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tim powers

Prime Minister Stephen Harper makes an announcement with Mayor David Miller at the Toronto Reference Library on Oct. 16, 2009.MARK BLINCH

We live in a wonderful country, a wealthy country, a stable and healthy democracy. Clearly, that must be the case as one of the most pressing debates over the last numbers of days is the one involving how the Conservative government spends the public's money on the public. After years of having Liberals give our money to their friends I guess a period of adjustment is required.

Apparently, in Canada it is scandalous to invest taxpayers money into taxpayer-desired projects. You know the ones. The kind you find in places like Toronto and Newfoundland. Jurisdictions so enamoured with Stephen Harper that statutes have already been erected to him to pay homage to his governance. Dalton McGuinty, David Miller and Danny Williams, the "three Ds for Steve," taxpayers and decision-makers of a different stripe one and all have said okay to federal spending. They even worked cooperatively to get it. And it didn't come with the condition that the ring be kissed or they be photographed holding a big piece of cardboard with a goofy grin on their faces.

Yup, the public-money-for-the-public controversy has so outraged the Leader of the Opposition that, well, he has decided that now, oops, it is not the time tgo vote against the government. This new aggressive posture of giving tacit support to the government he condemns - on principle, I believe it was, not polls - coming to him only after being mauled by small children. Though that must have felt better than being walked over by the grown men and women in his caucus.

What next in Canada? A dialogue about whether the winter is colder than summer?

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