Inkless Wells

Paul Wells on all the latest out of Ottawa—along with the occasional post about jazz. Follow Paul on Twitter: @InklessPW

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A spoke in wheels from the purview of benches would pre-emptively poison the well! Pass it on

by Paul Wells on Monday, November 30, 2009 8:31am - 42 Comments

In her inimitable prose style, Chantal Hébert delivers a magisterial thumping to any Liberal who would even think of opposing the implementation of a Harmonized Sales Tax for British Columbia and Ontario. The arguments make themselves: harmonized federal-provincial taxation is good policy; it is the preferred policy of two of today’s most important Liberals, Gordon Campbell and Dalton McGuinty, and of two significant legacy Grits, Paul Martin and Jean Chrétien; defeating it would help only Jack Layton, while exacerbating the Liberal rifts that Stephen Harper is in politics to encourage. I’d add only one more: if realigning taxation is unpopular, that’s partly (only partly) because Stephen Harper spent the 2008 election using all the ingenuity he could summon to argue that no rearrangement of the tax burden could ever be legitimate because they’re always really a tax grab. Liberals don’t want to be in the business of encouraging that belief.

Oh, and you federal Liberals from B.C. who snorted when I called Gordon Campbell a Liberal? Unless you have a plan for getting an endorsement out of Carole James, he’s the only Liberal you’ve got. Pushing him into Stephen Harper’s arms? Not brilliant.

Tags: Chantal Hébert, hst

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http://intensedebate.com/people/Raging_Ranter Raging_Ranter

Kind of like what Hudak is doing in Ontario. I expect such asinine behaviour from the NDP. They vigourously oppose the GST cut, then just as vigourously oppose harmonization. The GST is good! No, wait a minute, it's bad! But Hudak ought to know better.
Orson Bean

I see. So if you yourself cannot see, perceive or feel a tangible benefit from a given government action or policy, then as far as you are concerned, there is no benefit. That's quite a sophisticated system you have there for evaluating the merits of government policies.
Mulletaur

Perhaps now that all of this idle speculation has been put to rest we can start discussing important issues of policy and government accountability, like why General Hillier was knowingly handing over Canadian prisoners to the KGB trained NDS, rather than focusing on the opposition.
jarrid

This from the two leading federal Liberals on the HST:

"I'm not waffling, I'm skating" – Bob Rae

Meanwhile Iggy says he'll make a decision on whether to support the HST motion in Parliament in his own sweet time.

When your party has no principles or direction, every decision is weighed, not on whether it's good public policy, but on whether it'll make a good headline in tomorrow's press and serve the party's short-term politcal interests.

Everything the Liberals have done since January 2006 is based on short-term political tactics. It has not served them well.
kcm

"When your party has no principles or direction, every decision is weighed, not on whether it's good public policy, but on whether it'll make a good headline in tomorrow's press and serve the party's short-term politcal interests".

Way too much Irony for me before 8.30am! Nice one Jarrid! SH'd be proud.
http://intensedebate.com/people/psiclone psiclone

right to the point Jarrid! I couldn't agree more.