GCn20

I am in total agreement with you on your above post. Government is a cesspool and it is very hard to have an ounce of trust in anyone. Just as tax cuts are unlikely to be managed correctly, I believe the same for deficit spending to increase social programs. Neither are very sound strategies when the dollars are manipulated by crooks. For this reason, in the past 3 elections I have not voted for any party. I have registered a protest vote.

Dude...I'm not even going to bother reading any drivel written by Westwood. As for ANTIFA being extreme...they most certainly are. I'm not even going to debate that. If you don't feel the same way fill your boots. We will agree to disagree. I have no problem with anyone being anti-fascist or anti-racism, what I will never support is condoning violence and crime in order to further these causes. That is extreme.

Might get a series or two to knock some dust off but it wouldn't shock me if he didn't play at all.

By that reasoning the right could easily say the biggest left wingnut took over the Liberal party. However, I do agree that Poilievre really needs to come to centre if he wants to win over the country. Just as Trudeau needs to tone down the rhetoric and virtue signalling if he wants to retain power. Before you say that Poilievre is a bigger wingnut than Trudeau, I would recommend looking at the polls. Poilievre is leading in support for who would make the best PM. That ought to be a huge wake up call for Trudeau to pull his head out of his butt don't you think?

There are definitely NDP and grit supporters that would qualify as extreme. It is nonsense to suggest otherwise. Each of the federal parties cast wide nets for support and in kind have some supporters from the extremes. I do not deny for one minute that CPC has attracted it's share of wingnuts. I don't believe for one second that the party has been completely hijacked by them though. That's just the posturing of the left to paint all on the right as extreme. I do not find it extreme for a person to be a Christian and follow Christian beliefs, it's not my cup of tea but it's not extreme. I do not find it extreme to want small government and the resumption of the oil industry. Just as I don't paint all Liberals as ANTIFA supporting wingnuts, or socialists. It would be comically inappropriate to suggest that. I think a big part of the problem is that the left and right extremes dominate the news cycle now while the average supporter is just too boring to talk about. If you were to ask people on the left they would say that the right has been hijacked by the extremes, well newsflash....the right feels the same way about the left. Neither is correct, though both sides will suggest they are and the media seems to have some perverse attraction to keeping this charade alive.

I argue with a lot of people about a lot of things on this thread. However, I was not really speaking about the people here in that statement. Just generally what i am seeing overall in Canada and the US, in particular. I find most people here pretty moderate on most issues. I have seen no extremism that I can really recall, just difference in ideologies. Without all the emotion tied into some of the posts, I don't think anyone is all that far apart here.

I do agree that on both sides of the political spectrum we are seeing a real move to the extreme....and it's sad.

That may be the case, but that was not the argument. The tax cut did not automatically create a deficit, the mismanagement and misdirection of the cut could do so. It's not the same thing. The problem is that many use tax cuts and other similar economic principles failure to give credence to the thoroughly debunked Keynesian economics which is time proven to be far more harmful an economic approach. The problem is that it wasn't the tax cut, it was the failure to manage it properly that is the problem. The deficit isn't created by the tax cut, it is created by the mismanagement and poor planning of the tax cut. A tax cut in an of itself does not create deficit. However, Keynesian economics would have you believe they do and that has been debunked thoroughly by almost all of academia. In fact, they now teach Keynesian economics as a cautionary tale. Perhaps, I am getting caught up in the pure economics of each principle vs. the practice, as Friedman's economics can certainly fail if not implemented correctly even though it is far more economically sound. However, I am responding to the general statement that "tax cuts are deficit spending". It simply isn't true, although it can become true if other factors are in place. I will say I am probably being anal about it because my prof at Queens economics would have failed me if I made a blanket statement like that....lol. He was no fan of Keynes.

The problem is that you guys seem to want to dictate what can be tolerated and what can be excused. You point to my post as hypocrisy, when I am simply defending myself from a poster that suggested that a native Canadian was feigning victimhood, lacked self awareness, and was detached from reality. I suppose that kind of hyperbole against another poster is tolerable? C'mon man. You are calling Rich out but you are ignoring what he is saying in the first place. I fully admit I am stirring the pot, however, I would hope that my approach is at least respectful to other posters even if the content is most disagreeable to your sensibilities. You can judge the content how you will, criticize it..call it trolling....whatever....but lines are crossed when posters are insulted or they are told they are cranky old men, or detached from reality. That's not a counter argument...that's a personal attack, and it's shameful behavior.

You don't have to cut programming to offset tax cuts you can offset tax cuts by increasing revenues, higher GDP growth and through finding efficiency in program delivery. Also, tax cuts are not a straight dollar in dollar out variable as they have many positive effects on the economy that must be measured prior to declaring the amount lost. Deficit spending only happens when there are deficits. FULL STOP. You can have tax cuts without deficits. To say otherwise is absurd. As for a source that tax cuts are positive I will point you towards the papers of Milton Friedman the 1976 Nobel Prize winner in economics. Nothing but name calling again. Get a new gig. Attack the poster who disagrees with you...rinse and repeat. You don't even realize you are illustrating exactly what I'm talking about or do you think your little rant above shows a willingness to bring facts and open discussion to this thread. You come on here and try bully anyone who disagrees with your political viewpoint. I am not sure if you see it, but anyone who wants to go back and see your standard response to anything you don't agree with will quickly come to the same conclusion. You want to talk about a lack of self awareness....my god man. It's hilarious....and it's sad.

No. That is silly. You should take a math class, One does not automatically make the other happen. I can slash taxes and balance a budget, or even run a surplus. An economy has many moving parts and taxation is only one of a ton of lines on the ledger. Saying that a tax cut is deficit spending is silly and it is wrong and anyone with a grade 10 understanding of accounting would tell you that. Deficit spending happens when all revenues are less than all expenditures. Not one revenue stream. It is patently false to say that tax cuts are the same as deficit spending. As a businessman for over forty years, I have seen revenue streams come and revenue streams go and I have even axed revenue streams out. There is no correlation between one of many revenue streams and the bottom line unless you axe a revenue stream without making the necessary adjustments to expenditure or efficiency. Money in is not money out. Sales do not equal profit. Revenues do not necessarily equate to profit. There is more than one factor at work and there are two sides to every ledger. That's simple economics and I can't believe I have to explain this to grown ups.

I am not here to own the Liberals. I am here simply to present a different viewpoint to the echo chamber. I have not seen many arguments here that are good faith by anyone. That's just straight up fact. All I've seen on these threads are attacks against other posters who don't agree disguised as some kind of moral high ground. Same as what we see out of the modern day Liberals. When someone says they don't like the Liberals or the politics of the left they are not met with facts on the matter, they are met with insults and called knuckle draggers, or angry old men....and that's just the last page of this thread. It's really quite sad how you guys pretend to be having civil discussion when it is anything but that so I will continue on, so that people unacquainted with this forum know that groupthink isn't mandated at this web site. Bad faith argument...sheesh...like saying cutting taxes is the same thing as deficit spending...like there are only two lines on a federal budget. That's a ridiculous bad faith argument perpetrated by the tax and spend community with no basis in mathematics, accounting, or reality. Don't pretend that bad faith is exclusive to the right....I've seen a lot of the left leaning crowd here say some absolutely ridiculous crap.

If you bothered to pay attention to what you are reading I stated very clearly that balanced budgets are not often attained. They are often planned for, promised, and rarely delivered. That is exactly what I said. You putting up a chart doesn't disprove that. I am not against deficit spending if it is within the realm of reasonable amounts, and in times of need. What I am against is completely irresponsible, irrational, and ridiculously high deficit spending that never slowed down after the pandemic at a time that there is absolutely ZERO need for this level of irresponsibility. It is a gross mismanagement of the public purse. You can call that conspiracy theory, or nonsensical, but the majority of Canadians agree and that will be reflected in the next election. Oh boy....the victory lap I'm going to do when Trudeau is turfed in the near future is going to sicken you.

It can happen. However, it is ridiculous to suggest that tax cuts are automatically deficit spending. It's simply not true. If you people want to make that kind of leap of logic than I propose to call tax cuts a form of consumer social programming.,

Why would Poilievre or any other opposition party member offer legitimacy to this sham of a procedure by taking part in it? This was completely staged, predetermined, and a sorry excuse of a response to a very serious issue by the Liberal party. Shameful really. Sure,...sounds good. Agreed. The hypocrisy is so strong on your last point. I love to point it out. I get the exact reaction I want to illustrate this every time.

How very convenient you cut the chart off at 2014. I said governments would try for balance and not achieve it by small amounts except in times of recession. Not sure what is patently false about that. How about you throw up Trudeau's spending so we can compare. Might need a much bigger chart. Do that and quit playing silly bugger. Tell me why lefty is part of the problem when the term righty is not? Big double standard going with you. A lack of inquiry plays right into Poilievre's hands.

That would be concerning. Tax cuts are deficit spending? WTF?

Cutting social programs maybe but he doesn't have to do so. Trudeau has quadrupled the national budget deficit, shouldn't be too hard to find some savings because you can't tell me all the money went to social programs because I am not seeing anything representing a rise in them that accounts for these deficits.

I doubt Poilievre balances the budget either, but I am quite sure he will reduce deficit spending dramatically and will not artificially prop up our economy by borrowing money at a rate that is unprecedented in our country's history.

I can remember pretty much every camps first week giving most of the older vets a ton of time off.

LOL. I do believe he actually pulled most of the tweets about the Bombers down after a couple weeks when our local media gave him a hard time about it. I have not paid attention to Mo since that time, and if he has ended his bashing of the Bombers then I will gladly give him the forgiveness of his earlier stupidity and chalk it up to sour grapes. The comments were stupid though.

In the last 8 years I cannot think of an instance where the government has straight up answered a question in QP. You are right in that regard. Balanced budgets are difficult but not impossible. Budgeting for them and not making them by a small amount was the norm right up to 2015. Certainly there are planned deficits...but nothing even remotely compares to what we are seeing right now. Great, and so will I if he doesn't. I will stay consistent and not allow a government a free pass on that flimsy excuse.

Rationally, the leader of a party is responsible for the policies and governance of said party. Trudeau is the leader of the Liberal party of Canada which currently is our governing party. By all accounts, from it's own ex-members of caucus, all decisions made by this government go through the PMO. Objectively: Global issues are only part of the equation in governance. One can be affected globally but still be domestically sound in it's governance. The Liberals use the global issues to attain a free pass to irresponsible domestic fiscal policy. While I do admit that I come to this thread for entertainment and don't care a whole lot about federal politics in general because it is a quagmire of corruption from every party, I still maintain the privilege afforded to any in a political discussion to form and opinion and counter arguments made against that opinion. I sure hope that when Poilievre is the PM in the next year, that you give him the same free pass based on globalism as you have Trudeau, but I highly doubt you will. The polls are changing and the CPC is beginning to pull away and its not a matter of if anymore it's a matter of when. Do better yourself.

If you say so. It is not insane to criticize Trudeau no matter how much you would like to label it as being so which by the way is also a very predictable response. Don't like Trudeau you are a bigot or insane or any other gamut of ridiculousness you want to drag up. It's garbage. In order for an inquiry to have any value it only needs to be transparent and independant. It could be done behind closed doors for the sensitive parts of the inquiry. It's fiction that an inquiry can't be held and it is NOT just PP asking for one, it is ALL other parties in the House of Commons that represent and overwhelming majority of the voting public,. Johnston's reputation has taken a considerable hit with his decision in the eyes of the public, and the media. Don't believe me check out all the headlines in the newspapers today. Even the papers that tend to skew left are skewering him.

I'm not blaming Trudeau for this, I'm blaming Trudeau for the level that it's at. There is a difference. Look, if they were running a balanced budget and these factors all still existed I could give him more of a pass. When you have doubled our national debt in 3 years, and have taken on unprecedented deficit spending for several years and these problems go unmitigated and are worsening....I'm sorry that is garbage governance.