Beyond The Commons

Beyond The Commons

Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

The Canadian experience

by Aaron Wherry on Wednesday, June 23, 2010 12:38pm - 51 Comments

The Post’s Joe O’Connor gets a first look at the most scrutinized waterway in Canada.

And then there it was: the majestic fake lake, or most of it, since an amicable though vigilant young security person denied the Post a full, unfettered frontal preview. “You guys aren’t supposed to be in here,” she said. “You aren’t even supposed to get close enough to smell the chlorine.”

It did smell like chlorine, and it was only about six inches deep. An assortment of canoes — green, yellow and red — bordered the lake. A collection of bored-looking workers were sitting around on the, ah, dock (?), in Muskoka deck chairs, listening to a man with a microphone lecture them about what to do if “something” happens.

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  • ex canuck

    Yawn. Fake Lakes are last week's opposition smear. Find a new one, Joe.

  • Cats

    So it IS a reflecting pool ?

    But why do we keep saying lake ? Media, any answers ?

    Oh that's right! To make it seem MORE wasteful and justify the Liberal LIE that its costing $2 million. Turns out its $57,000. About the cost of a really good swimming pool.

    Cats thinks the liberals and the media have a lot of egg on their faces. Birds eggs!

    (Yum)

    • Amateur Hour

      Since it's difficult to get through three layers of security fences, the PMO decided to keep the media in a pen downtown … that pen cost over $2 million …

      • Cats

        Your point ? Renting a building for a few days, setting up 3 marketing pavillions, providing security and comforts for several thousand people costs this much money.

        That's the cost of doing bussiness.

        If you want to argue we should scrap the G20 go ahead. A strange arguement for the Liberals to make considering it was their PM Paul Martin who invented the thing!

        Cats calls hypocrisy.

        • Amateur Hour

          Harper's Conservatives have been in power for a few years now, so it's a bit rich to blame this one on Paul Martin's Liberals.

          Situating the meeting in the business centre of the country's largest city, fouling up mass transit for hundreds of thousands of commuters, spending a week prior interfering with the free movement of hundreds of thousands of workers and residents, asking people who freakin' live here to show ID in order to access their own homes and businesses, effectively shutting down hundreds of small businesses and a university with no compensation … all to prevent political and business leaders and those lobbying them from being inconvenienced by democratic protests or unauthorized photography for 72 hours. If they wanted to do that, they could have had these meetings in Ottawa, hosted by Mike Duffy.

          • Cats

            What you're describing is more or less EVERY G20 meeting.

            These aren't G8's. There are too many diplomats and staffers who require hotels. Very large cities are the only possible locations.

            As I said if you think G20's are stupid and we should just stick with the United Nations then please say so.

            Tell Paul Martin that too.

            Cats out.

          • Lord Kitchener's Own

            This is why people begged for it to be at the exhibition grounds and not smack in the middle of the downtown core.

          • Cats

            I love the airmchair suggestions that are at odds with the proffesional event planners.

            Regardless, stuffing people into the equivalent of a warehouse is not an appropriate conference centre. It would also increase security and transportation costs according to officiials.

            If you have a G20 you don't stick 23 or so foriegn leaders into an insulting location. That's just the cost of doing bussiness.

            If you don't want a G20 please say so. Don't pretend it could be done any cheaper, especially since most of the cost is security which is fixed.

            I mean sure, you could save a couple million here or there probably. But as i'm told every time I suggest eliminating the per vote political subsidy that's just a rounding error in Ottawa.

            Cats calls hypocrisy on Canadian media. Couple million for marketing is outragoeus, 4 million savings in eliminating 10%ers is a godsend, but 20 million for eliminating per vote subsidy is NOTHING.

            POLIITCAL MATHS BY CATS.

          • Lord Kitchener's Own

            A warehouse?

            When was the last time you were at the Ex???

    • Lord Kitchener's Own

      So it IS a reflecting pool ? But why do we keep saying lake?

      Because it feels better to think of our government spending $57,000 to build a dramatic replica of a majestic Muskoka lake, than it does to think of them spending $57,000 to build a 6 inch deep puddle of chlorinated water.

  • Charles H.

    Well that's certainly underwhelming.

    Edit: 6 inches? Hrm. Looks like they splurged a bit; the govt. was originally saying 10cm.

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/LynnTO LynnTO

    Chlorine? Well then, it couldn't possibly be a replica of Lake Muskoka, because Lake Muskoka smells like gasoline, trout, and expired tanning oil.

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

    Highly chlorinated 6" fake lake waste. So Muskoka. So fiscally responsible. So superficial. So Harper.

    • Cats

      Lol its Ted Betts. I see you commenting all over the web on various blogging tories posts! Your favourite thing to do is pretend that Harper isn't fiscally responsible.

      Yet you're a committed Liberal partisan! Kinda confusing considering the Liberal party hasn't met some HUGE spending idea they didn't like. Read your leaders latest book ?

      High speed rail from Vancouver to Calgary/Edmonton ? LOLZS. That's about 1,000,000 fake lakes.

      Cats laughs.

      • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

        No pretending necessary. Harper is the most fiscally reckless PM since Trudeau.

        Harper has not done one single thing that could in any way be considered fiscally conservative or responsible since becoming PM. Even before the election, he shattered the record for most spending and then broke his own record the very next year and put us into a structural deficit. Even before doing so again with the stimulus. He has become the biggest supporter of deficit spending and the critical importance of government spending to stimulate the economy. He's become a big backer of corporate welfare. He has expanded the regional development agencies he said no fiscal conservative could support and created new ones. He showers Conservative ridings with pork from my taxdollars. All of which he used to oppose. If Stephen Harper 2005 were to meet with Stephen Harper 2010, he'd start another Reform Party for sure!

        • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

          And if that wasn't enough to forever dissassociate the name "Stephen Harper" from the concept of "fiscal conservativism", how about a grant of $400 million to developing nations to help them fight climate change??

          Oooo, yeah. That is going to sit well with his "base".

          • Cats

            A double post !

            I caught a Ted Betts with my troll bait !!

            Anyways you totally and utterly discredit yourself by saying Harper hasn't done ONE fiscally conservative or responsible thing since becoming PM.

            How about using the surplus to pay down the debt by 40 billion instead of blowing it on Liberal spending programs ??

            Liberal spending programs + Liberal calls for more stimulus = massive, massive deficit.

            Harper is clearly the lesser of two evils. Anyone who is seriously interested in fiscal conservatism is going to go with him.

            Cats caught me a Liberal hack! Yay!

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

            Cats quite delusional. Quite understandable and I've seen it before from hyperpartisans: decide must support leader at all costs; ignore where leader has abandoned everything he stood for and broken more promises in 4 years than the last 4 PMs; what can't be denied has to be blamed on the opposition.

            I guess you COULD say that by not abandoning the Liberal policy of paying down debt with surplus, and using the Liberal created surplus to pay down debt in his first year, I suppose he was being a good Liberal there. I will give you that.

            But the bottom line is that in our entire history, no PM has spent as much money as Harper and none would have. Anyone who is seriously interested in fiscal conservativism is going to abandon him, if they want to stay true to their principles (which most clearly don't).

            Cats might prefer milk to kool-aid.

          • Cats

            Yeah lets split the right and have a party of true believers who sit in opposition for a decade!

            Funny that, pragmatic/realist becomes "hyper partisan". Thou dost protest too much though, as I said you're a well known Liberal party hack who comments on various boards playing up this ridiculous message that Harper isn't fiscally responsible.

            Above all else CONTEXT matters.

            Compared to the policy coming out of the leader of the official opposition since 2006 (and PM Martin's election platform before that) Stephen Harper is far more fiscally responsible than any alternatives.

            As I said. Add up all the numbers. If Liberals had won the 2006 election and Harper had never been PM the debt would be far, far larger.

            Cats wants to know how you're going to argue with that ?

          • Cats

            Shorter Ted Betts (indulging in double post of my own):

            Harper hasn't been fiscally conservative enough!

            Therefore you should vote for the fiscally reckless alternative!

            - Ted Betts.

          • tedbetts

            I love how, whenever you ask a conservative to defend Harper or his "conservativeness", the best they can come up with is "well, we think the other guys would have been worse".

            Somehow, somewhere along the line, Harper went from being the "fiscal conservative" champion to working toward fiscal conservativism "incrementally" to "he wants to be fiscally conservative (he really does, honest) to "yeah, well, the other guys would be worse. I'm sure of it. Because Harper says so".

            Other than the one example you gave – Harper continuing the Liberal debt reduction policy for one year – in what way has Harper been fiscally conservative? At all? And does that measure up in anyway with record breaking out of control spending over the last 4 years? Not cutting anything. Expanding government. Paying corporations to lose money. Subsidizing non-producing regions. Increasing taxes on businesses and individuals.

            He's the most reckless, biggest spending, big government PM in our history. Period.

          • tedbetts
          • Cats

            Who cares ? Politics is about choices.

            In every election since 2004 there have been two viable options for Prime Minister and Stephen Harper has represented the MORE fiscally conservative option.

            Or who cares, maybe your right, Harper has been the SLIGHTLY LESS FISCALLY RECKLESS option.

            People who care about budgetary issues and spending are still going to go with Harper. In the next election too!

            Cats really doesn't get your point. He's the better option. Is this your point:

            Harper hasn't been fiscally conservative enough!

            Therefore you should vote for the fiscally reckless alternative!

            - Ted Betts.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

            "Who cares ?"

            Well, for one, you do since you are clearly so defensive about whether there is any fiscal conservative left in Harper.

            Clearly A LOT of true conservatives care. Just survey Bblogging Tories on any day or any of the right wing think tanks like the Canadian Taxpayer Federation or the Fraser Institute or Harper's former mentor/chief of staff/campaign manager Tom Flanagan. Not just because of the lost opportunity (look at what Cameron is doing with a minority), but because rather than move the centre of Canadian politics to the right however incrementally, Harper has actually moved further to the left.

            And I'll tell you we voters do care when a politician gives up on anything he says was important to him and breaks promise after promise after promise.

            And Stephen Harper pre-2006 cared. In fact, he cared so much before that he started up a whole new party. So long long ago.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/hollinm hollinm

            tedbetts…..you are being disingenous to put it kindly. The world has gone through a lot since 2008 and Canada was not immune to the happenings in the States and elsewhere. Harper intially refused to provide stimulus to the economy but your buddy who pretends to lead the Liberal party and the two socialist parties wanted spending, spending, spending. So knowing he couldn't defeat them Harper bought in to their demands. You got what you got.

            Now tell us all what stimulus spending you wouldn't have done i.e. abandon the auto workers, not provide extended EI benefits, not bought CMHC backed mortgages from CMHC, not provided infrastructure funding. Tell us specificially what you did not support.

            Don't worry the day will come when the government takes action and you will see your cherished Liberal wasting programs bite the dust. You will see cuts in the civil service and I know for the sake of the country you will stand up and cheer because it will be the right thing to do. Be careful what you wish for.

          • tedbetts

            Ah Hollinm. Poor Hollinm.

            I have said nothing about the Liberals or whether they are better or worse. I have only responded with outright and justified mockery at the concept of Harper as a fiscal conservative.

            He isn't. And hasn't been since January 23, 2006.

            He was this country's history before the recession, breaking spending records and then breaking his own spending record again. The regional development agencies were being expanded before the recession. He was shovelling cash into corporate welfare recipients before the recession. Those are some more of those unfortunate anti-conservative facts.

            And, according to Harper, no one forced him to implement the stimulus. It was his idea on how and how much. He has campaigned across the country bragging about how good it was and how necessary. Doesn't sound much like a fiscal conservative to me.

            And there is absolutely no doubt that the Liberals would have spent far less. History supports that claim; only partisan speculation contradicts it.

            In fact, the recession saved him because ever since, the kool-aid drinking crowd has a ready-made (and completely divorced from reality) excuse to continue living in a dreamland about what Harper is really like: he was "forced" to do it.

            Even with that conservatives have to bury their heads further and further into the ground with billion dollar boondoggle summits, expansion of human rights commissions, pork for Steamboat Tony and Quebec (but not for NB until they elect a Conservative Premier!), nearly doubling the budget of the PMO, giving away $400 million taxdollars to developing dictatorships nations so they can fight climate change, millions of dollars to the already profitable Calgary Stampede (but not of course the Toronto Pride Parade), etc.

            Like I said, the most fiscally reckless and porkbarelling PM since Trudeau. Without any doubt.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/hollinm hollinm

            tedbetts……I read your posts and I laugh. Elections are about choices and you can continue with your neverending spin but that fact is Harper will win the next election and the Libs will be sitting in opposition trying to figure out who their next leader should be.

            You can argue the same thing day after day but you actually should be ashamed of yourself. Harper is the better choice and to suggest otherwise is a disservice to your country. To put the fool in the PM's chair who doesn't know a thing about the country and the issues facing it, other than what he has been told, will hurt the country.

            So until there is a real choice Harper is the one to beat. The opposition have thrown everything at the Conservative government and they continue to be the choice of the people. However, keep spinning yourself into the ground you partisan hack.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

            Oh, I see. So now it is unpatriotic NOT to vote for Harper.

            How very democratic and non-cult of personality of you. I suppose I should be grateful that you folk even allow us little people to vote at all!!

          • Cats

            Nah not unpatriotic just really, really, amazingly hypocritical of you to pretend to care about the nation's finances and then recommend we all vote Liberal.

            Once again, Ted Betts everybody:

            Harper hasn't been fiscally conservative enough,
            therefore we should vote for the MOST fiscally reckless party imaginable,

            Yay! Liberals! I'm Ted Betts !!

            Well i'm cats and I can't stop laughing.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/hollinm hollinm

            tedbetts……it is getting late and I really could care less what you have to say. It is so tedious.

            The one thing I will say is Harper won and the Libs lost. That is good enough for me. In fact Harper now sits just 12 seats short of a majority which was an improvment over their 06 seat count.

            So you can argue it six ways to Sunday but the Conservatives still are ahead of the Libs in every poll taken. Yes the polls go up and down but clearly Ignatieff is not going to win the hearts and minds of Canadians before the next election.

          • tedbetts

            This from a supporter of a guy who was polling at about 35% BEHIND Martin and who's party was polling at 24% just before the 2006 election.

            Actually it is not the 'one thing" you will say. I was responding to your idiotic invention that, and i quote, "the majority of voters support him and his government". Not only has he been doing bad in the polls – personally and his party – but while Canadians are increasingly happy with the direction of the country, they are increasingly dissatisfied with the direction of the Harper government. i don't think I've ever seen that before.

            But keep relying on that high standard of governance: at least we're polling higher than the Liberals. Because that is all Canadians really care about.

            Frankly, I'm quite pleased that you folks are so deluded about the level of popularity of your leader and party. it feeds that arrogance.

          • Cats

            Yeah he's sooooo unpopular that Iggy is going to vote him down in a non-confidence vote this fall.

            Errrr.

            As soon as he finds a spine. Maybe he could borrow yours ?

            Cats has 9.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/Thwim Thwim

            By that logic, you were perfectly happy with Trudeau & Chretien? They were good enough for you?

        • http://intensedebate.com/people/hollinm hollinm

          tedbetts….and for all that the majority of voters support him and his government while your party and its feckless leader are in the toilet. However, you can write until the cows come home but nobody and I mean no clear thinking Canadian is listening to the likes of you and the other Liberal propagandists on these boards.

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

            A majority support Harper and the Conservatives, Hollinm????? Not since Harper's mentor, Mulroney was PM.

            In fact, Harper is PM with less support among Canadians than any other PM in our history. Only 20% of Canadian voters voted for him in 2008, which was even fewer than in 2006.

            And what PM in our history has governed for very long with the consistent support of only 1/3 of decided voters as Harper has??

            It is only the short-sighted and arrogant who don't really care about Canadians that thinks the only thing that matters is being more popular than the Liberals at their lowest level of support ever. Such high ambitions!

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/LynnTO LynnTO

    Also: at 1:06, it looks a little like Fake Lake is leaking. Or is that just a geyser?

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

    My, my, the Cons supporters here are getting a little sensitive.

    It looks like those pond/landscape things that are outside banks and other big buildings. Just needs the little waterfall.

    Did you ever see a concrete and "square" lake in Muskoka? Na, didn't think so.

    • tedbetts

      It is how urban "champagne" Conservatives like Harper and Baird and Flaherty at this Cadillac Conference see "nature". ;-)

      But that waterfall idea I like. We could even call it, oh, I don't know, how about "The Harper Government Falls". I sure do like the sound of that.

      • Cats

        Champagne !! Oh but I thought they were Tim Hortons people ?? Oh right, I see what you're trying to do there.

        Yeah Harper is a total elitist now. And that Iggy is the salt of the earth, regular person.

        Oops. I should have said COUNT Iggy, because he likes to be addressed by his proper title.

        Cats loves this. Laughing at Ted Betts and his hardcore Liberal partisan hackery on these boards is my new favourite subject !!

  • Lord Kitchener's Own

    A collection of bored-looking workers were sitting around on the, ah, dock (?), in Muskoka deck chairs, listening to a man with a microphone lecture them about what to do if “something” happens.

    … and then, the earth began to move…

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/hollinm hollinm

    You guys should be embarassed. All this talk about a fake lake which really isn't worth it. Shows how "shallow" you are.

    • http://intensedebate.com/people/LynnTO LynnTO

      All this talk about a fake lake which really isn't worth it

      You're absolutely right. The overgrown puddle isn't even worth $57,000…it's the wall of canoes.

  • Cats

    The Blogging Tories offer the Tories constructive criticism about how to move to the right within the constraints of a minority government.

    Its helpful and welcome for those of us who care about fiscal issues.

    You attack the Tories and then suggest we replace them with the Liberals who are far, far worse.

    Therefore, its impossible to take you seriously.

    Ever hear about "concern trolls" ? You're a fiscal concern troll.

    Cats caught you big time.

  • Cats

    Lol! Seriously: "Ah Hollinm. Poor Hollinm.".

    It was hard to read the rest I was laughing so hard. Who are you to be so arrogant ? Are you one of Iggy's tsars ? Count Chocolula over here is being arrogant.

    Ted Betts everybody !

    This is pure gold. After claiming that you weren't making any judgements about the Liberals you say this:

    "And there is absolutely no doubt that the Liberals would have spent far less"

    Really ??

    These were the guys complaining the stimulus wasn't big enough ! It was their idea in the first place !

    You gotta be kidding me. Cats is picking his jaw up off the floor it dropped so hard.

  • Cats

    Politics is about choices and context.

    Your ability to hold Harper to one standard and then the Liberals to another is stunning.

    Its also laughable. Cats laughs hard.

  • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

    No one has ever come close to spending nearly as much as Harper has. No one has ever come close to creating a deficit nearly as big as Harper has. The last time the Liberals were in power, they not only balanced the budget for almost a decade, paid down the debt, but they actually cut spending.

    The Liberals never said the stimulus wasn't big enough. We can disagree here, but there is no need to lie. They thought the priorities were wrong – eg spending money on labs but no research funding to put people in those labs.

    Cats needs to go to bed. Clearly her brain needs the rest.

    • Cats

      Ted = Epic fail.

      "Stimulus not enough: Liberals"
      http://www.thestar.com/business/article/583372

      It took me exactly two seconds to find that headline when I typed in liberals larger stimulus into the search bar.

      Cats thinks its you who needs to give your brain a rest, all this Liberal partisan hackery has you confused.

      • http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

        Cats = epic fail.

        It took me exactly two seconds to actually read the article beneath that headline instead of relying on a torqued headline as you do.

        The only quotation from the Liberals was from John Macallum saying if the economy under Harper got any "worse" then it "might" be necessary for more stimulus. And in fact that is just what happened: a week or so later, Harper announced he thought we needed $3 BILLION more in stimulus and it was so badly needed in fact that it had to be rushed through with the normal accountability processes ignored.

        Oh Cats. Poor Cats.

        I can only imagine how tough it must be for you when reality has such an anti-Harper (and anti-Cats) bias.

        Cats needs to see someone to deal with her obsession with me.

        • Cats

          Your facts are badly off. The 3 billion was money to be spent ASAP because the budget money wouldn't be available until june. It wasn't EXTRA.

          Plus you are aware that reporters actually talk to people and summarize their positions without just publishing a transcript right ?

          Regardless, the Liberals consistently called for the stimulus to be spent faster and then freaked out when some of it went unspent. That in and of itself proves they wanted more money spent:
          http://www.liberal.ca/en/newsroom/media-releases/…

          Then in 2010 they complained about cuts and that the stimulus was being withdrawn too soon.

          Oh Ted Betts. Poor Ted Betts.

          Cats really thinks you need to stop ignoring the reality that for the last 2 years the Liberals were calling for more spending, faster spending, additional spending. You've obviously never seen an interview with John McCallum on Power Play.

  • Holly Stick

    The Fake Lake; also known as the Conservative Talent Pool.

  • http://intensedebate.com/profiles/dougrogers dougrogers

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