Friday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material to end your week.

- Sure, it's a plus to know that Canada's military is ready and willing to leap into action to protect what matters most to the government of the day. Now if only that meant something other than serving as political operatives to protect the Harper Cons' interests.

- Which is to say that the breaking robocall scandal is far from the only example of the Cons' anything-you-can-get-away-with mentality pointed out by John Ibbitson:

(I)t is certainly true the Tories push their campaign tactics to the edge of legality and sometimes beyond. They pleaded guilty last year to violating federal election laws in 2006 with their “in-and-out” scheme to fund the national campaign with money laundered through local campaign accounts.

And they may have instilled such an intensely partisan anything-you-can-get-away-with mentality among their campaign workers that one or more of them concluded it would be okay to cross the line of legality.

Political parties can’t be held responsible for the actions of rogue supporters. But they can he held accountable for creating environments that produce those rogues.

This is a mirror into which Stephen Harper and everyone who works for him should be looking.

- Meanwhile, Carol Goar slams Jason Kenney for ignoring what had been a reasonable set of compromises and accommodations developed in the previous Parliament to force through a bill designed to unduly restrict Canada's refugee system.

- Andrew Jackson points out how Andrew Coyne's attempt to dismiss Paul Krugman's economic prescription falls flat:

(A)s any reader of Krugman’s blog knows, he has acknowledged that a very modest US recovery is underway, while pointing out that the US economy is still operating well below its potential growth path.

He argues – incessantly – that the US economy needs additional stimulus if that gap is to be closed, and he has never argued that the first stimulus package had no effect, only that it was far too small to promote a meaningful recovery.

So there is absolutely no contradiction between what Krugman has argued and the fact of a very tepid US recovery.

Coyne goes on to side with the Fraser Institute argument that fiscal stimulus in Canada had no impact – an argument that has been thoroughly debunked by neutral economists such as Serge Coulombe...

- And given my own interest in chronicling what happens in Parliament, I'll readily note that it's worth reading about Elizabeth May's vigil in the House of Commons.