Canadian Election Watch - Day 10

Today's major party announcements:

The NDP's Layton Slams Harper on the economy and promises $100 million for job training and apprenticeship programs

Harper tried to defend himself and announced a $5,000 tax credit for first time home buyers

A group of demonstrators, including some Canadian Auto Workers members, used megaphones and placards in an attempt to disrupt Harper’s announcement and protest recent manufacturing job losses in the region.

Harper downplayed the protesters' presence, saying they were "the same protesters we get in every election."

Gee. I wonder why. Don't you, Steve?



From the same article, a new handy word:

In an interview on Tuesday, Liberal MP and former leadership candidate Bob Rae accused Harper of mismanaging consistent surpluses left over by previous Liberal governments.

"He had a $13-billion surplus waiting for him when he got there, and that's now down to just about zilch," Rae said from Halifax, where he was joining Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion for the first time in public during the campaign to announce the party's catastrophic drug coverage plan, aimed at the seriously ill, at Dalhousie University.

Rae's comments come as the Liberals launched a new advertising campaign criticizing "Harpernomics," while touting the party's Green Shift plan, which calls for taxing carbon fuels and shifting revenues to income tax cuts.

Meanwhile, the Liberals had a jarring end to their day when their geriatric plane had to make an emergency stop in Montreal "when a generator lost power", reports the G&M. Apparently, once they were safe, everybody got drunk:

With the plane downed, Liberal staffers started helping flight attendants serve drinks as reporters, staffers and politicians waited to see if they were staying or going.

They were last seen dancing around the airport to the sounds of The Clash.

Now, where was I? Oh yes. Earlier in the day, the Liberals pledged to spend $900 million on a catastrophic drug plan which, according to one NDP member I saw on my teevee, (Libby Davies ?) had also been promised in 1997. Whoops.

And check out this headline: PM says he'll govern as if he has a majority

He suggested while a majority is not to be expected, it is not to be feared.

In any event, he made clear that a stronger mandate would give him permission to run his legislative agenda as he sees fit.

There's that word: "mandate". Just what I warned about in my day 6 post. And here's why I could see that word coming from a mile/kilometer away. We certainly all know which posters line Steve's walls:



There are a few Tory scandals to update but I'll do that in a separate post.

As for Green Party news, there's this today: Elizabeth May, Knives & Peter MacKay

And last but not least, Gilles Duceppe is apparently trying to channel his inner cowboy (or something). Yeeha and all that.