The Painful Education of the Con Clown Lisa Raitt

As you may have heard, the absurd Con clown Lisa Raitt is said to be preparing to enter the Con leadership race.

And to try to boost her profile she's been posing as the Con's finance critic, and attacking Justin Trudeau's plans for a national carbon tax.

But when she recounted the story about how of how her "friend Marie" might not be able to take one of her three boys to hockey practice because of that dastardly tax.

Some in the Commons couldn't help laughing.

The Liberal response to @lraitt’s friend facing financial trouble? Laughter. Their arrogance is unbelievable. pic.twitter.com/xR0THIvFMp

— Rona Ambrose (@RonaAmbrose) October 5, 2016

And as it turns out for good reason. 

For as Paul Wells points out, for a would be Great Economist Leader, Raitt is tragically mathematically challenged.

Wherever she lives, if her kids are in house-league hockey they are probably young enough to qualify for the Canada Child Benefit, introduced in Bill Morneau’s first budget. If Marie’s family income is $60,000 per year and her children are ages 6, 12 and 14, she’ll qualify for about $11,500 a year in child benefits, tax-free. This compares to $3,600 in taxable benefits under the Harper government’s old Canada Child Tax Benefit. Let’s say she now nets an extra $8,500 a year. 

Marie must drive a lot, if carbon taxes tip the balance. Perhaps she drives a Ram ProMaster City, whose combined city-highway fuel efficiency, I learn, comes out to 9.8 litres per 100 kilometres. Kind of middling. At 11 cents per litre, that means 100 km of driving would cost her an extra $1.08. 

To use up her net gain from the Canada Child Benefit on costlier hockey trips, Marie would need to drive 787,000 km a year. If the hockey season lasts 120 days, that’s 6,558 km per day. Perhaps Marie plans to drive from Moncton to Winnipeg and back for her kids’ games. If so, her enemy would not be the Liberals, but the provincial police: to get from Moncton to Winnipeg and back within a day she would need to drive at a constant speed of 273 km/h.

Before summing up his stinging indictment this way:

Raitt is thought to be contemplating a run at the Conservative leadership. This is the quality of work she brings to the floor of the House of Commons.

And leaving Raitt looking as ridiculous as the time she claimed the Liberals had blown a multibillion surplus the Cons had left them...



Only to follow that up by claiming that Justin Trudeau had no right to celebrate the anniversary of his marriage...



When in fact there was no multibillion dollar surplus. Just the phony one Stephen Harper and Joe Oliver had cooked up...



For crass political purposes.

And who can forget the time Raitt claimed that enhancing the Canada Pension Plan would ruin Canadians...



Even though every serious expert pointed out it wouldn't, and was badly needed.

And so much for the Con's finance critic, or Raitt as a Great Economist Leader.

And while we're at it, so much for Tony Clement who is also mathematically challenged in the worst possible way. 



Tony Clement’s leadership campaign is struggling to raise funds and attract caucus support, according to a source linked to the campaign. The source, who asked not to be named, said the campaign has brought in an estimated $12,000, adding they didn’t have an exact number.

Having failed to raise enough money to even buy himself a used gazebo.

When iPolitics asked a number of campaign veterans in August how much a serious candidate would need to raise to run a credible campaign, the lowest number given was $500,000. Some suggested a figure closer to $1 million.

And of course so much for the Con leadership race.

A disaster in the making.

And always always a farce....