Election 2009?

[Edward Campbell]

Too bad!

According to this report, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from the CBC’s web site, Iggy and Steve will find a way to avoid a summer election:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/06/15/ignatieff-economic-report-response834.html

Liberals to set conditions on Tories to avoid election: report

Last Updated: Monday, June 15, 2009 | 7:02 AM ET

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff will respond to the Conservatives' economic progress report on Monday, in a statement expected to indicate to Canadians whether his party will present a no-confidence motion that could topple the minority government.

Ignatieff has reportedly spent the weekend examining the 234-page report and speaking with party officials. He met with the Liberal caucus on Monday morning before holding a press conference to issue his response to the report.

The Canadian Press quoted sources inside the caucus meeting as saying Ignatieff will impose conditions on the Tories to avoid a summer election, including a demand for changes to the federal employment insurance system.

The sources said Ignatieff will also demand more information about stimulus spending and the ballooning deficit — and action on the medical isotope shortage.

The earliest opposition parties could defeat the Tories in the House of Commons is Friday, as MPs vote on the latest round of spending estimates in support of the government's economic recovery plan.

NDP, Bloc will oppose

The NDP and Bloc Québécois have already said that they will reject the economic report.

If the Liberals also oppose the statement, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government would likely fall and send Canada into a summer election.

The economic statement, presented in Cambridge, Ont., on Thursday, was the second introduced by the Conservatives since January's budget.

In exchange for supporting the Conservative budget, the Liberals demanded quarterly reports on the state of the economy and on how federal stimulus funds were being spent.

The latest progress report showed roughly 3,000 infrastructure projects across the country are getting underway as part of the government's $22.7-billion stimulus plan and that about 80 per cent of the plan's funding has already been allocated.

'Never going to back down'

Ignatieff criticized the Tories' report on Thursday for a lack of transparency in showing whether stimulus money is actually reaching Canadians.

"You have to have a PhD in economics to figure out whether [the money] has actually got out the door," he said. "Our objection to the whole government's performance is that we cannot establish whether the money is getting out."

He has also said he doesn't think Canadians currently want an election but that his job is to hold the government to account.

NDP finance critic Thomas Mulcair said an election is not his party's first choice of action but it will not support the report.

"We were not about to provoke the fall of the government — on the other hand, we are never going to back down and we're never going to vote confidence in favour of the Conservatives," Mulcair said.

The Liberal party has previously stated that other factors that will determine their decision to topple the government include:

The "major medical crisis" provoked by the shutdown of the isotope-producing nuclear reactor at Chalk River.

The government's refusal to adopt equal access to employment insurance across the country.

The fact that only six per cent of infrastructure funds have actually started flowing.

Friday's vote would be the last before the House of Commons rises for a three-month summer recess.

With files from The Canadian Press

I think a national general election this summer would be a good thing for the economy. It’s principle effect – because it will be of little real political consequence – will be to stop the inflationary “stimulus” projects in their tracks, never to be resurrected.

I think there will be few real political consequences because I expect that the Liberals will make a few (single digit) gains in Québec and Ontario – maybe, just possibly, enough to form their own very weak minority government or, just as likely, another, but weaker, Conservative minority. The winners will be the civil service: especially the mandarins in Finance who are already nervous about the size and speed of the government’s “stimulus” programme. Their nervousness has two facets: the consequential deficits and inflation caused by too much spending too quickly.

Stimulus spending will stop, like a car hitting a stone wall, as soon as the election writs and dropped. After the election the next prime minister will confront a phalanx of middle aged, middle class civil servants in charcoal grey suits – most with PhDs in economics, all saying: “Stop! It is time to reign in the stimulus spending. The recovery is underway and, now, inflation is the bigger enemy. None of our programmes are going to do much of anything about the collapse of employment in Ontario’s manufacturing sector. There are excellent arguments for a sustained, but much slower, programme of infrastructure repair and maintenance and for some new spending on things like public transit. We (the bureaucracy) accept the political necessity of sustaining Chrysler and GM through a process of “graceful degradation” as they decline and, finally, fall away entirely, but it is important to realize and tell Canadians, as PM Harper did, that it is good money sent after bad and it is not an investment. We will never get it back. What you do not have to do TO your country, now, Prime Minister, is to burden it with a huge deficit and unnecessary inflation – which eats savings and kills jobs.”

But, sadly, it appears that Iggy doesn’t care enough believe he can win at least a strong minority, so he will continue to put Liberal Party partisan advantage ahead of Canada’s best interests.

Election now!



edited for title update

 

[dapaterson]

The impact of a quick election on DND could be significant; even if the result is status quo ante bellum an election means months of delays in advancing even the most basic of issues; a change of MND would mean further losses of time, and a new government would essentially derail much of the current work as priorities would shift and the old government's pet projects would be relegated to the woodshed until they could be repainted and refurbished.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Elections rarely do much for the defence procurement programme but, in my experience and except for the turmoil of the 1960s,* they rarely do much damage, either. The exception, in those same ‘60s, was the 1967 general election which brought in a government that set about, quite determinedly, to emasculate, if not fully destroy, the Canadian military.

During one or two election campaigns I observed some hard, serious work in NDHQ as projects were re-evaluated for cost and necessity. In a couple of cases, without regard for the likely outcome of the election, ill-considered projects were moved so far “out” to the edge of the spending envelope as to be, effectively, scrapped. But, mostly, the hiatus imposed by a campaign was just a blink in the eye for most projects, which, typically, take years, even decades, to move from concept to delivery.

But defence spending – at about $20± billion out of a federal spending plan of $200+ billion (not counting $30+ billon interest on the national debt) – is only 10% of the “problem” and will likely be even less involved in the “solution.” DND can/should/must shoulder part of the burden of solving the country’s economic crisis – especially when the ”solution” is likely to have minimal impact on the national defence.


--------------------
* When all governments in the West tried – and mostly failed – to come to grips with the rapid increases in the requirements for and costs of technologically sophisticated military hardware and the concomitant requirements for and costs of the people to use it. It was that – costs – that drove Minister Hellyer’s experiment with the unification integration of the armed forces.

 

[Loachman]

http://www.ctvbc.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20090615/Ignatieff_report_090615/20090615?hub=BritishColumbiaHome

Backed down again...

" 'I think Michael Ignatieff took a big stick and drew a line in the stand. And then he took that stick and erased parts of the line big enough that you could drive a prime-ministerial limousine through. Look, there's not going to be an election over this,' (Tom) Clark (host of CTV's Power Play) told CTV News Channel."

 

[a_majoor]

Other reasons might have been in the back of "the Count's" mind as well:

http://unambig.wordpress.com/2009/06/18/liberals-in-and-out-expense-audit-caused-ignatieff-to-back-down/

Liberals In-and-out Expense Audit Caused Ignatieff To Back Down?
June 18, 2009 — Raphael Alexander

The Harper and Ignatieff showdown is over and through it all the Liberals are still leading in the polls, according to the most recent EKOS offering. A tiny lead was carried over from the confrontation, although the Liberals have slipped to a 33-32 lead over the Conservatives, hinting that an actual election would have been anybody’s game. That’s down 2 points for the Liberals from the same polling company a week ago, a significant drop that could possibly indicate the short-term consequences of Mr.Ignatieff’s performance.

The survey was conducted during the critical time of election speculation, June 10-16, in a sample of 3,422 Canadians. A tiny error margin of 1.7% is still greater than the discrepancy in the lead for the Liberals. That’s how tight it is right now. Worse for Michael Ignatieff, the poll indicated that while 32% of respondents approve of the official opposition leader, a greater number, 34% disapprove.

Given what was at stake, however, in a showdown largely initiated by the Liberals themselves, it seems as though Mr.Ignatieff walked away with a less than ideal settlement. A deal to form a study panel to examine employment insurance over the summer isn’t exactly the kind of iron will that many Liberals must have been hoping for after the former hand-sitting performance of Stephane Dion. [If anything, as Scott Feschuk quips wryly, a summer "study panel" is the perfect weapon for Stephen Harper to keep the troops in order.]

But perhaps what actually kept the Liberals from pulling the trigger, despite the massive downside to such a gamble, is the same problem it’s always been in recent years. Economics. Elections Canada is currently analyzing nearly a million dollars worth of expenses that were filed by Liberal candidates in the 2008 election campaign, and is now auditing the Liberal party to produce detailed invoices and documents to prove that a mandatory riding services package was actually worth the $2,500 each candidate paid. The idea being, that Elections Canada is mighty suspicious that the riding services package fee to the party was merely a means of sending $770,000 to Liberal headquarters from the local fund-raising campaigns of 307 different constituencies.

The problem here is that until Elections Canada is happy with the audit, they won’t release the election expenses rebates from 2008, worth somewhere in the neighbourhood of $3.5 million. There’s little question that the party would be unable to continue without that kind of funding. But the Liberals are saying there’s no scandal here, and that the services were legitimately provided by the headquarters in the form of buttons, posters, brochures, photos, lawn signs, and all the rest.

Nevertheless, the rigorous accounting must have played some part in the preparedness of the party to fight another election in less than a year from the previous one. According to the Liberals, only four of the 307 candidates from the last election have received expense rebates, compared to 84 Conservatives. The party says it would have been no big deal, since candidates would have simply borrowed against their expected rebates. But would the banks have willingly lent money based on an uncertain outcome in the audit? It doesn’t sound plausible.

 

[Dennis Ruhl]

33 ministers of national defence in the last 50 years.

http://www2.parl.gc.ca/Parlinfo/Legacy/pages/DepHist.asp?Language=E&Dept=J&SubDept=All&Key=44

Does anyone wonder why the military seems to lack any consistent long-term equipment procurement goals?  At least MacKay has some stroke and may reappear as Conservative leader at some time.

I don't think that Ignatieff is willing to will wait past September 30 to force an election.  I don't think he wants to wear out the feigned outrage as Dione did while supporting the government.  Ignatieff will call the bluff.  Military issues will not show up in the campaign - they rarely do as other than as minor promises.

 

[Edward Campbell]

33 ministers of national defence in the last 50 years.

http://www2.parl.gc.ca/Parlinfo/Legacy/pages/DepHist.asp?Language=E&Dept=J&SubDept=All&Key=44

Does anyone wonder why the military seems to lack any consistent long-term equipment procurement goals?  At least MacKay has some stroke and may reappear as Conservative leader at some time.

I don't think that Ignatieff is willing to will wait past September 30 to force an election.  I don't think he wants to wear out the feigned outrage as Dione did while supporting the government.  Ignatieff will call the bluff.  Military issues will not show up in the campaign - they rarely do as other than as minor promises.

Why should they?

What major strategic/security issue faces Canada?

What is the problem for which the Canadian military is the solution?

Who is the enemy that threatens our security or sovereignty or vital interests at home or abroad? What military action should Canada take against that enemy?

What major promise are you seeking? Why?

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the CBC web site is an opinion piece by retired soldier, teacher and freelance journalist/commentator Robert Smol:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/06/19/f-vp-smol.html

Why I should be paying more taxes

Friday, June 19, 2009

By Robert Smol, special to CBC News

Last month, the hard reality of my growing professional success struck me, yet again, in the wallet as I proceeded to pay the government that which I still owed on my already high tax bill.

Am I frustrated? Absolutely. But not for the same reasons that many of my fellow grumpy, overworked middle-aged cohorts are frustrated with what they have to hand over to the public purse.

I am frustrated about not having the chance to pay more taxes.

Now, I am no government lapdog, as my earlier columns on this site would indicate.

More often than not, I can be found in full complaint over any number of issues, from health care in our hospitals to teaching standards and the size of our military.

But it has dawned on me as I have documented these shortcomings that nothing will change if I as a citizen am not prepared to put my money where my mouth is.

We are us

At school, I repeatedly tell my business students that the best quality goods or services come at a cost.

As an entrepreneur, if I want the best quality employee, or shipping or internet service, then I must be prepared to pay.

Why then am I made to seem like I have grown a horn when I suggest that the same business-like mantra apply to our government services?

Of course, just like in the so-called real world, taxpayers should insist that what governments provide be efficient and cost effective.

But if we want top quality nurses, doctors, teachers, police and soldiers — and in the numbers we feel we need — we are simply going to have to come up with the cash.

We are not a desperate have-not nation. Nobody is going to turn to the philanthropic CEO or rock star when a real pandemic, earthquake or military/terrorist attack comes our way.

Instead, we will have to turn to whatever we, as a society, have collectively managed to store up to help us in a time of need.

It is a reality I saw first hand when my military unit was deployed to Eastern Ontario in 1998 to assist during the famous ice storm.

While we scrambled through our relatively meagre military supplies to muster every available tool — chainsaws and generators — to help the local population, we discovered some local merchants were inflating the price considerably to rent or buy these items.

Because we hadn't set aside enough public resources in the first place, we ended up paying quite a bit more when the call went out for help.

It is a parallel I can't help seeing being replayed in our current economic situation, with the federal deficit now shooting up so dramatically as Ottawa tries to plug holes everywhere it can.

Being selfish

So, with this in mind, here are the reasons why I feel I personally deserve to pay more into the public purse.

I will try to leave the rest of you out of this. It is not my intention to pick and choose who should be ponying up. Rather it is simply for selfish reasons that I want to pay more.

I want to pay more taxes because I want to be assured of the services that will ransom me and those who might one day take care of me from the harsh realities that life will inevitably leave on my doorstep, whether it be sickness, old age, natural disaster or economic meltdown.

Come desperate times, I do not want to put my trust in those whose sole purpose is to turn a profit from my fears or my pain and suffering.

These are collective anxieties we all share and I'd like to be assured there are enough public resources set aside to deal with them, as there was during my parents' and grandparents' eras.

We boomers are going to be making extra demands on our social safety net as we age, everyone tells us. It behooves us to start contributing more now to pay for those needs.

Not a bottomless pit

Obviously, the public purse is not a bottomless pit and future governments will have to make some unpopular decisions on the allocation of scarce resources.

But surely there is more at stake here than just decisions about the allocation of future government services.

Doesn't the equilibrium between the right of individuals and corporations, like the car companies and others, to draw from the public purse come with a corresponding obligation to keep it full?

I for one feel I should pay more. I don't want to point fingers everywhere but it is hard to see how those corporate entities with their hands out now shouldn't be prepared to pay more later, particularly if we don't want to mortgage the cost of maintaining government programs on future generations.

I frequently hear successful managers and CEOs say that their employees are their greatest resource. A productive, healthy and well-educated work force is, I believe, what makes a company, and ultimately the economy, successful.

I also believe that a modern, accessible and efficient infrastructure is needed to make the economy attract and grow businesses.

The last places then where we should be making any cuts are health care, education and security as well as the infrastructure that makes for a highly mobile and efficiently telecommunicating society.

Call me selfish but I feel I deserve to live the twilight phase in my life in a progressive and caring society where I am taken care of through a generous and financially solvent public health-care system and social safety network supported by the taxes of a highly skilled and educated workforce.

It is a model that has worked for me so far. And I'm happy to pay more to keep it going.

Born and raised in Montreal, Robert Smol holds degrees from McGill and Queen's universities as well as from the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ont., where he obtained a master of arts in war studies.

At 17, he enrolled in the army reserves as a private in the infantry and served both full- and part-time for over 20 years until his retirement as a captain in the Intelligence Branch.

Since 1992, he has been mostly teaching elementary and high school students in the Toronto area.

As a freelance journalist, Smol has written extensively on military policy, as well as on veteran and education matters, for the Hill Times and Embassy Magazine in Ottawa. He also contributes to the Toronto Star and Sun, among others.

I don’t fully agree with Smol, I rarely agree, much, with anyone, but his little list of things upon which we should spend wisely and well is correct:

• Health care;

• Education;

• Security; as well as

• The infrastructure that makes for a highly mobile and efficiently telecommunicating society.

He wants these services, inter alia, to be properly funded for the sound and selfish reason that: ”I want to be assured of the services that will ransom me and those who might one day take care of me from the harsh realities that life will inevitably leave on my doorstep, whether it be sickness, old age, natural disaster or economic meltdown.” Amongst those “services” are the armed services and police and other agencies that provide our national and local “security.”

Those key services are also important to our national productivity which is, at the end of any discussion, the keystone for our future prosperity.

I part company with Smol because I’m not convinced that I need to pay more taxes to get better- even much better – health care, education, security and infrastructure. In fact, contrary to Smol’s opinion, I suspect I can have more and better core, essential services even as I pay less taxes. Of course I am willing to do without some services which you, perhaps, might think are “vital.”

I’m willing to do without (100% reduction): Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency; Business Development bank of Canada; Cadets Canada and so on down the alphabetical list. To govern is to choose, said Pierre Mendes France, a French prime minister back in the 1950s. Canadian governments, driven by an insatiable desire compelling political need to buy our votes with our money, have chosen to give us everything. We are to be denied nothing. The cult of entitlement – started y Pierre Trudeau – is firmly embedded in our national psyche and people like Mr. Smol can see no way “out” except to pay more and more and more.

Of course we should pay less and less, but based on getting less, being entitled to less, for “free.”

 

[Dennis Ruhl]

Why should they?

I am not sure they should.  Stacking defence against social issues isn't going to make defence a winner.

What major strategic/security issue faces Canada?

NATO/NORAD issues, terrorism, coastline sovereignty and airspace sovereignty issues.

What is the problem for which the Canadian military is the solution?

We have only prepared for one war in advance and that one was never fought - the Cold War.

Who is the enemy that threatens our security or sovereignty or vital interests at home or abroad?

When I hear, I'll let you know.  Our past enemies have all arisen unexpectedly.

What military action should Canada take against that enemy?

Canada should be prepared to defend its sovereignty and meet its treaty obligations as required.

What major promise are you seeking? Why?

None.  I was simply stating that defence is not a big part of campaigns.  I was not saying it should be.

 

[Old Sweat]

We have only prepared for one war in advance and that one was never fought - the Cold War.

When I hear, I'll let you know.  Our past enemies have all arisen unexpectedly.

The two above statements are catchy and have at least a grain of truth. Unfortunately they also are irrelevant.

We did not prepare for the Cold War; we prepared for what could have come after it - general war between the West and the Warsaw Pact. There also were mature plans in existence for various contingencies.

As for your second statement, what exactly do you mean? We knew that war was inevitable between the British empire and the Transvaal and had prepared contingency plans. I will agree that Laurier and the Quebec wing of his Liberal party were against sending a contingent to South Africa, but relented when faced with overwhelming pressure from the rest of the country. We also had plans for mobilization in the event of a war against an European power (read Germany) in both 1914 and 1939. The fact that Sam Hughes scrapped the plans in 1914, that does not alter the fact that the plans existed. These plans were written on the premise that we would have time for an orderly buildup of forces in the UK, followed by deployment to the continent. The Pacific may or may not be another matter, but that is a subject to debate separately. The US and the UK were attempting to avoid war against Japan. This strategy failed because Japan was not deterred by the feeble build up in the Far East including Force C to Hong Kong. Korea and the recent conflicts in SW Asia may be a different matter. However we were able to deploy naval, air and land forces to those theatres in a relatively timely manner.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Ottawa Citizen, is a piece by the paper’s municipal affairs writer that illustrates why we spend way too much on entitlements:

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Life/When+numbers+drop+enlist+some+francophoneys/1718149/story.html

When numbers drop, enlist some francophoneys
The Ontario government is using dubious tactics to boost its francophone minority population

BY RANDALL DENLEY, THE OTTAWA CITIZENJUNE 21, 2009 5:04 AM

What does a culturally sensitive province do when it is running short of francophones? In Ontario's case, it creates 50,000 new ones by redefining the meaning of francophone to include people whose mother tongue is something else. Under Ontario's new definition, a francophone can be a person born in Russia who speaks French and English. About the only sort of person who can't be considered a francophone is a Canadian anglophone who also speaks French.

Not content with that intellectually dubious decision, the Ontario government this week strongly suggested to the province's French-language school boards that they should admit students who speak neither French nor English. The raison d'être of our French-language schools is to serve Canadian francophones and deliver their constitutional right to an education in their mother tongue. Now the province wants to create a whole new category of francophone, the kind that doesn't speak French.

Ottawa-Vanier MPP Madeleine Meilleur, the minister responsible for francophone affairs, says the broadening of the definition of francophone is largely "symbolic" and came about because some French speakers complained to the province's French-language services commissioner about their exclusion from official francophone status.

Meilleur also says the broader definition will mean no additional services for francophones and will cost the province nothing. The 50,000 newly minted francophones will, however, help justify potential extensions of government bilingual services, which are regional and based on the percentage of the population who are francophone.

Ontario has quite a cultural infrastructure for a group that comprises less than five per cent of the population, even with the franco-phoneys added in. Still, francophones' rights are constitutionally guaranteed and even if Quebec has mistreated its language minority, that doesn't mean Ontario must do the same.

Much of that government spending and activity rests on the idea that there is an identifiable franco-Ontarian culture with long historical roots. Now the government is including as francophones people whose mother tongue is Arabic, German or Russian. Where's the cultural connection?

The concept really breaks down with the province's latest instructions to the school boards. At least those newly identified as franco-phone actually speak French, but when it comes to the schools the province is calling for volunteer francophones. No experience required. The only disqualifier is being a native English speaker.

Enrolment in French-language schools has slowly declined over the last few years, even though the number of schools has gone up. This is part of the declining-enrolment phenomenon that is affecting all school boards, but losing students is even more critical for the typically smaller French boards. Like all school boards, the French ones require more warm bodies. The problem is increased by the fact that only two-thirds of the parents who have a right to educate their children in French do so.

Ontario's solution is reasonable to the extent that it suggests the boards include students who are native French speakers from elsewhere in the world. It gets wobblier when people with French grandparents are added, and wobblier still when allophones who just arrived in the country are placed in line ahead of English speakers born in Canada. The children who fall into the government's new favoured categories don't actually have a right to French schooling. Fortunately, Ontario is unable to change our federal charter of rights to lob in additional rights as it pleases. Students whose mother tongue is not French or who do not have a parent educated in French in Canada can't attend French schools by right, but those in the new categories will be considered by school board admission panels.

Ottawa's French public school board already admits 100 to 150 students a year who don't qualify by right, says director of education François Benoit. Only a handful are anglophones.

The province's French-language schools policy documents acknowledge that some children admitted into French schools "speak little or no French." If our French schools are prepared to admit people who don't know a word of the language, what better candidates than the eager French enthusiasts who enrol in so-called French immersion? Surely actual immersion in French is the preferable choice. The official stance is that French immersion is good enough for the anglos.

It is easy to imagine why Ontario's French-speaking minority fears being overwhelmed by the anglophone majority, but the government's attempt to boost the number of francophones by adding native Russian speakers and suggesting that non-francophones be admitted to their schools serves only to undermine the concept of what a francophone in Ontario really is.

Contact Randall Denley at 613-596-3756 or by e-mail,

rdenley@thecitizen.canwest.com

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

There is a subtext here about the perceived unfairness of French immersion vs French schooling but that’s not the issue.

The issue is entitlement.

Franco-Ontarians are entitled, as a matter of constitutional right to certain services “where numbers warrant,” or some such weasel-wording. An entitlement, once met, is nearly impossible to change.

Clearly, if the number of Franco-Ontarians is declining then the “correct” solution is to close schools, fire teachers and so on. But that is, politically, the least palatable solution. Most members here can recall, in their own communities, the regular political battles over school closings. Residents feel entitled to a neighbourhood school – their neighbourhood school which mustn’t be closed, despite inadequate enrolment, until their children have finished with it. Some may also remember the Montfort Hospital saga. The Montfort is a perfectly good hospital here in Ottawa; it is the “host” for our new military medical centre. It is, also, completely “unnecessary” – by the Ontario Health Ministry’s guidelines, based on numbers, etc. But it is a French hospital, rather than a bilingual hospital like, for example, the Ottawa Hospital. In reality, of course, it isn’t a French hospital anymore because part of the federally and locally funded rescue plan involved expanding the Montfort’s “base" to justify its continued existence, and that required it to become a bilingual hospital – just about like its “competitors.” But Franco-Ontarians felt entitled to “their own” hospital – in addition to a  fully bilingual hospital – so politicians jumped through every imaginable hoop to provide it. The “correct” solution was to close the Montfort or the nearby General campus of the Ottawa Hospital. It was, and remains, the least likely solution because politicians are chronically unable to manage entitlements.

Thus, faced with a simple problem - how to manage entitlements when the entitled population base is, slowly but surely, disappearing - the bureaucrats and politicians decide that the solution is to falsify the data because it is easier to misspend taxpayer’s money than it is to actually manage the problem in a fiscally responsible manner.

We, taxpayers, "need" to pay lower taxes, overall, and governments "need" to do less for and to us with the reduced resources at their disposal. To govern is to choose and we, voters, need to choose those government services without which we are willing - and able - to live our lives.

 

[Brad Sallows]

"Why I should be paying more taxes"

He can, as a matter of feasibility, write cheques to the Receiver-General for Canada.  If he feels he should be paying more taxes - and has convinced himself it would indeed yield him an advantage - I wonder that he does not.  I suspect what he means is that he wants everyone to pay more taxes.

The assumption that "more taxes" will be used to fund the necessities of which he writes is necessary to state his case, but it is an invalid and unreasonable assumption.  So much for the Estimate Process.

 

[Dennis Ruhl]

As for your second statement, what exactly do you mean? We knew that war was inevitable between the British empire and the Transvaal and had prepared contingency plans. I will agree that Laurier and the Quebec wing of his Liberal party were against sending a contingent to South Africa, but relented when faced with overwhelming pressure from the rest of the country. We also had plans for mobilization in the event of a war against an European power (read Germany) in both 1914 and 1939. The fact that Sam Hughes scrapped the plans in 1914, that does not alter the fact that the plans existed. These plans were written on the premise that we would have time for an orderly buildup of forces in the UK, followed by deployment to the continent. The Pacific may or may not be another matter, but that is a subject to debate separately. The US and the UK were attempting to avoid war against Japan. This strategy failed because Japan was not deterred by the feeble build up in the Far East including Force C to Hong Kong. Korea and the recent conflicts in SW Asia may be a different matter. However we were able to deploy naval, air and land forces to those theatres in a relatively timely manner.

I don't know if plans by themselves are much preparation.  I believe defense against the United States was our over-riding concern until the plan was scrapped in the 1930s.  In 1914 we had 1 battalion of infantry and 2 cavalry regiments with plans for 20 divisions - I only count the 3.  Up until the week before WWII we had 3 understrength infantry battalions and 2 cavalry?/motorcycle?/armoured car? regiments.  There was no physical preparation.

 

[Old Sweat]

I don't know if plans by themselves are much preparation.  I believe defense against the United States was our over-riding concern until the plan was scrapped in the 1930s.  In 1914 we had 1 battalion of infantry and 2 cavalry regiments with plans for 20 divisions - I only count the 3.  Up until the week before WWII we had 3 understrength infantry battalions and 2 cavalry?/motorcycle?/armoured car? regiments.  There was no physical preparation.

We are getting into semantics, but in both cases the plan was to mobilize an initial force and then expand. In both cases it had been appreciated that the maximum land force we could sustain overseas was one cavalry and five infantry divisions. In the late-1930s there was a large - for Canada - increase in the defence budet, with most of the effort going to the RCN and the RCAF. The small permanent force was entirely in line with the strategic thinking of the era, and not just in Canada. As a result, and as there was no threat of invasion and ample time to crank up the industrial effort, the government had done what it considered to be prudent.

Having said that, you are in part correct as wilful neglect and hoping for the best have been the traditional pillars of Canadian defence planning. Remember the story of the little Dutch boy who kept the dyke from breaking by plugging the hole with his thumb. If he had been a Canadian, he would have been castigated for alarmism and sent to bed without his supper.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail, are Lawrence Martin’s latest thoughts on the Liberals – the party he believes most likely to defeat the Great Satan (Stephen Harper) and his band of hated Bushites:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/will-liberals-roll-no-dice-strategy-work/article1227753/

Will Liberals' roll-no-dice strategy work?
A good many in the party want to reboot, but senior strategists remain unmoved

Lawrence Martin

Thursday, Jul. 23, 2009

Some things are starting to worry some Liberals.

1. The economy isn't sinking. It won't propel them to power.
2. The Harper Conservatives aren't going to defeat themselves.
3. Liberals can't win by trying to be all things to all people. Paul Martin tried that.
4. Michael Ignatieff isn't capturing the public imagination, as earlier hoped.

A good many in the party want to reboot - and they want to do it now. The initial idea was that the combination of their new leader and a brutal recession would lead them back to the promised land. Being proactive wasn't necessary. But the economy is rebounding earlier than expected. Stephen Harper is back on his feet. Liberal polling numbers have stalled. Media reviews are unflattering.

There is concern the Liberal leader is risk-averse. Mr. Ignatieff, some worry, is still thinking things through - something intellectual types are inclined to do. In their wisdom, these leaders see the complexities of the issues, the grey zones, the competing shades and they hedge. Vague imagery results.

What to do? Get out some bold policy initiatives, many in the party say. Give the leader definition. Give Canadians a vision. Roll the dice.

But it's not about to happen. Instead, the Grits are gambling that no change of tack before an election campaign is necessary. “The plan,” a senior Ignatieff strategist said yesterday, “is steady as she goes.”

If there is worry among the rank and file about lack of policy, there isn't at party central. “The game is not policy, it's politics,” the adviser bluntly observed. He noted how Stéphane Dion brought out his Green Shift plan well before an election. Look what happened, he said. By the time the campaign rolled around, the Conservatives had undermined it. “You don't draw a target on yourself. Sure there are many in the party who are upset. I can live with it. We started in January with a plan - and we haven't moved off it.”

In the spring, it looked as if Mr. Ignatieff was coming forward with a national vision of strengthened east-west linkages. He talked of energy corridors, a national power grid. It's a time to be “daring,” he said, just as politicians were when they tied the country together with a ribbon of steel. But nothing has been heard on the energy highway plan since. His advisers say he is still very interested in national projects but wouldn't say whether this one was still on or not.

Some Liberals want a renewed emphasis on a traditional Liberal strongpoint: social policy. An Ekos poll recently showed health care has returned to top the list of Canadian concerns. “I would argue we have to get back on terrain where we are comfortable and the Conservatives are not, ” said one insider. “Conservatives are comfortable with tax-cutting, anti-crime measures, a hard-line foreign policy and the military. Leave that terrain to them.”

But the emphasis has been on holding the government to account, as Mr. Ignatieff tried to do last month on employment insurance, the shortage of isotopes and a plan for eliminating the national deficit. While Liberals feel validated on those issues, they didn't score in the court of public opinion. A media consensus emerged that Mr. Ignatieff appeared indecisive. He tried to walk a middle line between wanting an election and not wanting one. It didn't work. There is also a sense he is hesitant to attack the Prime Minister in a way the Prime Minister has attacked him. That, however, is something that according to strategists, will change. Attacks are coming soon.

A concession the Liberals did win from Mr. Harper last month, besides a multiparty review of EI policy, was an Opposition day vote in late September. It will allow the Liberals to potentially force an election at that time as opposed to months later.

But if the Liberals don't change tack now, if they continue to drift, what position will they be in to go to the polls at that time? They would have only a short five-week campaign to turn things around. No big deal, said Liberals at party central. “In politics, things change real fast.”

With their roll-no-dice strategy, they better hope so.

I’m sure the Liberal politburo has a plan, one of which they are mighty proud, too. But I think they are whistling in the dark. There is, simply, nothing substantial to differentiate the Liberals from the Conservatives. The Tory economic “plan” (wait for the American and Chinese recoveries to rescue Canada) is working; the Liberals have no new, exciting social policy plans – especially not in health care; the civic workers' strikes in Windsor and Toronto will, likely, make Canadians suspicious of parties, like the Liberals and NDP, that espouse big government; the Liberals have no exciting, new economic or industrial policies; there is nothing, at all, to differentiate Liberal foreign and defence policy from Conservative foreign and defence policy. September is too late to suddenly roll out policies. November is too late for an election campaign.

Ignatieff and the Liberal brain trust gambled, in the Spring, that the economy would sink Harper and that Canadians would not forget how much they dislike him. The economic gamble backfired. Harper has stayed out of the public spotlight; Canadians will remember, when parliament resumes, that they dislike him but the problem for the Liberals is that Canadians do not like Ignatieff, either. They may not dislike him as much as they loathe Harper but they have not warmed to him. The Canadians detest Harper gamble didn’t pay off, either.

Too little, too late from the Liberal Party of Toronto's politburo, I think and, therefore, no election until spring/summer 2010, at the earliest.

 

[George Wallace]

An interesting point that I got in an email, not verified as the truth, but still a thought to be considered:  80 Members of Parliament are two years shy of their "Golden Handshake (Pension) Dates".  Will they gamble everything and perhaps loose those pensions?

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail, is Jeffrey Simpson on a topic about which he actually does know something: Canadian electoral politics:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/until-something-changes-the-road-to-majority-is-blocked/article1234181/

Until something changes, the road to majority is blocked
Parties and voters have been boxed in by the unchanging nature of Canadian politics

Jeffrey Simpson

Tuesday, Jul. 28, 2009

Four blocks shape Canadian politics. The blocks are hard to move. Until one of them does, the shape of Canadian politics won't change.

The unchanging nature of Canadian politics, courtesy of those blocks, doesn't stop political commentators from nattering endlessly about who's up and who's down, which party wins and which party loses from this or that event or announcement or tactic.

The nattering fills the airwaves and pages but is almost entirely beside the point, easy filler for empty spaces falsely labelled “analysis.”

The four blocks are: the Conservatives with 30 to 35 per cent of the electorate, mostly in Western Canada and rural and small-town Ontario; the Liberals with about 30 per cent, largely based in urban Ontario and anglophone Quebec; the NDP with its usual 15 per cent of the vote, give or take a couple of points; and the Bloc Québécois as the dominant party for Quebec's secessionists of hemi-demi-semi-Canadian francophones.

For some years now, each party has tried all manner of strategies to enlarge its block – except, perhaps, the Bloc, which is more or less satisfied with being Quebec francophones' preferred party.

The NDP, better financed than ever in recent years and led by the experienced Jack Layton, has held its own, winning a few more seats and making inroads in the slow-growth parts of the country. But the party, soon to gather in convention, is still essentially where it was three or four years ago, stuck in the 13- to 18-per-cent range in the polls.

Yesterday, Statistics Canada reported the largest number of employment insurance claimants since it began collecting such statistics in 1997. With all the gloomy economic news, and the hurt that the recession has inflicted on so many people, you might think the federal NDP – the self-described part of “ordinary,” “hard-working” Canadians – would be reaping political benefits from the dislocations. Not so, despite the party's best efforts.

The Liberals aren't going anywhere either, except in Quebec, where some federalist francophones have fled the Conservatives and gone back to their natural Liberal home.

It would be comforting, but untrue, for the Liberals to believe this was of their own doing. It is more a function of Conservative weakness. The Conservatives essentially shot their bolt in their first spell in government, showering Quebec with money and attention, to no avail. Now, they are out of ideas, money and chances there.

So the Liberal block, largely an Ontario and Atlantic Canadian one, is slightly larger with the addition of some Quebec voters. But the block is nowhere near large enough to supplant the Conservatives.

The Conservatives are roughly where they were at the time of their first electoral triumph: rock-solid in the rural West and Ontario, and the dominant party in most of the small towns and medium-sized cities in those regions. They have tried everything to enter majority territory, cutting taxes, spending gobs of money, controlling communications as no government ever has (no wonder another prime ministerial communications director resigned yesterday), tailoring almost every policy for political gain. Their block hasn't moved.

The Conservatives have a leader who polarizes the country. Stephen Harper impresses his party's loyalists, who might not be wild about him personally but respect his judgment, policies and competence.

His troubles are the negative perceptions outside the Conservative core. In a recent Nanos poll, 15 percentage points separated those with a negative view of Mr. Harper from those with a positive view. His negatives outweighed his positives in every region but the Prairies. Result: Conservative growth potential is limited, since perception of leaders drives loosely committed voters who don't pay much attention to politics and know little about the issues.

The Conservative block just can't be easily expanded enough for the party to win a majority, or shrunk enough to deprive it of a minority. The good news for Conservatives is that the recession has not damaged them. Even better news for them is that the Liberals have almost nothing interesting to say about anything these days.

Canadians now tell pollsters that they prefer majority government. Until Canadians knock off a chunk of one of these four political blocks, however, there will be no majority.

I don’t dispute Simpson’s analysis but I think there is a possible “work around” for the Conservatives.

First: The Conservatives must hold their base:

22 of 36 seats in BC;
27 of 28 seats in AB;
22 of 28 seats in SK/MB; and
50 of 106 seats in ON.
_________
121 of 208 seats West of the Ottawa River

Second: The Conservatives must hold on to at least five seats in QC and 8-10 seats in Atlantic Canada. But they need to recognize that they are highly unlikely to break through in QC and there are too few seats in Atlantic Canada to make much of a difference.

121+14 = 135 of 308 seats

Third: The Conservatives must take about 20 (mainly suburban) seats away from the Liberals and the NDP, mostly in BC and ON.

135+20 = 155 of 308 (a razor thin majority, but a majority all the same)

It will be a hard row to hoe but it can be done.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Another factor: At some undetermined point in the future the seat distribution in the House of Commons will change as follows:

• Territories: From 3 to 3 – no change – percentage of seats remains at >1
• BC: From 36 to 43 – + 7 – percentage of seats rises to 12.6
• AB: From 28 to 35 – +5 – percentage of seats rises to 10.2
• SK/MN: From 28 to 28 – no change – percentage of seats falls to 8.2
• ON: From 106 to 127 – +21 – percentage of seats rises to 37.2
• QC: From 75 to 75 – no change – percentage of seats falls to 21.9
• Atlantic Canada: 32 to 32 – no change – percentage of seats falls to 9.3

The redistribution will cause changes to riding boundaries to give more and more seats to areas of (recent) high population growth. That will be the suburbs: areas where the Tories can and must do well if they want to win a majority.

The new challenge will be to win 171 of 341 seats or to keep the 155 I described above and get 16 of the 33 new seats.

 

[Dennis Ruhl]

Redistribution is way overdue.  My understanding is that it is to be based on the 2001 census, already 8 years old.  We are living with constituencies based on 18 year old population numbers.  The House of Commons is going to be getting really big unless they drop the guarantee that no province will lose seats.  A fall election is almost a guarantee.  The old Liberal guy isn't getting any younger and the economy can only get better.

 

[a_majoor]

You can see why Quebec and the Maritimes (and to a lesser extent Ontario) bitterly resist redistribution; political power is flowing away like water through their hands. This is a long term trend and unless some Ontario politicians get their heads out of their a** the long term trend for Ontario is bleak; we will be the Canadian rust belt.

As Edward has pointed out, the traditional Ontario/Quebec axis is losing relevance in Canada, if I were to make a bold prediction, the new alignment should be to draw a great circle from Cornwall to Prince Rupert, extending out to the Pacific Rim nations and India. Of course an "intellectual" would never think of such a thing, it dosn't fit on socialist kitchen tables, the BQ is far to parochial (hence the great circle dosn't start in Montreal of Quebec City) and the current party is seemingly too engaged in hanging on to what they have to look upwards and outwards. Perhaps I am too cynical.

I don't think there will be a fall election, the costs are too high and the expected return too small to justify forcing an election in the normal course of events. Only some scandal of outragious proportions would rock the boat enough to make this work for any party.