Ideology

One of the primary problems with having politicians, such as Stephen Harper and the federal Conservatives, that are driven by ideology rather than by careful consideration of each situation is that inevitably they make serious errors trying to make things fit their ideology that just don't fit.

One example was their move to increase competition in the market for providing mortgages to people who can't afford houses. While in many situations, increased competition is a good thing, in this case, not so much, as the government and CMHC will learn to its dismay as the Canadian housing market continues to unravel.

Another example of the same blind adherence to a 'more competition is good' ideology is the attitude of the Conservatives towards the Canadian Wheat Board. While competition between farmers will help lower prices for their products, allowing Canadian farmers the freedom to compete with each other by undercutting the prices they sell their products to foreigners for will not benefit Canadians at all, and will only end up hurting those same farmers who are currently protected from their 'tragedy of the commons' predicament (many small sellers all with the incentives to undercut each others pricing) by the single desk wheat marketing board.

Dave, at Galloping Beaver has more on how, when it comes to ideology, the Conservatives refuse to take success for an answer, and will insist on ideologically pure failure, much like the Soviet communists, instead.

Repeating Myself

Specifically, what I wrote on September 13:

"I was somewhat surprised to see Stephen Harper say the other day that the Liberals proposed shift of taxes from incomes to carbon would "wreak havoc on Canada's economy, destroy jobs, weaken business at a time of global uncertainty."

Sadly, no reporters were on hand, to ask, if increasing taxes on carbon and reducing taxes on income would destroy the economy, shouldn't Harper be raising income taxes and slashing carbon taxes in order to create an economic boom? If he truly believes what he says, isn't he showing gross negligence with respect to the Canadian economy. Given that the economy is currently struggling - couldn't he fix this with a reverse green shift, e.g. black shift?

* * *

Looking forward, the following scenario seems plausible:

1) Conservative party forms the next government
2) Canada goes into recession (we're pretty much in one already)
3) Conservative apologists explain that only a moron would blame the recession on the Conservatives because the federal government's policies are not so influential that they can change the course of the whole economy.

If you're childish like me, it will be fun to throw Harper's comment in the face of Conservative supporters when that time comes."

So if you see anyone arguing that Harper can't be blamed for the unfolding downturn because the Federal government is not that influential, just point out to them that Harper himself has argued the opposite quite recently.

Of course Harper was argued a lot of opposites quite recently. In other news, I see that Harper finally decided today to stop lying about the economy and admit that things don't look very good. Seems like only yesterday he was opining on how it was a good time to buy stocks and in his opinion, if we were going to have a severe economic downturn we would have had it by now.