Tuesday, January 27, 2009

A few thoughts on the budget.

One might call this a conservative leftish budget. Leftish that is in terms of Harper's basic ideological leanings. There is a fair amount of govt. spending even on items such as social housing, and also a considerable expenditure on infrastructure. Many right wingers will be disappointed in Harper and will cry out about the deficits and consider the bailout expenditures too large.
Critics however point out that the stimulus package is really not all that large and probably not enough to help the economy out of the depression to any great extent. However, there is enough in the budget that Ignatieff can agree with that there will be no non-confidence vote passed I would predict, even with some degree of certainty in these uncertain times. Ignatieff may groan and go through a few motions of dissent and criticism but what he will not do is to vote with the Blog and NDP to defeat the budget.
Some critics such as James Laxer on his blog call for Ignatieff to vote against the budget on the grounds it is too little and not focused enough on the best stimulus measures. However, Ignatieff would rather wait and build up the Liberal party. As things get worse for the economy they may get worse for Harper as well.

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