The Official Quit Picking on Stephen Harper Thread

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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Your benevolence knows no bounds, Cliffy! :)
 

Cliffy

Standing Member
Nov 19, 2008
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He's a politician, Cliffy and he's done me no harm in 9 years! Need I say more?
Not yet.
I'm not concerned with what he does or doesn't do for me. What he has done to others (indigenous peoples, veterans, scientists and science, education, youth, the elderly) and this country does concern me.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
75,301
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Not yet.
I'm not concerned with what he does or doesn't do for me. What he has done to others (indigenous peoples, veterans, scientists and science, education, youth, the elderly) and this country does concern me.

I don't want to piss on your parade, Cliffy, but I can pick away at it. For starters education is a provincial matter and I'm included in the elderly & getting two pensions from him. What scientists has he harmed? Most of the harm done to indigenous people was already done decades before he arrived on the scene. There's some improvement still needed in that regard and I think he recognizes it. I think there is still improvement needed for some veterans, but I don't think the healthy ones have much of a claim as they knew what they were getting into when they embarked on the career. Many of them got subsidized housing and education. But aside from all that Harper and all other politicians are limited by financial restraints and then there's guys like me who bitch when their taxes go up. I understand where you are coming from - my grand daughter and my sister both think he's an arch a$$hole. But they are quite naïve.:)
 

tay

Hall of Fame Member
May 20, 2012
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Harper defends his budget 'surplus' by admitting that there might have been some government departments that didn't spend all of their budgets but adding that government agencies aren't expected to spend every last dime they're given. Sounds good except..........

This item from CBC News last February reveals just how Harper is twisting the truth (link is external). It concerns the RCMP's unspent and 'refunded' budget for child pornography investigations.

Canada's national police force Mounties withheld some $10 million in funds (link is external) earmarked for its National Child Exploitation Co-ordination Centre and related projects, linchpins of the government's anti-child-pornography agenda.

The cuts, made partly as an RCMP contribution to the government's so-called deficit reduction action plan, have occurred even as the number of child-exploitation tips from the public increase exponentially.

The systematic underfunding is highlighted in a draft report prepared for Public Safety Canada, and obtained through the Access to Information Act.

The document, dated November last year, says the RCMP failed to spend its full $8-million annual budget to catch online child abusers throughout the five-year period ending in 2013.

Maybe there's less kiddie porn. That might account for the savings. Except that's not the case, just the opposite. In 2012 the RCMP received 10,000 tips. By 2015 that had swelled to 40,000 tips a year.

And let's not even get into what they've done to deserving veterans.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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I'm not sure about a Nobel Prize but he certainly deserves credit for enough savvy to save a couple of shekkels (a shekel = $1billion) for a rainy day such as now when he needs ammunition to get re elected. I live in the same country under most of the conditions as the multitude of whiners and the whining is sure getting f**king tiresome, especially from those willing to piss away $billions on refugees. :) :)
 

tay

Hall of Fame Member
May 20, 2012
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Imagine what could have been........


Market analysts and union leaders say the Harper government may have gotten a bad deal in selling off its remaining shares in General Motors, and one estimate projects a $3.5-billion loss for taxpayers.

The share sale was widely seen as an attempt to balance the federal government’s books ahead of this year’s election -- as the Tories had vowed -- despite a drop in oil revenues.

But according to calculations carried out by the Globe and Mail, this means taxpayers will take a $3.5-billion loss on Ottawa and Ontario’s investment in the automaker, which is a major employer in southern Ontario.

Including this week’s share sale, and the Ontario government’s $1.1-billion sale of GM shares in February, the two governments have recouped only $10.2 billion of the $13.7 billion they invested, the Globe calculated.

Many market analysts think the government would have been better off holding on to the shares a while longer. According to a report at the Financial Post, 14 of 24 analysts who follow GM say the time is right to buy, while only two are advising investors to sell.

“If you look at GM, it’s grossly undervalued relative to other global automakers,” John Stephenson, CEO of Stephenson & Co. Capital Management, told the Post.

Canadian Taxpayers Lost Billions On Tories' Badly-Timed GM Share Sale: Analysts
 

AnnaG

Hall of Fame Member
Jul 5, 2009
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Somehow, I really don't trust these fellows in government, right now. They've done nothing to impress upon me they in any way understand taxation. Or even representation. They don't understand governing, whatsoever, to be honest.

A $1.9 billion surplus when they'd forecast a $2 billion deficit? Seems shady. Something stinks of a lie.

The most likely reason is the government is excluding something from the budget.

Some thing or things totaling $3 billion in spending, not being accounted for by this Conservative government. It'd be nice if we had a budget officer who'd have already looked into the numbers to announce whether the government was being honest or not.

The Military, Veterans Affairs, the CBC, Air Canada, the NFB, healthcare, Canada Pension Plan, ect, and ect.

Somebody, the press and opposition parties, needs to look into these numbers, and do it quick, because they stink of fudge.

Thankfully and surprisingly the Ottawa Citizen has.......

Lee Berthiaume reports (link is external) on the $8.7 billion budgeted but unspent by the federal government over the past year. And if the Cons want to try to claim credit for the government's fiscal position, then surely they have to answer a couple of key questions for the money that went unspent:

What caused them to decide between 2014 and 2015 that the funding they themselves included in the budget shouldn't be used? And if they're on such an unsound fiscal footing that they feel the need to slash this much within a year of passing their preferred funding amounts in a majority Parliament, why would anybody take their platform numbers and promises seriously?

While the Conservatives have portrayed lapses as proof of economic prudence, critics say they amount to cuts by stealth. They say this is how the government can take money from Veterans Affairs, National Defence and other departments without actually cutting budgets.

Canadians won’t know exactly which departments or programs were affected until after the election, when the government publishes its annual detailed accounts. But figures produced by the Parliamentary Budget Office over the weekend provide an idea of where some of the money came from.


more

Federal departments left $8.7 billion unspent last year | Ottawa Citizen
Erm, why in the world would you trust ANYONE in governmentat ANY time?
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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No one opposes a surplus in principle, but it should be achieved through economic growth not slashing services. The fact that this surplus is less than 0.1% of our GDP just shows it's nothing to celebrate and is nothing to do with 'economics'.

Got to disagree with that, The Gov't is the worst organization for delivering services. We could get most services for the half the price if they were farmed out to the private sector and the bureaucraps got laid off. They could retain one bureaucrap as a watch dog to check on deliveries.
 

cribone

New Member
Sep 2, 2015
26
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1
Imagine what could have been........


Market analysts and union leaders say the Harper government may have gotten a bad deal in selling off its remaining shares in General Motors, and one estimate projects a $3.5-billion loss for taxpayers.

The share sale was widely seen as an attempt to balance the federal government’s books ahead of this year’s election -- as the Tories had vowed -- despite a drop in oil revenues.

But according to calculations carried out by the Globe and Mail, this means taxpayers will take a $3.5-billion loss on Ottawa and Ontario’s investment in the automaker, which is a major employer in southern Ontario.

Including this week’s share sale, and the Ontario government’s $1.1-billion sale of GM shares in February, the two governments have recouped only $10.2 billion of the $13.7 billion they invested, the Globe calculated.

Many market analysts think the government would have been better off holding on to the shares a while longer. According to a report at the Financial Post, 14 of 24 analysts who follow GM say the time is right to buy, while only two are advising investors to sell.

“If you look at GM, it’s grossly undervalued relative to other global automakers,” John Stephenson, CEO of Stephenson & Co. Capital Management, told the Post.

Canadian Taxpayers Lost Billions On Tories' Badly-Timed GM Share Sale: Analysts
Harper said something last night that the carmakers wouldn't like some of the provisions in the Pacific Trade Deal being negotiated. He didn't elaborate nor did the other two leader press him on it.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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Harper said something last night that the carmakers wouldn't like some of the provisions in the Pacific Trade Deal being negotiated. He didn't elaborate nor did the other two leader press him on it.

The other two idiots weren't interested in issues as much as to hear themselves talk, shout, rant and rave. Jr. couldn't make up his mind about much, he vacillated between the economy being in ruins and the economy being sound (when it suited his agenda)
 

MHz

Time Out
Mar 16, 2007
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Any list of opinions on what people think he is best suited for? (like being back of the unemployment line)
 

mentalfloss

Prickly Curmudgeon Smiter
Jun 28, 2010
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Harper making a respectable contribution to Parliament

‘It’s great that he shows up’: Stephen Harper, average MP, popping up in Parliament — but keeping low profile

Stephen Harper is out as prime minister, but the Calgary MP hasn’t been completely out of sight in Parliament. In fact, he’s earning some additional respect from caucus colleagues for staying engaged.

Harper-the-average-MP is also proving popular among some Conservatives — even after the party’s election loss — because he’s more approachable, no longer protected by an RCMP detail or the youthful PMO handlers known as the “boys in short pants.”

The former prime minister hasn’t shown up regularly for daily question period, or for Conservative caucus meetings since the first post-electoral gathering at which he accepted responsibility for the election loss and took feedback. But Tories said those absences were to avoid being a distraction for new interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose.

Harper has, however, been voting regularly early in the 42nd Parliament, including on the selection of a new House of Commons Speaker; against an NDP sub-amendment in reply to the throne speech; and against the Liberal government’s motion for a middle-class tax cut and pushing annual TFSA contributions back to $5,500.

Harper also voted late Thursday in support of the Official Opposition’s motion calling on the federal government to keep Canada’s six CF-18 fighter jets in Iraq and Syria for the coalition bombing mission against the Islamic State.

Whether he keeps up the regular voting schedule remains to be seen. The House of Commons adjourns Friday until Jan. 25.

‘It’s great that he shows up’: Stephen Harper, average MP, popping up in Parliament — but keeping low profile
 

mentalfloss

Prickly Curmudgeon Smiter
Jun 28, 2010
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Re: Harper making a respectable contribution to Parliament

Only on CC do you have people spinning a positive story to keep up a division.
 

Walter

Hall of Fame Member
Jan 28, 2007
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Re: Harper making a respectable contribution to Parliament

Harper is doing what he has been hired to do, only to a Liberal would this be news.