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Politics in 2017

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mariomike said:
Canadians will be safer when he gets his hands on the codes?

Safer than with Hillary's hands on anything...







... except the bars on her well-earned cell.
 
Loachman said:
Safer than with Hillary's hands on anything...

Thanks for clarifying! I was a bit confused by his answer,
http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2015/12/17/what-is-nuclear-triad-debate-sot.cnn



 
Chris Pook said:
So two by-elections then?
:nod:
dapaterson said:
Showing up when not invited is not a particularly diplomatic thing to do...
Which I guess we'll see if the new Global Affairs Minister tries going to Russia - although they know where she stands on the whole Ukraine thing.

I'm kinda intrigued by Dion's "well, I'll have to think about it" according to the CBC.  I guess he doesn't quite get the concept of "here's your hat - what's your hurry?".
 
milnews.ca said:
Which I guess we'll see if the new Global Affairs Minister tries going to Russia - although they know where she stands on the whole Ukraine thing.
Well, we know a bit more about how Russia feels now - highlights mine ...
Russia has signaled that it will only remove newly appointed Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland from its sanctions list on a reciprocal basis.

Russian news agencies cited an unidentified Russian Foreign Ministry official as saying on January 11 that Freeland has been on a list of Canadians subject to sanctions, which includes a travel ban, since 2014.

Moscow introduced the sanctions list after many Western countries, including Canada, imposed targeted sanctions against Russian officials over Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.

"The issue of removing her from the response sanctions is an issue of reciprocity and the mirror principle," the Foreign Ministry official said. "The fact that she is blacklisted will not impede contacts with Russian officials at international forums." ...
 
milnews.ca said:
Well, we know a bit more about how Russia feels now - highlights mine ...
Russia has signaled that it will only remove newly appointed Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland from its sanctions list on a reciprocal basis.

Russian news agencies cited an unidentified Russian Foreign Ministry official as saying on January 11 that Freeland has been on a list of Canadians subject to sanctions, which includes a travel ban, since 2014.

Moscow introduced the sanctions list after many Western countries, including Canada, imposed targeted sanctions against Russian officials over Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.

"The issue of removing her from the response sanctions is an issue of reciprocity and the mirror principle," the Foreign Ministry official said. "The fact that she is blacklisted will not impede contacts with Russian officials at international forums." ...

Damn!  They are good.  They targeted her way before she was elected and would become the Minister of Global Affairs.
 
George Wallace said:
Damn!  They are good.  They targeted her way before she was elected and would become the Minister of Global Affairs.

More of that Russian super Int.
 
I'm not quite sure what the issue is with the PM's selection to head GAC. Who else has the experience she has, the linguistic capabilities, the global connections, and name recognition? I actually think having spent so much time outside Canada should be lauded as an asset and not a detraction, as her job is to be the Face of Canada abroad.
 
captloadie said:
I'm not quite sure what the issue is with the PM's selection to head GAC. Who else has the experience she has, the linguistic capabilities, the global connections, and name recognition? I actually think having spent so much time outside Canada should be lauded as an asset and not a detraction, as her job is to be the Face of Canada abroad.

It's twofold.  Don't let anyone say otherwise.  This was also a calculated move to send Russia a message.  She is in fact one his most capable ministers.  McCallum going to China was also calculated and will likely impress Beijing.

My only beef with the entire shuffle is Monseif but I did hear at least one credible explanation that I'm willing to accept for now as to why she stayed.
 
captloadie said:
I'm not quite sure what the issue is with the PM's selection to head GAC.
One issue is how well she (as well as her boss) can navigate the Russian position given 1)  her history w/Russia and 2)  PEOTUS's suggestions to date that he can make a "deal" with Russia.
Remius said:
This was also a calculated move to send Russia a message.
Agreed.  That said, I don't know about her competence one way or another, but I know she's been pretty anti-Russia/pro-Ukraine, and my only question is how her boss will manage all of that in dealing with Russia and the U.S. down the road.
 
Jarnhamar said:
I was going to post this in the meme  thread but it seems more relevant than tounge in cheek.

15940769_10154931315139204_443935095698501393_n.jpg

It would seem that with Trudeaunomics, the PM will make all Canadians equal for generations to come.  Equally impoverished.  Thanks for nothing, all you Harper haters that brought this crowd into power.
 
jollyjacktar said:
It would seem that with Trudeaunomics, the PM will make all Canadians equal for generations to come.  Equally impoverished.  Thanks for nothing, all you Harper haters that brought this crowd into power.

So it seems the "Department of Fiscal Projections" is betting that the liberals will be in Power until 2051?  :o
 
milnews.ca said:
One issue is how well she (as well as her boss) can navigate the Russian position given 1)  her history w/Russia and 2)  PEOTUS's suggestions to date that he can make a "deal" with Russia.Agreed.  That said, I don't know about her competence one way or another, but I know she's been pretty anti-Russia/pro-Ukraine, and my only question is how her boss will manage all of that in dealing with Russia and the U.S. down the road.
But unless we reverse current policy, we have already made our choice. We are currently pro-Ukraine/anti-Russia, put in simplified terms. That's why we have trainers in the Ukraine and will be a leading nation in Latvia.
 
Remius said:
My only beef with the entire shuffle is Monseif but I did hear at least one credible explanation that I'm willing to accept for now as to why she stayed.
  Do tell.
 
Don't act daft, Remius. You know very well that is not what this graph shows.

What we have to look at is that, in 2014, the Harper government had a plan for dealing with public finances that would have seen surpluses small at first, then increasing, that would have wiped the national debt by 2038, based on current projections.

Then, the Trudeau government came along and introduced a new, high spending plan. That plan, when projected in the future would not reduce, but rather double the national debt in the projection horizon of 30-33 years.

The important figures to keep in mind in our shorter term horizon of one to three election cycles is that, by the end of their current mandate, the Liberals will have added 146 more billion dollars to the national debt than the Conservatives would have under their plan.

Second thing to realize is that, if a new government wanted to go back to the Conservative plan's level after next election, they would have to be able to generate an average of $55 billion $ surplus in each year to do it in a 5 year horizon or a 45 billion$ in each year to do it over a 10 years horizon.*

Another way to look at what the Liberal plan is doing is the following: Imagine that after the next election, the new government wants to make debt reduction an issue again. First, they would have to eliminate the operation deficit in the budget (i.e. "balance" the budget). Then debt reduction can slowly start. To imagine, mentally move the Conservative plan line down to the Liberal debt level for say 2023 (balanced budget 1) and, because we are staring from a greater debt and the greater, the harder to get out of it, flatten the Conservative curve somehow: then look how far to the right the "zero" debt intersection occurs in terms of years. It's probably somewhere around eight to ten years later.

There will be pain and suffering all over again and bigger than what it has been under Harper (because most of the pain had already been inflicted by the Harper government to get to this debt free status).

* The calculation is actually a matter of differential equations resolution as we are dealing with two curves and the difference in the surface between the two curves. However, an easy and quite valid evaluation is to do the following, which is what I did: (1) take a given period; (2) calculate the difference between the number generated by each plan at the beginning and then at the end of the period; (3) average the two numbers; and (4) divide the resulting average by the number of years in the period. This gives you the "average" surplus that must be generated to reduce the debt to get from one plan to the other (smaller debt) one.

In my case, I took the following  "differential" figures: in 2021, 150 billion more $; in 2026, 400 billion more $; and in 2031, 750 billion $ more.

So: 5 years horizon: $(150b + 400b)/2 = $275b, over 5 years (divide by 5): $55b.
10 years horizon: $(150b + 750b)/2 = $450b, over 10 years (divide by 10): $45b
 
Oldgateboatdriver said:
Don't act daft, Remius. You know very well that is not what this graph shows.

Don't act so offended.  It was meant in jest. 
 
Journeyman said:
  Do tell.

Well aside from the gender parity issue, some pundits have guessed that this was a bit of a take the blame moment for Trudeau or at least as close as it will come to that.  Basically he made a campaign promise on electoral reform with no real plan and essentially told her to make it happen with no real road map on how to achieve it.  So sort of a his mistake/her fault sort of thing or whatever. 

So moving her to something else so as to not punish her.  he basically let her flail in the wind with no real direction. 

Does not mean she isn't to blame for what happened just that it's a convenient way to let her off the hook for something he is ultimately responsible for.

I didn't see it that way at first but it sort of makes sense.

 
 
captloadie said:
But unless we reverse current policy, we have already made our choice. We are currently pro-Ukraine/anti-Russia, put in simplified terms. That's why we have trainers in the Ukraine and will be a leading nation in Latvia.
Agreed -- she'll get to manage any friction from the U.S. & Russia, then, if this isn't the deal PEOTUS decides to go with.  How will she do with such friction?  How will her boss do?  Have to wait & see ...
 
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