As you may have guessed by the title, I am not a fan. I would like to start a thread concerning Canada's current PM. I thought I would throw a fishing line in this pool to see if there are any Canadian poker players out there concerned with Canada's future or perhaps some defender's of the Harper Gov. If there are any Americans out there who even know our PM's name I encourage you to chime in LOL.

Can you outline a couple of actions he has taken that you consider destructive?

To start Canada has traditionally been a peace keeping country meaning we have strived to solve any foreign disputes in a diplomatic manor. Since Harper has been the head of our government he seems to support military intervention on a growing scale.

Harpers environmental policies are also appalling, he has been gutting the protections we as Canadians hold dearly for many years.
As in the US, Canada's prison & surveillance state continue to expand, plus the BS war on drugs.

Harper has done the complete opposite as that he campaigned on, such as a small & transparent government & actually being fiscally conservative. Harper's government has run record high deficits, while large multinational corporations are allowed to rape Canada of its resources leaving little to benefit for the average Canadian in the way of jobs etc.

It is as rigged in Canada as it is anywhere else.

Can you tell us about all of the other Canadian prime ministers because NO1CURRRRR USA #1.

I like your hockey players, tho.

It's the Tea Party with some restraint. All ideology, no evidence. See also the muzzling of our scientists and the cancellation of our long-form census.

Is this dude some kind of secret Kenyan Muslim or what?

Next time try having an election ?

Looking forward to hopefully voting him out. Trudeau's an idiot though.

This, but Trudeau isn't necessarily dumb, it's just the right wing smear machine is lining up to portray him that way. They've copied the US play book and are now trying to implement it.

The Cons are masters at negative politics, they'll try everything they possibly can to paint Trudeau as incompetent. So far, it hasn't seemed to stick, but the election campaign will be the real test. He's very glib, which can be a detriment in a sound-bite society and especially in a short campaign.

I still remember good old Harper saying we will not change or touch Income Trusts. Within a month he changed how they were taxed and I lost big. The amount that man lies is unbelievable.
His latest tax cuts as he said the budget would be balanced and now not a hope with were Oil is at and Instead of admitting he is wrong he delays the budget.

Harper had some great people that drove the economy Flaherty. Also losing Mark Carney was big.

Trudeau is unproven and his dad royally screwed my Province Alberta I will be voting for him.

Simple explanation Harper = Bush(the dumb one)

Canada at one time leading in growth of G20 Countries now dropping like a rock


A reason why would be good?

He cut DND by like $5-billion a couple of years ago and is giving them another 2.7-billion haircut this year. Most, if not all, of that is coming out of administration. We had some ridiculous ratio of two admins-- maybe three?--for every soldier who has actually seen or handled a gun.

Re: Peacekeeping, I think the popular impression of peacekeeping is a bit unrealistic -- often it's imposed on a country rather than invited. You might not remember the Somalia Affair? Our peacekeepers beat a kid to death for fun, the entire airforce regiment ended up disbanded over it.



Your record deficit information is from 2009/2010. It was $50-billion then, peak-crisis.

It is $5-billion now and should be zero by the autumn.

A lot of that very high deficit was the economic action plan ($16-billion, auto bailout, more generous EI payments, infrastructure spending, personal income tax cuts, etc) and mortgage guarantees. We didn't face the same risk of the calamity the States went through but even so to prevent a scared market and to keep banks continuing to issue mortgages the gov, through the Insurance Mortgage Purchase Program, actually bought the mortgage debt it was already guaranteeing, so that part of the deficit was sort of artificial -- it was debt we took on but it was secured debt that was being paid back with interest: it was a stabilizing initiative and we made 2-billion on it in the end.

I don't really know why you painted that as a negative. What should they have done instead?

The problem with Kyoto was that it imposed binding limits and financial penalties on economies like Canada but not the US, India or China -- the biggest emissions producers. We proposed that if they were to agree to be bound by Kyoto, we would stay. They didn't, so we withdrew and escaped paying $14-billion in penalties for basically failing to suppress the economic recovery by taxing the **** out of gasoline (China's GHG emissions, meanwhile, have doubled or tripled in the last 20 years).



What do you mean by this?


I don't know what this means either. If you're thinking of the oil sands, Suncor is a Canadian company.


Socially, the most conservative guy I know is married to a dude. Harper is evangelical Christian, I think, but like Chretien won't touch abortion or life debates. I find a lot of our discussion of Canadian politics is filtered through the American lens and the inclination to caricature conservatives as cackling villains puffing on cigars can obscure the context in which a decision like the deficit was made.

NO way than tell me why he is delaying a budget and no date when it comes out?

The troops hate him. Guy loses his legs yet every year has to get a written diagnosis saying his legs have not grown back. Mental stress at all time high along with suicides in the military yet Harper pulls 1.8 billion back from veterans to balance budget.

What about the income splitting that will cost billions so yuppy couples can buy a second BMW

Also lets give Mark carney the credit and the regulations that we in place that kept our banks strong

Such an airhead, love how he accepted a floor crossing deviant like Eve Adams with open arms.

Kyoto is the least of our worries. Harper has gutted our core environmental regulations and slashed funding for Environment Canada, NRCan, Fisheries, Parks, etc. The Lac-Megantic disaster can be largely attributed to lax rail safety regulations. Plus the aforementioned muzzling of scientists. He's basically carrying water for the big oil and gas companies.

That one puzzled me also but they are making her run against Joe Oliver. That is tough and her husband was key player in the conservatives and a value also.
So if she loses she is gone and if she wins wow

Her reputation is mud, she's good looking though.

The government falls if it fails to release and pass a budget. The sudden massive decline and instability in oil price caused the delay; it will be released in April instead of March. I think you'd agree that's the responsible thing to do.



I don't know enough about vet's programs to comment on requalification; Rick Mercer didn't give anything resembling an overview except this poor guy's frustration at dealing with VA. At first I assumed the issue was over eligibility for the main benefit vs the supplementary benefits.

{Edit, one supplement is the Permanent Incapacitation supplement and at first I incorrectly thought the problem was that VA enrolled people to a permanent benefit on an annual needs-tested basis, and from within that program he accessed mobility equipment}

I haven't heard they're challenging him on any of this, and not sure whether these annual forms are because he's seeking continued access to the program or if it's to medical devices -- he mentions having his wheels taken from him twice owing to paperwork; it sounds like if you want a device you just tell them what it's for and they send it to you, or more likely the medical supply co sends it to you and bills VA. If they don't receive the paperwork that justifies paying the medical supply company the device is brought back to the warehouse.

The veterans ombudsman released a report on this a couple of years ago, if you're interested. Their concerns seem to focused on the level of compensation rather than the eligibility requirements, though.

In any event he's not being asked to prove his legs are missing because they want to humiliate him; he's being asked why he wants them to send him a wheelchair. This would be true under any government.

(That's not to say the man isn't clearly sensitive about it, only that it's false hope to think anything would be different with a change in government.)




The maximum benefit is $2000 per household. I like the idea of one income of $80,000 being treated the same as two $40,000, but the benefit won't reach people who could really use $2000. It's not a great idea in reality.


Sure! The question was why the deficit exploded as it did that year and OP seemed legitimately unaware of the reasons, along with how different the picture is five years later.

Not a guarantee for March Finance Minister on West Block and he would not make that guarantee. Also he said they may use the rainy day fund to balance it. Economists say he doesnt have a chance to balance it.

Also about that time the Duffy trial will begin we know the conservatives are not gonna like that.


As for the Veterans we have a base just outside Edmonton and the stories are just horrible. Look at his old minister Harper had to get rid of. The big contention is veterans who get hurt must take a lump sum payment and its smaller than the monthly. Lets face it Canada treats its veterans like the US. Not enough mental support and the injuries veterans are coming back with are costly. 10 years ago many would have died .

Like I said from the beginning when he screwed me on my income trusts it was an uphill battle to get my vote. I have voted liberal once, green party twice and will vote Trudeau next election.

I figured Harper would win on his economy platform but not anymore.

This is like asking who was a worse governor of Georgia, Nathan Deal or Sonny Perdue? Nobody not from Georgia even knows what you are talking about, and most of the people from Georgia don't either.

Holy crap that's a horrible idea. I doesn't take a genius to abuse that system.

oh bull****, the bolded probably has some truth to it, but what regulation did harper change to cause that? That disaster would have happened regardless of who was in charge.

This is political opportunism at its worse. Jumping on a disaster like some ambulance chaser to push for your guy. I hope it feels good.

I agree the rail disaster was due to LAX railway legislation but that is a North American Issue and also new forms of highly flammable oil.

As for Harper and the Environment I agree he has cut budgets on anything involving the environment. Harper is big buis and has flat out said we will do nothing that jeopardizes our economy in regards to the environment