Moonbox

We don't have a useful point of reference for the current health crisis. None of the viral outbreaks we've seen over the last 30-40 years have been nearly as serious. Comparisons to SARS, MERS or H1N1 are worthless because those viruses didn't spread nearly as quickly or as insidiously. We'd probably have to go back 100 years to the Spanish Flu to come up with a similar pandemic, but both the economy and the health care systems were so different then that it's not that useful either. One point that seems to be overlooked by a lot of people is that it's the fact that most people DO NOT get very sick that makes this coronavirus so problematic. A virus that consistently exhibits early, serious and obvious signs of infection is easy to track and contain. This one doesn't. The very fact that it's mild for most people is what allows it to spread undetected and cause such a serious problem. A terrifying virus like Ebola with an R0 of less than 1.3 (and 50% mortality) is actually far less dangerous than something like like coronavirus, with an R0 of probably 3-4 and a 1-2% mortality rate. It sounds silly, but, but that's how compound/exponential growth works. As for the economic side of things, most people don't really understand how the global system works. Even BEFORE the imposed shut-downs, companies were facing huge supply-side problems and layoffs were imminent, just on account of things not arriving from China etc. As the healthcare situations in Italy and Spain spiral out of control (with more to follow), those economies start shutting/slowing down as well which leads to further disruptions. Fear and anxiety start taking root (reasonably) and that's when people stop deciding to spend money. What initially started as a supply-shock to the economy is therefore followed by a demand-shock. We end up in a situation where manufacturers can't build what they planned because parts aren't coming in, and nobody wants to buy half their stuff anyways because they don't know what's going on with their jobs. The bottom-line, worst-case scenario is obviously that we'd say "To hell with the elderly" and just let the virus run its course and cull the weak/old. IF we decided to do that, and IF people didn't care about their parents and grandparents - then yeah, the economic impact would be mild. That's not the reality though.

Yeah I've been trying to tell everyone this for the last couple of weeks. Given their initial cover up and their flexibility with the truth, I don't think we can trust a word they say on this matter. Nobody else has managed to just shut the virus down cold-turkey, so how has this disaster of a government managed to stop it all at 81,000 cases? Not likely. There's no doubt that EVERYONE's numbers are underestimating the number of people infected. This virus doesn't have a 14% mortality rate. If we're to believe the 1-3% mortality rate instead, we're underestimating the number of infected by at least 10x.

Like I said, we're not proposing months of house arrest and 100% isolation. That's a straw-man that folks like Trump are tossing around. Everyone can't stay home. Parts of the economy still MUST function. We know that. That being said, the virus will cripple large parts of the economy regardless of what we do. Whether governments impose self-isolation or not, people aren't going to be spending money. Until the anxiety and uncertainty we're dealing with shows signs of resolving, people won't be travelling, going to restaurants, playing sports and certainly won't be making big-ticket purchases when there are mass-layoffs and global supply-chain problems. The idea that we just lift the shutdown measures and things go back to economic-normal isn't base on reality. To oversimplify, we're looking at a shorter-term reduction to something like 35% economic capacity so that we can get back to 75% capacity over the coming months, and then more quickly to 100% capacity in 2021. The alternative is that we limp along at 65% capacity, things get much worse, and then we drop down to <50% anyways and it lasts far, far longer, with far worse long-term consequences. Those percentages are all made up, so don't overthink the "math". I'm just trying to illustrate the idea. It's what I'm hearing daily on conference calls with Canadian and US macro-economists and investment strategists managing hundreds of billions. We cannot separate the health impact from the economic impact. As one goes down the crapper, the other follows.

So you're saying that the WHO isn't taking direction from the scientists, doctors, epidemiologists and "immunologists" that work for/with it? You're better a better judge of this sort of research? No doubt there's a lot of bureaucracy involved with UN organizations, but the D E E P S T A T E corruption theories can explain away literally everything if you're willing to do a bit of mental gymnastics.

No, but nobody is saying we need to lock everything down for 5-6 months. As he said, a slow and pensive return to more normal functions will likely be how we proceed from here. The virus is going to be circulating and spreading, likely, for at least a year, and we frankly can't just shut down the economy for that long. On the other hand, we can't return to normal economic function (or even close to it) until cases start slowing and the outlook improves. By can't, I mean it doesn't matter if lock-downs are imposed or optional. The economy will not function properly as long as hospitals stay overloaded and people are dying without access to ventilators. People won't travel, they won't go to restaurants and they won't gather or do a lot of normal activities. Consumer spending will be steeply curtailed, which will subsequently lead to companies stockpiling inventory and eventually more layoffs. Global economies will not function amidst this sort of health crisis. Some parts of it will, but there's way too much uncertainty for money to flow like it needs to for business-as-normal. The idea that we lift the isolation measures and things just start chugging along again is pure fantasy.

Remember, just a couple posts ago? Somehow suggesting that our criticism of the Bombardier bailout is exceptional. This isn't a question of "laws". It's a question of horrible policy decisions and pandering to special interests. The only solution here is for voters to get their heads out of their anuses and to hold politicians accountable for these demonstrably awful decisions. The issue here is that pandering is usually bad for the general public interest, but ends up being political gold. The votes you win by handing money over to special interests usually far surpasses the number you lose from informed voters who see it for what it is. Ignorance is the problem. That's why we're talking about Bombardier right now. It's why we talked about ethanol, solar, softwood lumber and other subsidies in the past. It's why we discussed the auto-bailout, at length, back in 2008/2009. Bombardier is the current subject, and it's something worth discussing.

Now we peel away the thin disguise of your "argument", which is the absurd notion that we're being grossly unfair to poor little Bombardier by discussing them specifically. That we're talking about them at all, apparently, is proof of some vendetta we have against them. Just no. Stop being silly. Bombardier is simply a really good example of the underlying problem. Not only is it a large and well-known name, but it's been a chronic offender and a shining example repeated failure. We're throwing good money after bad without changing anything and that's always a bad idea. The worst part of the whole debacle is that the founding family still holds a controlling share of the company despite their demonstrated inability to operate profitably. Corporate subsidies, tax breaks and incentives aren't always a bad thing (though often they are). In Bombardier's case, however, the past and present leadership has proven it can't be trusted or relied on to provide value for taxpayer money. We're putting public money into a company to support and inflate the value of the controlling family's stock, and they're giving up pretty much nothing for it. We're getting fleeced.

but Trudeau is way more likely to mess up without all that big and best stuff, you know? Trump has all the best things. He's got the best people, the best resources, the best experience, the biggest military, the biggest small hands, the best hair and definitely the best words. The job's going to be a cakewalk for him. His administration is a finally-tuned machine firing on all cylinders.

Look up straw-man before you post again please. I don't want to hide it from anyone. I would love to have more public spending accountability. Nobody suggested otherwise anywhere. Stop pretending like someone has. This is juvenile, school-yard logic. The fact that there are problems elsewhere doesn't mean that Bombardier itself isn't a problem and that we shouldn't be discussing it specifically. Your argument is akin to the small child saying, "...but but they all did it toooo!" You see the thread title? It's about Bombardier.

No way. Trump is a bigly man with the incredible ideas. He's got the best ideas. They're great. He also has the most resources behind him - the best resources, and the greatest team in the whole world helping him. His team is great. They're wonderful people and they're going to help him do tremendous things...really yuge things. And by the way, Trumps selected his team based on his experience running a very successful business. He's been very successful, you know? Anyways Trump does have a hard job because he has to deal with China - and he has great respect for China - the greatest respect, but Trudeau doesn't have to solve bigly problems like that. You know, who would you want on your side if China invaded? Mad-dog Mattis, or that guy Harjiit with the silly hat? How can you even fit a helmet under that thing? Ridiculous. totally ridiculous. Look, Trump has a way easier job because he has the best experience and the best people and resources. That makes his job way easier.

Because you're contesting the validity of claims regarding Bombardier's lack thereof. You're also protesting our questioning of repeated Bombardier corporate handouts/welfare, bizarrely implying that we can't discuss it specifically without talking about accountability as a general macro issue. If you extend the logic you're using a little bit further you can see how absurd it is: -How can you demand accountability from federal government and Bombardier without demanding it from corporate Canada across the board? -How can you demand more corporate accountability without demanding more from politicians? -How can you demand more political accountability without demanding more from the public service sector? None of these leaps make any actual sense, and all we really do is expand the envelope and derail the discussion.

What are you even talking about at this point? I'm not even sure you know. This is gobbledygook running off the rails.

Churchill was instrumental in writing the Treaty of Versailles?

Winston Churchill had nothing to do with the rise of Hitler. How do you even link the two? Did Galipoli lead to WW2 or something?

Three of Canada's largest media outlets accept the CTF's figures and publish them on a national scale. That counts for a lot more in terms of credibility than your lame-duck deflecting. Refusing the citations simply because you don't like the source is a cheap and intellectually vacant tactic. There's no doubt that the CTF has a bias, but that they're openly publishing numbers on a national scale that could be easily refuted/challenged if Bombardier were capable of doing so. If I were so inclined, I'm sure I could drag up alternate sources, but there's really no point. You've not provided any sources yourself to dispute any of the claims or citations being made nor have you made any effort to explain how or why they're wrong. All you've managed to do so far is bring up red-herrings and straw-men, directing us to look elsewhere for examples of failed corporate welfare when we're already discussing a current, large and repeated example of it.

If you say so. What about all of the citations from the CBC, GlobeandMail, Financial Post and the Ottawa Sun? Are we pretending they were never linked? If you're going to demand references and citations, at least acknowledge them and/or refute them before you foolishly proceed to say that we have no evidence for what we're saying. The fact is that Bombardier can't and won't explain/prove how much they've paid back and they're working hard to prevent the public from getting this information. It's juvenile logic to ask for evidence that the loan repayments haven't happened, because it's impossible to prove something hasn't happened unless you can prove what has happened. So far we can only prove that a small fraction of the loans have been repaid and any other information is being suppressed for very suspect (and likely very obvious) reasons. Okay perfect. I'm glad we agree. Since the subject of the thread is Bombardier and its apparent lack of accountability, can we now continue to discuss it without further protest? This is a large and obvious present-day/current-event example.

I've provided you with numerous links to confirm exactly what I'm saying. The fact that you chose not to read any of them or to get an idea of what we're talking about isn't my fault. Your argument is straw man. You've invented this idea that we're all perfectly okay with bad corporate welfare initiatives in general and that it's only Bombardier that we have a problem with. That's not the case so let's drop that altogether. This thread is about the current bailout plan for Bombardier and the reasons why and how a lot of us think it's a bad idea. Previous bad ideas do not justify the next bad idea, so stop bringing up the auto or softwood lumber industries as support for the newest Bombardier debacle. If you want to have a general discussion about corporate welfare in Canada, start a thread about that. It's been discussed at length before with many of the same conclusions but I'm sure you'll find takers in a new thread.

Obviously you don't understand what straw-man is. Nobody is saying anything of the sort. Almost everyone here would agree that accountability should apply everywhere including (and here's where we actually get back on top) Bombardier. The reason this story gets more attention than others is because of its scale, size and history. This isn't the first, second or even third time we've handed public money to bail out Bombardier. Their repayment history on previous loans is poor and there's no reason to believe this will change in the future. Continuing on the same path without major changes is pretty much the dictionary definition of insanity.

Hopefully Trump doesn't feel insecure about Trudeau's big mouth though. We have to be careful and acknowledge that Trump's mouth is more bigly. It's a great mouth - the best mouth. He can do wonderful things with his mouth - the best things. It's going to be great.

This is pure straw-man and a wildly diverging segway from the discussion at hand. None of the above has anything to do with the Bombardier handouts or why it's okay for them to hide their their repayment history while continuing to receive corporate welfare. I suppose you thought that poor corporate behavior elsewhere somehow supports Bombardier's position, but that makes no sense whatsoever.

There is "information" available. Just not the information we're specifically interested in and Bombardier goes to great lengths to keep hidden their loan repayment history. It's incredibly easy to bury this information in the corporate books of company that big with vague/general terms, long repayment schedules, deferrals, and GAAP magic. The fact that you thought you could go through annual reports online to get a coherent understanding of Bombardier accounting suggests (no offense or insult intended) that you might be a little naive about how useful these reports are to the the average reader. Don't take my word for it though: http://business.financialpost.com/news/transportation/how-bombardier-inc-suppresses-information-about-how-much-government-funding-it-receives " Bombardier Inc. has gone to great lengths to suppress the release of information about the government funding it receives, heading to court 10 times in nine years, often citing competitive concerns. " http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bombardier-planes-federal-government-1.3452023 "...over the last 50 years, Bombardier has received more than $2 billion in government assistance, with only $543 million of it having been repaid."

yet the repayment history of the federal/provincial loans they've received are not made public and kept hidden under the guise of "competitive trade secrets". Ooops!

The amount of time you spend trolling these forums is something special. Guys he's not even trying to have a conversation. This is just outright baiting mockery.

None of us really know the details. One of the main reasons all of this stinks so bad is that it's all being kept hidden. Details, repayments, conditions etc. We're not even allowed to know how much of taxpayers' money has been recouped. Personally, I think that if your business is floundering and you need to beg the government for money to stay afloat, you don't get to hide your books anymore. That's public interest now.

I don't know, why don't you tell me? While you're at it, tell me how it helps determine why it would be a good idea to disrupt Canada-US trade. It also has a bigly military, a yuge population, and the best words. Tell us how any of this suggests a positive outcome for starting a trade dispute with Canada. So far you've failed miserably. and you're apparently building a wall to keep them out. Brilliant. Compete or be left behind? Is that why President Trump is intent on scrapping Free Trade deals? Because US labor is so competitive with Chinese and Mexican "human capital"? Are you even giving these comments a whiff of thought before barfing them out on your keyboard?