Monday, October 06, 2008

Mr. Dithers (updated)

Harper:

On the campaign trail, Harper played down fears of a recession in Canada and said the main problem afflicting the world economies is the freezing up of bank credit, which has hurt companies and consumers looking for loans.

"Our main advice is obviously to encourage co-ordinated action, to encourage actions that will stabilize the situation without creating a great deal of moral hazard for taxpayers," Harper said while campaigning in Ottawa.

"Let's be clear: the prime minister of Canada isn't going to go around the country predicting a recession when we're not in a recession now. I remain fundamentally optimistic about the Canadian economy, but optimistic, as I've said from the beginning, within the framework that we're now living in ... a period of economic uncertainty."

Harper added: "We're in relatively good position compared to some other countries."

"Framework...of economic uncertainty...in a relatively good position..." Uncertainty by definition means it is not possible to predict with any credibility: things are uncertain. Therefore, Mr. Harper, the claim of the "relatively good position" of the Canadian economy is not valid because in an uncertain economic climate you cannot be sure of anything, let alone the country's position. You contradict yourself.

I am not an economist, but given that we live in a country with, what is it, a notable fundamental like an 80% trade reliance on the on-the-floor-gasping US market, I would suggest that your fuzzy claim that things are fine and your lack of any sort of plan to address reality, might make one think you're d i t h e r i n g. Is it perhaps that you, vaunted economist of the Calgary School, have encountered an economic scenario so far out of your ideological understanding that you really haven't a clue where to begin addressing it with out abandoning your entire worldview?

Could it be, Mr. Harper, that you're stuck? Are you having your assumptions about human nature challenged? Is there a gnawing fear that the Marxists, and the Leninists, and the Ecologists, were right and that the great greed-lazy experiment with Capitalism is doomed to collapse under its own contradictions? Denying the problem exists in the "Real Economy" is a lie: it was some very tangible things, a house and a person, that bridged the real economy of people's lives and livelihoods to the abstract economy of financial markets.

You who come from an ideological outlook that denies the value of government, that seeks to destroy it from within, leaving everything up to markets and business. Fail do you, when you neglect to factor the long term consequences of your berserker approach to goverment. Even termites leave a structure behind when they dismantle a tree. Now you've killed Canadians because you let the market police the safety of the food they eat. What makes us think you're equipped to protect Canadians as the same pathogen you triumph infects the world?

Or do you know what's going on? Do you see where this leads? Do you see the hungry masses with their rage, and their pitchforks, and their torches in your nightmares? Oh what will your platform tell us, I wonder?

Update - Look at him go!:
"Look, we're not an island. We can't pretend, and we're not pretending, that we will escape effects of world developments," said Harper at a campaign announcement in Ottawa about child-care benefit improvements.
...
The Conservatives have a Plan B to assist the Canadian banking system if the crisis spreads here, Harper said, but insisted Canada remains in a better situation than elsewhere.

So they have a Plan B - save the banks! How's that working out so far? Oh, right:

The Conservative leader was responding to news that world markets plummeted again Monday as government bank bailouts in the U.S. and Europe failed to calm fears of a global financial crisis.
A little behind the curve, ain'tcha? Well, we can see where your priorities are at least. Um, what's yer Plan A and C, we'd like to know?

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