Moonbox

I'm a little late replying here sorry. I would strongly consider voting for someone who's pushing Senate reform. I don't like the appointed Senate. It doesn't make sense. The Senate is ultimately our check and balance for parliament. If parliament isn't looking out for us, then the Senate is there to block bad legislation. It defeats the whole purpose of the Senate to have the senators appointed. That's like having your brother or sister audit your business. It doesn't make sense. Why would you have a political safeguard appointed by the people that the senate is designed to safeguard against??

A carbon tax is almost as unpopular in Ontario as it is in the west. It's one of the main reasons the Liberals lost Ontario outside of Toronto. The Carbon tax is ONLY popular in Quebec because most of their power comes from Hydro. It's an unfair, hypocritical plan that is only going to hurt the average worker in Canada and offer MARGINAL benefits.

I basically agree with everything you say, although I contest that everything is being outsourced to China or Mexico. I'm sure many things are, but assembly is usually done domestically because of the huge transportation cost advantage. How much do you think it costs to transport a new and completed vehicle from China to Ontario...or Mexico to Ontario? A lot. Certain things can be transported cheaply and certain things can't. I know an orderly bankruptcy is necessary but what I'm really hoping is that whatever company emerges from bankruptcy protection doesn't have a militant UAW/CAW to deal with. When push comes to shove, the union is mostly responsible for the problems the Big Three are facing. Yes, poor management decisions helped things along, but the Union has always been there and it's been exaggerating labour costs for decades now to the point where there's a $30/hr wage and benefit difference between a Nissan and a GM worker. I don't want ANY tax dollars provided for a bailout if we're just going to continue subsidizing CAW entitlement wages.

That still doesn't make Toyota unsucessfull. The company posted a 1 quarter loss after massive growth and profitability and is not anywhere near a situation where they would need a bailout. They'll weather the auto market collapse and be stronger for it. GM and Chrysler, however, are completely boned. This 'bailout' is nothing but a temporary measure. The companies are going bankrupt either way, but now they have until March to plan for it.

We're better off with Harper than the bozos the Liberals have lined up for us. I'm not a hard core Con. I voted Liberal provincially in 2007 and I voted for Martin in 2004. Liberal leadership today has nothing different to offer Canadians right now. Period. Go back to the 2008 election platform. Take a look at what the Libs are saying they want to do that the Cons aren't. There's really nothing but a lot of crying and whining.

Let's be serious here. The Senate is a joke. It was a joke under the Liberals and it's a joke today.

The Liberals were also responsible for most of the debt anyways....but we've had that argument before. I'm totally for spending decreases. I've been deeply dissapointed in his Mulroney/Liberal style pandering thus far and if Ignatieff can convince me he's ready to reduce idiotic spending on things like a Human Rights Museum or hugely disproportionate equalization payments to Quebec, he'll immediately have my vote. My main concern for government is the budget. Pay off our debt, lower my taxes, pay for my health care and help with infrastructure, and then F off please. Personally, I think Harper's doing a crap job, but I think it's a less crap job than Dion would have done or an NDP/Liberal coalition. Give us a fiscally conservative majority government, whether it be Liberal or CPC, and please let's end this mess.

The Canadian banks did NOT get a bailout...period. I work at a bank. I'm doing more lending than I ever have. I sold 5 lines of credit this week at 6.5% interest unsecured. Most of you don't have a clue how the financial system works and I won't even bother explaining the finer details unless you really really want to know. There are very simple reasons why mortgage rates haven't fallen with the BoC rate. There are also very simple reasons why the banks aren't lending to Joe Schmo the GM worker. Yes, it's likely compounding a bad economy, but the Americans are in the mess they're in right now because Democrats back in the early 2000's encouraged cheap, easy lending to help the economy rebound from the .com market crash. We all see how that turned out.

The Canadian banks did NOT get a bailout...period. I work at a bank. I'm doing more lending than I ever have. I sold 5 lines of credit this week at 6.5% interest unsecured. Most of you don't have a clue how the financial system works and I won't even bother explaining the finer details unless you really really want to know. There are very simple reasons why mortgage rates haven't fallen with the BoC rate. There are also very simple reasons why the banks aren't lending to Joe Schmo the GM worker. Yes, it's likely compounding a bad economy, but the Americans are in the mess they're in right now because Democrats back in the early 2000's encouraged cheap, easy lending to help the economy rebound from the .com market crash. We all see how that turned out.

Canadian Blue I have to agree with everything you say there.

Oh my isn't that a shocking revelation. A politician wasn't completely honest and forthcoming with information. What has the world come to? Maybe if the average person wasn't dumber than a cow you'd see through the BS for what it really is. Anybody who unconditionally says there won't be a deficit is full of crap. It's foolish/naive to have believed the claim at the time and if you're outraged by it now it's only because you're outraged by EVERYTHING Harper does no matter what or you're not smart enough to see through a promise that is not under the PM's control. Harper is 100% full of crap. He's all over the place with his views, opinions and policies and to be honest I don't believe half the things he says. Having said that, the opposition is even more full of crap and quite a bit less competent. I'll stick to the snake of a Prime Minister that we have now rather than the clowns aspiring to take his job.

Only the ridiculously hack Liberals are criticizing the stimulus package. It's exactly what their party was proposing and threatening to bring the government down if it did NOT happen.

Jdobbin I know you understand the difference between running giant deficits during GOOD economic times vs giant deficits in bad times. Mulroney had a crap economy to deal with for the largest part of his term. Inflation was extremely high and thus so were interest rates and something ludicrous like +40% of every tax dollar was going towards debt payments, which was covering pretty much interest only. This was all a mess he inherited from Trudeau. The deficit was higher during Trudeau's term (relative to the size of Canada's economy) than it EVER was under Mulroney. He wasn't a good PM, I'll concede that, but Trudeau was far far worse. The worst part about it, however, was that Trudeau did this ALL with basically zero previous debt and a largely rosy economy. The Liberals did this over 12 years during the strongest economic time we've seen in 50 years. This means higher tax revenues with less need for social spending (see EI surpluses). They over-taxed federally and cut transfer payments to provinces, many of whom had to raise taxes or make enormous cuts to cover the deficiency. Granted, they did cut spending, and they finally turned away from Trudeau economics, but you VASTLY exaggerate their competence fiscally. To put it simply, they were in the right place at the right time. This whole balogna argument about Harper eliminating the surplus and giving us no breathing room is a joke. The 2004-2005 surplus was 1.6 billion. That's how much breathing room Paul Martin had during a booming economy. Get out of here.

Everyone wastes money on Quebec. Every party is guilty for it. It sickens me whatever party is doing it. There's a reason the province is a have-not, despite their immense resources and ideally located population.....

okay Topaz, at the end of your ramble you said Harper should have listened to Dion's warning. What was that again? That the economy was going to the crapper? Okay...the economy is going to the crapper. Now what??? What do the Liberals have to offer, SPECIFICALLY, that the Cons haven't already? Please...

Opposition agrees to $30-billion stimulus in coalition deal It's on the Globe and Mail as well...if you need me to find it and link it. That was the number they were looking at... The convenient thing about this argument is you've completely ignored the Trudeau Liberal track record of recording the biggest and highest relative debt levels the country has EVER seen WITHOUT a recession to worry about. Tax revenues are one of the biggest factors in the year end budget. When the economy is booming (which it was for the ENTIRE time the Liberals were in power 1993-2006) tax revenue is high. When commodity prices, lending, consumer spending etc all collapse in short order (such as it is now AND during both the start and end of Mulroney's terms), those revenues go down. Mulroney was a garbage PM, I won't contest that, but acting like the Liberals are somehow financial gurus is just stupid considering they're mainly responsible for the federal debt we hold right now.

A liquidity crisis, and the consequence of lower tax revenue for consumer purchases and business revenue, happened to the $15B surplus. Complaining about where the surplus went during an economic crisis is particularly funny when everyone's demanding increased government spending and corporate bailouts.

Yeah it really comes down to being reasonable. The Public, by and large, will support a union it feels is asking for something reasonable. Casino works fighting temps and split shifts is a pretty reasonable dispute. Postal workers making well above average wages, however, while also demanding to be able to bank an overly generous number of sick days per year, is ludicrous. This is the exact same sort of garbage that has the Big Three at their knees right now. As a taxpayer, we should not be supporting a culture of entitlement in our over paid public service providers.

Danny Williams is a worm with a big mouth. I'd love to see what NAFTA has to say about his big balls too... While I don't necessary disagree with what he's trying, I doubt he'll get away with it.

Mr Harper's numbers are high because the Liberals have succeeded in alienating not only the west, but Ontario outside the GTA as well. I'm not a huge fan of Harper right now. I don't like a lot of things he does and I know he's a social wing nut. With that said, I do feel he's better than the current Liberal clown show. All you have to do is look at the bozos running the party these days and it's REALLY easy to see why nobody is interested in them. Bob Rae ran probably the most unpopular provincial government in Canada EVER. His stablization policy (lol he just threw money towards social services) failed miserably during the last big recession and he left us with record deficits that took years to recover from. Stephane Dion brought us the most ill-conceived and unpopular election proposal we've seen in longer than I can remember. He was totally out to lunch and the Liberal Party followed him blindly into the mess he landed them in. Michael Ignatieff stands for a lot of the same things Harper does. He also supported going to war in Iraq. He's spent more time living in the USA and the UK than he has in Canada. He came back to Canada just recently and now he wants to lead the country? Seriously?

It depends on the company. Some companies have diversified while others will be in for a beating. We shouldn't. Unless the unions are willing to make gigantic sacrifices to earn an actual FAIR wage for their skills and training (similar to Toyota/Nissan/Honda wages), throwing money at the Big Three is an exercise in idiocy. I completely agree with you. I'm cool with a bailout if it's going to create a totally new dynamic for Big Three automakers but unless that's going to happen they can stick it up the arse. Given that our Fed government has approved a bailout I can only hope that the US plays tought with the UAW...hopefully that will make sure we aren't going to be paying for it in the future.

It's a really stupid poll. Depending on where you are, you could find some Christians whose intolerance would rivalled only by the most intolerant of....every other religion. There's moderates and fanatics of any religion. Let this thread die it's retarded.

There is a ton of spill off from the Big 3. For every job lost at the Big 3, there's probably 2-3 jobs lost in parts manufacturing and service elsewhere in the country. Make no mistake, there's plenty of jobs to be lost here. My problem with bailing out the Big Three is about the same problem I have with the ethanol industry. On their own, they're all completely failed business models. They're not sustainable and the cost of keeping them afloat is higher than the benefit they provide. Sustaining the Big Three under their current model is only going to cost taxpayers more in the future. Either they and particularly their unions can negotiate to restructure, or we can replace and restructure them after the creditors go after them. There's a lot of infrastructure and machinery we're talking about here. It's unlikely that the creditors would scrap it for salvage. No, it's more likely some sort of new company would emerge from the debacle, without a militant union haunting it.

I don't agree with jdobbin often, but I'm totally with him on the ethanol fuel subsidy. It's one of the many things that makes me sometimes question voting conservative lately. It's less efficient fuel, does nothing for the environment, and simply increases the cost of gasoline due to its high refining and transportation costs. Ethanol fuel is the biggest and best example of backwards thinking the world has going for it right now.

For once the US republicans have got it right. As far as I see it there are two options available: Either: 1) The CAW/UAW agrees to massive pay and benefit decreases to be more competitive with what Honda/Toyota workers earn, or 2) Let the Big Three sink like the dead weight they are. I cannot fathom why we would want to toss money at these slugs if the unions are expecting to maintain the status quo that makes the Big Three uncompetitive. How can they POSSIBLY expect to not be in the EXACT SAME situation a few months or years from now if their competitors have a 33+% cost advantage for labor? The math doesn't add up and if the auto unions aren't willing to play ball than I'm perfectly content to see the Big 3 crash and burn. I'm willing to deal with the short term consequences as well. I'd rather that than see my taxes gradually increase to support a completely failed business model. Don't prolong the inevitable.