Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Environics' polling on inequality shows over 80% of Canadians wanting to see governments reduce the disparity between the rich and the poor - even as the current federal government moves as far as possible in the opposite direction:

More than eight in 10 Canadians suggested their governments have a responsibility to do something to reduce the gap between the wealthy and the rest of Canadians.

When asked whose job it is to address income disparities, a clear majority agreed strongly (52 per cent) or somewhat (30 per cent) that governments should actively find ways to shrink the gap.

- Meanwhile, Matthew Yglesias checks the evidence rather than taking corporatist dogma for granted, and finds that capital gains tax levels look to have little if any effect on actual investment:

Germany started charging capital-gains tax in 2009 and implemented a 25 percent rate on new investments. This seems to have changed nothing at all...

My bottom line is that while I'm not generally a deficit hawk, cutting the capital-gains tax rate without any budget offsets, as the Bush administration did in 2003, is incredibly irresponsible. Capital-gains tax cuts are extremely regressive, so if you really are a big believer in the growth-sparking impact of lower rates, the reasonable thing to do is offset the budgetary impact of the cut with a big progressive hike in ordinary income tax rates. If you're not willing to do that, then you're really just offering rich people a giveaway. Incurring the massive direct dissavings involved in a deficit-financed tax cut in exchange for some very-possibly-not-there incentive effect is crazy.

- And speaking of free money for those who don't need it: yes, the Cons are still planning to funnel an extra billion dollars per year in health-care funding toward Alberta at the expense of other provinces which need it more. And there's absolutely no way the change should be allowed to happen without some serious outcry from the regions that stand to lose out.

- Jennifer Ditchburn points out that the Cons have turned their usual smear tactics toward environmentalists and premiers, while Tim Naumetz reports on the attack ad launched by their "non-partisan" alter ego against Bob Rae.

- Finally, Dan Gardner points out the concept of fundamental attribution error as a reason to take a look at how international relations look from Iran's side.

On disciplinary problems

Come to think of it, this can probably be summarized in "shorter" form. So here's shorter Gerry Nicholls, Age 10:

MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!! Mr. Mayrand gave me detention for starting fights again! But it's not my fault. He only hates me 'cuz I call him Mr. Doodyhead!!! No fair!

On projection

Gerry Nicholls' latest most certainly demonstrates a pattern of interaction between Elections Canada and right-wing organizations. But it's the exact opposite of what Nicholls is trying to pretend.

Here's the sum total of Nicholls' evidence of a supposed "vendetta" by Elections Canada against Stephen Harper and the NCC:

Now before you write me off as paranoid, consider the background. Before the charge was laid against us, the NCC had long been a vocal opponent of Elections Canada's attempts to impose free-speech stifling third-party advertising laws on the country. We called them election gag laws.

In fact, in 2000, our president at the time -who happens to be current Prime Minister, Stephen Harper -went so far as to publicly call the then head of Elections Canada, Jean-Pierre Kingsley, a "jackass."

More to the point, the NCC also frustrated Kingsley by ceaselessly fighting his gag laws in the courts at every turn, delaying their implementation for years.

Now, it shouldn't take a particularly close examination of that "background" to notice that it involves absolutely no wrongdoing by Elections Canada.

In fact, the obvious conclusion is that the NCC went out of its way to attack Elections Canada at every opportunity, through both legal means and personal insults. And Elections Canada didn't take the bait: instead of sinking to the NCC's level, it chose only to work on enforcing the law as it stood. Which would seemingly be exactly what one would want out of an independent regulator.

But as far as Nicholls is concerned, his own side's jackassery (to apply the term where it actually belongs) somehow serves as evidence of wrongdoing on Elections Canada's part. Because apparently as soon as somebody is on the receiving end of enough baseless cheap shots, it can't actually do its job without been seen as harboring a vendetta.

Needless to say, there is indeed a parallel between that case and the Cons' in-and-out scandal. But the connection is that in both cases, Stephen Harper has tried to pre-emptively attack an independent regulator which can't return fire in the hope of avoiding being subject to the law - apparently keeping in reserve the ludicrous argument that his own unwarranted attacks could somehow be used to smear Elections Canada, rather than serving as evidence of his own bad faith.

Under those circumstances, the hard-earned "terrible news coverage" arising out of the Cons having brazenly broken the law is still far better than the Cons deserve.

Simple answers to simple questions

Leftdog:

Does the National Citizens Coalition Also Claim That Canada's Federal Court Of Appeal Is Retaliating Against Harper With In/Out Charges?

Yes. Along with Harper's own Director of Public Prosecutions. And the cursed inventors of paper and e-mail who are to blame for allowing damning evidence to be preserved. And reality in general, with its well-known anti-Harper bias.

Their words, not mine

For those wondering whether the right-wing focus on slashing taxes and the public service is even intended to result in economic benefits rather than simply being a matter of anti-government ideology, I'm not sure one could ask for a more decisive statement than Gerry Nicholls' latest commentary on the National Citizens Coalition:

Here's what (Paul Tuns) wrote about the NCC's response to the federal budget:
...

I'm just saying that the messaging from the NCC would have been clearer five or ten years ago; the NCC isn't supposed to be worried about job creation except as a talking point about lower taxes and less government.

Paul's comment reflects the weakness with the current NCC leadership. They have no clear understanding of true conservatism.