Fleishman Hillard: The Political View

Yes, that’s right.  Our own Jim Flaherty has been named the best Finance Minister in the WORLD – that’s THE best – for the relative health of Canada’s economy compared to everyone else’s economies.

He was praised because Canada slayed its deficit, put rules in place to stop banks from making risky loans, or merging recklessly, or from being taken over by banks from other countries.  For having the foresight to reduce corporate taxes, and for the “brave” move of ending trust conversions.  Those are some accomplishments all right.

The problem is that nearly all of THOSE accomplishments belong to the previous government.  Except for the Trust thing, which I actually think was a mistake, but whatever.

This government’s ACTUAL economic accomplishments include a shovel-ready stimulus package that hasn’t really put many new shovels in the ground, tepid EI reform, buying part of a bankrupt auto manufacturing company and turning a large budget surplus into a multi-year, multi-billion dollar deficit, and after predicting no deficit less than a year ago.

In the old days, Liberal finance ministers used to conservatively under-project their surpluses, today, Conservative finance ministers, liberally underestimate their debts.

In a world where deficits come in trillions, I guess only blowing a hundred billion or so may actually make you the BEST.

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Update – I find myself in agreement with Jim Travers this morning who says “Tories Get High Marks They Often Don’t Deserve”.  The Finance Minister’s recent award definitely falls into that category.  It’s a good read, give it some thought.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/707203–tories-get-high-marks-they-often-don-t-deserve