While an overwhelming majority of Canadians think the recession in the United States and global financial crisis are responsible for the deficit, the Conservative government is also on the hook, with 2/3rds of Canadians placing blame:
Canadians accept the global circumstance, but that situation doesn't provide the cover the government hoped. A large majority will accept the "wear it" narrative, a decidedly bad number for the government.
The poll also samples coalition opinion. On the question of a coalition government or an election (If the House of Commons votes against the budget, the Conservative minority government would fall. All things considered, which of these options would you prefer if the Conservative minority government is defeated?), the numbers favor an election- 48% would prefer an election, 38% a coalition, 14% unsure. The regional breakdowns show strong coalition support in Quebec, but all other regions decidedly against, including Ontario (50%-31%).
One interesting finding, despite this gap between a coalition and election, when the question turns to economic management, a coalition led by Ignatieff is much closer to the Conservatives. Harper only holds a 3 point lead over an Ignatieff led coalition on the question of boosting the economy (36-33%). The gap is only 5% on the question of getting us out of recession. These numbers are particularly bad for the Conservative, because the question specifically asks "a coalition government headed by Michael Ignatieff", and the findings are tight, despite the overall opinion of a coalition. Another indication that Harper is losing the battle of perceptions on the economy.
7 comments:
This isn't very surprising. After all, when the car crashes into a telephone pole it's generally the driver who steered it there that gets blamed.
What's also not very surprising are the efforts of the conservative shills to blame everything else despite the fact that it never works. You'd think someone would recognize that and try a new approach.
Robert
And, it doesn't help when the driver was wearing rose colored glasses.
They can no longer blame everything and anything on the Liberals.. (rain, hail, kid's got cavities, etc., etc.).
Harper squandered $25 Billion BEFORE he begrudgingly admitted there was a "fiscal slow-down", which turned into a "mild recession", to a "full blown recession", and so on, until it became "the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression".
When Lyin' Jim (aka "Deficit Jim") realized they had screwed up the economy (by doing things like introducing the 0 down 40 yr mortgages to Canada, cutting the government's tax base - yeah, the thing that pays for stuff like infrastructure projects, railways, roads, EI, etc., etc., and generally f'ing everything up, they decided to try to blame it on a "global" recession...
Nice try boys. We all know what you did to Ontario... this is nothing different. It will take a Liberal to come in after you and clean up your mess...
This is Steven Harper though, he will probably find a way to sue the person who planted that tree there in first place. He has already ran the "he had to prorogue parliament to save our democracy", I bet the next campaign is more than likely going to be advertising that the delay to deal with this crisis is the fault of the opposition. We have already seen the message that the Liberals wanted spending increases to infrastructure, so by doing so puts us into deficit.
"Nice try boys. We all know what you did to Ontario... this is nothing different. It will take a Liberal to come in after you and clean up your mess..."
Or an NDP govt, In 1991, Roy Romanow NDP’s were elected provincially to clean-up the corruption and huge debt and deficit left by the Grant Devine Conservatives – where several members of the caucus were convicted of fraud relating to expense accounts that occurred during Devine’s second term.
Remember in the 90s recession, the NDP govt was first govt of any prov and the federal govt that got out of deficit. Hence, the liberals are lucky to have NDP coalition govt where they take taxpayers money seriously, along with sound economic policy.
Conservative governments always blow the budget out of the water. It's the greatest irony that they are perceived as more fiscally responsible...or have been. Then once the pot is empty, they can justify the kinds of spending cuts and deregulation that fits their ideology.
I remember Layton dropping Romanow's name on the campaign trail, when reporters questioned the complete absence of anyone with an economic background in his candidate slate. I believe the question was who has any economic experience on your team, and then Jack got the deer in the headlights look, quickly pivoted and mentioned Romanow. Not sure that equates to Liberal "luck" in having Layton's team on board, but if that's all you got...
"Conservative governments always blow the budget out of the water."
Seems a long established, international trend, doesn't it?
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