Moonbox

Elizabeth May didn't behave like a serious leader in that debate. She was rude, obnoxious, loud and all I heard from her was, "The OECD said.....!" She kept repeating it over, and over and over. The problem, however, is that the OECD is a European-based (France I think) group whose authority and expertise is far far FAR from absolute. Economists in Canada have NOT thrown their support behind her and you'd be hard pressed to find even one doing so regardless of what recommendations foreign economists in the OECD make. Nobody was arguing her or really even acknowledging that she was there. Her response to this was just to get louder and even more obnoxious. I didn't know a lot about her before the debates and I have almost been cheering for her because she'll split the left even further, but I tuned her out halfway through because she was so unbelievably irritating. I doubt very strongly that the personality she showed there (ie rude, crude and loud) will have helped at all.

My thoughts exactly. Again, I will likely be voting for Harper, but I think you're REALLY stretching this whole 'real job' thing.

Jack Layton was a city councillor in Toronto in 1985 and on for awhile. From 1988 - march 1990 he lived in a $800/month three bedroom subsidized apartment. By 1990 he and his wife had a combined income was $120,000. It took 2.5 years almost for him to start paying even REASONABLE rent given his income. He's a snake, a cheat and a completely unscrupulous liar. It was a Toronto Star article YEARS ago but it was a disgusting abuse of the system. I'll give you a wikipedia link and you can look it up from there because I'm going to bed right now and don't feel like searching. Layton and Subsidized Housing - Hahahaha

I was impressed with Dion in the French debate. In the English debate I think he did terrible and I truly feel bad for the guy because he's not as bad as he seems. I think Duceppe did a decent job but he is extremely rude and was a little too aggressive. I think May spoke decently but I don't think Canadians will have been impressed as she was just too obnoxious for anyone to relate to. I was dissapointed in Harper. I think he did a relatively decent job but he was far too restrained. There were numerous times where he could have delivered some heavy blows on Dion and Layton particularly but his new sweater vest image stayed his hand. I was completely disgusted with Layton. Just like last time, he was all hot air and rhetoric. The highlight of the debate for me was when the moderator asked him to explain one of his "Big bad Harper" claims and he just stuttered and bumbled. His response, after trying to avoid the question and after looking embarrassed at being called out, was something along the lines of, "Just LOOK at him!" Haha Jack. You are such a joke. I respect the intelligence at least of the rest of the leaders. You're a used car salesman.

Yeah Argus I can't really back you up on that one. University professor can sometimes be a wishy-washy job but it IS a job nonetheless and some of them work pretty hard. I support Harper too but I don't think this is a very strong point. You could maybe say that Dion is an out of touch academic and Layton is a proven social assistance cheat (which he really truly is) but they all worked for a living.

I find that so weird too. The more the election drags on the more I like Dion. I dislike his party, but I found out of everyone in the debate last night he was the most composed and most passionate when he was talking. He seemed, unfortunately, to speak the least during the debate and seemed to have been less a part of the arguments, but when he DID speak I liked him a lot. That's probably because I understood his french better than his english and he wasn't reaching for words but that's an altogether different issue.

The constant problem with Liberal promises for social services, however, is that they never explain how they are going to afford them and for 13 years in power they never delivered them despite promising them. Dion can promise all he wants but his Liberals can be squarely blamed for the drop in social services since the 1990's. NDP promises are so out of this world I won't even discuss them.

I understand all this. What I was saying was that nobody ever said Harper was going to win the socialist vote either way so that doesn't really matter. We were talking about the economy though, and you've again dodged my challenge/question to you. The only thing I got out of that was that you would have rather had income tax cuts than GST cuts. Fair enough but where was the explanation I was asking you for all of Harper's apparently disastrous economic policies?

I really didn't like the way they did this one, or at least how it was moderated. There was FAR too much interrupting and people talking over one another. Duceppe, May and Layton wouldn't shut up when everyone else was talking. It was pretty much a big 4v1 against Harper. I think he did alright and so did Dion. The debate really didn't do anything for me other than make me like May and Layton even less. I liked Dion though. I felt that of everyone in the opposition he was the only other one who acted like a human being and wasn't just blowing hot air and yelling.

You can disagree with all of these things. Harper is not a pandering socialist nor is he socially liberal. We know that. His stance on same sex marriage is irrelevant as it will never affect Canadians. His daycare policy helped families. It may not have been enough for you, but he's never been about massively expensive social programs. You can disagree on him not wasting Canadian time and money intervening on the death penalty for a confessed multi-murderer, but I have more important things to care about. As for the GST vs Income Tax cuts, do you know how that affects you differently, or is that again just you towing the party line?

Seriously?! He called you dobby! You'll survive that verbal atom bomb I promise! And this is your response to my challenge for you to EXPLAIN what you think are Harper's bad economic policies!!? Providing internet links does not magically mean that you're right! All your links were just references to Harper spending announcements. Every government has spending announcements! Every opposition party has proposed even HEAVIER spending increases than the Harper government! Get your head out of the sand!! You said Harper went overbudget. I acknowledged that. With that said, it was a budget HE set in the first place and HE STILL has a balanced budget with LOWER taxes. PLEASE. I beg of you! Explain what his bad economic policies are. Specifically, Jdobbin, what economic policies has Harper implemented that have set Canada so astray and how is the Liberal opposition's proposed spending increases of $80 billion going to help bring the supposed 'overspending' Conservative budget in line!?? Answer the question! If you can't do that, then at least acknowledge that you don't have anything even resembling a clue what you're talking about. So far you've shown us that you can't argue your way out of a wet paper bag.

It's actually kind of funny. I suggest watching it.

No I don't ignore them. I read them, and then I explain to you that increased spending can help soften an economic downturn. I also explain that the Conservatives are a minority government and that they need to be spending to maintain support and ensure the polls don't dive on them. You've now blatently refused to EXPLAIN any of your balogna statements and I'm sure we'll continue to see you wailing on and on about how Conservative spending has been out of hand DESPITE a balanced budget with lower taxes during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. You'll no doubt try to say they're on the way to a deficit, but like I've said it's sound economic policy to run a slight deficit in the first place to encourage spending in a sinking economy. Finally, and we'll leave you with this tidbit: WHY ARE THE LIBERALS CRITICIZING HARPER'S SPENDING POLICIES WHEN THEY ARE PROMISING OVER 80 BILLION IN INCREASED SPENDING!????? Again Jdobbin, I invite you to EXPLAIN your statements and rationalize how you came to them. I fully expect you to dodge as usual but a guy can hope.

Well THERE'S a compelling argument. Elaborate, please. Let's discuss this.

How do you even say this?? Harper knows Iraq is unpopular with about 95% of Canadians. He's not stupid, despite what you'd like to think, and there's no way in a million years he'd go into Iran. To suggest such is just silly scare mongering.

Jdobbin I asked you several times and you ignored me every time but I'd like to know how the Tories are worse managers of money when they've lowered taxes, maintained balanced budgets and when the Liberals have promised over $80 Billion in extra spending with no indication of where the money is coming from. Take a shot at it please.

I challenge you to find ANY specific economic policies Harper has initiated that are in any way similar to those of Bush, because I know that you're just making that up. Tax cuts don't count by the way, because they have nothing to do with the collapse. Because he and his party members would all be thrilled with the idea of acting on unpopular ideologies and committing political suicide right? These are the scare tactics that failed the Liberals in 2006 and they'll do so again. The whole 'hidden agenda' crap is so tired and old and you have nothing to base it on. Kind of like the moron Trudeau who consigned the Liberals to the wilderness for 11 years or something while Mulroney inherited his mess? Do you remember how Harper quit from the progressive conservative party in disgust back in the 80's at Mulroney's policies? Get a clue Eyeball. Nothing you said here has any substance.

*Edit I just watched it. Was kind of goofy but i got a chuckle out of it. The best part is he asks the environmental protestor what happens to his job if the Tar Sands projects are all cancelled.

They are debating tonight and soon after on national television. I am happy to debate with you if you have something to debate. To be honest sometimes in OTHER threads you actually have interesting things to say. That does not change the fact, however, that most of the threads you start are nothing more than you tooting the 'I hate Harper' horn. Keep writing your useless threads. It's your priviledge as a Canadian. Just don't be surprised with the contempt you get in return.

No, there is ZERO evidence of this. There is evidence that the Tories reduced over taxation on the country and that they have consistently delivered balanced budgets while doing so. The present Liberals have NO spending record other than the fact that they are proposing to increase spending by something like 80 billion. You and a lot of the other Tory bashers like to bring this up all the time. You say the Tories are fiscally irresponsible BUT you fail at EVERY chance to explain how the alternatives (who are promising spending increases WAY above and beyond the Tories) would be any more responsible. The fact that Chretien/Martin Liberals maintained the highest taxes pretty much ever, bogarted EI and crippled provincial governments with unfair reductions in transfer payments doesn't really count as a good public record btw.

This is a discussion forum where we debate politics. If you are posting something, we're assuming you want to discuss it. We're also assuming that given your prolific history of spamming anti-Harper forum topics, that you're posting another criticism of Harper. Use common sense. That's because it never has been a significant part of their party platform. This is nothing new and/or interesting. This means nothing to anyone anywhere. My mother has voted nothing but Liberal since Trudeau and is voting for Harper this election. What does that mean to you? Probably nothing, just like this thread topic. We're not attacking you. We're attacking your persistently silly and useless forum threads. Debate with us, argue with us point for point, but please don't expect intelligent discussion if you're just posting for the sake of posting. We already know you don't like Harper and we've already discussed this before.

I think that's a bit of a reach. I don't think the average canuck takes their thoughts that far.

No, that's why Liberal staffers were looking up the speech. Harper wanting to send troops to Iraq is something everyone already knew in 2006 and he was elected PM regardless. The issue Bob Rae is making NOW is that Harper plagiarized a speech which is funny considering his party leader did just as bad or worse and so did numerous high ranking officials within his party (Iggy also).

Wait...are you denying that it happened?????? I already provided links to newspapers confirming it. Harper and his 'minions' did provide an answer too. The writer of the speech resigned and the PM's office said they had no knowledge of the speech being plagiarized. What else do you want? As far as I know with Dion he never apologized or admitted it. He tried to hide it.

When I provided a word for word comparison of both articles it became rather unlikely that I made that up and just as unlikely that whoever I referred to for my search had made it up either. It's simple copy and pasting and a 5 second search would have yielded you the same results. Yes, I understand it's important to reference your opinions and claims but sometimes even I give people the benefit of the doubt. How is it corrected? The speech writer in Harper's case resigned. It's a gigantic stretch to assume Harper would be dumb enough to know he was speaking a plagiarized speech. Where was the correction from Dion, other than yanking the information off his 'official website' and trying to hide his tracks? How is that different? Other than that it was easier for Dion to hide his tracks? It was a blatent rip-off on both sides. At least in Parliament the issue can be easily critiqued. That's a bit of a jump in logic. You're assuming that the position of the official opposition was not already that it was dangerous to leave Saddam Hussein in power. Words being copied by a speech writer does not mean that Harper did not come to this conclusion on his own. The question of whether Saddam Hussein needed to be removed from power is something altogether different. He was a proven mass-murderer and genocidal maniac who used WMD's on his own citizens in an area of the world which the west depends on for fuel. The Bush administration led everyone to believe they had conclusive evidence he had another WMD program in development, and the world (ie Howard, Harper, Blair etc) all acted on this supposed 'evidence'. It turns out we were all fooled, but blame Bush for this.