RIGHT ON !!!!

Finally some people who are talking sense! The media in this country is doing a great disservice to us the Canadian people! They do not even try to hide the fact that they are anti conservative. If the Liberals and NDP were made to include the coverage they get from the Media in their Election expenses they would be way over budget! When asked questions, Stephane Dion and Jack Layton rarely answer the question and are never held to account the same way that Stephen Harper is. I think it is a disgrace the way the Media has handled this whole economic crisis around the world and Canada’s situation in it. The Media is supposed to be there to simply present the facts of all news, not try to impose their beliefs onto us. Let the Canadian Public think for themselves and make informed decisions based upon FACT only

Actually the media is acting as an agent of the Liberals and the NDP, provoking hysteria where none need exist. Coyne’s arguments are solid but won’t be published in the left leaning media. Hard to sell advertising when there is no crisis, real or imagined. The media motivation is selling not reporting. Look at TV and online media. Facts are optional and retractions appear on page 43759 in the bottom right corner.

You could have added these other positives:
- oil and gas prices are down saving consumers
- interest rates are down saving borrowers
- dollar is down to help exporters
- Economists outside Canada predict Canada will out perform all members of G8 in 2009
- The last thing we need is a carbon tax to negate all of that and slow the economy everywhere.
- It was interesting to note that the fat cat economists of the big five banks did not have one idea about what could be done to prevent the dire things that they were forecasting.
- The TD must not have believed their own BS as they raised interest rates the next day to try and fulfill their prophecy.

Doc is spot on!

I have to say, Mr. Coleman, that you, Andrew Coyne and the entire legion of ink-stained wretches and talking heads in the media are guilty of not living up to the standards of erudition and literacy that you assume unto yourselves or that we, the great unwashed in your audience, should expect from a class of people that presume to explain to us, the intricacies of political speak. In these cases, perhaps the fault for your negligence lies in a sub-standard educational system, or perhaps you just weren’t paying attention in English class.

As for the politicians guilty of the same litercy crime, it may be closer to misrepresentation (if not defamation) than simple misstatement.

I watched Mr. Harper’s press conference and he did not say, as you and Andrew Coyne quote; “the opposition parties were hoping for a recesssion…”. He said: “the opposition parties were VIRTUALLY hoping for a recession…”.

There is a vast difference between a straight, blatant accusation, which it was not, and the use of a literary allusion, modified by the word “virtually”, which maybe is too nuanced to be understood by people not of Mr. Harper’s Ontario Scholar literary credentials.

Conrad Black would get it. You, Coyne, and the mass media apparently didn’t. Or if some did and used it nonetheless to pillory Harper, then they qualfy with the likes of Layton & Ignatieff (I’ll forgive Dion unless the French translation was accurate) as blatant political opportunists, which I guess we already knew they were from countless other examples of their odious tactics.

Not much discussion about S Dion ’s plagerism is there ? Maybe wisecracking E May’s short rule is about to crash , although Stephanne can always put her in his cabinet ! Hope the media gets some common sense ,although i’d not want to bet on it !!What a disgrace !!! Even the world bank is saying we are better off than the others .Maybe Mr HARPER better start pushing the panic button soon !

Stephen Harper is basically on his own. Public ignorance and the left wing media are doing the opposition parties work for the opposition. Dion, Layton and May might as well take days off with this kind of support. Unfortunately, the truth will remain hidden. Even if the truth were known, the public would probably just dismiss it. Unless something dramatically happens before election day, Stephen Harper’s days as Prime Minister may be numbered. The liars and half truth tellers will have won the day.

How can I trust Mr. harper in any thing he says
1-I will not touch the trust units, three monthes later he does hundreds of thusands of dollars lost by investors.
2- senators shoud be elected he appontes 2 to his cabinet.
3-election date shoud be set date not decided by the P.M. has the motion passeded in the house he then decides to call an election one year earlier.
a man to be trusted????

The Liberals, NDP and the Greens with big help from what is actually their media, are whipping up as much confusion and fear as they can because they perceive it will benefit themselves. They care not that they are making things worse for the electorate. I read in a letter to the editor in the National Post someone wrote “the media keeps blowing out the candles and then reports how dark it is”. That pretty much describes it.
Too bad I don’t remember the fellows name to credit him.

During the Great Depression, there were no Canadian banks that failed vs. thousands in the U.S. Canada’s banking sector is far more secure than other countries in the G7.

The present crisis, however, is one of confidence and leverage. All banks have leverage by their very nature although many of the investment banks in the U.S. were leveraged up to 30 to 1. This crisis is playing out on an interconnected global financial system so yes, Canada can still be affected both in access to credit and economic growth.

Stephen Harper delineated the complexities of the present liquidity problems on CBC earlier this week with greater clarity and depth than any politician I have heard including Barrack Obama, John McCain, or Stephane Dion. Dion’s plan is to consult and gather information for 30 days and then determine what action to take…in other words, he does not have any clue of what to do.

Do we need a university professor trained in public policy, a lawyer or an economist? Personally, I would prefer someone whose has extensively studied global economics particularly in light of the complexity and intractability of the present problem. Each of us has to make a personal choice on such matters.

It is very difficult to actually understand all of the issues involved in this crisis and there is very little written by the media that sheds light on what is driving this crisis. The econ blogs are more helpful in this regard. In particular, Greg Mankiw’s blog has many pieces of interest including articles by Gary Becker and Edmund Phelps, both Nobel laureates in economics.

Income trusts (yes, I had those in my RRSP too) by contrast pale into insignificance to the scale of this global financial crisis. From what I can glean, this does not seem to be as serious as the Asian financial crisis but we should be taking these events very seriously as Jim Flaherty, Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkoski, and Gordon Brown are doing. We do not see a coordinated response by Central Bankers in the U.S., Canada and Europe for nothing.

I continue to lose faith with the Canadian public who listen to ‘fear’ mongers like Layton and Dion - rather than facts, that our economy is solid, and our banking is the ‘best’ in the world according to a report out of England. How can anyone expect the gov’t to protect each and everyone of us from a ‘world’ catastophe as is promised by Layton and Dion. These people will get what they voted for ‘fear mongers and liars’ - and that scares me more than any thing else. Have Canadians not learned anything with our higher standard of education and better news reports. Or is it the LIberal media once again at work making sure that Canadians are ’scared to vote’. It won’t be the first time - and it appears it will happen again.

Welcome to Canada. Where any right-think is quashed by the media and the public are led, if not told, what is the left, er, Liberal, er “correct” way that you should think. Big government and a press that supports that is correct. Big Government knows what is best for you, Canada.

As for the income trusts - any Finance Minister worth his position would have had to make the same decision as Jim Flaherty did. It is one thing to promise to leave income trusts alone. Income trusts are structured so that the “company” (the trust) does not pay much, if any, income tax. After the Conservatives came to power in Ottawa, some of Canada’s largest companies said they were looking at converting to income trusts. Faced with this huge shift of the tax base from “business” to “people”, JimFlaherty made the decision that is right for Canada.

Who pays the tax for income earned by an income trust? The owners of the trust. IF John Q. Public/Jean Q. Publique owns the trust units, once the return of capital portion of those “juicy” distributions reduces the tax cost to zero, the distributions become fully taxable. Just imagine the outcry then about my “tax free” income! Who should pay income tax? Only people, or should companies, however they are structured (corporation or trust) pay a share as well? People complain that companies don’t pay enough tax and that they should not be given any breaks, yet only blind ignorance can lead to the love of a “tax free” trust income.

I do not offer my apologies if any of the above facts do not fit any existing belief systemthe reader may have. I quote Mr. Coleman from earlier in the week: “Deal with it.”

Unfortunately we can always count on the media to fan the flames rather than to use a fire extinguisher. All protfessions have Codes of Ethics and
Stabdards of Practice, and prctitioners can be held accountable. I think
that “Journalits” and other media people who are in the public eye
should be regulated, licensed, and held to analogous standards. What
they are constantly and consistently doing is wholly irresponsible with
absolutely no accountability nor responsibility.