I never knew the prolific old lefty playwright and actor was married to Lady Antonia FRASER - author of many "historic" biographies (I am sorry to say that never found her books credible. They always seemed indulgences of near-fiction - more like romance novels redeemed by an historic allusion.)
2006 Oct - Pinter in (his contemporary's equal ) Sam BECKETTs "Krapp's Last Tapes". An excellent role for him - no doubt!
The only film by PINTER I recall seeing was his British "Betrayal" with Patricia HODGE, Ben KINGSLEY and Jeremy IRONS. It was adapted from his play of the same name, which reputedly drew upon his own divorce from 1st wife, Vivien MERCHANT (a stage name, as she was born Ida THOMPSON and so was no relation to famed Merchant Ivory Productions impresario - Ismail MERCHANT.) It had a huge impact on me - very moving.
He died - apparently - from recurrence of cancer, a reprise of 2002 esophageal cancer?
[RIP was commonly misunderstoodto mean "Rest In Peace", when in fact it stands for the ancient Latin prayer "Requiescat in pace" which cannot be literally translated as such - although it is a good approximation of the intent. In the modern world (by this I mean the opposite of the ancient world or our post-christian era that began in 1 A.D) we tend to believe that the dead go to their respective fates immediately after death. In Ancient times it was thought that the dead waited in Hades until Judgment Day, and hence "Requiescat in pace" was a prayer that the deceased rest peacefully, not in torment, while awaiting the Judgment Day.]
"A consortium of zoos intends to file suit to enjoin the team from calling itself the Lions. The zoos will argue that associating real lions with this franchise is a form of cruelty." Paul Ruschmann on a Detroit News blog. "
Under Coach Marinelli the Detroit Lions were 24-0! They still have #1 Draft pick though.
The "Angel at the Fence, The True Story of a Love that Survived" by 79 year old Herman Rosenblat is like a number of other book frauds promoted by Oprah Winfrey. It is the latest in a list of memoirs in which the author has been accused of fabrication and could put greater pressure on publishers to fact check books more carefully.
In 2006, U.S. author James Frey admitted he had fabricated key parts of his drug and alcohol memoir "A Million Little Pieces," the top selling non-fiction book in the United States in 2005.
In February 2008, Misha Defonseca admitted most of her bestselling autobiography, which told of a young Jewish girl saved by wolves while hiding from the Nazis in wartime Europe, was made up.
Also in 2008 was "Love and Consequences," a memoir by a Margaret B. Jones about a mixed-raced girl growing up in a gang-ridden neighborhood of Los Angeles, and supposedly a participant and perpetrator of violence was revealed to be a fabrication.
I suppose this is the down-side of promoting reading - you get a few duds. But what does it do to the craft (when editors do not even bother to check basic facts - even though it is being portrayed as non-fiction - it would be fine otherwise) and memory of those who died?
Those liberals who usually read Maureen DOWD are going to be upset (not because of her fill-in - Nick KRISTOF) because someone is calling them out on a fact that has puzzled many for years.
Liberals don't give. Conservatives do.
Conservatives outspend Liberals when it comes to giving to charity (in the US). They also volunteer more. These facts are from a 2006 book entitled "Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservatism" by Arthur BROOKS.
He followed this up with an international comparison of generosity in April 2008 called "Gross National Happiness". The upshot is that privately, Americans are the most generous donators in the world - based on a number of scales. The least generous according to BROOKS - the French.
These days' finding someone who knows what they are talking about on Tech Issues is a real hassle, and I often find the worst is a "helpful" sales clerks who often just makes things worse. I usually turn to a GOOGLE search, but even that is fraught with challenges - wading through "honey-traps" just baited with key-words to funnel traffic into a number if useless and very questionable "tech" sites.
I couldn't resist repeating this piece from the NY Times DealBook blog, written by freelance writer Vincent Indelicato (with an obvious acknowledgment to Clement Moore who penned the famous "Twas the night before Christmas" poem in 1822.) Twas Wall Street's night before Christmas...
‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through Wall Street, Not a derivative was trading, not even a REIT; Stocks were tumbling with great despair, Dreams of executive bonuses were vanishing right out of thin air;
Bankers and rating agencies nestled all snug in the same bed, While visions of AAA danced in their head; And Fannie in her kerchief and Freddie in his cap, Fell asleep holding bags of subprime mortgages in their lap;
When out of the credit markets arose a crisis to scare, All awakened with panic to the fall of a behemoth named Bear; Away to the discount window the Fed flew like a flash, As Lehman’s stocking hung desperately by the chimney with no cash;
When what on A.I.G.’s wish list should suddenly appear, But a $700 billion bundle of holiday cheer; Not so for The Big Three with bankruptcy near, Taxpayers exclaim, recession in the new year!
Obama in the White House, Democrats shout out with glee, If only Santa could bring investors the gift of liquidity. For Madoff, lumps of coal, $50 billion out of sight, Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.
Excellent article in The Economist last week revisiting the circumstances that led to the famously controversial, Tariff Act of 1930 (aka the Smoot Hawley Act) that increased protectionist tariffs in over 900 items just as the world was collapsing into a global depression. The political "groundswell" for the tariffs began - poignantly - during the 1928 election campaign, only to be introduced in the House in March 1929. The battle in the Senate was - apparently - plagued by rampant pork barreling from both parties. Neither had yet developed the strong ideological positions on international trade which they now hold. But by the time the Senate approved the legislation in March 1930, the flush of the boom came to roost as the bust really took hold. (image courtesy The Economist: Willis C. Hawley, a Republican Congressman from Oregon, and Reed Smoot, another Republican Senator from Utah)
[Editor: I found it quite comforting that much of the commentary on how the legislation developed and unfolded was recounted from Canadian academic research1 published in the "no nonsense" (as some surely are) Journal of Economic History - Dec 1997.]
Footnotes: 1) “Trade Wars: Canada’s Reaction to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff” by Judith McDonald, Anthony Patrick O’Brien and Colleen Callahan. Journal of Economic History, December 1997.
In my web wanderings I found this news item in the Fairbanks AK News Miner newspaper - discussing why how the Governor has quietly moved the state seat of government from Juneau to Anchorage AK. A comment for that item mentioned that you couldn't even drive there!
That got me thinking, so I asked Google Maps to tell the driving route. Here it is.
Personally, it seems way too hard. 1900 miles drive to Prince Rupert, then 400 miles by car ferry? Why not 1) turn right at Whitehorse and go through Skagway AK? I have done that road in the dead of winter (right by Lac Laberge) and it was still (barely) open. That would be about 800 miles. Even 2) driving to Haines AK would seem possible, but maybe not in the winter. This is only 750 miles. It would seem crazy that there wouldn't be a regular weekly ferry to Anchorage.
Flying would seem simpler but much more dangerous. In 1990, I flew into Wrangell AK (named after Russian Governor who negotiated the Alaska Purchase for Russia in 1867), and then by helicopter up the Stikine River to the Eskay Creek Gold Mine (now part of Barrick Gold Corp ). This rich orebody was a mountaintop. We next travelled up to Fairbanks AK to see what has become Fort Knox Gold (now part of Kinross Gold Corp.) and then flew over to Nome AK, home to a large coldwar air force base, to visit the Red Dog Mine which was owned at the time by Cominco Ltd. - now Teck Cominco). While in Fairbanks, I recall being shown the "hydraulic1" mining that they still allowed in many of the rivers! That trip was the modern equivalent of a visit to the Klondike!
Footnotes: 1) Hydraulic gold mining is just a modern update on the "placer" mining technique used during the regions Klondike Gold Rush of 1898. It involves pumping river water through high-pressure hoses, eroding the riverbank and channeling the sediment through a sluice gate system. This holds a series of graduated fine mesh screens to extract the gold nuggets and dust from the sediment. Environmentally - it is a disaster!
The unraveling of the how the disaster occurred continues.
Apparently, a former assistant director of the office of compliance inspections and examinations in Washington at the SEC named Eric Swanson left in 2006 and in 2007 married Bernie MADOFF's niece, Shana Madoff.
NY Times Tuesday Dec 16. "A Vienna bank, Bank Medici, became the latest major institution to acknowledge it was a client of Mr. Madoff, saying it had $2.1 billion invested with him. Institutions and individuals have now reported losses of more than $20 billion."
Other "Red Flags" are not that convincing to me, as the first 4 could equally apply to all Wall Street managers. For me the most telling is the rampant nepotism at MADOFF. There is a certain "intellectual Darwinism" that occurs in Money Management, in fact it should be embraced and it sends a troubling message when ignored by hiring your own kids. Now perhaps 1 or 2 of the MADOFF sons/daughters were pretty smart and skilled in the investment business, but not ALL OF THEM CAN BE. If they are THAT talented, Dad should help them fund their own enterprises outside of his operation. I see the same problem arose at Noel's Fairfield Greenwich Group.
The most important flag was that a very small accounting firm did the audit of a $17 bn fund! Come one now that is taking "friendship" (as I presume that would have been the response if queried") way too far. Another was this apparent reply to the question "why don't you charge fees?" in a May 2001 MAR/Hedge column, "Madoff Tops Charts; Skeptics Ask How". Get serious.
This image is inflammatory. It is beacuse I associate the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) with the vile repression associated with Hitler's Germany.
It is time to get rid of the HRC's in Canada. They have evolved into an instrument to smoother free speech. We must have the right to offend others by what we say (as long as no physical harm comes from it and nothing defamatory is said.) Otherwise political discussion - even unpopular discourse - will be at risk from a slow slide into PC chill.
Trust Colby COSH to review Naomi KLEIN's new book and mention her New Yorker Profile. She is 38 years old and still hasn't had her brood with husband Avi LEWIS yet (of the stalwart Socialist founder of the NDP David + Stephen LEWIS family). To much a feminist "kid" to grow up. I see disaster in her future. So sad. I appreciated the low-down on the KLEIN and LEWIS clan's though, totally predictable really. Sort of reminds me of this recent VW Routan ad
COSH's opinion of the "Shock Doctrine" - it wouldn't pass a undergrad "History of Economic Theory" essay. Well done Colby.
Dr. GULLEDGE's debating strategy appeared to be based on confusing the audience by "sophistic sleight of lip" but this is exactly what the Climate Changers want. The standard Climate Change (CC) argument goes like this:
It is indisputable that the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is rising.
It is effectively indisputable that the increase in CO2 is due to human activity, particularly the burning of fossil fuels.
It is indisputable that increasing the CO2 level in the atmosphere reduces its transparency to infra-red, which reduces the rate at which the earth radiates heat.
By conclusive inference it follows that increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will have some effect on the climate, and the probability is overwhelmingly high that one major effect will be an increase in average global temperature ("global warming").
As soon as questions arise about more detailed effects, like possible increases in hurricane activity, reputable scientists start to argue.
Therefore, global warming is indisputably real, but the details are not clear.
A short recap of a rebuttal of this by a Denier under the handle of "mikegeo" is:
The question of global warming is still subject to debate. Despite the anecdotal points raised by CC'ers there is still a great deal of debate over this - look to severe problems with "Global Average Temperatures" or ice cover for example.
If the earth is warming, how do we know is it different from any other climate cycle experienced in the past? There have been many kinds of climate catastrophes - some prompted by meteors, volcanoes and or evidenced by past ice ages and associated temperature reversals.
If so the earth is warming, why? The "Greenhouse Gas"theory is full of holes. It can not be reliably put forward as the only reason. Man was not a factor in previous climate catastrophes yet they occurred. How do we know this is the mechanism?
Climate Changers have the process of the process of scientific inquiry backwards if you have already "assumed" that carbon dioxide is responsible for the warming and that man is responsible for the carbon dioxide. (The writer goes on to mention a few other useful facts.)
To base draconian economic and and environmental regulations on sporadically recalled weather events from year to year may be politically expedient but it is hardly responsible public policy.
In another significant development the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin RUDD released his governments program new commitment to the 2020 Kyoto Protocol, however it has been modified from what many of the "green wing" in his party wished for. Australia will commit to reduce Green House Gas emissions (GHG) by 5-15% by 2020. That could increase to a 25% reduction if other key polluting countries meet specific targets designed by Australia. This is a wonderful solution and one that I hope others adopt. This common sense approach will link countries compliance and no single country will have to "hobble" itself economically only to see others benefit at no cost by ignoring Kyoto.
Furthermore, last week the U. S. Senate Minority issued a 2nd update on debunking Al GORE's outrageous claims from his dramentry "Inconvenient Truths" in this report. They report that 650 distinguished scientists disagree with the UN sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report of 2006. Among the points raised:
Another 400 scientists have added their names to a growing chorus of skeptics about the so-called global warming “consensus” since this report was prepared last year. Now over 650 prominent international scientists, including many current and former UN IPCC scientists, who have now turned against the UN IPCC. (This is more than 12 times the number of UN scientists (52) who authored the media-hyped IPCC 2007 Summary for Policymakers.)
The chorus of skeptical scientific voices grew louder in 2008 as a steady stream of peer-reviewed studies, analyses, real world data and inconvenient developments challenged the UN and former Vice President Al Gore's claims that the "science is settled" and there is a "consensus."
Some of the bad news for "Climate Changers" (aka "anthropogenic warming fears") included: Global temperatures failing to warm; Peer-reviewed studies predicting a continued lack of warming; a failed attempt to revive the discredited “Hockey Stick”; inconvenient developments and studies regarding CO2; the Sun; Clouds; Antarctica; the Arctic; Greenland; Mount Kilimanjaro; Hurricanes; Extreme Storms; Floods; Ocean Acidification; Polar Bears extinction; lack of atmospheric dust; the failure of oceans to warm and rise as predicted.
In 2008 marked the year that the purported "Global Warming consensus” collapsed as: 1) Russian scientists “rejected the very idea that carbon dioxide may be responsible for global warming”. 2) An American Physical Society editor conceded that a “considerable presence” of scientific skeptics exist. 3) An International team of scientists countered the UN IPCC, declaring: “Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate”. 4) India Issued a report challenging global warming fears. 5) International Scientists demanded the UN IPCC “be called to account and cease its deceptive practices,” and 6) a canvass of more than 51,000 Canadian scientists revealed 68% disagree that global warming science is “settled.”
Major skeptics and their supporters have popped up among many popular periodicals and newspapers.
At the launch of the IPCC report in 2004 it was widely repeated that 2500 scientists associated with the IPCC's reports had endorsed the IPCC's conclusions. It is now know that this was a misrepresentation as the 2500 were merely peer reviewers and had not endorsed the final report which was "summarized by the IPCC Secretariat" - basically political appointees and bureaucrats.
The Chair of the IPCC, Dr. R.K Pachauri of India received his doctorate in Industrial Engineering in 1972 from North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC. He began his career at the Diesel Locomotive Works, Varanasi, India and before he ascended into the UN bureaucracy he was Director of TERI (Tata Energy Research Institute), a jointly funded government/industry applied research institute.
Dr. William M. Briggs, a climate statistician who serves on the American Meteorological Society's Probability and Statistics Committee, has described as the behavior as “really outrageous and unethical behavior on the parts of some editors." when colleagues "tried [to] getting papers published that explored non-‘consensus’ views.” Some skeptical scientists have faced threats and intimidation. Dr. Briggs objected to being called a "Flat Earthers"
Al GORE claimed that Earth was facing an environmental catastrophe if CO2 emissions surpassed 350ppm. See chart below with data from Paleozoic Era.
2) More Than 650 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims Scientists Continue to Debunk “Consensus” in 2008. (http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm) The report features the names, biographies, academic/institutional affiliation, quotes and of literally hundreds of additional international scientists who publicly dissented from man-made climate fears. This report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation. It also features their own words, biographies, and weblinks to their peer reviewed studies, scientific analyses and original source materials as gathered from directly from the scientists or from public statements, news outlets, and websites in 2007 and 2008.
It is almost beyond belief - US$50 billion for upto 4 years!
Bernard L. Madoff's fraud is almost big enough to give "a Ponzi scheme" a bad name. The fact he was "turned in" by his 2 sons almost makes it read1 like a segment of TV sitcom "Arrested Development". The question on everyone's mind? How such an incredible manipulation so large, (itself suspicious as Madoff's firm reportedly only had US$17 billion last January) could have happened and been undetected for so long. This truely was a master stroke as it would have required massive complicity or gross incompetence by someone. The NYT has reviewed some client statements and notices without finding anything extraordinary, unless they were all completely false (I note that they were not custodial account statements, but brokerage account statements, itself a potential red flag as it is not common for brokerage account to segregated such accounts.) Another issue was the murky division of "trading from safekeeping" functions so activity can be properly audited. Madoff reportedly operated on the 17th floor, separate and distinct form the market-dealing/making operations below.
Among one of the largest effected is HSBC Bank who gave Madoff a $1 billion mandate. It is noteworthy that many of the investors were very large and sophisticated clients who would have been wise to any obvious fraudulent behaviour. Apparently there were rumours of some problems with Madoff in 2001 and a number of investigations were undertaken but nothing was found. The fallout will be to shake the confidence of many private money-management clients in their managers and raise the volume on demands for greater oversight of Wall St. from the SEC and other regulators.
Footnotes 1) In Season 1, the family patriarch George BLUTH (played by Jeffery TAMBORE) is arrested for SEC fraud.
Stephane DION resigned as Liberal Leader yesterday, and today Bob RAE announced he was giving up in favour of Michael IGNATIEFF, so it's unanimous. Iggy is not that committed to the Menage a Trois/Coalition with the NDP/BQ - certainly not as much as Bob RAE, and has been quoted as saying "not necessarily the Coalition". Conservatives under HARPER looks more secure every minute.
If the Menage a Trois/Coalition does not defeat the Conservative Government on January 27, then we will not have to suffer Jacques PARIZEAU, Ed BROADBENT, and Elizabeth MAY in the Senate (and possibly Maude BARLOW and Judy REBICK). That is a relief.
[Update: 2008Dec24 HARPER appoints 18 new Conservative Senators! My only disappointment is Deb GREY is not among them.]
Others have mentioned the "Cave-cam" video that sealed his fate. M. DION will be missed the most by the Conservative Party, who feasted on his "easy pickins".
As to the impact of the "Stimulus Budget" on Jan 27, who knows. Jacquie THORPE already notes we are awash in stimulus. Yesterday's (Dec 9, 2008) interest rate cut of 3/4% was an aggressive signal of it's new policy stance as it is clear that we are now in a recession - something that the BOC Governor Mark CARNEY was coy to admit only 2 weeks ago. This puts the Bank of Canada's (BOC) Overnight lending rate at 1.5% - the lowest since July 1958 when John DIEFENBAKER was Prime Minister.
This is the "Winter of our Discontent" and the wheels are coming off.
First this, The Manipulation of Gold Prices which was quickly followed by - Gold in Backwardation. Two thoughtful pieces which attempt to explain the whiplash inducing behaviour of Gold prices over past few weeks in the context of Central Bank "expectations management" and a CFTC "Collusion Conspiracy".
The Stock Markets tank. Never did I ever, ever believe I would see U.S Tbills trade at zero yield! This is historic - Gravity has been repealed!
"The Treasury Department will sell $28 billion of three-year notes tomorrow (Current BM YTM 1.12% dn 0.103) and $16 billion of 10-year notes (Current BM YTM 2.65% dn 0.089) on Thursday." (As noted in Accross the Curve I can't understand why the Treasury didn't hit every one of the $126bn in bids - I mean why hold back? Are you serious or just pretending. Also that bidders only got 82% "fill" of their "zero" bid is confounding - who took the other 18%?)
We live in strange times! Everyone wants to sanitize their YE Accounts is reason given, but it may just be the wall of Treasury bills flooding Wall Street with no where else to go. No lending is taking place anyways. It's a Government take-over of lending AND borrowing.
From what I can tell on Radio-Canada, Mr. Jean CHAREST has won a stronger mandate in the Quebec Election. Liberal 66 seats +18; Parti Quebecois 51 seats +15; Action Democratic 7 seats -34 and Independents 2 seats +2. Mario DUMONT has resigned as leader of the ADQ after making abject apologies to voters for his inexperience during the last session and promised to do better after this election. Quebec voters were clearly unmoved. It was also a vindication for PQ leader Pauline MAROIS who fought hard to gain the leadership and has had trouble connecting with voters.
Not sure what this will mean for Public Policy except the narrow majority shall no longer mean accommodating the ADQ and make governing easier. Voter turnout at 57% was lower than in 2007 at 71%.
It was unfortunate that federal politics probably pushed the Parti Quebecois vote up in the last two weeks. The next election may be the the Federal one. A resurgence of the PQ may hinder the BQ presence in Ottawa as there is a line of thought that suggests voters like to have "dynamic tension" in the political balance between provincial and federal parties. This would be good for the federal Conservatives.
Now this is interesting. The other day Adobe Inc. (US$23) announced layoffs and reduced Revenue expectations but due to favourable Income Tax refunds bumped-up EPS forecasts for 4Q08.
The 600 layoffs are in the developer ranks - which given ADBE just released it Creative Studio 4 package is not altogether surprising - as even before the merger with Macromedia, both of these companies were "programmer rich" environments. Now that 2 years have passed since that merger and 2 upgrades have been completed, that "software consolidation" has probably been accomplished.
Yet what really caught my eye was this at ZDnet.com - "With 256-bit encryption, Acrobat 9 passwords still easy to crack". How is that possible? Well as Dancho Danchev explains, you are only as strong as your weakest link and in Acrobat 9, despite doubling the encryption level from 128 to 256 bit, they dumbed down the process so it is easier to do a brute-force crack! Why bother with an upgrade like that?
Here is a stock I recently bought, TMX Group (X - C$22)1
... and here was Announcement in the Financial Post today.
I bought when the insider (the company) was buying - which considering their business, is always a calculated risk for this stock. As soon as the buy-back was finished (at around $27), the stock dropped to C$23 and currently is at $22. Depending on where the market goes from here, are dividend cuts next?
[Update: 08DEC2008 - In an interesting development after the markets closed today, the NYSE was reported to be in talks to acquire/merge with Deutche Bourse.]
Footnote: 1) TMX Group owns and operates the Toronto, Montreal Stock and B.C and Alberta based Venture Exchanges, including all trading and clearing of all stocks, options and financial futures.
With global multinational TOTAL SA, scuppering any hopes that it might wade into Calgary and pickup Nexen Energy Inc. the gloom is starting to spread. Most "traditional" (read as our American cousins) multi-nationals have "iced" their Oilsands plans in the last few months. Today StatOilHydro ASA did the same, postponing development of it planned $16bn Heavy Oil Upgrader just outside Edmonton. (see chart WTI US$/bbl - courtesy Oilnergy Inc.)
West Texas oil fell more than 6% on yesterday (Dec 4) to its lowest level in nearly four years in response to further bleak economic data that could spell a deeper decline in global energy demand. U.S. light crude fell US$3.12 to US$43.67, the lowest since Jan.5, 2005. London Brent crude fell US$3.16 to US$42.28.
The price decline has been shocking. Since the meltdown began in ernest in August WTI has dropped from US$110 to below US$50.
Here is a list of the number of Oil Sands projects that have been shelved.
Our nascent political drama hit a speed-bump this morning as Governor-General (GG) Michaelle JEAN agreed to prorogue Parliament until Jan 26 2009 so the Conservatives will not have to face an immediate non-confidence motion in the House from the newly formed opposition Coalition of Liberals, NDP and Bloc Quebecois. By agreeing to this break, the GG is allowing the Conservative Government the time to properly prepare their Budget response to the Global Economic Meltdown.
The opposition rebellion was ignited when the Conservatives embedded what was seen as a gratuitous insult to the Opposition on an uncontroversial Confidence motion following the Dec 2 Fiscal Update. This clause would have revoked the existing $2 per voter Election grant to Political Parties. Without this funding, the Liberals, NDP and BQ would be technically bankrupt as they rely heavily on those funds to run their election campaigns. The Conservatives are philosophically opposed to the idea, but they also have the luxury of strong financial support from party members1. It was a serious strategic error for Mr. HARPER not to have anticipated the oppositions outcry from such a provocative move.
Once opposition gelled HARPER quickly backed off and removed the offending clause. (Personally I think he might have indicated a less radical solution like phasing out funding over 2 years or perhaps adding a formula where the government would equally match personal contributions.) However the Opposition parties were not so easily placated. Their outrage transmuted into dissatisfaction with the Fiscal Update and defeating it became the object of their dissent. The Liberals charged that the Conservatives "lack of crisis measures" was tantamount to macro-economic negligence and mis-management. The fact that the Conservatives were rushing to bring out such a "Stimulus Budget" after the Xmas Break on Jan 27, 2009 was impatiently brushed aside as "too little, too late". Faced with the realization that bringing down the Government on a Non-Confidence motion would plunge the country into another election - which would be electoral suicide for whomever initiated it - the Opposition Parties accepted that they would have to mobilize the Coalition to be allowed to Govern.
Mr. HARPER's fatal error became the pretext for the Opposition Parties to advance to a Governing Coalition, although perhaps a little prematurely. A remaining challenge for the Coalition is to transition from their lame duck leader, M. Stephane DION to a new Leader to be selected in the May 2009 Leadership Race. It is unlikely that the GG would appoint a Governing Coalition led by an outgoing, lame-duck leader and a yet-to-be-determined Leader. But certainly, she would prefer that to another General Election.
We know now that the Coalition (the Liberals 77 seats, NDP 37 seats and BQ 49 seats = 163 vs Conservatives 143) has been in the works for some time. Perhaps with indecent haste the 3 Opposition Parties all signed the formal terms of the Coalition Agreement (which governs allocation of cabinet positions, voting rules, dispute resolution procedures etc.) The Coalition has agreed to maintain unity for at least 2 years before triggering another Election.
For our financial markets, this 7 week break from political theater will be a blessing as the news in that time will be unremittingly depressing. Yet domestically, our banking system is probably the most sound in the world right now. Our real problem will be to survive the drop in demand for many of our commodities at once, and the severe depression griping our main trade partner the USA.
Therefore, if the Coalition can hold together until a new Liberal Leader is selected - they may get the chance to govern.
Here are videos of both HARPER's Address and DION's response.
[Update: 2008DEC08 Stephane DION has stepped down as Liberal Leader and now Liberals must rapidly select a new leader before January 26 when Parliament reconvenes and the Conservative government "Stimulus Budget" is expected. Without a Liberal Leader the "Coalition" will not be given the chance to form a government after a non-confidence motion. I predict some Liberals would rather cross the floor to join the Conservatives or become Independents than join such a "Menage a Trois" with the BQ or NDP. Endgame approaches.]
Footnotes: 1) It was expected that the next allocation of Party Financing would total $30 million to be split between the various parties according the their share of popular vote. Liberals $10 million, Conservatives $7.7, NDP $4.9, BQ $2.6 and Greens $1.8.
2) In the Dec 2006 Liberal Leadership Race, these were the Candidate Expenditures.
2006 Oct - Pinter in (his contemporary's equal ) Sam BECKETTs "Krapp's Last Tapes". An excellent role for him - no doubt!
