The Associated Press reports that Stephen Harper has vowed to bring down the Liberal government at the next opportunity. He condemned the deal concluded by the Liberals and the NDP to prop up the government, and he was right to do so. The Liberals vowed to match $4.6b in corporate tax cuts with the same amount of social spending. This was never a part of the Liberal platform, and they have kowtowed to NDP requests so that they may prolong their power.
In Adscam, they stole $100m of our money so that they could hang on to power. Now, they have stolen 46 times that amount to buy however much time they think Jack Layton can get them. If a year, we’ve bought a corrupt government for the rate of $525,000 per hour - plus the cost of whatever this $4.6b of social spending is going to exact on our economy. In the US, the Joint Economic Committee of Congress estimates that every dollar our American neighbours pay in taxes actually costs them between $1.40 and $3 in lost opportunities, misallocated resources and so on. I don’t see any reason to believe that Canada is any different (in fact, it is almost certainly worse) so taking the midpoint, we are in fact buying Paul Martin’s government for over $1.1m per hour. And whatever the results of this $4.6b in social spending are, doubtless we’ll have to repair the damage it does in the future, so we can add that to the bill as well. It’s been proven many times that government spending of this kind just makes things worse (Adobe Acrobat required).
Lyndon Simmons wrote:
I am having a really hard time trusting the motivation of Stephen Harper and his need for a snap election. As Paul Martin continues to make announcements in order to solidify support for the Liberal Party, Stephen Harper is following him around promising that “I will do that too if I am elected.” (Atlantic deal, gas tax for cities, child care, etc.)
So if “government spending is just going to make things worse” then does it matter which party does it if they are both promising the same thing? I would find it seriously ironic if the Conservatives were elected and then were obliged to keep Liberal promises because they didn’t have any of their own.
Here is some advice for Mr. Harper and his conservatives: come up with some new ideas instead of running around saying “Don’t worry, we will do that too,” every time the Liberal party makes an announcement. We know where you stand on same sex marriage and we are getting tired of it. It is not the only issue Canadians care about.
How about letting us know what else you stand for, and then we can have an election?
Posted on 29-Apr-05 at 3:50 pm | Permalink
Grog wrote:
Lyndon has hit Harper’s credibility problem on the head - Harper has yet to tell us why he wants to lead this country.
So far, all we have is Harper’s past rhetoric, and the platform/rhetoric of the Reform/Alliance parties - hardly something that represents much outside of Alberta voters.
(Oh wait - Harper did say today that he’d cozy up with George Bush if he becomes the next PM. Of course, that’s like trying to get cozy with a paranoid cobra with a persecution complex)
Posted on 29-Apr-05 at 7:18 pm | Permalink
Jon wrote:
Lyndon said,
“Here is some advice for Mr. Harper and his conservatives: come up with some new ideas instead of running around saying “Don’t worry, we will do that too,â€? every time the Liberal party makes an announcement. We know where you stand on same sex marriage and we are getting tired of it. It is not the only issue Canadians care about.
How about letting us know what else you stand for, and then we can have an election?”
While I agree with your point Lyndon, the fact is it is the Liberal message that Harper has to emulate to get the necessary votes in central Canada.
There was a party that stood apart from the Liberals on principle: it was called the Reform party.
It was rejected in ‘93,’97 and again in ‘00 as the Canadian Alliance.
While I would love to see a principled conservative party go up against the Liberals with a distinct platform and message, I doubt very much that they’d garner any support outside of the West or rural Ontario.
Nor will they ever on that kind of a platform. Canada is a number of solitudes, some of them ideological, some regional and linguistic, all of which will never be accommodated under one central government.
You’d think we would have figured that out by now.
Posted on 01-May-05 at 5:20 pm | Permalink