontarios) economy having some effect on the rest of the country but referring to them as "pip-squeaks" is merely going to reinforce their opinion that we have thought and behaved as though Toronto was the center of the universe and now it's their turn to gloat. At least Harper hasn't run around alienating the west as virtually every Liberal leader did by pandering to Quebec in such obvious fashions with grants for everything from Bombardier to a Private lodge in the eastern townships. The one that really ticked me off was giving Bombardier research and development money to develop fuel and emissions compliant lawn mower engines for c***** sake! Bombardier wants to get into that business, use their own money instead of taxpayers to figure out how to put a cleaner engine on a lawn mower. Sheesh; that stuff is enough to bring a grown man to tears.
Trudeau was arrogant enough but what do we do with a Russian prince or duke or whatever the h** he is who hasn't spent the last 20 years in Canada and was proud of identifying himself as an American while courting the elitists of that country. If he falters; the fall-back reserve kicker is Bob Rae and he had more to do with embarrassing Ontario than anyone while it's lofty leader, handing out grants to the "Buddies In Bad Times Theater". This total disregard for taxpayers money is at the core of everything wrong with the Liberal party and I don't see that changing with Iggy Pop at the helm. Just listen to both of them (oppositon leaders) now, offering everything from free Day Care to a chicken in every pot to garner votes. Where do they (and you) think that money is going to come from? Far better a bunch of military gear than the usual "nanny-state' hand outs.
Seeing how ON has 40% of the GDP of the entire country it's still the economic engine of Canada regardless what you think about that.
AS of fiscal 09, 10, ON is the only province in Canada to have never recieved one cent in equalization payments. The province has been carrying the rest of the country since confederation. Now that ON is experienced some hard times, what do we get from the Harperities. NOTHING, ZERO, ZILTCH. For that reason alone the people of ON should not vote conservative.
By the way, to put things into perspective, Alberta's share of the GDP is 13%. The lion of the Canadian economy!!! LOL
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