CanPol: May(?) 2011 Election. Vote today!

[Hauldren Collider]

I'd just like to get on-record as saying that is absoultely adorable that Canadians have their very own elections, almost as if they were a real country and everything.

Not quite as adorable as Canada having its own navy, but cheek-pinchingly cute nevertheless.

QFT

[notyoueither]

Don't you have some chads to hang in Florida, or something?

[notyoueither]

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2011/04/02/rex-murphy-newfoundlands-three-gigawatt-insult-to-gilles-duceppe/

Rex Murphy: Newfoundland’s three-gigawatt insult to Gilles Duceppe
Rex Murphy Apr 2, 2011 – 8:05 AM ET | Last Updated: Apr 1, 2011 1:13 PM ET


There can be no real surprise that when Stephen Harper visited Newfoundland this week he came to announce, in the form of loan guarantees, some support for the ever-so-long-anticipated hydroelectric development of the Lower Churchill.

The Lower Churchill and its three-gigawatt energy potential — for those who might not instantly recognize the reference — have been part of every political campaign in Newfoundland, and every Premier’s pledge on entering office, for at least three decades. And for good reason. Not the least of now-retired Danny Williams’ political triumphs was his dogged efforts to bring the Lower Churchill within a glimpse of actual development. He did what none of his predecessors could.

There may have been, however, some small surprise that Stephen Harper was so well-received in St. John’s. Sitting smiling close by while the PM spoke was none other than the successor to Anything-but-Steve Danny Williams, the new Premier, Cathy Dunderdale. What a change from Williams’ time, when for this Prime Minister a visit to Newfoundland probably evoked the joys of root canal, and he was less popular than the latest Greenpeace acrobat mewling on about the seal hunt.

It’s safe again to be a federal Conservative in Newfoundland. Even the local Liberals admit that the Tories there are fielding the strongest slate of candidates to be seen for over a decade.

The pledge of support from a potential Harper administration on the Lower Churchill development should be good news for everyone in an energy-anxious world. The Lower Churchill has every virtue. It’s ready power, reliable and renewable. Great Gaia, even Elizabeth May could support it. But most significantly: Harper’s pledge is a sign that the longest, most bitter, contention in Newfoundland public life may, finally, be over.

The Lower Churchill issue has been seen, for over 30 years, as the only possible “repair” for another project, that, in Newfoundland eyes, was grotesquely unfair: A 1969 deal involving the Upper Churchill that was, in terms of its financial benefit for Newfoundland, a disaster, a shame and an abiding blister on the public consciousness.

That deal was a cash bonanza for Quebec, which purchased the power — under a long-term deal that monumentally underestimated the escalating oil prices following the oil embargo of the 1970s. This wasn’t, as the phrase has it, just a sweetheart of a deal for Quebec — it was a great eager flashy harem and cathouse.

Quebec has made billions of dollars off a contract signed 42 years ago, that — to be plain — stupidly did not allow for any inflation in the price of energy over the life of the contract. In fact, quelle horreur, the price Quebec pays actually goes down for the last 25 years of the deal, which ends in 2041. Newfoundland has been receiving a pittance on the resource; and despite attempts of every administration in Newfoundland, under every Prime Minister since Trudeau, to rebalance the contract, nothing has worked. (One political note: It is, in my judgment, inescapable that had the inequity flowed in reverse, if the deal had worked as massively against Quebec’s interests as it did Newfoundland’s, then the feds and the Quebec government would have had it changed decades ago.

I labour over this history to place in context the astounding, even outré, comments offered by Canada’s First Separatist, Gilles Duceppe, on hearing of the proposed arrangement — which, I hasten to mention, is merely a $4.2-bilion loan guarantee from Ottawa, not some massive outright subsidy. Mr. Duceppe, with a logic that can only belong to a man who gets paid to be a separatist by the government he’s trying to extinguish, called the deal “a direct attack on Quebec.”

What really bothers Mr. Duceppe and other separatists is that they want to retain Quebec’s monopoly on southbound power sales to the United States — something the Lower Churchill project, including its 1,100 km of underwater transmission cables, would threaten. “By financing the Newfoundland project, Stephen Harper has given Quebec a slap right in the face,” the BQ leader declared.

It’s one of the continuing risibilities of the Canadian federation that we cosset and pamper and pay for the separatist faction in the House of Commons, and go along with the pretense that they’re parliamentarians like any other. They are not. They displace the natural balance of the federation. They have a vested interested in seeing the parliament they attend not working. And they leap to any perceived or manufactured imperfection in our system as evidence of dark perfidy or contempt for Quebec. They warp the system. Nowhere do these observations meet with greater validation than these ludicrous comments by Duceppe on the proposed assistance to the Lower Churchill.

National Post

[Fake Boris]

So you are supporting the Tories' efforts to subsidize Newfoundland's Hydro megaproject, then?

I was pretty sure the Bloc was extremely proud that Quebec's "major infrastructure shift" to Hydro took zero money from the government.

It's amazing how you and the Bloc change your tune so many times a day and are incapable of seeing the contradictions.

Do you understand that ROC complains much more when we get something than we do when someone else does?

There is little more to this than the fact that it costs too much politically to subsidize Quebec, and the electoral benefits are too narrow.

[Fake Boris]

Please summarize your point. Your point seemed to be

Quebec has the most export-driven economy in Canada

Which is categorically false no matter how you slice it.

1) I said "IIRC"
2) Oil exports depend little to none on exchange rates, export of goods and services does (a lot). We are thus more affected - at least in the category of exports that matters.

[Fake Boris]

One can make calculations using BS assumptions. Like claiming more transfer payments when the largest benefactor is already Quebec and there are already major distortions in services resulting from the system as it is.

This business with Newfoulndland and hydro is really unsavoury as well. It's almost like someone wants a 'then get the fvck out!' reaction.

No, it doesn't work that way.

The Bloc has been claiming - and still claims - that most transfer cuts since the Chrétien days are not justified. They want that money back for Quebec, but you could use the same formula they used on any other province and get a number. Most of that money they want wouldn't come in equalization payments anyway.

[KrazyHorse]

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/...illes-duceppe/

Rex Murphy: Newfoundland’s three-gigawatt insult to Gilles Duceppe
Rex Murphy Apr 2, 2011 – 8:05 AM ET | Last Updated: Apr 1, 2011 1:13 PM ET


There can be no real surprise that when Stephen Harper visited Newfoundland this week he came to announce, in the form of loan guarantees, some support for the ever-so-long-anticipated hydroelectric development of the Lower Churchill.

The Lower Churchill and its three-gigawatt energy potential — for those who might not instantly recognize the reference — have been part of every political campaign in Newfoundland, and every Premier’s pledge on entering office, for at least three decades. And for good reason. Not the least of now-retired Danny Williams’ political triumphs was his dogged efforts to bring the Lower Churchill within a glimpse of actual development. He did what none of his predecessors could.

There may have been, however, some small surprise that Stephen Harper was so well-received in St. John’s. Sitting smiling close by while the PM spoke was none other than the successor to Anything-but-Steve Danny Williams, the new Premier, Cathy Dunderdale. What a change from Williams’ time, when for this Prime Minister a visit to Newfoundland probably evoked the joys of root canal, and he was less popular than the latest Greenpeace acrobat mewling on about the seal hunt.

It’s safe again to be a federal Conservative in Newfoundland. Even the local Liberals admit that the Tories there are fielding the strongest slate of candidates to be seen for over a decade.

The pledge of support from a potential Harper administration on the Lower Churchill development should be good news for everyone in an energy-anxious world. The Lower Churchill has every virtue. It’s ready power, reliable and renewable. Great Gaia, even Elizabeth May could support it. But most significantly: Harper’s pledge is a sign that the longest, most bitter, contention in Newfoundland public life may, finally, be over.

The Lower Churchill issue has been seen, for over 30 years, as the only possible “repair” for another project, that, in Newfoundland eyes, was grotesquely unfair: A 1969 deal involving the Upper Churchill that was, in terms of its financial benefit for Newfoundland, a disaster, a shame and an abiding blister on the public consciousness.

That deal was a cash bonanza for Quebec, which purchased the power — under a long-term deal that monumentally underestimated the escalating oil prices following the oil embargo of the 1970s. This wasn’t, as the phrase has it, just a sweetheart of a deal for Quebec — it was a great eager flashy harem and cathouse.

Quebec has made billions of dollars off a contract signed 42 years ago, that — to be plain — stupidly did not allow for any inflation in the price of energy over the life of the contract. In fact, quelle horreur, the price Quebec pays actually goes down for the last 25 years of the deal, which ends in 2041. Newfoundland has been receiving a pittance on the resource; and despite attempts of every administration in Newfoundland, under every Prime Minister since Trudeau, to rebalance the contract, nothing has worked. (One political note: It is, in my judgment, inescapable that had the inequity flowed in reverse, if the deal had worked as massively against Quebec’s interests as it did Newfoundland’s, then the feds and the Quebec government would have had it changed decades ago.

I labour over this history to place in context the astounding, even outré, comments offered by Canada’s First Separatist, Gilles Duceppe, on hearing of the proposed arrangement — which, I hasten to mention, is merely a $4.2-bilion loan guarantee from Ottawa, not some massive outright subsidy. Mr. Duceppe, with a logic that can only belong to a man who gets paid to be a separatist by the government he’s trying to extinguish, called the deal “a direct attack on Quebec.”

What really bothers Mr. Duceppe and other separatists is that they want to retain Quebec’s monopoly on southbound power sales to the United States — something the Lower Churchill project, including its 1,100 km of underwater transmission cables, would threaten. “By financing the Newfoundland project, Stephen Harper has given Quebec a slap right in the face,” the BQ leader declared.

It’s one of the continuing risibilities of the Canadian federation that we cosset and pamper and pay for the separatist faction in the House of Commons, and go along with the pretense that they’re parliamentarians like any other. They are not. They displace the natural balance of the federation. They have a vested interested in seeing the parliament they attend not working. And they leap to any perceived or manufactured imperfection in our system as evidence of dark perfidy or contempt for Quebec. They warp the system. Nowhere do these observations meet with greater validation than these ludicrous comments by Duceppe on the proposed assistance to the Lower Churchill.

National Post

Sorry, do you have an article that doesn't spend half its time explaining that governments shouldn't have to abide by the contracts they sign?

[Asher]

1) I said "IIRC"
2) Oil exports depend little to none on exchange rates, export of goods and services does (a lot). We are thus more affected - at least in the category of exports that matters.

You know not of what you speak.

The capital projects related to oil production are massively affected by the currency exchange.

[Asher]

No, it doesn't work that way.

The Bloc has been claiming - and still claims - that most transfer cuts since the Chrétien days are not justified. They want that money back for Quebec, but you could use the same formula they used on any other province and get a number. Most of that money they want wouldn't come in equalization payments anyway.

The more the Bloc talks, the more convinced I am Quebec deserves zero transfer payments. Their fiscal mismanagement should be their problem, not mine.

[Asher]

Sorry, do you have an article that doesn't spend half its time explaining that governments shouldn't have to abide by the contracts they sign?

A contract is a contract, but that contract was hilariously one-sided and clearly exploited ignorance/stupidity on behalf of the agent negotiating the contract for NFLD.

Is Good Faith not a prerequisite for a valid contract?

You wouldn't enforce a contract made by a 4-year old child, why enforce one made by a Newf?

[Fake Boris]

I labour over this history to place in context the astounding, even outré, comments offered by Canada’s First Separatist, Gilles Duceppe, on hearing of the proposed arrangement — which, I hasten to mention, is merely a $4.2-bilion loan guarantee from Ottawa, not some massive outright subsidy.

So a $4.2B loan guarantee to a province of ~500,000 is not a massive subsidy?

[Asher]

What the hell are you talking about?

[Asher]

I don't recall ever supporting the NFLD subsidy/"loan guarantee".

NFLD is wealthy enough with energy money now. Quebec & NFLD should both **** right off.

[Fake Boris]

You know not of what you speak.

The capital projects related to oil production are massively affected by the currency exchange.

Don't be such a tool. This effect can never be as large as exports in the manufacturing industry. And even if it were - it can be compensated with oil money.

[Asher]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/tories-enter-second-week-with-commanding-14-point-lead/article1969494/

Tories enter second week with commanding 14-point lead

The Conservatives have opened up a 14-point lead over the Liberals, according to a Nanos daily tracking poll, and start the second full week of the election campaign sitting firmly above the 40-per-cent mark – the kind of support that typically leads to a majority government.

Stephen Harper’s party leads the Liberals in every region of the country, trailing only the Bloc in Quebec.

The Nanos Research survey conducted for The Globe and Mail and CTV shows Mr. Harper’s Conservatives with the support of 42.3 per cent of respondents, a wide lead over Michael Ignatieff’s Liberals at 28.4 per cent. The NDP is at 16.4 per cent and the Greens at 3.8 per cent.

It’s not good news for Mr. Ignatieff’s Liberals, who released their campaign platform Sunday and will now fight the rest of the campaign without a stock of campaign policy promises that might help them alter the course.

But it’s still too soon to say whether the Liberal platform will have an impact on the race. The tracking poll, which combines samples conducted over the last three days, was conducted April 1 to 3, and many of Sunday’s survey interviews were completed in the afternoon, only hours after Mr. Ignatieff released his manifesto.

But the results still mean that the at the outset of the second full week of campaigning, the Liberals are fighting to limit the Tories to minority government. And the NDP have for days remained below the levels of support they received in the 2008 election.

The poll has now placed Mr. Harper at levels of support above 40 per cent for three straight days. That level is traditionally seen as the yardstick for forming a majority government.

Mr. Harper is starting the week with a clear attempt to convert the lead into individual seats, campaigning against the long-gun registry in Welland, Ont., against NDP incumbent Malcom Allen.

In Quebec, the Bloc Québécois remain ahead at 34. 6 per cent. But the Conservatives appear to be solidly in second, with 25.1 per cent. The Liberals trail in third with 17.7 per cent, and the NDP with 16.9 per cent. The margin of error for that sample is 6.6 per cent.

The Conservatives lead in every other region, and not only holding big leads in B.C. and the Prairies but also holding the edge in Atlantic Canada and Ontario.

In British Columbia, the Tories now have 49.7 per cent support, compared to 23.4 per cent for the Liberals and 20.6 per cent for the NDP. In Ontario, the Conservatives lead with 43.0 per cent, over the Liberals with 37.5 per cent, while the NDP have 16.2 per cent support.

The three-day tracking poll is a national survey aimed at catching the evolving voting intentions of Canadians. Each night a new group of 400 interviews is added to the sample and the oldest group of 400 is dropped, producing a rolling average.

Nanos reports that its margin of error for a survey of 1,200 respondents is plus or minus 2.8 per cent, 19 times out of 20. The margin of error increases with regional numbers, which are drawn from smaller samples.