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Oh come on Derby, let's someone say it...
Karzai you fucking ingrate we've bankrupted ourselves saving your worthless dirtpile. You got til Christmas Eve to get your guys in line cuz we're broke, we're outa here!!!

   

Of course the Liberals would have run a deficit.

And it would have been the correct the policy. The country is facing a recession, potentially a severe one. Running a balanced budget during a recession is dumb.

   

Actually thats an interesting perspective. We are losing lives and spending billions in Afghanistan all for what?

For us to go 30 billion into debt next year? To erase any chance we have of beefing up our navy and airforce which we task with protecting our borders?

   

For the record they did promise but with the caveat without knowing what was on the books.

   

Only if you buy a car.

Otherwise the GST savings, for most Canadians, are negligible.

   

Ziggy says our economy is fine though.

I don't believe the Liberals would run a deficit, certainly not a 30 billion dollar one.

I hope for the countries sake Harper is only saying that so he can look like a hero when the deficit is only 15 billion.

I just love how only a month ago the Libs and NDP had their platform vilified as deficit magnets by Harper et al. He promised no deficits. I guess now we know why he didn't put forth a platform. He knew damn well he was going into the red and didn't want to tell anybody that fact prior to the election.

On a positive note we are still winning the premiership and have advaced in the champions league. likely the only chance I have of any team I support winning anything.

Ah well.

   

That was his point.

   

Who not knowing? The Libs? If so I agree. They fully costed their platform as did the NDP.

I guess Harper accused them of running a deficit platform was true because he knew things on the books they didn't.

Is it jst me or should it be law that the govt provide a full accounting every single year detailing such things as revenue collected and from where and a fully annotated cost schedule?

   

Oh was it? Woops, my bad.


Wouldn't that be the Auditor General of Canada's job?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheila_Fraser

   

You said earlier that the GST cut was criticized by most economists. That's true. There were far more efficient taxes to cut.

However, virtually all economists will tell you that a balanced budget or even a surplus during a recession is even worse policy than a GST cut.

Why? Contrary to what you wrote earlier, a GST cut is stimulative. However, it is less stimulative than, say, an income tax or better yet, a payroll tax. This is why economists criticized the GST cut - it is an inefficient tax to cut. Cutting payroll taxes gets you more bang for you buck.

However, running a balanced budget isn't an inefficient policy - like a GST tax cut - its a bad policy. During a recession, demand contracts. To counter-act the recession, the government has to replace falling private aggregate demand with rising aggregate public demand. The best way to do that is for the government to spend more than it takes in to act as a counter-balance to the contracting private economy. This is why the Liberals would run a deficit, its good policy.

   

you could have bought a car in the last 3 years and saved 2 grand.

http://www.tc.gc.ca/programs/environmen ... bility.htm

Liberals never had a program like that

   

We're going to crush Real!

YNWA!

   

Impractical. There just too much that can happen that would throw the figures off as to make whatever figure posted meaningless. Lofty ideal, just doesn't work in practice.

   

Name one left of centre social policy initiative introduced by the Chretien government in the 1990's.




Except that, prior to Trudeau's tenure, there was no deficit. Pearson was an excellent Liberal Prime Minister who is widely admired today by all sides. Why didn't he run his government on a deficit. Why was it necessary for Trudeau to do so?




Well, that Maclean's article may or may not exist. How convienent that you're able to cite some phantom article by Maclean's that ostensibly claims Mulroney ran some bad economic programs.

Hey, 3 years ago I saw an article in the New York Times that proved Paul Martin was a Pedophile. I can't cite that article mind you, but I'll just throw it out there and see if it sticks.

Nice try. Do you come from the Bill O'Reilly school of Journalism or the Rush Limbaugh one?



[/quote]

Name one social program initiated by Pierre Trudeau still in existance today.

   

Not from what I've read.

A GST cut is not stimulative because its simply not a big enough factor. Its non-existent in day to day purchases and believe it or not not a factor in big ticket purchases due to the social conditioning. People usually decide how much they are going to spend on a given large item such as a house or car. A GST cut may get you better value, say a CD player, but the amount you are spending is preset. Most people approach large purchases on a "I can afford this much" basis.

I disagree that economist say running a balanced budget is bad during a recession. What they say is that running a deficit isn't an awful proposition. Subtle but distinct difference.

An income tax cut will always beat a consumption tax. First, a consumption tax requires you to spend money to get it and everybody only has a certain % of their income available to qualify. Not so with income tax. Second, with income tax cuts it usually means a fat refund check. Thats like found money when you get that refund check even if they are giving you your own money. Thats just like a stimulus check.

As already pointed out the Libs fully costed their platform under certain provisios.

Still its not fair to simply state for the record that the Liberals would run deficits without any proof as a measn to excuse the CPC.

I don't see anybody on the con side saying that a conservative govt would have cut defence spending as much as the Libs in 93 so therefore they are all to blame.

Whenever the CPC does bad we always get the old "ya but the Liberals ...."

The Liberals would not have run a deficit. If you believe they would have (and I means all conservative supporters of all stripes) then by all means step aside and let the Liberals form the govt so we can be sure.

   

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