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Friday, June 12, 2009

Ignatieff Takes Time Deciding to Topple Government

The Conservative Government released the quarterly Economic Progress report. The reports were started in exchange for Liberal support for the 2009 budget. The report is an update as to how well the Government is doing at distributing the economic stimulus package.

The BQ and the NDP were quick to condemn the report during question period. Michael Ignatieff has decided he will wait until tomorrow to make a final decision. This gives him time to read the 234 page report. He has also promissed not to leave Canadians hanging by making a decions on Friday.

"What they expect of me is to do my job properly and I'm trying to do it properly. So I'm going to look at the report tonight if I get a minute and tomorrow, and then we'll make a decision," he said after giving a speech to Quebec business leaders.

Ignatieff gets full credit for not jumping to a decision. Either he has basically made a decision already or he better get his priorities in order and clear his schedule to give this more thought. Taking the time to make the right decision instead of jumping to conclusions or at the very least not playing with an open hand is an improvement under Dion's leadership.

The Liberals are climbing the polls and the economy will probably be on it's way to recovery if they wait to pull the plug on the Government. On the other hand this would be 4 elections in 5 years. The Liberals have been complaining the government has not been spending enough money while the deficit is too high. They also want to reduce qualifications for unemployment insurance to a bare minimum. These are not strong planks for building an election platform.

Hopefully the Liberals will take more time to rebuild before jumping into another election. The party needs to build itself up on principles and solid policies. Voters can sense opportunism and it will hurt them in both the long run and in the short run.

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