Planning for failure

While Canada's political scene is abuzz with discussion about the Cons' most recent wave of reckless and chaotic spending as epitomized by the Marquee Tourism Events program, Stephen Harper is apparently determined to make sure that any future wave of stimulus is similarly rushed rather than allowing for any intelligent planning:

Today, Prime Minister Stephen Harper downplayed the need for a second round of stimulus spending, as suggested by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, saying the priority should be to ensure countries are meeting their initial pledges.

"My own thought is before there's talk of additional stimulus, I would urge all leaders to focus first on making sure the stimulus that's been announced actually gets delivered," said Harper. "That's been our focus in Canada and I would encourage the same priority elsewhere."

Harper's government believes a recovery will take hold in 2010, and with the recession turning a corner, it's time for leaders to work through coordinated actions to wind down some of the extraordinary spending programs.

Now, it would be fair enough if Harper's position were simply one that the federal government should be planning for all possible contingencies. But contrasting his statement that we shouldn't even talk about additional stimulus with his government's public push for an "exit strategy" from the current round, it's clear that Harper's aim is something different entirely.

Instead, Harper's position looks to be exactly the same one which forced his government into its current panicked and ineffective stimulus package in the first place. Rather than making any effort to be prepared for any further economic downturn, he's stubbornly proclaiming that the recession which he said could never come is now over - and concurrently refusing to lay the groundwork for additional stimulus which might actually have some greater prospect of accomplishing anything positive than his government's current haphazard efforts. And it shouldn't come as much surprise if a few months down the road, we end up with an even worse excuse for a stimulus package as Harper tries to compensate for being proven wrong once again.