Welcome To The Depression...

[Gary Ruben]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

LOL politics you gotta love it

1. when trudeau came to power the canadian dollar was worth MORE than the US dollar. Through idiotic left wing nanny state policies he completely pissed our economy away. YOU CANT SPEND MORE THAN YOU EARN. Everyone repeat this over and over until it sinks in... eventually you will have to pay that debt. Since chess players are so darn smart this shouldn't take long :) then again look at the state of the CFC...

2. The Conservatives of the 80's were far from conservative. A REAL conservative doesn't piss money away like they did. That is why the Reform party was created. The PC's were closer to the liberal party in policies and this pissed off the real conservatives... thus the reform party started.
oh yeah, and remember the interest rates that they had to deal with on left wing nonsense debt? that is the real reason for the huge increase in the debt.

3. Even the CBC has to admit that the 'fundamentals' of the Canadian economy has been well handled by harper. As much as I don't care for harper, he has handled the economic situation as well as can be expected. Those on the left of the political spectrum only have one solution to this... TAX TAX TAX. People who think this would solve the problem should read Adam Smith 'the wealth of nations' repeatedly until they understand it.

4. Remember who got us into this war across the world... it wasn't the bad old conservatives... it was the LIBERALS!!! conservatives just want our troops to have some modern equipment. Ever fired an old 'liberal era' FN assault rifle? Big heavy clunky thing (mine was labeled built in 1965) Compare that to the newer equipment that the conservatives have given the armed forces today. Not perfect but at least they actually care about the troops.

and damn i hate hippies... they should get a haircut and get a real job!


Thus ends both the history and economic lessons for today :)

BTW why ban Ben? does he really annoy you that much?

1. Actually your point is incorrect. Trudeau came to power in 1968. The way it was is: Under pressure from the International Monetary Fund, the Canadian government returned to a fixed rate system from 1962 to 1970. The move was credited with restoring confidence in the Canadian dollar.

In 1962 the Canadian dollar was devalued to 92.5 cents U.S. and we were treated to the Diefenbuck. Diefenbaker was, of course, a PC Prime Minister so don't go blaming the opposition. Diefenbaker didn't lose for no reason at all.

2. The Reform Party. Who can forget Preston Manning and the rallies at the Metro East Trade Center in Pickering. Wasn't the Reform Party a reincarnation of the Social Credit Party? Everyone who hasn't read a book on the Social Credit Party should do so.

In fact, the reason for the debt was that the PC's spent far in excess of what they were taking in. The following Liberal government corrected the problem.

3. Harper is spending plenty. The economy in the Ontario and Quebec are terrible since Harper came to power. Next will be Western Canada. Just watch if oil hits 40 or 50 dollars a barrel, or less, and Natural Gas 5 dollars or less per MCF.

4. Who got us into the war is not the problem. It's who is keeping us there. Harper has pulled a date out of the hat and said we will leave in 2011. Until then he will spend countless billions of our tax dollars when it would be better spent at home. Maybe then chess parents would get the same tax break as those whose kids enroll in physical activities.

I never suggested Ben be banned. I've always enjoyed my posts to him.

Your comment on Hippies does give us some insight. For some reason it seem so many Western right wingers don't want to live and let live. They feel they have to control other peoples lives.

[Paul Bonham]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

Charest and Elsie Wayne, I seem to recall, were the only two PC's to win their ridings.

Wow, a chance to tell one of my all-time favorite jokes.

After that election, why did Jean Charest and his wife stop going out to restaurants for dinner?

He couldn't stand to hear "Jean Charest, party of two" !!!!!

[Gary Ruben]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

wow, A Chance To Tell One Of My All-time Favorite Jokes.

After That Election, Why Did Jean Charest And His Wife Stop Going Out To Restaurants For Dinner?

He Couldn't Stand To Hear "jean Charest, Party Of Two" !!!!!

LOL !!!!! :)

I once went to the local mall to listen to him speak. He was visiting the riding for one of the elections. His bus was late. I guess buses are always late. He gave a nice talk and sounded reasonable.

That election I voted Liberal. Charest was still a Progressive Conservative. The only Conservative man with a seat in the House of Commons.

I remember one election a worker came to the door and asked me to vote for her party's candidate. I told her No. So she told me to vote NDP and laughed.

Her and her party must have told a lot of people to vote NDP. Anyhow, I followed her advice and Bob Rae and the NDP won the election.

Another time a high school girl ran for public school trustee. I voted for her. What did I care? My kids weren't in school. She won. Aside from sleeping through a few meetings, according to the local newspaper, I think she did a good job. That board had two factions. A religious faction and a non religious one. She shifted the balance to the non religious oriented group.

[Jason Lohner]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

2. The Reform Party. Who can forget Preston Manning and the rallies at the Metro East Trade Center in Pickering. Wasn't the Reform Party a reincarnation of the Social Credit Party? Everyone who hasn't read a book on the Social Credit Party should do so.

In fact, the reason for the debt was that the PC's spent far in excess of what they were taking in. The following Liberal government corrected the problem.

3. Harper is spending plenty. The economy in the Ontario and Quebec are terrible since Harper came to power. Next will be Western Canada. Just watch if oil hits 40 or 50 dollars a barrel, or less, and Natural Gas 5 dollars or less per MCF.

4. Who got us into the war is not the problem. It's who is keeping us there. Harper has pulled a date out of the hat and said we will leave in 2011. Until then he will spend countless billions of our tax dollars when it would be better spent at home. Maybe then chess parents would get the same tax break as those whose kids enroll in physical activities.

I never suggested Ben be banned. I've always enjoyed my posts to him.

Your comment on Hippies does give us some insight. For some reason it seem so many Western right wingers don't want to live and let live. They feel they have to control other peoples lives.

Preston Manning was not an offshoot of the Social Credit party, they were formed from pissed off REAL conservatives who were fed up the the PC's. Social credit formed the provincial government for years hear in BC and were far better than the depression years the NDP ran in the 90's.

My point with the liberal party (under trudeau) was that Canada was in pretty decent shape (remember that it was a fight between the Bank of Canada and the PC government that caused the monetary problems) until they spent far more than they brought in.

The Canadian liberal party during the 90's were riding a worldwide economic boom in which they spent everything that they brought in. The liberal party had NO economic policies that was aimed at reducing spending or debt or taxes.

As for Harper, If the CBC has interviews that state that during this GLOBAL economic downturn we are doing as fine as we are then Harpers economic policies are doing their job. I still think he is pandering too much to the liberal supporters (perhaps because he only has a minority) but he should REALLY cut size of government and reduce taxes. I don't need a nanny state.

I don't see Gas going down in prices for a long time... and under the liberals they would just tax it more! Remember that when the conservative government was in charge in Alberta the gas prices were at an all time low and they still got their province out of debt and in an economic boom! the right economic policies will work if implemented.

Sure who started the war is relevant. You can't go blaming the conservatives for everything. They are just continuing with what the liberals started. Quite honestly I would rather Harper spend the money supporting our troops than some nonsense new government bureaucracy that the liberals would implement (gun registry anyone???)

I would love to live and let live with hippies... but the problem is that people of the 'hippie' sort are constantly getting into my face. Constantly trying to steal more money (in taxes) for their stupid social experiments. If they would stop telling others how to live and 'live and let live' then I could put up with them. Until then, I hate them.

[Garland Best]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

The Canadian liberal party during the 90's were riding a worldwide economic boom in which they spent everything that they brought in. The liberal party had NO economic policies that was aimed at reducing spending or debt or taxes.

Uhh, sorry wrong.

The Liberal Government led by Cretin/Martin stated that during any year with a budget surplus, 1/3 of the surplus would go to debt reduction, 1/3 to tax reduction, and 1/3 to program expansion.

During the Liberal stay in power, the government went from inheriting a record 42 billion dollar deficit in 1993 to posting a budget surplus in 1998. From 1998 to 2006, the end of the Martin government, the Federal Debt was reduced from $560 Billion to $481Billion, a $59Billion dollar reduction.

How did they acheive this? By reducing per capita government spending by 20% between 1993 and 1996.

As a direct result of this, Federal Taxation as a portion of the GDP dropped by 4% over the same time frame.

It was the Liberal Government track record in eliminating the deficit and reducing the Federal Debt that convinced me to vote for them for 3 consecutive terms.

So no, sorry, no points for that one.

[Bob Armstrong]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

Hi Garland:

Impressive - facts do make a difference. Thanks.

Bob

[Paul Bonham]

Re: US Election>Canadian Election

That's about as exciting as a U.S. election ever gets.

I think in both Canada and the U.S., elections need to be made more exciting by one simple step. We've all seen how on election night, as soon as the polls close, we turn on the vote coverage and presto! they already have projected the winner(s). Even if only one or two districts / counties / ridings have reported results, computer projections take that data and proclaim the winner (with rare exceptions where the initial results are close).

I think what they should do is turn OFF all the computers and just let the results trickle in and damn the projections. Let us ENJOY and SAVOR (SAVOUR? Canadian spelling?) the election night excitement!

I grew up in a family of 8 kids, and we used to hold our own elections. We tape recorded a few of them, where we had background noise of phones ringing, the TV going, and all of us talking at once. We had a system where all of us were running, and we would each vote for our 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice for "Lordship", where our 1st choice got 10 votes, 2nd got 6, and 3rd got 4, something like that. So altogether there would be several dozen ballots to count. I think the recording lasted over 2 hours, complete with interviews! We would pretend the votes were trickling in from across Canada; every phone ringing would be a few new votes coming in.

The CFC might want to use this idea for their next annual meeting / voting.

[Gary Ruben]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

Preston Manning was not an offshoot of the Social Credit party, they were formed from pissed off REAL conservatives who were fed up the the PC's. Social credit formed the provincial government for years hear in BC and were far better than the depression years the NDP ran in the 90's.

My point with the liberal party (under trudeau) was that Canada was in pretty decent shape (remember that it was a fight between the Bank of Canada and the PC government that caused the monetary problems) until they spent far more than they brought in.

The Canadian liberal party during the 90's were riding a worldwide economic boom in which they spent everything that they brought in. The liberal party had NO economic policies that was aimed at reducing spending or debt or taxes.

As for Harper, If the CBC has interviews that state that during this GLOBAL economic downturn we are doing as fine as we are then Harpers economic policies are doing their job. I still think he is pandering too much to the liberal supporters (perhaps because he only has a minority) but he should REALLY cut size of government and reduce taxes. I don't need a nanny state.

I don't see Gas going down in prices for a long time... and under the liberals they would just tax it more! Remember that when the conservative government was in charge in Alberta the gas prices were at an all time low and they still got their province out of debt and in an economic boom! the right economic policies will work if implemented.

Sure who started the war is relevant. You can't go blaming the conservatives for everything. They are just continuing with what the liberals started. Quite honestly I would rather Harper spend the money supporting our troops than some nonsense new government bureaucracy that the liberals would implement (gun registry anyone???)

I would love to live and let live with hippies... but the problem is that people of the 'hippie' sort are constantly getting into my face. Constantly trying to steal more money (in taxes) for their stupid social experiments. If they would stop telling others how to live and 'live and let live' then I could put up with them. Until then, I hate them.

The comments in this thread regarding hippies serves one important purpose. It highlights the intolerence shown by so many who gravitate toward the Western Canadian faction of the Conservative Party. I think you've picked the wrong hobby. Hippies were always part of the chess scene.

Harper wants to give us new taxes. He has proposed giving tax rebates to those buying houses to help them pay their costs. Why should I pay more taxes to pay for someone elses house? Harper wants ME to pay billions of dollars to pay for other peoples houses. That's a plural "ME"" which includes all the others who don't want to be taxed to buy other peoples houses. I long ago figured out I don't have billions of dollars.

Conservatives are always the same. They sneak in taxes and overspend. Spend like drunken sailors. Can't trust them with power and certainly not with a majority government.

Garland responded to you on the deficit Mulroney left.

Regarding the Reform Party, Preson Manning father was the Social Credit Premier of Alberta for many terms. The Reform party he started sure looked to me like the old Social Credit party.

You must mean you don't see gasoline coming down for a long time. Oil and Natural Gas are already coming down. Natural Gas has come down on the markets from around 13.50 to the current 7.50. Alberta Gas is about a dollar less. Oil has come down from 147. to less than 100. dollars a barrel. Gasoline is trading at around 2.40 per U.S. gallon down from at least 3.00. Harper is allowing the oil companies to gouge us. Harper is also taxing us heavily on gasoline. If he wasn't raking in tax dollars he would cap the GST on gasoline so we only paid on prices up to 1.00 per liter. Harper hasn't done that, has he? Harper and his conservatives just keep on gouging. They are just as bad as the Liberals and you don't want to admit it. Are you a card carrying Conservative?

If oil comes down to 40 dollars a barrel and Natural Gas below 5 then Western Canada can put up the for sale signs and turn out the lights. The drillng activity and growth will stop.

In any case, the Conservative government has been in power for more than 2 years and the lousy economy in Eastern Canada is their fault. They were asleep at the switch and now everything is unravelling. I wouldn't be surprised if sentiment turned around before the election and people vote for a political party which might be able to bring back the good times. Right wing parties are putting North America into a depression with hugh financial institutions failing. The Right Wing Republicans in the U.S. are nationalizing companies and you'll see it in Canada as well as time goes by.

[Jason Lohner]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

I guess what we have here is a misunderstanding of terms... let me define my idea of a true conservative

- small government
- reduces taxes
- believes in freedom to make owns choice (doesn't try you to force you to 'act' they way they want)
- believes that you are responsible for own actions.
- doesn't pander to special interest groups to gain votes

Under this definition, the Conservative party doesn't really fit the bill. The liberals are far from it and the NDP/Green party are so far left that they are going backwards. Neither does the Republican or Democrat party in the states. Although I would have supported Ron Pauls platform.

Here in BC our government is Gordon Campbells 'Liberal' party. They are FAR from the policies of the Liberal party of Canada. They are actually the remnants of the old Social Credit party of BC. They are our 'right wing' choice. Our only other 'real' party is the NDP which ran the province into the ground in the 90's. The old 'Reform' party was probably the closest to the idea of conservative, but under Harper (now renamed Conservative party) they have strayed far from their roots. Still, I can't see any other real choice. All the other parties just want to tax more. As Ben put it 'the conservatives eff with our money the least'. Its a choice of the lesser evil.
If Harper seriously reduced government then I could see a decent reduction in taxes. Until then he doesn't fit my definition of Conservative.

As for hippies. Once again, I dislike hippies because it is THEM who get in MY face and won't 'live and let live'. Why should my taxes increase to support some social experiment??? I loved when Vancouver had the indy car races and the hippies came out to protest Cars! I drove by and yelled 'get a job'. Most hippies are extreme environmentalists... I always ask them what they wipe their butts with... and when they reply I call them hypocrites.
All their protesting just makes me want to do the exact opposite of their cause. If they just wanted to sit around and smoke pot and leave me alone, then I wouldn't have a problem, more power to them, but I detest when anyone tries to restrict my choices in life.

As for the afgan war, I am quite neutral on it. I don't support it, but then again I am not against it either. I realize that we are now in the war and we have to make the best of the situation. Pulling out would probably cause alot of chaos and the loss of many more lives. Then again I was surprised when the liberals sent us their with 1960's era equipment. Now that we are there I support any effort that helps reduce the loss of Canadian lives.

My final quote is from the CBC website... (as far as I am concerned it is a liberal party propaganda front) Jim Carol is an economist

"Jim Carroll: I won’t venture into politics, other than to say that Canadians, and our leaders, need to recognize that old style policies of shoveling money around won’t work, and yet they are all probably guilty of that.
It might sound like a cliche, but we’ve got to restructure; we’ve got to go for higher value industries, we’ve got to innovate. We need to focus on growth markets, and transition the industries that are challenged. Look, we can’t compete with Asia and low cost manufacturers on price. Or, we can choose to move up the value-chain, enhance our skills, and take on more complex, higher value products.

And we can’t do that through platitudes and empty slogans. I think Canadians have to realize the scope of the global competition that is out there, and realize that we’ve got to abandon a lot of our old style thinking and get moving with a different frame of mind. We can’t protect ourselves from the world — we have to go out and compete in the world."

[Gary Ruben]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

I guess what we have here is a misunderstanding of terms... let me define my idea of a true conservative

- small government
- reduces taxes
- believes in freedom to make owns choice (doesn't try you to force you to 'act' they way they want)
- believes that you are responsible for own actions.
- doesn't pander to special interest groups to gain votes

Under this definition, the Conservative party doesn't really fit the bill. The liberals are far from it and the NDP/Green party are so far left that they are going backwards. Neither does the Republican or Democrat party in the states. Although I would have supported Ron Pauls platform.

If they don't fit the bill for you do what I do. Don't vote. Quite simple. Their funding comes from your vote. If you don't vote some party loses funding.

The governments of Canada and the U.S. have shown us what happens when they stay out of the market. It falls apart. The financials sector in the U.S. has fallen apart and now the taxpayer must foot the bill. Nationalization is the order of the day. AIG, Freddie and Fanny Mae. More to come.

We should soon be hearing about our institutions exposure to the U.S. current failing institutions.

The Canadian problems happened on Harpers watch. Him and his finance minister don't appear to understand the complex Canadian economy. They are wasting our wealth on a foreign war. A U.S. war.

[Jason Lohner]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

If they don't fit the bill for you do what I do. Don't vote. Quite simple. Their funding comes from your vote. If you don't vote some party loses funding.

The governments of Canada and the U.S. have shown us what happens when they stay out of the market. It falls apart. The financials sector in the U.S. has fallen apart and now the taxpayer must foot the bill. Nationalization is the order of the day. AIG, Freddie and Fanny Mae. More to come.

We should soon be hearing about our institutions exposure to the U.S. current failing institutions.

The Canadian problems happened on Harpers watch. Him and his finance minister don't appear to understand the complex Canadian economy. They are wasting our wealth on a foreign war. A U.S. war.

Or, you can get involved, as they say... you can't complain if you don't vote.
I personally have written many emails to several MP's on various issues, I suggest you do the same. I don't know if I can vote for the Conservatives this election due to their idiotic Copyright bill C-61. I probably will vote for an independent.

As for the failing economy... The economy has cycles, boom and bust and this has been tracked for hundreds of years. No amount of government intervention will stop this. Harper has put policies in place to reduce the pain, but it can't stop these global cycles. As for the tax payers footing the bill, the US government should just let these companies fail. The more the government interferes the worse it gets. They should never take over/bail out failing companies. This just encourages bad management. Just look at our own government run companies, If they didn't have a monopoly they would never be able to compete because of the waste. Here in BC our car insurance is government run, My brother lives in Alberta and pays HALF the premiums for the same insurance because of competition. His driving record better? hardly, he Demolished a greyhound sized bus!!!

Yes Ontario is suffering, but alot of that is due to the closure of Automotive plants. They manufactured alot of gas guzzling trucks. Because of Gas prices, Nobody wants a gas guzzler! Now lets look at what the leading parties want to do about high gas prices. Liberals want to add more taxes (surprise surprise!!), Conservatives want to cut the gas taxes. Liberals signed the kyoto accord (reducing the amount of oil that canada can produce, driving up demand thus driving up prices). Conservatives won't implement this accord. Yet you blame the conservatives for this! Sorry but your logic is faulty.

[Gary Ruben]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

Or, you can get involved, as they say... you can't complain if you don't vote.

I pay my taxes. That buys me the right to complain.

As for the failing economy... The economy has cycles, boom and bust and this has been tracked for hundreds of years. No amount of government intervention will stop this. Harper has put policies in place to reduce the pain, but it can't stop these global cycles.

I don't think this is the result of a cycle. Looks to me like mismanagment. Harper hurt the Canadian economy by taking wealth out of the system. His Income Trust decision took billions of wealth out of the economy.

As for the tax payers footing the bill, the US government should just let these companies fail. The more the government interferes the worse it gets. They should never take over/bail out failing companies. This just encourages bad management.

Quite frankly, I don't know what the fallout would be from allowing AIG to fail. They were the largest insurance company and the way financial institutions seem to be intertwined they couldn't let a domino effect take place. You only have to look at the stock markets to see the fallout of these failures.

Yes Ontario is suffering, but alot of that is due to the closure of Automotive plants.

The Ontario economy has always been more than the auto industry. Many industries I used to visit in the course of my work are no longer in business. In any case, you'd be amazed how much natural gas they used and now those customers for natural gas are gone. The auto industry used an awesome amount of Nat gas. An engineer at one of the auto manufacturers once told me that there is more energy which goes into a vehicle, counting everything right down to making the screws that go into them, than the average owner will ever put in the gas tank. I had no reason to doubt him. Our steel industry has also taken a beating as have most of our industries.

I guess Harper and his finance minister just didn't understand they had to work with industry to keep them here.

The next government in Canada will have to figure out how to envigorate the economy here because the market for oil and gas depends on a strong economy to keep prices high. I don't think Harpers master plan of making me and others pay for other people to buy houses is the answer. You never said how you feel about it. Maybe you don't mind.

[Ed Seedhouse]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

And we can’t do that through platitudes and empty slogans.

And yet your post consisted almost entirely of that, when you were't just contradicting yourself of course.

[Jason Lohner]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

The next government in Canada will have to figure out how to envigorate the economy here because the market for oil and gas depends on a strong economy to keep prices high. I don't think Harpers master plan of making me and others pay for other people to buy houses is the answer. You never said how you feel about it. Maybe you don't mind.

Because I don't believe he is making other people pay. What he wants to do is offer a tax cut incentive for people who buy their homes. To me a tax cut is just letting us have some of our own money back (ie the govn steals less of it)
A tax cut wouldn't take a cent away from your pocket. What he has to do is cut some government spending to be able to afford the tax cut (which I am sure he won't). Tax cuts have been shown time and again that they help the economy. Our tax burden on businesses just make them non competitive.

[Jason Lohner]

Re: Welcome To The Depression...

And yet your post consisted almost entirely of that, when you were't just contradicting yourself of course.

perhaps you can add something constructive to the conversation? Most of my ideas have been around for years. And have alot of historical data to back them. Low taxes == better economy. Just look at countries with low tax policies and you will see a growing economy. Now look at countries with High tax policies... you find a stagnant or poor economy. Even communist countries like China have figured this out. If they can make a major change from Marxist economics to a capitalist society, I'm sure that us 'educated' Canadians can.