Welcome to Conservative Canada, leave your veil at the door

Rae goes after Canon in question period about the Khadr deal and the word goes out to attack Rae and set the scenario that the Opposition parties are soft on terrorism.

So an asshole talk radio jock does a rant that Rae will probably be at the airport handing Khadr ten million dollars and his intelligent listeners with their built in Liberal hate start repeating it. Delivering the line with a smile and a sneer.

When you question the line, they come back with well we did it with Arar.

You try to explain that Khadr was 15, a child soldier, the UN bit, the fact that the Americans wanted us to take him years ago and so on and so on.

And the response is I don't care, Khadr wasn't Canadian, he's like all the others, they come over here for our healthcare and then run back to Pakistan, they should of shot him.

Yep Canada is now a conservative country with very thin veils covering our inner racism.


,

Nail biter in Mississauga

Hazel squeaks by with seventy nine per cent of the vote. But former Liberal MP and incumbent city councilor Carolyn Parish got booted.

Look on the bright side Torontonians, since Calgary has now turned progressive and you folks have elected a red neck, maybe you will have a chance of moving the Stampede east.

As always with the best of belated intentions

My seventy nine year old aunt died this weekend and I went to her visitation yesterday. She married at eighteen and remained so for sixty one years. My eighty seven year old uncle stood beside her for two and half hours telling all who were not afraid to look at a person in a coffin, how she peacefully passed away. 

Her children seemed almost afraid to enter the room and being worried about their father wanted him to circulate and speak with the other friends and family who had gathered in the various seating areas, but he wouldn’t leave her side.

He didn’t want her to be alone.

I could of and should of told him that I would stay with her until he returned, he would of let me, I am that persuasive, but I didn’t and I feel like an asshole.

Obviously not a big deal in the scheme of worldly events, but at some point in my life I need to start acting with compassion instead of just pontificating compassionate intentions.

Trapped in Toronto

The latest from FFIB:

If my memory has not failed me, I believe it was pogge who posted about how the radical right is obsessed with their fears. Fear of immigrants, fear of socialism, paranoiac suspicion that their rights and way of life are being attacked by the so called elitism of progressive thought.

So the idea for this somewhat over the top interpretation of two right wing radicals visiting Toronto was born.

Personally I always thought they were just envious of us. Not because of our wealth, power or influence, but simply because we are not afraid to howl at the moon, at two in the afternoon.

See more FIBBS here.

Payback is so sweet

My first trip to Calgary was in 1968 when the Mayor went on the radio and said all the long haired, hitchhiking bums from the east should be kicked out of the province.

Woo woo, Calgary. Eat this Jack Leslie.

Petty Bubbles in the air

You just keep blowing it, Bubbles
There were Bubbles everywhere
They filled the skies and hurt your pride
Then just like your law suit will, they went away and died

But fortunes always hiding
You will look everywhere

But you will just keep blowing it, Bubbles
Petty bubbles every where.

Who voted for us

Microsoft had a great policy to handle rejection. Instead of finger pointing and making excuses, they would overly embrace those in the marketplace that supported and defended them.

Although I am not a big fan of Microsoft or our current government, it might be a more positive and worthwhile activity for all those marketing types in the PMO who are currently scrambling about in damage control mode.

Imagine having to come up with excuses why India, did not vote for us, nor China, nor the United Arab Emirates (Oh never mind we know about that one). This could go on for weeks as we find out Britain didn’t vote for us or the US didn’t support us. There is no end to the number of countries, Harper has pissed off.

It would be a lot less work, more uplifting and quite frankly get it over with sooner if we just had the PMO come up with a reason why seventy odd countries, did vote for Harper and his government.

Seriously, why did seventy odd countries vote for Harper and this government.

Government steps back into our hotel rooms

Sun Media’s, Canoe News has just released the government’s reaction to the Toronto Star’s front page article about how strippers and escorts are being added as new job classifications to the federally controlled national job classification system.

The Star article claims that the government wants to help unemployed Canadians find careers as strippers and for-hire escorts.

Apparently, it was only a draft version created by Finley’s office, that was sent to the provinces and according to her PMO assigned, spokesman, Ryan Sparrow, nor would it ever have been a policy under consideration by our government.

Which then begs the question, why put the jobs on the list going to provinces for consideration.

Well so much for that expected increase in tourism from those Chinese businessmen.

Deficit Jim blames BC and ON

Lost in all the finger pointing by Harper, Canon and crew about how the world listens more to Ignatieff, than I guess, Harper, Canon and crew.

Deficit Jim set a new record yesterday, producing the country's largest deficit ever. Originally projected to come in at $53.8 billion, the new record for fiscal year ending March 31, 2010 is $55.6 billion.

And guess who's fault it was: The liberal provincial governments of BC and Ontario.

From the CBC:

That figure is almost $2 billion higher than the $53.8-billion deficit projected in the federal budget last March, and was largely prompted by a one-time transfer of $5.6 billion to Ontario and British Columbia to help them make the transition to the harmonized sales tax.

Of course the only reason that both provinces agreed to switch to a single, value added tax scheme this July, was because the federal offered them $5.3 billion to do so, and one would assume that our finance minister would have planned for that expenditure, since the switch didn't take place until the next fiscal year.

But hey, don’t worry Canada, Jim is promising to produce a surplus by March 2016 at which time I’ll be 67 years old.

I wonder if we will still have the old age pension and universal health care by then.

h/t Bowies Blog

I wear my paranoia well

The rains ceased and the clouds parted over the center of the universe last Thursday afternoon and as the earth turned on its axis emulating the westward journey of the sun, I left work, hopped in my Jeep and headed east on a 26.8 km trek, from the fifth largest city in Canada to Toronto, our nation’s largest metropolis and home of our country’s elite.

My mission, to secretly meet with some of the best known, Toronto area, progressive, bloggers.

Note to self: Do not head into Toronto on the night when the Leafs are playing the Habs in the season opener. 

Two hours later I arrived at the secret location, a three story and seemingly popular pub, only to realize that I did not know the names of the people I was meeting, only their blogs. Nor did I know what they looked like. So reverting to my friendly salesman mode, I approached every table where at least one women and two males were seated and asked them if they were elitist bloggers. 

Second note to self: Do not approach under 40 year olds in a posh Toronto bar and ask them if they are elitist bloggers. They become terrified and will, I believe complain to management, where you will then be followed by large serious looking waiters.

So I went out for a smoke and decided to email my inviter, since I was tweetless and lo and behold this confident, young woman, grabbed my arm and led me to a small secluded nook where sat some of the most proficient, experienced, serious, humorous, snarky, and politically astute bloggers that I regularly follow, followed will start to follow around these parts.

And needless to say beers of both common and premium variety were consumed, as well as a Tom Collins, conversations occurred, and I for one was having a surprisingly good time as I started practicing my new social networking skills.

Most people would assume that an old salesman, based on the nature of the profession alone, would be an expert at social networking, but unfortunately one of the necessary skills required in social networking is to be sociable.

And for the same reason that a contractor’s home is in a state of constant disrepair, to a salesman whose livelihood depends upon repetitive empathy, responsiveness and a constant friendly out going personality, it just seems like too much work to give a shit after five o’clock.

So as simple as meeting a few bloggers for beers might seem to most, it was a uniquely bold endeavor for this anti-scocial, anonymity protecting old salesman. When your personality is more important than your knowledge in the real world, the risk of not meeting the expectations of your online personality, paranoiacally, takes on too much importance. 

In hindsight this blog was started as attempt to develop some sort of communication to people outside of my daily life, where the comfort of anonymity would allow me to say what I wanted without repercussion. Of course as therapeutic as ranting into an empty void may appear, I quickly realized that joining a community of ranting people, such as this one, gave me not only the opportunity for feedback, but a feeling of camaraderie. 

Everyday I read ten or more posts, voting often and I am now at the point where I can recognize who wrote a post by the title, or at least by two paragraphs in. Bloggers take on the anonymous personality that we as the anonymous reader has personally developed and assigned to them. 

In that respect this is a fictional, anonymous community that we belong to and although there has been comfort in that, at least for this anti-social paranoid, I think it is time that I start to take this community more seriously.

The first step was meeting those experienced, impressive bloggers last week, the second was to get a Twitter account and add it to this page. Not sure what to do with it or what the next step will be, but it is definitely time for an upgrade.

Of course my anxiety now is that I am probably taking all of this way too seriously, but as a fellow traveller, once told me some forty odd years ago, while leaving a Doors, concert, you wear your paranoia well.

Scene from the Tory Caucus washroom

h/t Impolitical here, who asked for a simpler FFIB

When a broadcaster reveals their progressive side

Global TV has never seemed that progressive to me, but yesterday after my favorite soap ended, I'm watching Global Toronto news and Leslie Roberts while doing the summary of the oceanic CENSUS story on the newly discovered number of species, some what humorously adds:

There has been no word from Ottawa yet.

A definite shot about the canceling the long form census.

His co-anchor in almost disbelief repeats the line and then starts scrambling, as does the weather guy who is trying to make a quick segue. You could envision the floor directors draws dropping and making the cover up and move on, hand signals or yelling in their ear pieces.

Maybe not that big a gaffe for this pro Harper network, but I thought it was funny.

Salesmen Bookkeepers and Politicians

There is an old salesman's theory. When the CFO and the finance department take over the company, it is time to walk away.

Customer retention is no longer the priority. The narrow, black or white, bottom line view of the bookkeeper will eventually destroy customer satisfaction and in the end the confidence of your customer base. That theory, in my humble opinion, explains why Paul Martin is not the prime minister, today.

Paul Martin was a good, if not great CFO, but as the front man he was no salesman. He was the honest and ethical bookkeeper who didn’t realize that sometimes, shades of grey are required. It was necessary to create the Gomery Commission, but it was naive and just plain stupid to hold daily televised hearings in Quebec, where they became a daily soap opera featuring the flaws in your product offering.

There has to be a balance within an organization between the back room role of the fiscal managers and the public relations role of the sales and marketing staff.

Conversely, speaking as an old commissioned sales rep, you run away from any company where the marketing department controls finance and the budgeting process.

That company is in it for a quick hit and short term gain. Their smoke and mirrors budgeting will not only result in less revenue in the long run, but more importantly it will hurt your long term relationships and destroy your reputation the marketplace. The company will never be able to deliver on what they have promised and instead will just keep changing the projections.

Welcome to the Harper government.

As has been written around these parts, many times, by many bloggers, everything about our current government is marketing. From the mandatory PMO approval to attend the opening of a local hockey rink, to billion dollar international summits, or more recently, forcing our public workforce to count and report on the number of economic recovery signs, still standing each week, the main concern of this government is the messaging of the Harper brand.

Don't get me wrong, repetitive advertising is necessary, especially when introducing a repackaged product that has failed in a larger market. But, you do not replace your fiscal managers with brand managers, and your bookkeepers with copywriters.

During the last election our finance department refused to admit that a recession was starting until two weeks before the vote. The message then changed that through no fault on their part, the country was being dragged down with the rest of the world. Of course, the followup message advised us that Canada would be the first country to recover.

The government would try to prove that, by being the first to raise our prime lending rate, although tentatively and marginally, at the billion dollar marketing event that took place this summer. An event where our economist prime minister as the leader of the hosting nation would espouse the rollback of world wide recovery programs. This of course resulted in a polite but deafening, silence from the rest of the world leaders in attendance.

The reality is that some economies are in worse shape than ours, look south for one example, but there are also other countries of similar size and circumstance whose economies are in much better shape.

Australia for example is a resource rich, country, of 20 million people that is going through a boom period economically. Their largest trading partner is China who is buying up anything that Australia can dig out of the ground. Australia just raised their prime lending rate 25 basis points from 3.5%. They never had to drop close to zero like we did.

The leaders at the G8 and G20 summits realized that Harper’s pronouncements were intended for local consumption only. Financial ministers and economists worldwide realize that despite all the national rhetoric, Canada’s economy will remain stalled until our largest trading partner gets its own economy back on track.

It is beyond my abilities and one dimensional view of the world of finance, to rehash, at least in this post, all the falsehoods in the current governments fiscal messaging.

The poor financial forecasting that took place in their first two years of operation, when they foolishly cut their second largest revenue source by over 28% or the introduction of sub prime mortgages into Canada, that forced them to move $75 billion worth of high risk paper from the banks to our government books last fall.

It should be self-evident to any Canadian, who is concerned about our economy, that the fiscal responsibility of previous governments, resulting in operating surpluses was immediately replaced by deficit spending, long before the recession started.

Instead compare the financial messaging between governments, past and present.

Neither Jean Chrétien’s PMO marketing department or his ministerial caucus as salespeople ever risked claiming, economic nirvana. Instead Paul Martin as finance minister would always forecast for the worst case scenario, projecting modest surpluses. Then miraculously at government year end or if suddenly required for an international crisis or a national emergency, additional funds would be readily available due to a better than forecasted performance.

If it really is all about the economy. We need a government whether right, left or center that consists of more than just marketing.

We need a government with a leader that understands the importance of fiscal management and is also smart enough to prevent the bookkeepers from setting policy.

Unfortunately, as an economist, our current prime minister is better at marketing and sadly as a marketer, his product is flawed, his messaging too transparent and his market base too narrow.