Paul Martin and Jean Chretien

From 1998 to 2003, the Canadian government received proposals from Canadian banks to merge, with each other, and with entities in the insurance industry, in order to compete with the big American financial institutions that were madly rushing into hedge funds and derivatives.

The liberal government of Jean Chretien and Paul Martin thought the idea was unwise and refused the request. They also initiated a review of banking policy that ended up favoring consumer protections over the new profit centers for the bank.

They also looked at the Canada Pension Plan. Like the U.S. Social Security system, economic and social factors had conspired to raise questions about it’s long term viability. What did the Americans do? After bickering and arguing for 20 years: nothing. What did Paul Martin do? Analyzed it, consulted with the provinces, and then fixed it. Done.

Canadian banks did not require a single dollar of government bail-outs during the world-wide financial crisis of 2008-2009. Not one dollar. Canada emerged from the global economic crisis with one of the healthiest economies in the G-8.

In 2002, Stephen Harper criticized the Liberal government for standing in the way of progress by blocking “innovations” in the banking sector. Now he struts around crowing about his management of the financial crisis.

Born on third base; thinks he hit a triple. Mr. Chretien and Mr. Martin left you a surplus, Mr. Harper. Where is it now?


The details of the Liberal approach to bank mergers.

More on the pressure resisted by Martin.

Calgary Herald thanks Jean Chretien.

And nice tribute from Newsweek.

From a Liberal website:

In 2002, Stephen Harper lambasted the then-Liberal government for “the failure to adapt bank regulation to the needs and challenges of a financial sector that is less and less national, and more and more global.”

Yes, it’s from a partisan source.

Canada vs U.S.

It appears that most of the opposition to proposals for national health care reform in the U.S. stem from the belief that government can not do anything right.

Let’s let corporations decide, instead, when I should see a doctor, and how much I should pay.

As a Canadian, let me extend my sympathy. You poor Americans. You are so proud of your flag and your nation and your constitution– but so embarrassed by the idiots you elect to office every two years that you can’t trust them to run an insurance program. You call yourself the greatest country in the world but the citizens of this country appear to be the dumbest voters on the planet.

You see, we Canadians are very lucky. We actually elect reasonably good governments and then give them the power to execute their policies and then we enjoy the benefits— like universal health care coverage. Oh, of course it’s not perfect. You can always find a few Canadians out there who envy you Americans your vastly over-priced system that treats you quickly and then bankrupts you.

But how good is the Canadian system? Not a single politician in Canada will run on a platform of dismantling it. How simple is that? If there were any number of Canadians who were dissatisfied and wanted to move to the U.S. model, surely we’d have a member of parliament or two who would dare to campaign on privatizing health care. But even our conservative parties pledge to leave health care alone, or even to improve it.

That’s not the only thing our government does that strikes most Canadians as reasonably good. Your Social Security is a mess because Republicans won’t cooperate with reforming it and Democrats are terrified of being accused of raising taxes. Our Canadian government simply adjusted the rates of contributions a few years ago. Most Canadians probably barely noticed. But the result is that the Canadian Pension Plan is actuarially sound and all Canadians can count on receiving full benefits when they retire.

Oh and our banks. Did you know that our banks were the only banks in the developed world that did not need a single penny of bail-out funds? Not one cent. Once again, we happened to choose a government (the Liberals) who decided that the credit default swaps, sub-prime mortgages, and derivatives, were too risky. Our banks pleaded to be allowed to make the big money, like their U.S. competitors. The Liberals, under Jean Chretien, said “no”. Our government also wouldn’t let the banks merge so they could take on the big U.S. banks. Crazy, eh?

Do you Americans ever get sick of your two year election cycles? It seemed to take Obama forever to finally get to the inauguration. Well, we might have an election this fall. If it is called soon, the campaigns will start almost immediately and end six weeks later. Yes, six weeks! Isn’t that a gas! Done. Over. And much cheaper too.

No doubt our government could do better. We haven’t done very well in reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. We didn’t get sucked into Iraq, but we are stuck in Afghanistan. Our top executives, like yours, get paid too much. The taxpayers bought the Skydome for the Blue Jays but the perception is that no major league sports team will get a tax-payer funded stadium ever again. (That’s why the Expos are gone, probably, and why the NHL doesn’t want to see any U.S. teams moving to Canada. Probably.)

But it’s a nice country. You should come visit sometimes. Our Conservative party would be roughly comparable to your Democrats. Obama probably would have gotten about 75% of the votes up here. Our liberals would probably find Obama a tad too “moderate” for our tastes.

You guys did invent the Internet– good for you!  Yes, your government invented it. And yes, Al Gore took the initiative, in Congress, to fund the proposal.

I personally thank God regularly that we don’t have anything like the Republican Party up here.

Bring your can-do spirit, your generosity, and your exuberance. But don’t bring your guns.

The Cost of the Iraq War

According to Harper’s Magazine, the projected cost of the Iraqi adventure will come out to about $20,000 per U.S. household.

That’s just the financial cost, of course. The cost in lives and limbs is far, far greater.

As with many large human enterprises that end in disaster, the actual costs are never known or described at the time the enterprise is embarked upon, because if they were, no sane person would approve of the plan. If George Bush were running for president this year and he promised to start a war that would cost every household $20,000, I don’t think most people would vote for him.

I’ve heard it argued that most people felt, at the time, that attacking Iraq was the right thing to do. That is why the Democrats– especially Hillary Clinton– sound so anemic right now. They can’t really take Bush to task about this– they voted for it too.

Were there reasonable people around who knew that attacking and occupying Iraq was going to cost so much at the time George Bush set out to do it. The answer is clearly yes. Not George Bush, no. Not anyone on his staff– except, dimly, Colin Powell– no. Not anyone in the Republican party, no. And, it is clear, almost nobody in the Democratic Party, which is why so few Democrats are now able to make hay of the horrible consequences of the stupid decision to invade and occupy Iraq.

But a lot of other people, including Canadians and Europeans knew that it was a bad idea. Prime Minister Jean Chrétien– probably not sure if he was doing the right thing at the time– declined to participate because a large majority of Canadians didn’t think it was a good idea. They were right.

The Americans are in a massive, unholy mess right now in Iraq. Bush keeps on insisting that there is light at the end of the tunnel, but I think that light is coming from a directorship at a large oil company after 2008, or the reflection off Karl Rove’s fleshy forehead.

Stockwell Day Good Night

Stockwell Day is not going to be our next prime-minister. There. Done. You can now relax.

Stockwell Day is a social conservative. His grass-roots support consists of conservative Christians who believe he can turn the clock back on the issues of abortion, premarital sex, and homosexuality. That’s why they supported him. That’s why they wrote checks for him.

During the leadership campaign for the Alliance Party, Day was forced to admit that he’s not going to do anything about abortion or homosexuals or premarital sex. Sort of. Both Preston Manning and Tom Long said that they sure as hell aint going to do anything about it. Day realized that he would not be elected if he said that he could do something about it– like ban abortion– if he did get to be prime-minister.

So he backed off.

This leaves his grass-roots supporters with a conundrum. If he isn’t going to do something about the issues they care most about, why vote for him? He’ll just be another Preston Manning with a nicer voice.

Well, they’ll probably vote for him anyway. What will they be thinking? That his retraction is ruse? That once he gets elected, he’ll sneak some legislation in? That he’ll ban abortions?

Day has no chance of winning in the foreseeable future.

1. He has no support in Quebec and he aint going to get any. To win seats in Quebec, he is going to have to get the support of either Bouchard or Charest. Do you think that will ever happen? Day is to Bouchard what Britney Spears is to Margot Timmins.

2. Harris’ popularity in Ontario is going to decline for the next two years. Harris would have preferred Tom Long anyway, not for any real policy reasons, but because Tom Long owes him, big time. That would be useful, politically, to Harris. Day will be no use at all.

3. Joe Clark will continue to siphon off significant numbers of voters from key ridings. Clark will not do particularly well either, but the PC party is still strong in the Maritimes and has some potential in Quebec.

4. The current budget surpluses make the Reform Alliance Party seem out of step with current realities. The haranguing about fiscal conservatism sounds tinny and quaint, in an era of multi-billion dollar surpluses. The issue in the next election will be what to do with all that money: not how to get less of it.

Day might be able to make a case against Chretien, on the basis of the corruption within the Liberal Party– which isn’t really very remarkable at all, compared to Mulroney’s Conservatives, or any American party. But that might only serve to strengthen the Bloc Quebecois in Quebec, and the Conservatives in the Maritimes, and the NDP in British Columbia.

It just doesn’t add up. Where is Day going to win all those seats, other than the seats they already have in Alberta and Saskatchewan?

One last thing: don’t underestimate Jean Chretien. He’s old and a bit foggy, but he’s crafty and he has Paul Martin, and he can rightly claim to have done what Preston Manning has only wished to do for twenty years: balance the budget.

Balanced Books: Jean Chretien and the Temple of Doom

For the first time in 30 years, the annual budget of the Government of Canada will show some black ink.

The immediate response of the Reform Party was to denounce the government for spending some of the new “fiscal dividend”, instead of cutting taxes.

The Reform Party is on record as having advocated big tax cuts years ago. Had we followed Manning’s advice then, we would still be facing billions of dollars in deficits, just as the Americans, who cheerfully followed Reagan’s advice, are still a few years away from balanced books.

The Reform Party has a problem. Most Canadians regard this balanced budget as a significant accomplishment. Most Canadians, I suspect, are pleased with Chretien and Martin, and a little self-satisfied: we took the high-road, we suffered years of cuts and sacrifice, but it has finally paid off. The annual budget is balanced.

If the Reform Party could see themselves, they might hesitate before making the usual partisan jabs at the Liberals. No one knows for sure, of course, but my guess is that most Canadians are really very pleased about this achievement. We’ve gone through a lengthy period of painful sacrifices to get the federal budget under control. It was difficult, but we did it. We should be pleased and proud.

Then we see Preston Manning with his bad hair-cut, whining about how this government, the first government in 30 years to bring the budget under control, is irresponsible and shameless because it is putting a few bucks back into some of the programs it’s gutted over the last few years.

Preston Manning is being dishonest when he claims to speak for most Canadians when he demands a tax cut. Most Canadians have indicated over and over again that, yes, while they would like a tax cut, they also believe that a good chunk of the “fiscal dividend” should go back into some of the social and health programs that make Canada a civilized nation. This is not a matter of interpretation or fudging the stats: the polls are consistent and decisive on this issue. Manning is not only wrong but he is also shrill and whiney. My guess is that the next polls show the Liberals ever farther ahead of Reform than they are now.

So it took a “free-spending liberal” to bring the budget deficit under control. Mulroney, a conservative couldn’t do it. In the U.S., Reagan, an arch-conservative, not only did not reduce the deficit: he escalated it from about $50 billion to over $450 billion, by cutting taxes (at least, for the rich) and increasing spending on the military. Clinton only now has brought it back under control, though the Americans are a year or two behind Canada.

Jean Chretien and Paul Martin should get gold medals. Chretien should get a special shiny gold medal for being lavish with praise for his finance minister. This is not a leader who is insecure about his position in the party or his ability to lead. This is a leader who thought that Paul Martin was a pretty smart guy and maybe he should be in charge of getting the deficit down, so he made him Finance Minister and then did the simplest thing possible: left him alone to do his job.

The Salaries of Canadian MPs

According to Southam Newspapers, Canadian MP’s rank near the bottom of the world in terms of pay. Here’s some comparisons:

The big surprise here is socialist Sweden, which pays their members of Parliament less than anyone else, though they sit for a respectable 125 days a year. My goodness. What happened to the stereo-type of the free-spending left-lib government hack squandering all the taxpayer’s hard-earned money on useless and wasteful policy-wonking? What’s going on here? How come the most conservative government in the western world, the U.S., pays their legislators nearly the most?

There is a theory that a national health insurance plan similar to Canada’s would never work in the U.S. (where the cost of health care is, proportionately, three times what we pay) because conservative doctors would consider it a moral duty to cheat the plan as much as possible. There is a good deal of evidence that this theory is true. So the conservatives have made themselves a self-fulfilling prophecy: national health insurance will not work in the U.S. because we will abuse the system to death.

Good for them. That’s why they get paid so much.

Canadian MPs are paid too little. Most people in responsible positions that are at all comparable to being a member of parliament earn well over $100,000. But if we do decide to increase their pay, we should demand something in return: genuine democracy. Thanks largely to Trudeau, our government has evolved into an overly centralized system wherein most key decisions are made by top advisors and cabinet and ordinary party members play almost no role in arriving at decisions anymore. If we really only need ten people to run the country, let’s pay ten people to run the country and toss the rest of the bums out. Let’s also abolish the Senate now and get it over with.

Yes, our MPs are paid too little, but one thing does need to be pointed out: they all applied for the job knowing full well what the wages were. No one forced them to run. If they don’t like the pay or working conditions, fine, quit. There is something offensive about these guys campaigning on civic-mindedness, prudence, and responsibility to the taxpayer… and then doing everything they can to line their own pockets once they get in.

The problem is: who decides what the government should be paid? I have a solution. It’s so ingenious I can’t believe no one every thought of it before! And it’s perfectly in tune with the modern spirit of privatization and downsizing. This is the plan: every candidate running for political office must include, as part of the registration process, a “bid” for his own salary. So when Joe Schmo launches his campaign in Kamloops, the first thing voters want to know is, how much is he offering to work for? Preston Manning can offer his services for $34,500 a year. Chretien thinks he’s worth $100,000. Voters can decide.

You may think this will give an unfair advantage to the rich, who can afford to offer to govern for free. I don’t think so. I think most voters will realize pretty quickly that a Paul Martin at $125,000 is worth a lot more than a Sheila Copps at $69,000, or a Conrad Black– should he decide to run– at $5,000. It would make elections a lot more interesting, because really good, popular politicians could set records for highest pay, and would be entitled to influential positions because the voters want them to have influential positions. Politicians would be more accountable, because we could quickly figure out if they were worth the amount of money they asked for, instead of the amount that all MPs, competent or not, receive.

One last rant here: the taxpayer subsidizes education in Canada to an enormous degree. I forget the actual figures, but I saw them once in the Globe and Mail, and believe me, the numbers are huge. Among the most expensively subsidized educational programs is medicine. And those figures do not even include the cost of providing hospitals and clinics in which doctors and nurses are trained.

I propose that every medical student, nurse or doctor, who enrolls in a Canadian college or university, should be required to sign an agreement to repay every last cent of the subsidized portion of their education if they ever decide to move to U.S. and practice there. The amount would probably be well over $100,000 for doctors, and $40,000 for nurses. Perhaps someone will come up with better figures for me. Why should we Canadian taxpayers, in effect, subsidize the U.S. health care system just because they’re too stupid or dishonest to have their own coherent plan?

Country Salary Sitting
Japan $169,759 43
Germany $102,798 66
United States $169,672 144
Canada $64,400 148
Sweden $36,465 125