- Harper Extremist Right Wing Agenda – Canadian Election

The Harper government’s strategy from the time it took office was to slash taxes to the point that there is no appreciable surplus. This, obviously, was not an accident but a well thought out strategy. For one thing it was intended to make people ‘Happy with Harper’ by reducing taxes. For another thing, their obvious strategy is that any programs promised by the Liberal or other parties, would be attacked on the grounds that taxes would have to be increased to support it. The more comprehensive the policy the bigger the attack. On the other hand the Cons are employing the strategy of ‘a plethora of micro policies’ – small policies that are focused on a small, well defined segments of the voter population, aimed at maximizing media attention but claiming low costs to implement and simple top understand. It also allows them to do this on a continuous basis throughout the campaign. When in power they bring in these micro-policies and claim that they are a party of action and fulfill their promises. On the other hand, their true agenda is brought in through stealth – there are many examples, for example in the last Budget regarding funding for films, the amendments to the Immigration Act (IRPA), criminal laws being extended to the fetus, and others, as well as administrative changes.

In actuality reducing taxes to the extreme is one of the objectives that the paper by Mike Harris and Preston Manning for the Fraser Institute just before Harper was elected and is part of a far reaching, well defined, Extreme Right Wing agenda. They recommend reduced government spending – which Harper does seem t have got to yet.

By slashing taxes to such an extent Harper has weakened Canada’s ability to withstand hash economic times through social policies (enshrined in the Canadian way of life and distinguishes us from the Americans). This of course will be very important in the next year or two. Disjointed ‘micro-policies’ also weakens our ability to deal with large problems like the environment and the economy in a coherent, comprehensive and effective fashion. For Harper and the Con’s this is not a bad thing since they really don’t want to ‘deal with the environment’ but would rather push it off to the individual Provinces ‘À la Firewall’. They really don’t want comprehensive Federal social programs since this detracts from their Laissez-faire, sink or swin, approach to the economy (which, of sourse, one of the major factors defining them as extremist, right wing) which again can be seen in Harper’s Firewall Letter.

Harper's reducing surpluses to zero is actually a result of his sink or swim approach to our economic activity. That is, people should not turn to the Federal government for help when they are thrown into dire need due to economic downturns, they should turn to themselves. This became very clear when Flaherty told the municipal leader to stop whining when The Federation of Canadian Municipalities released a study last November warning that much of the nation's municipal infrastructure is "on the brink of failure" and will cost $123 billion to upgrade. Flaherty responded "we're not in the pothole business in the government of Canada." (see: Toronto Star, "Cities told to stop `whining'", 22 Nov.'07).



Here is one of the Harper quotes – Scary Stuff! it is something that everyone should consider when choosing how to vote:

· Whether Canada ends up as one national government or two national governments or several national governments, or some other kind of arrangement is, quite frankly, secondary in my opinion… And whether Canada ends up with one national government or two governments or ten governments, the Canadian people will require less government no matter what the constitutional status or arrangement of any future country may be.
o Speech to the Colin Brown Memorial Dinner, National Citizens Coalition, 1994


The Liberal Party has a long tradition now (since Cretien) of sound fiscal management. Further they left the state of the Government finances and the state of the economy in very good shape, far beyond reasonable expectations.

Keep in mind that in Ontario the PC government was touting sound financial management right up to the end of their reign. When the Liberals took office they found a deficit of a billion dollars which the PC had not revealed. These are a lot of the same people that are now involved with the Harper and the Con Party.

Harper saying that Bob Rae “took a slowdown and turned it into the biggest recession since the 1930s” is obvious fear mongering and very much not true ( not to use the ‘liar’ word) .