Biggest story yesterday was, without a doubt, the eHealth auditor’s report on a $1B WASTE of OUR MONEY. That was, in fact, the biggest news story this week. On Wednesday morning, the Ottawa Citizen (a CanWest newspaper) reported on David Caplan’s weasley resignation over eHealth on PAGE 4 in a sub-sub column type story, buried far away from the front page. I thought: OK, it’s a CanWest paper. They don’t like to talk dirty about ANY liberal.  Strike one.

So then came on Global TV News (CanWest again) with Kevin Newman, live from Toronto, on Thursday evening. Lead story? How the CONSERVATIVES are NOT ACCOUNTABLE for the stimulus program with their ‘vague’ Action Plan website with only ballpark numbers, and how in the States it is all so wonderful with fancy websites with all the information you could ever need on their stimulus packages, down to the cent. We got to see some Liberal MP, aide by the side, you know, to provide him with some much needed ideas, staring at a computer screen and commenting on how the Economic Action Plan website is misleading Canadians and withholding the truth. Then they tracked down John Baird, and his explanation was simple: (paraphrasing) “That website they have in the US cost them 65 million dollars, we’d rather put that money into roads”. There, end of the story. A non-story, really. Why did they open with this story as opposed to the Billion Dollar Scandal in Ontario? Simple, so we can now ease into the liberal un-friendly story with the following line: “… and another example of what can happen when Governments are not held accountable: in Ontario a report came out today on eHealth, the Ontario Government’s…”. ANOTHER EXAMPLE? You’re equating a blatantly incompetent McGuinty Goverment’s 1 BILLION DOLLAR WASTE to a website that only lists ballpark figures of money actually spent and got something for it? And those are BOTH examples of what can happen when Governments are not held accountable?

Strike two.

This morning, I open the Citizen. Granted, they (finally) have the eHealth story on the front page. However, my eye caught a story further on in the paper: “PM appoints 5 judges with Tory links“. And I thought: funny how I never read: “Chretien appoints 5 judges with Liberal links” back in the nineties. It was just “PM appoints 5 new judges”.

With the polls clearly indicating that Canadians are moving away from Liberals and towards Conservatives, it is no wonder CanWest is losing money: you can’t bet on a losing horse and expect to make money.

So the budget’s out. Billions and billions in spending and tax cuts. I would like more tax cuts than spending, but hey, we’re in a minority government and we can’t just do it our way. (I would also do away with 230 million for the Arts, but we all know how a measely $48 million worked out in the past).

This budget is obviously heavily geared towards appeasing the Liberals: moderate tax cuts, investments in jobs, subsidies, low income, infrastructure. It has nothing for the NDP because, well frankly, they would vote it down regardless, and they didn’t bring any suggestions to the table, so why would there be anything in there for the NDP? The Liberals didn’t bring anything official to the table, but at least they let everybody know what they would like in it, so I guess the CPC watched the evening news and got the message.

Layton, who sported a green tie matching his green brain, turned it down without even reading it. He didn’t like the fact the Throne Speech was less than four pages (he would rather drone on and on and on and waste a whole day on reading it) and so the budget couldn’t be much better. “The bad stuff in there is not good, and if there’s good stuff, we don’t trust them to actually implement it” is a wonderful stance to take Jackie! Has anybody ever told Jack the role of the opposition is not to just oppose everything the government does?

Jack wants his stuff in the budget, or he’ll vote against. I guess it’s “My Way or the Highway” for Jackie.

Iggy meanwhile, said he had to look at the polls sleep on it to see if the budget was good enough, and today he came back with some changes. He likes the budget, but it didn’t implement all of the Liberals suggestions, so there’s a blackmail ultimatum on the table.

Iggy wants his stuff in the budget, or he’ll vote against. I guess it’s “My Way or the Highway” for Iggy.

Gilles just dismissed it right out as “there’s nothing in there for us”, meaning no money for Quebec specifically, and as such, he can’t vote for it.

Gilles wants his stuff in the budget, or he’ll vote against. I guess it’s “My Way or the Highway” for Gilles.

It seems the only one not going the “My Way or the Highway” route is Harper, wich is ironic of course, since he’s the only one being accused of doing just that.

All Hail The President-Elect! He has surrounded Himself with an intellectual team other countries dare not dream of! In fact, according to Randall Denley, Ottawa Citizen columnist, Canada does not have what it takes–and never will–but perhaps Harper could look at Ignatieff, our Greatest Thinker, for some “thinking” inspiration. If “Determined Determination” is a sign of things to come, hold on to your hats folks, there will be some eye-poppin’ thinkin’ comin’ from that Hill!

I am not an economist. In fact, the last time I took economics in school, Keynesian Economics was taught. Things have changed since then. But it seems clear to me, that in this global credit crisis, which is caused by government overspending and extending too  much credit to people who cannot afford it, that extending more credit is not the answer.

The Government’s role is to make sure the economy keeps rolling along. Left leaning governments do it, generally speaking, by raising taxes and spending more on social programs. They, generally speaking, want to have more of a hand in the marketplace. Right leaning governments do it, generally speaking, by lowering taxes and allowing the citizens to keep more of their money to spend as they wish (and spend it they will). The marketplace, according to them, will take care of itself.

And so we come to Canada. Canada is just on the brink of plunging into a recession. Mostly because of global economic woes, the financial trouble of our main trading partner, the United States, and also because Canadians too, have been overextending their credit. (As a side note, a recession is an inevitable part of our natural economic curve: it’ll come regardless of what governments do).

The Harper Government should be about less government spending, leaving more money with the people to spend as they wish (and again, spend it they will). It should be about less credit and more cold hard cash. Credit is what gets you into trouble, everybody knows that. First, the Canadian Government gave $25B to Canada’s banks to secure “shaky” mortgages, so that the banks had more cash on hand to, you guessed it, be able to extend more credit. Now there’s talk about bailing out the Big Three, private, foreign owned companies that make automobiles (bailout means: extend more credit to restructure), and as recent as yesterday, an announcement of going into a $30B deficit in the next four years, spending cartloads of cash on infrastructure. A $30B deficit means the government is operating on more credit.

Interfering  in private business, increasing government spending, securing loans, does that sound like a right leaning government to you? No, it sounds like Liberal and NDP policies. Giving money to GM and Chrysler comes straight from Layton’s Book of Poor Economics, and speeding up infrastructure spending is straight from the Liberal Book of Doing Something to Accomplish Nothing. Even Flaherty’s Economic Panel is a Liberal plan.

So we have a right leaning government currently implementing left leaning policies to crawl out of a left-created hole. Why? Because of the threat of a coalition government taking over? Public pressure? Have we all been bombarded with so much left-leaning MSM messages that we believe stimulus packages are all that is needed to get out of this crisis? Referring to the title of this post, the Coalition has already pushed through their main objectives and as such, are controlling what the government is doing, and as a result, ARE governing. The threat of overthrowing the government has paid off.

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I have highlighted more credit throughout this post. Because more credit is what governments across the world throw at the current financial crisis to try to solve it. Again, I am not an economist, but it seems to me that in times where money is short, you cannot spend you way out of a shortfall on borrowed cash. That’s such poor economics, it could have sprung from the mind of Jack Layton.

Maybe a year or two with no available credit will make Canadians actually only spend what they have and maybe pay off some of their debt (at least not add to it).  It will make them go back to the things that are important and cut out the things that are not. I know I am. 

And maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

The country is facing a recession, people of all stripes are cutting back on their expenses, some are losing money on their RRSPs, gauging (more like fleecing) at the pumps, people are losing jobs left and right, yet the Liberals, NDP and Bloc are against capping their salaries, cutting their expense accounts and want to hold on to their entitlements.  “We must work together to make this parliament work for the Canadian people” has changed to “I don’t want to give up my $1.95 per vote and a pay hike”. Thanks Jackie, Stephane and Gilles. Glad you’re working for us. Glad you’re chippin’ in.
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So, what other things you have been saying during the campaign that have now proven to be untrue? Or, in other words, what other things has Mr Harper said during the campaign, that you said were lies, turn out to be true?

Yes, Dion held his L O N G awaited press conference yesterday, after HIDING OUT for nearly a week. Saying he’ll step down, but stay on for now (?). He blames everything on himself, but mostly on a number of other things (is that possible? It’s like a shirt is 100% cotton, AND some wool h/t Seinfeld), such as: read more…

Let’s face it: Harper did not get a majority due to the following facts:

1. The boneheads in Newfoundland who voted for equalization handouts even though they are a “have province” now. They would rather risk a carbon tax on their precious oil than to finally take their place in confederation and pay towards this country.
2. The idiots in Quebec who vote for the Bloc and thus for separation. In particular the idiots in Gatineau who mostly work for the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT and would surely lose their jobs should their party of choice succeed in its goal and separate.
3. The idiots in downtown Toronto; How ANYBODY in Ontario can vote for Bob Rae, I will never understand. Another vote for hand-outs. Lovely.
4. 59% turnout. It’s a shame.

And there you have it. Last night’s election results.

Yes, the Ottawa Citizen endorses Harper . Not because he’s such a great guy with a great party, but they feel we need to keep the steady course. Congratulations on finally getting it!

This comes in stark contrast to its columnists who have tried very hard in this campaign to ween us away from the Conservatives:

Randall Denley: Harper just pandering to voters with crime policies, Harper’s problem is not lack of empathy, but lack of credibility, Harper fails to lose bully image

Janice Kennedy : Putting families on the ballot, National unity? Who cares?

To all the people who laughed at PMSH’s statement that now is perhaps a good time to pick up some bargain stock: you think this is a party leader who is “out of touch” with the electorate and doesn’t know what the electorate wants to hear. I tell you this: these words came from a Prime Minister who holds a Masters’ Degree in Economics. These words did not come from a party leader who wants to be re-elected (although that is naturally what he wants). Mr. Harper is an economist first, politician second. As an economist AND PM you have to avoid panic in the stock market at all cost. In times of economic uncertainty, when stock markets are crashing, the best thing to do is to try to get people to BUY stock, not SELL them. Selling your stock will just increase the rate the stock market will go down. The only way to reverse a massive sell off of stock (ie: the market going down) is to BUY stock (ie. market going up). This is BASIC ECONOMICS. Shouting doom off the rooftops saying “We’re tanking!” is extremely irresponsible for a Leader of a country (and isn’t that what our Opposition ‘leaders’ strive to be?) It just creates panic resulting in a massive sell-offs of stock which in turn will make them worth even less. If the opposition leaders would set aside their desire to be elected for a minute, and take into account the well being of all Canadians, they’d have to conclude the same thing: saving this economy is more important that any one individual’s election. Harper is doing what it takes to save this economy, even if it means lower polling numbers. He says it would be irresponsible of him to create a panic even though that is what the electorate wants to hear and would improve his standings.

The fundamentals of the Canadian economy are very strong. They only thing going wrong with our economy currently is that the stock markets are going south (no pun intended). The Canadian People want to hear Harper say what he is going to do about it. Well, the only way to stop a stock market from going down is to MAKE PEOPLE BUY STOCK. Isn’t that what he is saying? If any of the opposition ‘leaders’ had any formal training in economics, and not a week long crash course on it, they would know that. I think they do know that, however, they’ve put their own selfish election chances over the fortunes of the Canadian People. They shout doom and gloom, creating a panic resulting in economic woes, in order to get their own behind into the PM’s chair. PM Harper has done the exact opposite!

If the opposition ‘leaders’ were serious leadership material, they’d realise the PM’s first and foremost responsibility is the stabilizing of the economy.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what Harper has been doing for the past year and a half. That is why we don’t have bail-outs for banks and big investment firms. That is why our inflation is still below 4%. That is why we have a job gain of 87,000 jobs in 2008 so far. That is why the IMF projected Canada to lead the G7 in economic growth next year.  And that, is why we have to continue with his successful strategy.

From The Star, December 21, 2007:

OTTAWA – Prime Minister Stephen Harper expects Canada’s economy to suffer next year, buffeted by turmoil south of the border and the “cost” of new climate-change measures here at home.

In a calculated signal to Canadians, Harper said that 2008 will be “more challenging” for his government and the country.

“There remains very serious economic uncertainty in the United States and in other parts of the world, and it’s impossible for me to see how Canada can be entirely immune from those developments,” he said in a year-end interview with the Star.

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