Kudos for the post: a straight shot, right to the kisser.

The more that’s done, the healthier this industry becomes.

calls Harper a LIAR?

It must be quarter past the hour.

I think we’re in never, never land.

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/fsr/2007/fsrfull0704.pdf

Here’a a good article analysing the sources of the financial crisis back in February 2008 :

http://user.uni-frankfurt.de/~ffecht/FinCrises/Lit/Goodhart%20(2008)%20The%20background%20to%20the%202007%20financial%20crisis.pdf

The bomb was ticking for a very long time – in fact, since asset pricing models for the derivatives at the root of this crisis did not include the possibility of decreases in housing prices in the United States, and as this decline started in 2007, it was not a question of ‘if’ it would go off but rather ‘when’ and how big a mess it would create.

By the time the Bank of England lent £3 billion as lender of last resort in September 2007 to the Northern Rock, a British bank which didn’t even have any direct exposure to sub-prime mortgages and associated derivatives, there was already a very big financial poopstorm on the horizon. Unfortunately, both Congress and the Bush Administration decided to allow it to play itself out rather than intervene at an early stage.

It was just like the old Leonard Cohen tune, “Everybody Knows” …

Basically the situation is the Opposition said Harper-Flaherty were ignoring data and presenting a misleading, positive picture and the Opposition now says Harper-Flaherty have come around, while Harper-Flaherty say things have changed in the last couple weeks and they were right then, but what was right two weeks ago is wrong now, and now they are right again.

The Department of Finance put out an interesting document this afternoon regarding the rapidly shifting forecasts for the economy over the last six months:

http://www.fin.gc.ca/n08/08-106-eng.asp

Not only have the forecasts constantly trended downward, the consensus amongst the experts that usually exists is now disappearing, with sharply diverging views on how 2009 might unfold in both Canada and the U.S.

Now that he returned with a minority Parliament, his government will not survive unless this government does stuff that is rash and stupid. Stimulate! Stimulate now!

I wish Harper would have the guts to point out more forcefully the stupidity of certain arguments from certain opposition corners (of the alleged error of sucking fewer billions out of the economy — tax cuts — thereby limiting the ability of government to decide where best to throw those billions away — stimulus). He doesn’t. Mainly because that was one of the arguments in the now FU’d FU. When all you hear is that the sky is falling, I guess a politician needs to parrot a certain amount of the same stuff, or be labelled, what’s the word, out of touch.

Hey, I’m a small-c conservative happy to support or mock Harper when required. Back off with that QED branding iron, Paul.

The answer to your question is, emphatically yes – absolutely.

Lehman Brothers filed for Chapter 11 on 15 September, the biggest banko in U.S. history with over $600 billion of assets at risk. When a bank that big and that important fails, it means only one thing : liquidity crisis. Remember what happened during the Great Depression : a huge speculative asset bubble burst while a recession had already been underway, leading to a collapse of the banking system. Exactly the same circumstances we found ourselves in by mid-September of this year, except that this time the U.S. Treasury tried to take some action to stop the financial system from collapsing, having learned at least that lesson from the 1930′s.

The public interest and a nation’s agenda are too precious to leave to either the government or corporations. Neither has Canada’s best interest at heart. A peoples’ news co-operative, funded by the people and with the people’s interest at heart, can and should overtake the corporate media.

Ten, twenty years from now we will look back at today when we let domestic corporations and public service pension funds dictate the national agenda and say “what were we thinking?”. An overseas owned news entity is free and clear of Canada’s oppressive libel laws and human “rights” commissions; I see this as enormous opportunity for Canadians to break free from the surly bonds of manufactured consent.

Allow 100% foreign media ownership NOW! It can’t possibly be any worse or more seditious than the pap they churn out today. See, you have to truly despise Canada and Canadian taxpayers to advocate for $30-60 billion in new spending; no foreigner can possibly manage that level of antipathy towards Boring Canada and her good citizens. Win win.

However, Harper did speak on the economy in the last weeks of the election, and said the fundamentals were strong and he would have a surplus and never run a deficit. He said he didn’t need a plan because everything was fine. He said the fact that Dion had a plan showed that Dion was in a panic and needlessly causing alarm.

Of course, it may also simply be that they could deny that things were really, really bad before and not really get called out on it. I don’t recall anybody during the election asking Harper, “Prime Minister, this liquidity crisis has the potential to turn into something really, really bad – what’s your plan ?” Just a reminder : Election Day was 14 October, on 10 October banks virtually stopped lending to each other as the TED spread went up to a record 4.64% (it usually hovers around 0.5%), Paulson’s $700 billion bailout plan was first announced on 19 September. Lots of time for everybody to understand this problem was already really, really bad before Election Day. If I’m wrong about this, please don’t hesitate to point me to an interview where a journalist tried to nail Harper down on this.

Now of course, the hits just keep on coming. A perfect example is today’s newspaper headlines. If someone had told you three months ago that the U.S. Federal Reserve would have a Japanese style zero percent interest rate by mid December, would you have believed them? Until we get a better handle on how and when the U.S. economy will steady itself, predicting the future direction of our own economy is incredibly difficult.

But really now…putting it all these manufactured soundbites together to get something absurd…is this surprising?

Media, fickle? You don’t say…

Austin

BTW…Personally, I think my opinions of the CPC under Harper do not lack consistency (perceived partisanship notwithstanding). They certainly provide me with more predictive value and they certainly wouldn’t be the same under a guy like Prentice.

As for the topic at hand, I had the same reaction as PW regarding this latest headline. It seems like Harper can’t with for losing (with some).

On the one hand, I think the current crisis is partly manufactured by the Chicken Little’s in the media, and on the other, I think that whoever attempts to authoritatively forecast the future is doomed to wearing egg repeatedly. I would rather Harper had made a steady on type statement …something like, “Things are serious, we need to be careful, we are talking to several experts and seeking to navigate the best way forward.” etc. Not over alarmist or over optimistic.

But then he is who he is and I wouldn’t want his job for anything. I am much too thin skinned and would just pop off at the mediots who pepper me with inane questions. (Yes, I know, mediots is not a word.)

Man, I just shudder to think what this phrase means. I suppose you mean “bated”, see dictionary.com. But “baited breath”???? — not a pretty picture!

Carry on!

“I’m very worried about the Canadian economy. … The truth is, I’ve never seen such uncertainty in terms of looking forward to the future.”

Personally, I think he should have left that stuff on his mother’s (or his therapist’s) couch. No one wants to hear how worried and scared their PM is – whether it is actually the “truth” or just meant to scare the hell out of us.

On the upside, Harper also said in the same interview that he was going to enjoy being Prime Minister as long as it lasted.

QED

You’re right. Flexibility is a better word, I suppose.

Have you actually spent any time or effort paying attention to what other people are saying?

Sean Stokholm: I think there are few neutral commenters (I myself am not neutral along party lines), but I don’t think it is neutrality that is lacking, it’s (in Paul’s words) “defiance of logic or changing circumstance”. It’s people who talk out of both sides of their mouths, arguing mutually contradictory statements.

Sometimes people will twist themselves into pretzels because there is no logical consistency to what they are saying. Occasionally I will engage in debate, but I know there are certain commenters here to avoid.

A Prime Minister? No. This Prime Minister? Yes. Especially the reality part.

For the record (yes, you can quote me, Paul), I can’t imagine many people are awaiting Harper’s pronouncements on the economy with baited breath at this point. When you change your mind 7 or 8 times in the span of a few months you tend to lose a bit of credibility. I tend to think that McCallum’s claims re: our politicians God-like affect on the overall confidence in the economy are as nonsensical now as Harper’s were during the election.

Then again… maybe a few fireside chats couldn’t hurt. Fortuantely, Harper’s voice and demeanor are just sooo sooooothing.

Maybe we should just permanently prorogue things and let the Queen take charge again.

I suspect the really worried, so unpredictable spiel is simply a tactic Harper is employing. Fear can be useful in politics and if we might be heading into another election, making people even more worried is one strategy Harper might successfully employ. It won’t do much for the economy though.

Austin

Competence and inspiration? We’re talking about Stephen Harper here, not Barack Obama. Quit trying to Americanize our politics.

The CPC is just flapping in the wind on the economic file, and I would much prefer to see them fall on this sword of their own making to underline their complete stupidity…

Austin

What we needed, both times, was an acknowledgement of the difficulties along with a message of hope.

Fair? Not really. Deserved? Oh yeah.