Category: Federal politics
Federal politics
A hurricane of numbers has descended upon us, as both the Alberta and federal governments announced their 2017/18 budgets in the past two weeks — i.e. their anticipated (i.e. hopeful, optimistic, ideal) spending and expected revenues for the next 12 months.
I often think the parties in power simply throw out as many numbers as possible, so we will give up on trying to make sense of anything.
But two numbers — two measurements — can tell us how we are doing economically as a province and as a nation.
One is the gloom and doom, fiscal-conservative number — the debt-per-capita.
The other is the why-worry measurement used by free-spending governments to justify their spending — the debt-to-GDP (Gross Domestic Product) ratio.
Right now, the Alberta New Democrats and the federal Liberals are tossing the province and the country into big-time debt.
On a debt-per-capita basis, the numbers are terrifying.
Formerly debt free (thanks to oil and gas revenues), Alberta&rs ...
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He’s going to win.
On Monday night, Stephen Harper and his Conservatives will be re-elected for a fourth term, with a majority government.
A bare majority government, mind you, 170 of 338 ridings. (In 2011, The Conservatives won 166 of 308 ridings.)
He’ll win, because almost all Canadians who describe themselves as “fiscally conservative and socially liberal” will continue to vote for his party.
We’ll hold our noses while we vote.
Harper the control freak – muzzling scientists and his own members of parliament, dissing the country’s top judge, ramming omnibus bills through Parliament, black-balling anybody who opposes him – is thoroughly unlikeable.
I’m disappointed in what has not been done. He has given up on Senate reform, on smaller government, on tax-filing reform, on CO2 emission gestures. He’s lost interest in modernizing our military. The recession-fighting Building Canada Fund is now a Conservative slush fund.
But &helli ...
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By GRAHAM HICKS
Hicks on Biz posting
Sunday, June 8, 2014
www.hicksonbiz.com
graham.hicks@hicksbiz.com
Eyebrows were raised in a few political circles the other week, when photos of my door-knocking in Inglewood with potential federal Liberal Edmonton-Centre candidate Randy Boissonnault made the Twittersphere rounds.
About the only other federal Liberals I whole-heartedly supported – when I was a full-time Edmonton Sun columnist – were Anne McLellan and David Kilgour, and Kilgour had started at a Conservative.
So why door knock with Boissonnault?
Simple. I have reached the point I’m more interested in individuals than party politics.
I want to help intelligent, thoughtful individuals who actually believe in public service, who, for the right reasons, want to be in the House of Commons to make a difference. I’m tired of career politicians who don’t know how to make a living in the real world, and fed up with over-inflated political egos. I want individuals running for th ...
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