Fractionals

Hey, I heard a bit on NPR yesterday about attack ads against Harper; how the ads hurt the Liberals' image, even though Harper was pretty much what they claimed he was. The commentator then said exactly what you did in this post, that in parliament Harper probably won't get anywhere. Some consolation, a little?

A bunch, although Warren Ellis likening Harper to a bad actor is both funny and kind of a little disturbing:

"Doesn't Stephen Harper look like
the kind of actor a US or US-but-
produced-in-Canada TV show uses
as the bad guy when they can't
afford a British actor?

(Which, when David Warner is still
working, is kind of unimaginable.
But still.)

You know the kind of guy. Grey
hair, so white you can practically
see through his skin into his
circulatory system, with the kind
of unblinking half-glower that let's
you know that no matter what he's
talking about, he's actually thinking
about shoving pregnant lesbians
tits-first into a woodchipper. He's
the white guy in the suit whose last
job was sitting behind a big desk
condemning Tia Carrere to death
in an episode of RELIC HUNTER.

Paul Martin should never have let on
that he was desperate. And now
he's in the bin and you're ruled by
the guy who plays Creepy Vice-
President in Sci-Fi Channel shows."

Actually, I suspect Harper will be working closely with the Bloc. They may not be the best of friends, but they do have certain policy stances in common.

I don't expect Harper to be able to turn Canada into "Jesusland", or whatever, but I do expect to see him deliver on a lot of his campaign promises, especially the less controversial ones, despite a lackluster showing at the polls.

Maybe; the most disasterous thing he could probably get away with are his dumb-ass tax cuts (even if you want them, mangling the GST isn't the best option), and I'm pretty sure that he's going to do that.

You speak of "mangling" the GST as if it were not a vile and accursed blight on the Canadian retail economy. :-P

In all seriousness, though, I would certainly prefer an income tax cut over a revenue-equivalent sales tax cut, but that's just because I save a significantly larger fraction of my income than the average Canadian. Why do you feel that way, may I ask?

Right after I posted that I wanted to edit it slightly, but of course I can't.

I wasn't trying to sound offensive at the end, though I think it may have come across that way. I am really just curious why you would oppose a GST cut as compared to an equivalent income tax cut, because to the average Canadian they would be indistinguishable.

Don't worry, you didn't come across as offensive on either, to my eyes.

You've got me all wrong, though, I don't "oppose a GST cut as compared to an equivalent income tax cut" - I oppose both. I like social programs, remember? I even like government spending, at least when it's done intelligently. I think the GST thing is worse than the income thing, because my twin brother who has a business degree tells me it is dumber, and I trust him.

(and by the way, it's not as if business spending is significantly less wasteful than government spending - the difference is one of scale, not of type)

Oh okay, that makes sense. I was framing the question incorrectly from the beginning. Also, my economics degree agrees with Ben's business degree, for what it's worth, at least from an increase-national-savings-and-investment perspective.

However, we will definitely have to strongly disagree on the question of "business spending [being] significantly less wasteful than government spending," but you knew that already. And that isn't even the real reason I oppose taxes, but meh. :-P