Harperland and the Winter of Our Discontent

Gawd. It's getting grim out there in Harperland. I've never seen so many people looking so miserable and so grumpy. Every subway window seemed to me today like a framed picture of despair.

The weather's brutal, the credit card bills are coming in, the future has never seemed more uncertain, the country never so lost. People are screaming at each other like maniacs on comment boards everywhere. It truly is the winter of our discontent.

And to make things even grimmer, if that's possible eh? There was Andrew Coyne today agonizing over why Stephen Harper is so unpopular. 

Real wages, household incomes, average net worth: all are at or near all-time highs. Unemployment is back below seven per cent: not as low as in the boom years of the last decade, but lower than at most times in the past 40 years. The proportion of the population on “low income” is the lowest it has been since Statistics Canada began collecting data on it. 

The paradox remains: How could a government presiding over such a strong economy be so unpopular? It is unusual enough for a governing party to fall, and stay, below 30 per cent in the polls. But to do so in good times? Unheard of.

And in the process helping to spread the myth that Harper is a Great Economist Leader. 

When in fact he's just a Con man who is only interested in killing government. He's so ignorant with numbers, or so crooked, he gave Pamela Wallin's expenses a passing grade...



When Pammy comes after him it's not going to be pretty.

And his job creation record is so appalling, for that alone he should be FIRED.

Net new job creation has barely kept pace with population growth, and the employment rate has been stagnant for almost three years—languishing far below its pre-recession highs. No wonder it still feels like a recession in the labour market; by this key measure, we are hardly any better off than during the darkest days of the financial crisis.

He hasn't created enough jobs, most of the jobs he has created are lousy ones, young people are losing hope, retirees are filling grocery bags just to survive.

All he has to show for his phony job grant plan is an expensive propaganda campaign in search of a program.

As the federal government struggles to get provinces on board with the new Canada Job Grant, focus groups felt that a federal government ad campaign was effective in promoting the still-nonexistent program.



Which made people feel warm, and then feel CHEATED.

And even if Harper does come up with pot of money, by slashing services and killing jobs, so he can bribe voters with an income splitting proposal, it's also much less than advertised. 

Solberg and his former colleagues in the Harper government are trying to spin this as a panacea for everyday families, but the largest share would go to high-income families where one partner is in the top tax bracket and the other has no earned income. 

Even worse, the Conservative approach to income splitting would provide no benefit at all to single-parent families – even though more than a quarter (28%) of all children live in families headed by a single parent. The same holds true for families where both partners work and have incomes below $43,561.

And in an angry grumpy country it will only stoke the resentment of all those who paid for the program but didn't reap its benefits. 

They'll all want to be paid off eh?

As if Great Leader didn't have enough problems...



Because that sordid senate scandal isn't going anywhere. 

And the main reason Stephen Harper isn't going anywhere either, no matter what he says or does, is because after eight years most Canadians can't stand the sight of him anymore.

They don't like him, they don't trust him, they just want him to GO.

Which of course explains why he has been keeping such a low profile. Hiding from the public, avoiding the cameras, even if that means ignoring the plight of a million Canadians freezing in the dark.

And reduced to putting out a solitary tweet like this one today to show he's still with us...

Thank you to the 56 437 @ORNose volunteers who helped keep our roads safe this holiday season.
— Stephen Harper (@pmharper) January 3, 2014

In body if not in mind.

And even if it suggests that he may be drinking heavily, and is at the very least clearly DESPERATE...



Yes indeed, I don't know why so many progressives are feeling so grumpy. But I'm not eh?

When they've got to hide him to make him more popular you know The End cannot be far off. 

He's losing his moxy, he's losing his marbles. He's almost good to GO.

What more can we ask for in this winter of our discontent?

Have a great weekend everybody !!!

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