At today's Economic Update

Some wondered what today's "fun" post that I mentioned yesterday was going to be... I got to attend today's Economic Update in person, that's what.


The Prime Minister was at his best today, especially the Q&A session he did afterwards. He's always on top of his game when he does Q&A, even unscripted with the media... memo to the braintrust, let him do it more often! I really hope someone posts the footage of that, because it was great stuff, and the Prime Minister was much more of the easy-going and personable guy that very few Canadians ever get to see.


His speech was great, he conveyed a lot of good information about the stimulus package, information that the media hasn't been relaying to Canadians. (whether that's intentional or not, I don't know, but I do have my suspicions) One significant piece of good news is that housing starts, a key indicator of the economy, were up by 10,000 units last month. Several of our Budget initives are having an effect, as new home buyers are taking advantage of low interest rates and new programs to jump into the market.

One interesting thing in noted in watching CTV Newsnet's reporting of the event was that they deliberately cut off the Q&A session. CTV was talking to Craig Oliver, and the anchor made the comment, "I see the Prime Minister is doing a Q&A session, do we have time to go to that? ...no, okay, we don't have time.", and they moved on instead. Yea, RIGHT, you don't have time... a 24-hour news channel, and you don't have time to cover the PM? Uh-huh... I'm thinking it was a deliberate SNUB because he wasn't taking questions from reporters. For the record, the questions were direct and hard hitting, they weren't softballs.

First question: "What will happen to the stimulus money if an election is called?" Okay, that one was kinda a softball, but he leveled a very direct challenge to Michael Ignatieff, pointing out that because the Business of Supply has not been dealt with by the House, THE STIMULUS MONEY WILL BE FROZEN AND/OR GONE IF THE HOUSE FALLS. I'm betting Iggy and the Liberals DON'T want Canadians to know that minor little detail, eh? Make sure Canadians know that... if Iggy brings the House down, it's because they're only looking out for themselves, NOT Canadians.

Second question: "You said during the election, 'No Deficits', then we went into deficit. Can you explain to me why?" The PM nail this tough one, discussing some of the decisions made by the G20 as a collective, and elaborating on why we can manage this. The Prime Minister also expounded further, and was very clear about the differences between ideology of our Government and the Opposition parties... ALL OF THEM, without exception, want to increase spending on a permanent basis, which dispite their best assurances to the contrary WILL involve tax increases. We, however, recognize that the best approach for the Canadian economy in the long run is targeted and short term stimulus that will END in the near future, allowing Canada to return to a surplus fiscal situation. He also pointed out that it was because Canada had been paying off our debt during the good years that we're in the most enviable economic position of all the G7 countries.

All in all, it was a great event, and if the media simply reports what happened there, the feedback will be positive. Of course, if they're only offering up portions and then spinning it, well, that's another story.

To that end, I encourage the media to offer up the footage of the PM's Q&A session on their websites, so Canadians can see what the PM is really like, and that he's not the wooden pre-concieved image that they choose to feed Canadians.