The Good side of Harper

[SirJosephPorter]

The people ousted the Liberals because the arrogant bastards stole millions and millions and millions and millions and millions of the taxpayers' dollars.

Colpy, Liberals were in power just too long. When one party is in power that long, people look for any excuse to get rid of it and give the other fellow a chance. It happened in Australia, when Howard was turfed out (he didn’t have any scandals), it will happen in Britain, It happened in USA.

So it is nothing out of the ordinary. If not for the sponsorship scandal, it would have been something else. But when a party has been in power that long, people look for any excuse to get rid of them.

But observe the difference. Last time after a prolonged liberal rule, Conservatives (Mulroney) got two back to back majorities. This time Messiah is struggling to get even one. You are saddled with a weak leader. Whatever Mulroney’s fault (and there were many), he was a smart, astute politician, who knew how to win elections.

 

[#juan]

Well, Sir Porter, it has become absolutely clear that you are a hard-core Liberal supporter.

Funny how you work up the unmitigated gall to sarcastically call Harper "Messiah", when I and other Conservatives often criticize him.

Meanwhile you grovel before a false picture of Jean "the Don" Chretien, the most corrupt PM in our history, and literally worship Pierre Trudeau, who did more than any other PM to thwart effective democracy in this country.

One doesn't know whether to laugh, cry, or vomit......but I'm leaning towards the latter.

Then, in midst of a sycophantic post expressing your undying love for your Liberal masters..........amongst that great pile of manure, one finds this "gem":



HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAH

Sorry, I'm getting hysterical.

The people ousted the Liberals because the arrogant bastards stole millions and millions and millions and millions and millions of the taxpayers' dollars.

Full stop.

Geezus! Are you really that deluded???????????????????????????????

Colpy
Before you break your arm patting yourself on the back, you should note that most of the money in the sponsership scandal was recovered and Chretien put quite a few people in jail who were involved. Hell, Mulroney threw out a cabinet minister for corruption every year he was in office. He also brought us the Bloc. Wouldn't it be nice to have balanced budgets again? I know you like your leaders to get their crooked money in brown paper bags but to each his own. Liberals don't have a corner on corruption by any means. Conservatives are responsible for most of our debt and they are adding to it every hour.

 

[Socrates the Greek]

Well, Sir Porter, it has become absolutely clear that you are a hard-core Liberal supporter.

Funny how you work up the unmitigated gall to sarcastically call Harper "Messiah", when I and other Conservatives often criticize him.

Meanwhile you grovel before a false picture of Jean "the Don" Chretien, the most corrupt PM in our history, and literally worship Pierre Trudeau, who did more than any other PM to thwart effective democracy in this country.

One doesn't know whether to laugh, cry, or vomit......but I'm leaning towards the latter.

Then, in midst of a sycophantic post expressing your undying love for your Liberal masters..........amongst that great pile of manure, one finds this "gem":



HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAH

Sorry, I'm getting hysterical.

The people ousted the Liberals because the arrogant bastards stole millions and millions and millions and millions and millions of the taxpayers' dollars.

Full stop.

Geezus! Are you really that deluded???????????????????????????????

But they left the Canadian banking system in real secure position, and OH THE LIBERALS ALL PAID THEIR TAXES ON TIME.

OH..... LETS STICK TO PURE FACT NO BROWN BAGS ARE ON RECORD IN SECRRET MEATINGS OVER THE BOARDER TO BE CLACIFIDE UNIPOTREN FOR DECLARATION, Colpy, it really smells when we open it up, bad Conservative thievery.........All you have to do is divide $100BILLION over 20Million tax payers and the number will irritate you worst than hemorrhoids. Had the Liberals been in power the Canadian economy will not be facing bad red ink.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

All you have to do is divide $100BILLION over 20Million tax payers and the number will irritate you worst than hemorrhoids.

Socrates, I am afraid that is human nature, we do not see the wood from the trees. I remember in one of the threads we were discussing the stellar performance of Canadian banks. Somebody there complained about the high ATM charges. To which my response was, which would he rather pay, higher ATM charges or tens of billions of dollars in bailout money (which government would have to pay if Canadian banks were in the same sorry state as US banks).

Same way, people see the 100 million $ or so involved in the sponsorship scandal. However, as soon as Harper came to power, he gave Bush a gift of 1 billion $ in the softwood lumber dispute. It was a propitiation gift to get in the good graces of Bush. How was that any better use of the money than that wasted in sponsorship scandal? And it didn’t work anyway, relationship between USA and Canada wasn’t any noticeably warmer than before.

Then of course, as you say there is the huge Leviathan of deficit, which threatens to put the budget in the red at least for years, if not the decades.

A reporter was talking to Paul Martin the other day and Martin made a very interesting point. Harper is giving the excuse that this crisis was unforeseen, so he had to incur the astronomical deficits. There is some truth in what he says.

However, Martin pointed out that when Liberals were in power, there were plenty of unforeseen crises. There was the 9/11, dot com recession. But Liberals were prepared for unforeseen crises, they kept running a healthy surplus throughout. When Bush went for astronomical deficits in USA, Liberals kept running surplus here.

Martins’ point was that it is the job of Prime Minster to cope with unforeseen crises. Harper was wrong to fritter away the surplus in tax cuts favoring the rich (GST cut disproportionately favors the rich, while income tax cut favors the poor and middle class). Then when the unforeseen crises came, he had nothing to fall back on.

If we had Martin in power instead of Harper, I am confident that we would have had no deficit, or only a modest amount of deficit by now.

 

[Colpy]

[SirJosephPorter]Peace?

Chrétien took us into the current combat role in Afghanistan

Colpy, he also kept us out of Iraq. If your Messiah had been in power, he would have taken us into Iraq, he said so himself. So, peace? Absolutely.

Only a Liberal could call well over 100 Canadian soldiers dead "peace".....because it was a Liberal policy. (A policy I agree with, BTW)

I asked you if you were deluded. You just answered.

Prosperity?

Most certainly. Your political bias notwithstanding, facts, figures have a way of intruding upon one’s political beliefs. Facts don’t’ lie, it was a period of unparalleled prosperity in Canada.

No argument there.

Yep....because of free Trade and the GST. Not hard to balance the budget when your revenues are swelling by leaps and bounds.....because of free trade......

Now this is your political bias speaking. I know the conservative dogma is that anything good is done by Conservative, everything bad done by Liberals. So I assume somehow you give credit to economic prosperity (do you even agree that there was economic prosperity during Liberal rule?) to Mulroney, Joe Clark, Diefenbaker etc. (or do you go back even further?). But again, facts do not lie. We had unparalleled economic prosperity during Liberal rule, and people give the credit where it is due, to Liberals (and mainly to Martin).

If you will read my posts you will see I give Martin credit for sound fiscal management. I also give Lyin' Brian credit where it is due.....for providing the means to increase gov't revenues due to a booming economy in great part because of the Free Trade deal (that Chretien was going to scrap HA!) and increased revenue due to the GST (also which the Liberals promised to scrap....:roll. Go to your famous websites and see how gov't revenues expanded during Chretien's rule....ask yourself why.

I liked neither gov't, BTW.

I was a member of the REFORM Party, not the idiot PCs.

I just give credit where it is due.

Remember, the prosperity was largely the result of Conservative policies....

But of course, Colpy, of course. Policies of Mulroney, Clark, Diefenbaker no doubt (or even further back?). That may be your conservative dogma. Canadians give full credit to Liberals, that is why they gave them four wins in a row.

see above

I have a good friend.....now Professor emeritus in History at UNB-SJ. He reflects that one of the major reasons he is glad of his retirement is that he was having to add Trudeau to his Canadian History course......and even voicing his name makes him ill.

So your good friend doesn’t like Trudeau, big surprise there. As I said in Canada (especially in Ontario and Québec), Trudeau remains hugely popular.

Yes he is.......almost a Cult of Personality.....adherence to which by definition ignores the flaws......BTW, my friend is brilliant....I did say Professor emeritus?....he hates Trudeau because he loved the nation.

Trudeau did great damage to this country's democratic institutions.

That is your opinion. In my opinion, Canada owes Trudeau a great debt for the Charter and the Constitution.

No, it is not my opinion....it is fact. Canada is currently the world's least responsive democracy.......in other words, the people have no control other than in their elections every five years.....because of concentration of poweer in the PMs' office and the improper use of Order in Council.......both policies instigated by PET.......who treated Parliament (the voice of the people) with absolute scorn........

I NEED to PEE!

There are lots of people in Russia that idolize Stalin. I don't care.

You compare Trudeau only to Stalin? Are you getting soft? I thought you would compare him to Hitler. You disappoint me, Colpy.

Read your history. Stalin was MUCH worse than Hitler.

And no, I am not comparing PET with Stalin.....even I wouldn't do that.

I am comparing the unthinking adoration that people have for leaders that have done serious damage to the society......not the leaders themselves.

 

[Cannuck]

To me when I look at the big picture of over $100B debt over 5 years, that is so scaryyyyyyyyy because if we divide $100B into 20.000.000 tax payers in canada we come up with a much biger number then the $1800 JML is saving in fact we come up with some disturbing numbers in debt per Canadian which idetifies that the $1800 JLM is saving as a carot on the stick by Harper the
Minipulator ..

You're oversimplifying the issue. Due to low interest rates and cheap labor, now is the time to provide funds for our crumbling infrastructure. While I'm not really a fan of deficit spending, there probably isn't a better time to pump money into it than right now. It will probably cost us less in the long run and it has to be done whether we like it or not.

 

[Cannuck]

But observe the difference. Last time after a prolonged liberal rule, Conservatives (Mulroney) got two back to back majorities. This time Messiah is struggling to get even one. You are saddled with a weak leader. Whatever Mulroney’s fault (and there were many), he was a smart, astute politician, who knew how to win elections.

...and the fact that Mulroney didn't have to concern himself with the Bloc has no bearing on anything...:roll:

 

[mt_pockets1000]

It does my old heart good to see this weasel squirm. Just today he's already backtracking on his previous estimates in the latest budget.

Harper defends federal government's forecasts for the economy

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Only a Liberal could call well over 100 Canadian soldiers dead "peace".....because it was a Liberal policy. I asked you if you were deluded. You just answered.

Colpy, in my opinion, Afghanistan war was well justified (it still is). A great injustice was perpetrated against USA, I think USA had the right to take out the government responsible. I for one am proud that Chrétien decided to help USA in Afghanistan.

So yes, 100 Canadian soldiers dead, while 100 too many is not too high a price to pay to fight terrorism. If Messiah had been in power and we had gone into Iraq, that would have been a totally different story. So yes, I think we were at peace, the war in Afghanistan notwithstanding. And 100 Canadian dead in 8 years, I would hardly call it a massacre.

No, it is not my opinion....it is fact.

Not a fact, Colpy, just your opinion.

Canada is currently the world's least responsive democracy

How? How is it any less responsive than say, democracy in Britain or Australia? Canada is a typical Parliamentary Democracy, comparable to other Parliamentary democracies. Don’t’ compare Canada with USA, that is a totally different system.

who treated Parliament (the voice of the people) with absolute scorn........

that is what happens when a party has majority, Colpy. Individual MPs would rarely go against the PM.

It may be that you don’t like Parliamentary democracy. But I don’t’ think Canadian system is any less responsive that say, British or Australian system. Or how about t he New Zealand system? They don’t even have two chambers, they have only one chamber.

 

[Cannuck]

Colpy, in my opinion, Afghanistan war was well justified (it still is). A great injustice was perpetrated against USA, I think USA had the right to take out the government responsible. I for one am proud that Chrétien decided to help USA in Afghanistan.

Whether you believe a war is justified is irrelevant. You made the false claim that Canada was at "peace" and it was due to a Liberal government when in fact we are at war and it was a Liberal government that took us there. Spin it all you want but it doesn't change the facts.

As far as Trudeau is concerned. He was an enemy of democracy. All one has to do is look at the rise of enabling legislation during his reign of terror. He practically patented it.

 

[Socrates the Greek]

You're oversimplifying the issue. Due to low interest rates and cheap labor, now is the time to provide funds for our crumbling infrastructure. While I'm not really a fan of deficit spending, there probably isn't a better time to pump money into it than right now. It will probably cost us less in the long run and it has to be done whether we like it or not.

When we see almost 400.000 jobs will vanish soon we see that Harper Conservatives aren’t as quick to spend it,

If they were quick to put it to good use we would not see this idiotic fiscal exercise.
Knowing Harper’s creative CHEATING SHADY accounting he may at the end of the day call the money that never went to infrastructure a SURPLUS.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Cannuck, you have been addressing several posts to me in the last few days. Well, don’t expect a reply from me. I don’t even read your posts these days.

As they say on Jerry Springer Show, ‘talk to the hand’.

 

[Cannuck]

Cannuck, you have been addressing several posts to me in the last few days. Well, don’t expect a reply from me. I don’t even read your posts these days.

I don't expect you to reply nor do I care. It actually makes it easier when I don't have to defend what I say. Ignore away.

 

[JLM]

"
Life expectancy

1993 - 77.7
2005 - 80.1 "
Those figures are pure speculation and just an estimate at best as you cannot say what the average life expectancy is for someone born in 1993 until everyone born in '93 is dead- probably 2113.

 

[Cannuck]

When we see almost 400.000 jobs will vanish soon we see that Harper Conservatives aren’t as quick to spend it,

If they were quick to put it to good use we would not see this idiotic fiscal exercise.
Knowing Harper’s creative CHEATING SHADY accounting he may at the end of the day call the money that never went to infrastructure a SURPLUS.

Those of us with a little accounting skill can spot that a mile away. I'll keep you informed of his shenanigans if you wish....or you can let the Auditor General do her/his thing.

 

[Colpy]

Canada is currently the world's least responsive democracy

How? How is it any less responsive than say, democracy in Britain or Australia? Canada is a typical Parliamentary Democracy, comparable to other Parliamentary democracies. Don’t’ compare Canada with USA, that is a totally different system.

I am not an idiot, I know the difference between a Parliamentary and Republican system.....

No other Parliamentary system uses regulatory law as much as Canada's.

In other Parliamentary systems, MPs are NOT expected to toe the party line except in the case of "confidence" bills in the House.

In no other Paliament are MPs routinely punished for not voting with the gov't.

In no other Parliament are OiCs used so extensively.....and without ever being refered to Parliament.

All these things focus power in the PMs office.

PET was responsible for establishing much of the above as precedent in Canada.

 

[JLM]

I am a Conservative Party member.

I have some serious problems with Harper, in his tactical abilities (Damn, did he ever blow it when the "coalition " challenged his update), in the way he handles the party, and in his political philosophy.

BUT, I think he is a decent man. I think the demonization of him is entirely unfair......especially when one looks at dear old Mr. Chretien, the most popular PM since Trudeau.

Harper, on any scale of humanity, stands head and shoulders above either of those two men......neither one of whom could identify a principle if it junped up and bit him on the ass.

Which is part of Harper's problem: he does have principles.

That is why we are still in a combat role in Afghanistan, because Harper wishes to uphold our national honour by fulfilling our treaty obligations.....and because he believes the cause is in our national interest.

That is why we support Israel, because it is right to do so.........because the alternatives are simply beyond the Pale.

That is why we have thumbed our noses at China in minor ways......because they are an emerging fascist superpower, a threat to the west, and an extremely negative influence on the world.

That is why Harper attracts such scorn.....partially it is his manner, but for the most part, Canadians prefer their politicians with NO principles. Those with principles alienate people.....so unCanadian a thing to do!

As discontent as I am, that is why I will probably continue to vote CPC. A little principle is better than none.

I await the veritable tidalwave of incoming ridicule......... :-0

I used to be an N.D.P. member until I found out there is absolutely no advantage to it. Just got phoned all the time for 101 different reasons that had nothing to do with my welfare. So I can't see why anyone would be tied to any party unless they are considering running for a seat. Why be a slave? Especially as there is no political party that has an scruples or ethics- just one common goal, get as much of their snout in the trough for as long as possible, while doing their best to keep all other snouts out. When I posted "the good side of Harper"- that was with full realization of the 100 bad sides.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

"
Life expectancy

1993 - 77.7
2005 - 80.1 "
Those figures are pure speculation and just an estimate at best as you cannot say what the average life expectancy is for someone born in 1993 until everyone born in '93 is dead- probably 2113.

Sorry JLM, that is how life expectancy is always defined. The life expectancy calculated in this manner is used in many walks of life (e.g. deciding lei insurance premiums, retirement planning, calculating annuity payments etc.). Now, if you want to change the rules just for Liberals (thereby trying to portray Liberal achievement les than it really is),that is your business.

However, that is the figure of life expectancy, and you cannot deny the fact that during Liberal rule, life expectancy increased (well, perhaps you can, but that does not negate it).

 

[Cannuck]

I used to be an N.D.P. member until I found out there is absolutely no advantage to it.

Nice to see you are cured. Did you have to take penicillin or something?

 

[JLM]

Good day Cannuk, my point is reflecting on “JML’s comment that income splitting for taxation purposes, last year it saved us about $2000. This year due to the tax calculations being so mind boggling I let H & R Bloch does it for us and to my relief found we're saving $1800 this year; obviously it works best where there is a disparity between the income levels of the spouses, which is our case. For this reason alone I'd be very reluctant to get rid of Harper”.

To me when I look at the big picture of over $100B debt over 5 years, that is so scaryyyyyyyyy because if we divide $100B into 20.000.000 tax payers in canada we come up with a much biger number then the $1800 JML is saving in fact we come up with some disturbing numbers in debt per Canadian which idetifies that the $1800 JLM is saving as a carot on the stick by Harper the
Minipulator ..

That's probably very true but the good side of it is, is by the time he has that figured out and how much I owe him I may be dead. Worse case scenario, if I'm still alive and I don't have the money- he's not getting blood out of a turnip- I'm at the age now where I've done saving, starting to spend what I have saved and borrowing what I can now at these low interest rates- 31/2% in my case as long as I own a house. And they can't take away my house as long as my wife is still alive and she's quite a bit younger than I am. :lol::lol: