[Guy_Fawkes]

Just let me get my slicker on, I dont want to catch any poo in this fling fight.

[Thanos]

Ignatz's back is against the wall and probably doesn't have a choice. The Liberals are in danger of losing the Senate if Harper appoints any more Tories to it over the next year. If they want to keep the Senate they have to get their own minority, have a ton of their old-timers shuffle off into the sunset, and then appoint a bunch of younger newbies in order to maintain the Senate status quo. If they lose the Senate then their agenda is fucked because the Harper appointees will screw them up as much the next time they're in government as the Chreiten appointees have screwed Harper.

Any fall election this year won't happen because of policy or grandiose rhetoric, or Afghanistan, or EI, or even over anything that Harper may or may not have done wrong during the economic meltdown. It'll be all over a bloody fight for the Liberals to maintain a death-grip on the Senate. More pathetic than usual IMO, even by the incredibly low standards of Liberals.

[Lemmy]

EyeBrock EyeBrock:

Ken, I'm just calling it as I see it. Not being partisan here and you have seen me post less than supportive stuff on Harper.
I just think this threatening a 'no confidence' vote is playing into Harper's hands mate.

Iggy has way more to lose on this. Harper can just hunker down and dig in. Personally I don't think the CPC will get a majority but the Libs won't beat Harper at this time either.
Maybe in a year or two they would have a decent chance but a fall election will spell the end of Iggy.

My crystal ball's tuned to the same channel. All I see is a piss-pot full of wasted tax dollars. Then again, maybe it'd be a good thing for the Liberals' long-term strategy to go to war with Iggy, lose a fall election, bouce Iggy and find a leader that doesn't come with as many uncertainties. Maybe losing a Fall '09 election would position the party for a real chance at a majority in a couple of years.

[EyeBrock]

Lemmy, we seem to agree on most things these days. Where did we go wrong?

[ridenrain]

Thanos Thanos:

Ignatz's back is against the wall and probably doesn't have a choice. The Liberals are in danger of losing the Senate if Harper appoints any more Tories to it over the next year. If they want to keep the Senate they have to get their own minority, have a ton of their old-timers shuffle off into the sunset, and then appoint a bunch of younger newbies in order to maintain the Senate status quo. If they lose the Senate then their agenda is fucked because the Harper appointees will screw them up as much the next time they're in government as the Chreiten appointees have screwed Harper.

Any fall election this year won't happen because of policy or grandiose rhetoric, or Afghanistan, or EI, or even over anything that Harper may or may not have done wrong during the economic meltdown. It'll be all over a bloody fight for the Liberals to maintain a death-grip on the Senate. More pathetic than usual IMO, even by the incredibly low standards of Liberals.

I think you're right with that. The Libs know they can throttle parliament with their senate majority and they are definately afraid of losing that.

[OnTheIce]

Lemmy Lemmy:

EyeBrock EyeBrock:

Ken, I'm just calling it as I see it. Not being partisan here and you have seen me post less than supportive stuff on Harper.
I just think this threatening a 'no confidence' vote is playing into Harper's hands mate.

Iggy has way more to lose on this. Harper can just hunker down and dig in. Personally I don't think the CPC will get a majority but the Libs won't beat Harper at this time either.
Maybe in a year or two they would have a decent chance but a fall election will spell the end of Iggy.

My crystal ball's tuned to the same channel. All I see is a piss-pot full of wasted tax dollars. Then again, maybe it'd be a good thing for the Liberals' long-term strategy to go to war with Iggy, lose a fall election, bouce Iggy and find a leader that doesn't come with as many uncertainties. Maybe losing a Fall '09 election would position the party for a real chance at a majority in a couple of years.

I think you may be right.

But....

The Liberals have to pick a solid leader. A Frank McKenna type of dude.

Had they picked a better leader, such as McKenna I think they'd win this possible election hands down.

[EdwardRI]

Lemmy Lemmy:

I theory, I agree with what you're saying. What I disagre with is the notion that the Conservative Party of Canada represents right-wing economic ideology better than the Liberals. I don't see the Cons being 'right' of the Libs and, given that we're stuck with a choice between two pretty much like-minded parties on the political/economic spectrum, I have to make my choice based on something else.

I wasn't defending the Conservative Party of Canada, I was defending free-market policy. Being an atheist, I often find myself at odd against the CPC. I just really dislike the NDP and Dion. It's quite possible that Iggy could have a platform I prefer to the CPC's, in which case I would vote Liberal.

Lemmy Lemmy:

If that "something else" is social justice, then I'll likely lean Liberal. The Conservative Party, IMHO, is chaulked-full of mean-spirited Alliance/Reform idealogues that have read way too much Ayn Rand (and understood very little of it). As an Ontarian, the memory of a majority Provincial government run by that sort is too fresh in my mind. Mike Harris' secret agendas played out once the majority was in place and I fear the same thing from Harper.

I've heard of Mike Harris? I don't really keep up to Ontario politics, so I can't say. I'm not a big fan of social justice - I've been told I lack compassion or such thing. I care more about my personal economic situation than the well-being of people I don't know.

Lemmy Lemmy:

If I vote purely on economics, then I'd also vote Liberal, given that Harper just implemented the most left-wing budget in Canadian history. I cannot support ANY party that runs a $50B budget deficit, especially when we've spent the past 20 years learning how crippling it is to manage a Federal budget when a third of total spending is pissed-away servicing debt. On the other hand, I'm very disturbed by Iggy's support of the Iraqi war (though I'm certain Harper would also have supported the war), the ease with which he allied himself with separatist bastards last fall, and a host of other uncertainties.

I don't know the specifics of Iggy's economic platform. The last election platform of the Liberals was the Dion plan and until I have specifics on Iggy's, it's Dion's that I go off of. But yes, I'm not a fan of deficits. Or the war (never was).

Lemmy Lemmy:

All I'm left with, then, is a choice between 2 parties, neither of whom I have much faith in. So then I have to think about my particular riding. The incumbant Conservative is a walking corpse and the Liberal candidates in recent elections have ranged from tree-hugging kooks to whiney rich brats to religious fundamentalists. So I'm likely to vote Green as a protest vote. If enough of us do that, maybe the Big 2 will start to get the message that they've BOTH been poor governors of our land.

I'll vote CPC unless Iggy has a more free-market platform.

EdwardRI EdwardRI:

The point on the Business Cycle is irrelevent. What IS important is that we are on the downslope of the Laffer Curve. I wouldn't support any tax hikes, whether the economy is rising or falling. If we want to raise tax revenues, we need to REDUCE tax rates.

We're on the same page here.

[Lemmy]

EyeBrock EyeBrock:

Lemmy, we seem to agree on most things these days. Where did we go wrong?

We talked about cops the day after I got a $341 ticket!

[EdwardRI]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

EdwardRI EdwardRI:

If the right-wing were actually more free-market than the left, you might have a point there. In fact, it was Paul Martin in Canada who pulled us out of huge deficit spending and Brian Mulroney who introduced the GST (although, to his credit, he also brought us NAFTA). Similarly in teh US, it was Bill Clinton that reigned in an era of relative prosperity and right-winger George Bush who racked up the largest deficits and the biggest government expansion since WWII.

The idea that the right wing is any more fiscally responsible than the left is a myth. fact is, bioth parties are very close to the centre of the bell curve, and their fiscal policies aren't all that different.

Economic efficiency ain't all it's cracked up to be anyways.

I thought Paul Martin was a better Prime Minister than Mulroney, and mostly thought Clinton was a better president than George Bush. They had more economically right-winged, efficient and free-market economic policies.

I give no devotion to any party for such reasons that everything isn't black and white.

[OnTheIce]

Lemmy Lemmy:

As an Ontarian, the memory of a majority Provincial government run by that sort is too fresh in my mind. Mike Harris' secret agendas played out once the majority was in place and I fear the same thing from Harper.

Ah yes, the guy who brought forth an entire platform, in a book called "The Common Sense Revolution" and followed through with a vast majority of the things he said he'd do?

Damn, it sucks when politicians do what they say.

Why is it when Conservative politicians don't do what's on their platform to the exact word, they're accused of having a "secret/hidden agenda" but when other parties do it, it's just changing with the times?

[Lemmy]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Ah yes, the guy who brought forth an entire platform, in a book called "The Common Sense Revolution" and followed through with a vast majority of the things he said he'd do?

Damn, it sucks when politicians do what they say.

In his book, he left out the part where he would destroy public education and healthcare and raise my taxes with Provincial downloads. It'd be nice if he'd mentioned who the victims were gonna be as a result of his promises.

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Why is it when Conservative politicians don't do what's on their platform to the exact word, they're accused of having a "secret/hidden agenda" but when other parties do it, it's just changing with the times?

I don't know. I can only speak of Harris, who spoke in half-truths.

[OnTheIce]

Lemmy Lemmy:

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Ah yes, the guy who brought forth an entire platform, in a book called "The Common Sense Revolution" and followed through with a vast majority of the things he said he'd do?

Damn, it sucks when politicians do what they say.

In his book, he left out the part where he would destroy public education and healthcare and raise my taxes with Provincial downloads. It'd be nice if he'd mentioned who the victims were gonna be as a result of his promises.

You forgot to mention how Martin and Chretien cut transfer payments do the Provinces, in which the Province had to recover and naturally, pass down those cuts accordingly.

Further, when Harris left office, he not only increased the spending on health care to pre-Federal-Cut levels, but increased it to an all time high.

McGuinty has increased spending as well during his two terms while closing ER'r in rural communities.

Destroyed public education? Oddly enough, the funding model and other issues such as testing are still in place today. Had they been so devastating, surely McGuinty, the husband of a teacher, would have made the changes necessary to correct it.

[Lemmy]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

You forgot to mention how Martin and Chretien cut transfer payments do the Provinces, in which the Province had to recover and naturally, pass down those cuts accordingly.

Further, when Harris left office, he not only increased the spending on health care to pre-Federal-Cut levels, but increased it to an all time high.

McGuinty has increased spending as well during his two terms while closing ER'r in rural communities.

Destroyed public education? Oddly enough, the funding model and other issues such as testing are still in place today. Had they been so devastating, surely McGuinty, the husband of a teacher, would have made the changes necessary to correct it.

McGuinty's failure to disband MPAC, redress the Education Act and dismantle OCoT are the 3 primary reasons I won't support the Provincial Liberals in the next election. But that's got nothing to do with Harris fucking up this province.

[ASLplease]

I'm from Ontario, so I want the Liberals back in power so we can continue to leech off the west

[kenmore]

Critics say leaked video of private speech shows the prime minister's true 'two-faced' nature.» and what an asshole he is