Whose Afraid Of An Election
If the Conservatives aren’t afraid of a fall election then why are they throwing every excuse imaginable out there in order to prevent one? Could it be that they are afraid because of this.

All G7 economies save those of Canada, Britain and Italy will expand in the third quarter, the Paris-based OECD said Thursday. Canada’s gross domestic product will contract at an annual rate of 2 per cent in the period, the weakest of the three laggards…

More economic contraction in the midst of an election would become a serious hurdle for the Conservatives to overcome.

Are The Dippers Afraid Of Going To The Polls
I doubt it. A new Angus Reid poll puts them at 19%.

CP: 33%
LP: 32%
NDP: 19%
BQ: 9%
GP: 7%

Previous polls have shown them trending upward back to their 2008 election night numbers.

What Dan Says
Dan Gardner on the current state of politics in Canada.

As the more astute among us will know, there are a few things going on in the world at the moment. Economic crisis. Climate change. A failing war. And so on and so forth. Meanwhile in Canada, a party with no policies threatens to push a government with no principles into an election, prompting angry talk of home-renovation tax credits and taunts so childish they would make the average tween cringe.

Hey, that’s what happens when you put the tweeniors in charge. You get the worst of both worlds; teenage stupidity and senior senility.

I Demand You Apologize…
…for not agreeing with me. Alan Willaert is clearly campaigning hard for this year’s dumbest person in the world award.

2nd Class Citizens
Why do western democracies all have a group of people who are treated like an underclass?

A recent report by an Israeli non-governmental organisation says 5,000 Palestinian children in East Jerusalem will not be able to attend classes this year because there are not enough classrooms…
According to the report, there is a huge discrepancy in the number of schools and quality of education in the Arab East part of Jerusalem, compared to the predominantly Jewish West of the City.

The same thing happens here in Canada. The First Nation children in Attawapiskat don’t have a school yet Christian fundamentalist schools get $4 million for renovations. It’s disgraceful.

…The Home Renovation Tax Credit or visiting Barack Obama?

The legislation on the HR tax credit has already passed through Parliament. It was a part of the spring budget. What hasn’t been done however, is the implementation of it by a ways and means motion. The House of Commons resumes sitting on September 14th and the Conservatives can introduce a ways and means motion to implement the HR credit on that very day.

But, ways and means motions are votes of confidence and if the opposition parties vote it down it will trigger an election. So will Harper introduce a ways and means motion at first opportunity or will he wait so as to avoid a possible election interfering with his visit to Washington on Sept. 16th?

The course of action Harper chooses will undoubtedly determine which is more important to him; the Home Renovation Tax Credit or visiting Barack Obama.

We elect parties to represent out interests in Parliament and to implement a specific agenda. This can be extremely difficult for a party to accomplish when not enough voters elect them to form a government so they must constantly be listening for opportunity’s knock.

For the NDP, opportunity began knocking the moment Ignatieff’s Liberals signaled they would no longer support Harper’s minority Conservative government and presented itself in the form of a simple transaction; exchanging support for implementation of some part of NDP’s agenda. Were Jack Layton to ignore this opportunity it would be nothing less than a betrayal to the 2.5 million voters that elected the NDP to implement their agenda.

Liberals don’t understand that and have repeatedly allowed opportunity to wander away. 79 times the Liberal Party was given the opportunity to implement a part of their agenda in exchange for supporting the Harper Conservatives and 79 times the Liberals Party wasted that opportunity. Now they are mocking the NDP for not following in their foolish footsteps and are claiming that opening the door to opportunity’s knock is itself an act of betrayal.

I can’t understand how the Liberal Party has allowed themselves to become so deaf to opportunity’s knock but I do understand this. Jack Layton and the NDP are not fools. They can hear opportunity knocking and will earn the faith of every Canadian who voted for them by answering the door.

Then:

80 per cent of infrastructure cash already rolled out, Harper claims
Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered a rosy report June 11 on the progress of his government’s stimulus spending as he attempted to stave off a summer election, saying 80 per cent of the money earmarked under the plan had been rolled out across the country.

Now:

The Conservative government is warning that if the Liberal opposition forces an election this fall it could jeopardize Canada’s economic recovery by delaying thousands of infrastructure projects.

So which is it; was most of the stimulus funding handed out over two and a half months ago or is most of the stimulus money still waiting to be handed out?