Resignation of Mr. Flaherty: This is a man who inherited a $13 billion surplus from the last Liberal government and managed to turn it into a $20 billion dollar deficit in two years, during good economic times and before the 2008 recession. Squandering $33 billions in that amount of time takes talent, hard work and dedication. That fact should put everything else he did as Finance Minister into perspective.
Resignation of Alison Redford: She was probably the reason for the surprise win of the Alberta PCP a couple of years ago. Such a feat should have earned her some loyalty from her caucus and other bigwigs in the party but that was not the case. That might be why some of the statements from the announcement of her resignation was her giving the rhetorical middle finger to her former colleagues. I would not be surprised to see the PCPofA relegated to the Opposition benches next time, which really is where they should have gone the last time.
Stephen Harper: Just got owned by the SCC.
Quebec election: Still a lot of time to go but the election is not unfolding as Ms. Marois would have liked. She is still going to win, maybe even a majority government, but I imagine there is a fair amount of angst amongst the PQ election team at the moment. As well, it is probably becoming safer to say that the leader of the PLQ does not have to worry about his job after April 7. He has done a pretty good job for someone that has only been a party leader for about a year.
Liberal nomination battles: It always amazes me what Liberals fight each other about. They tie themselves in knots and make themselves look stupid for the most trivial of reasons. Here is a free piece of information for Liberals. None one cares how political parties pick their candidates. Really they don't, so why some Liberals have chosen this particular hill to die on just leaves me shaking my head. As well, to the Liberals of T-S you have no hope of winning that riding in any by-election anyway. There is no way the NDP is going to allow the riding last held by the wife of Jack Layton to get away from them. The amount of resources they will pour into that riding will be ridiculous.
3 comments:
They're called tax cuts! Canadians have been over paying for decades! Most of that so-called "20 billion" dollar surplus were unspent EI premiums. The Coinservatives then reduced the GST by 2% thereby helping the poorest Canadians.
The Tories only went into deficit after the 2008 election because the socialists, separatists and Liberals demanded a economic rescue package and threatened to bring down the Government if they didn't deliver. Subsequently the Liberals, in a remarkable act of cowardice and betrayal, abandoned the coalition project and supported the 2009 budget.
Liberals have only themselves to blame for the budget deficits since, they voted for all Conservative budgets from 2006-2010!
The government was in a deficit situation BEFORE the 2008 recession, to the tune of $20 billion dollars. The recession did not cause that, it was the Conservatives using Canadian government finances to attempt to buy votes.
Economically speaking cutting the GST was the stupidest thing the government could have done. At least that is what every economist who did not work for the Conservative government was saying. Hell, even the Conference Board of Canada, that bastion of hard left socialist thought, stated the government should have cut income taxes and not the GST.
Spin it all you like and deflect the blame for the deficit from the Conservatives if you like. Whatever gets you through the night but the simple reality is the Conservatives squandered $33 billion in their first two years in power and that fact cannot be forgotten in assessing Mr. Flaherty's time as Finance Minister.
Oh yes, in 2000 Paul Martin came down with a budget that cut $100 billion in income taxes and also indexed the tax brackets to inflation and he did it without creating a deficit.
So, I see no reason why the Conservatives needed to go into deficit to cut taxes.
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