Last week Charles Adler interviewed Michael Marzolini from Pollara. What caught my ear was the pollster’s editorializing that Canadians were concerned about our economic prospects – due to sluggishness of the US economy and what we “saw for themselves” (or words to that effect) of the gloomy employment situation south of the border.
Canadians’ concerns that the U.S. economy will worsen in 2007 has body-checked Canada’ four-year trend of ever-increasing economic optimism, according to a new national poll released this morning by Michael Marzolini, Chairman of POLLARA Inc., at a breakfast meeting of the Economic Club of Toronto.
I waited for the followup – qualification by Marzolini that those perceptions are largely inaccurate and that the US economy continues to outperform our own. That didn’t happen. Instead, what followed was more evidence that we in Canada are routinely fed “findings” by pollsters who are negligently uninformed, analysed by media too lazy to confirm whether the premises – much less the conclusions – are valid.
Of course, he’s not alone;
The Canadian Chamber says Canada’s average annual real GDP growth will be 2.8 per cent in 2006 when all the numbers are counted, but that GDP growth will slow to 2.4 per cent in 2007. There are several factors for the projected slowdown, but key is lower U.S. demand for Canadian exports as a result of continuing economic weakness south of the border.
The Chamber projects that the Canadian economy will limp home as 2006 concludes, struggling to reach 2 per cent growth in the final quarter.
I cite that source not for the Chamber’s take on expectations or opinion on American prospects, but for the figure of 2.8% growth rate in the Canadian economy for 2006. Now, let’s look at that struggling American economy.
Economists are hastily upgrading their forecasts for the US economy after a series of surprisingly strong reports suggesting the so-called “soft landing” may be over and growth is accelerating.
Over the past week, surprises have come in stronger-than-expected reports on US job creation, the trade balance and retail sales — all key contributors to economic activity.
Lehman Brothers chief US economist Ethan Harris on Friday boosted his forecast for fourth quarter 2006 growth to an annualized rate of 3.3 percent, a leap from the firm’s prior call for just 2.0 percent growth.
And all those jobless workers?
The latest data showed US employers added a healthy 167,000 new jobs in December, with unemployment holding at a low 4.5 percent. Average wages were up 4.2 percent annually.
That’s right – the national rate in the US is still 1.5% below that of Canada’s 30 year lows.
What most are aware of however, is that our economic growth isn’t evenly distributed. Unemployment rates in Calgary are around 2% at the moment, while Quebec’s contribution to those “lowest jobless numbers in 30 years” is 7.5%.
Now, over to Joan Tintor, who interrupts the 24 hour coverage of global warming to provide this little-reported bookend.
Ontario slips into negative growth in third quarter; GDP minus 0.1 per cent
[…]
This is Ontario’s first quarter of negative GDP growth since the SARS-induced recession of 2003. Before that, the last negative-growth quarters were in 1992. It’s certainly the first negative growth on McGuinty’s watch.
News which is sure to send media outlets back to the pollsters to ramp up the message that the “sagging” US growth and employment rates are dragging our “more bouyant” Canadian economy down.
(More data)
Update – Michael Marzolini responds in the comments.
Related – “You gotta love Decima, if they didn’t exist the Liberals would have to create them.”
“News which is sure to send media outlets back to the pollsters to ramp up the message that the “sagging” US growth and employment rates are dragging our “more bouyant” Canadian economy down.”
It’s those layoffs at Yankee owned auto makers in Ont. that have brought down our buoyant economy.
Harper’s fault, somehow.
Doubt this headline will show up on Warren’s blog….
Should be a worry for Harper as well.
For years the Democrats and the Media (same thing) have tried to talk down the US economy as we all know that Bush is a dork and everything he does is a complete disaster like tax cuts. Hence the popular belief that the American economy sucks even though since after 911 and SARS it has been booming. The Canadian media incapable of independent thought from their American superiors at the New York times and CBS news have bought this message hook, line and sinker.
What I find totally depressing is how many in the Canadian business community seem to be incapable of independent thought. The business shows on TV all spout this same negative nonsense based on what facts? Are they all lefties? Do they all want Bush to fail? Do they all want Democrat politicians to be elected and put up more trade barriers further weakening Canadian business prospects?
Ever so slowly – as the internet blosphere matures the pollsters and MSM will become increasingly suspect as purveyors of factual informatioN. Polls in many respects are a scourge in the field of public information abetted by bias in conglomerate Canadian MSM.
Truth in polls?
Perhaps. Perhaps not.
Truth in TV news?
Perhaps.
Perhaps not.
MSM…how does that old saying go?
“Don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is already made up”…
Couldn’t help but pick up on this:
“What most are aware of however, is that our economic growth isn’t evenly distributed. Unemployment rates in Calgary are around 2% at the moment, while Quebec’s contribution to those “lowest jobless numbers in 30 years” is 7.5%.”
Amazing how averages work. If Quebec is taken out of the equation the numbers look fantastic. What’s worse is Quebec’s situation is completely a product of their own socialist manufacturing.
Just food for thought. Averages are misleading. If my feet are on fire and my a$$ is sitting on a block of ice – on average my knees are just nice and comfortable.
I wonder what the average Canadian thinks?
Derek,
“I wonder what the average Canadian thinks?”
Given the POLLARA question, evidently he or she does not.
Furthermore, Canada should ALWAYS be outperforming the US economy just to keep pace because we are starting from a lower economic base.
It’s been amazing to watch the same Canadians who blame free-trader Bush for not solving cross border disputes celebrate the electoral gains of pro-barrier Democrats in Congress, as though it means brighter days ahead for our trading relationship …
I was through California during a “recession” that I had been hearing about for years.
My son , now a young man , still talks about my comment, “if this is a recession we need some of this in Canaduh” I was absolutely overwhelmed by the activity. Contrast that with the recession in Ontario of about 10 years ago where you could drive by miles of shutdown factories and broken roads until you reached a city of gold – Ottawa, spending lavishly on itself with ill gotten money from an entire empire.
my spawn remember that too, along with the national capital commission numbering the trees with little brass plates, maybe an early accounting system for greenhouse gas reduction.
Ace, you are correct. That just means declining standard of living.
Never understood why everyone thought a low dollar was great. That just means you took a paycut.
Anyway, glad the US is doing well. Be nice to see further tax cuts up here, since that is what is fuelling a lot of this.
It will be interesting to see where the deficit figures come out in the US this quarter, with higher than expected growth, it means that tax revenues should be up.
Gosh if that deficit goes away while they are fighting two wars like this then there is an enourmous amount of fiscal capacity in the US.
If there were peace and the expenditures for military fell…..no wonder the french worry!
Ace – Couldn’t agree more. Henry Ford said, “Thinking is hard work. That’s why so few people do it.”
Polls are very closely linked to the problems that statistics come with. And we all know what Mark Twain had to say about stats.
Does everyone remember when the Dow broke an all time high under Clinton? The media went nuts about it. The DOW has been breaking all time highs for the last few months now with nary a mention from any of the jenyusses.
By the way, did you hear Chris Mathews talking about the New war plan and saying that Cheney just likes to kill? yikes…waaaay over the top.
I remember when we were having a recession in the West and the feds had to raise the interest rates because of a heated economy in the East.It spelled the end for many farmers with floating interest loans,floating interest loans that used to have legislation prohibiting them.
“Slowing in the US economy” is code for … the Yanks aren’t buying as many cars built in Ontario nor wood from Canada because their housing starts are down.
40% of all goods and services made in Canada are bought in the USA. We are totally dependant upon the USA for our well being. But this latest “woe is me” blame game is analogous to Quebec that is totally dependant upon the ROC for supporting their ill conceived socialism, however that doesn’t stop Quebecers from bashing the ROC and feeling morally superior.
I heard Ontario Conservative John Tory over a year ago talking about how Ontario had lost 200,000 manufacturing jobs in the prior year. There is still no coverage of this is in the Globe and Mail, no criticism of Liberal Premier McGuinty who overtaxes us so he can have money to buy back MRIs from private “Mike Harris style” Health Clinics and keep Ontario safe from private solutions.
Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams chased out Chevron from its Hebron oil development project because he does not understand the dynamics of global oil production, hence workers are leaving Newfoundland for Alberta.
Canada needs tax cuts for business pronto. We tax capital as if it was a sin for a company to have capital, the economic oxygen for survival. The world is not standing still, we can’t expect to just continue to get production orders from the USA and put our goods on a truck and ship them south. Other countries are competing with us for those US purchase orders. We are running out of time to create an investment climate in Canada that will spur innovation, R&D and improve productivity so that our expensive labour can compete with India and China and Brazil.
To put it in a nutshell, I’m not surprised that pollsters are sprouting nonsensical, incorrect opinion as if fact. I’ve come to expect it.
Pollsters are full of crap. I’m inclined to consider them as almost a part of the leftist state apparatus, seeing as they consistently opine thru a leftist-manipulative filter.
Stephen,
There are some benefits to a low dollar. One of those benefits includes an artificial economic advantage when dealing with the US. As an example for Canadian companies exporting to the US, when the US dollar with worth $1.50 CAD (or more) every dollar US that you get for your product is worth $1.50 CAD. If you have set up US pricing (which is not directly linked to the Canadian dollar) you have a built in additional margin. Drop that exchange rate to what it is today and all at once you need to step up your competitiveness. Basically, the rise in the Canadian dollar costs exporters corresponding amounts of margin in their sales and therefore profits.
“I wonder what the average Canadian thinks?”
Given the POLLARA question, evidently he or she does not.
Ace, you hit the nail on the proverbial head. Unfortunately, unlike a lot of people these days that check out stories from several sources and check up on facts that just don’t sound right, most Canucks just scan the headlines and take what is fed to them by the MSM and accept it as gospel. A case where perception becomes fact and propagated through 15 second sound bites.
“I wonder what the average Canadian thinks?”
Not much, as proof is in the pudding – who got voted in for a decade…
Liberals
Hobbes…you are partially right, but one of the problems with a low-dollar(read subsidized) is that Canuck companies are not forced to become productive and innovative in their manufacturing. Thus, when the loonie rises, all of a sudden the obselete machinations of the average 1960’s Canuck company show just how inept and unproductive they really are. Yeah it may hurt for a while, but let the buck rise, and the market will either force these companies to become productive, or they will go the way of the Dodo. A win-win situation.
I think the benefits of a low Canadian dollar are outweighed by the uncertainty of the rates. Business should buy complicated and expensive contracts to mitigate some of the future dollar risks but not all them do. Canada could go to a US dollar and completely rid itself of this problem and IMHO changing to a US dollar does not present a challenge to Canadian sovereignty. I think a more profitable and prosperous Canada would always make for a more stable union. Canadian ‘hewers of wood and drawers of oil and water’ form an excellent economic base which should enable Canadians to greatly prosper, but the Canadian beauracracy is very powerful and the political infighting is truly remarkable. PMSH is the best bet for Canada right now. And he definately has his work cut out for him. The Ontario and Detroit auto industries will reap what they have sown. Thanks Buzz. And the electricity in Ontario will have to be bought and paid for eventually. Thanks Bob Rae. Ottawa and TO and Montreal etc. still seem to believe that the rules of the market do not apply to them. And as long as Alberta and the Western provinces bail them out, I guess they are right.
I agree that a weak dollar was hiding our weak productivity improvement from a lack of R&D expenditure in Canada because just like everything else, Canada was piggybacking off the USA and a low Lonnie made it easy to compete for trade.
Also we should never, ever talk about foreign exchange rates without talking about corresponding interest rates, which drive the F/X rates.
Chrétien and Martin drove down interest rates in the early 90’s. Interest rates were historically higher than the USA to attract needed capital, but under the Liberals the rates were dropped lower than the US. That did 2 things, it cut the interest carry on our domestic debt and made the Liberals look good as it helped balance the budget. But it drove the exchange rate down to 60 cents. At that level exports picked up even faster than they would. Now 85% of our trade is with the USA and a weak Lonnie relative to our only trading partner was just that … weak.
But at 60 cents, Canada could keep shipping product across the border and not worry about Hyundai competition in Seoul. Now our manufacturing competitiveness is in trouble. The only one way to fix that is to either drop interest rates and cause inflation or cut taxes and let our entrepreneurs keep more funds to invest in productivity improvements.
Now things are quite a bit more complicated. The Lonnie is really a petro-dollar. So our Ontario exporters shipping to Michigan have to contend with an extra element of risk, relative to say an Ohio exporter to Michigan in the same currency. Exchange risk with the USA is just one more problem that the Liberals swept under the rug for 13 years. Now our businesses have an extra headache.
Media Polls; has anyone ever seen raw polling data and a list of those polled ??
Been asking this question a couple of years now. Lefties ? enviros ? anyone ?
Perhaps so-called ‘exclusive polls’ are exclusively the figment of a propagandists’ imagination.
Kate,
You are encouraged to read the speech. That will help you to understand that a public opinion survey does not measure GDP, housing starts, and trade-deficits – only public attitude and intent. “Mood” is what Pollara is reporting here – not economics. Though this recent apprehension does impact on spending, saving and investing – and as such, public attitude toward the economy often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The five chief bank economists on the panel had no trouble with the results or analysis, and know that the data Pollara has been collecting for 23 years has some value.
Your readers should understand that perception and reality are two different things – though in many cases perception is, or often becomes, the reality.
Thanks for the crtique. Your blog remains a must-read.
Cheers,
Michael
Not to worry, all those in TO will improve the jobs and manufacturing output, when they all spend thousands of dollars going green in order to get a tax cut of 1000.00. But, they have to contend with their gods stmt that working for easy money in not good for the environment. Anyone priced out the cost of a new stove, washer/dryer/fridge/freezer lately. But, how many of those appliances are made in canada. I don’t think many families could afford to replace everything at once, and one at a time wont make a difference. Glad winter has hit the east, but they will just call it an example of climate change and evidence that GW is a real issue.
One reason housing starts are down in the USA is there were no hurricanes devastating whole communities.
To keep things simple enough for the Sheeple of Ontario….. Just Blame Bush and call Harper his stooge! That’ll be the answer to all your problems.
Marz and Mary…….symaptico!
“Your readers should understand that perception and reality are two different things – though in many cases perception is, or often becomes, the reality.”
Considering that the U.S. economy is doing so outstandingly well, and considering this includes the absorption of some (estimated to be as high as) 20 million undocumented foreign workers and their families, then I perceive the U.S. economy to be something beyond our ability to understand in the reality of our situation in Canaduuuuuhhh.
So , Mr. Marzolini, what exactly is the value of your poll?
I suppose it tells us how remarkably uninformed the citizens of Canada are.
I hope you are not telling us that momentous decisions are being made based on opinions of a population who have no facts to back up their opinions.
Michael, my complaint had nothing to do with whether you were measuring mood or perception, or what you said in a speech given to bankers. It was based upon the interview you did with Adler, where, instead of pointing out the gap between public perception and the published data, you went out of your way to reinforce the perception – even dismissing his comment there was little sign of slowdown if you were to visit a US shopping mall.
In my opinion, a pollster’s job includes identifing those moments when public opinion isn’t based on quantifiable fact – otherwise, the polling process crosses the line from measuring public opinion into that of manipulating it
It is in those moments that the knowledgeable listener or viewer looks at your industry and asks a very good question – why should we trust you?
if you were to isolate eastern Ontario, the number would show that we are in recession big time….since dalton mcliar took the reins of power, the extra tax burden, as well as his anti-business/anti-american slant, things have went downhill….on top of that, 15% of the population has no family doctor, 20% of surgeries cancelled daily, tourism down 30% in the last 3 years, and trending lower, another term of dalton mctaxandspendliberal will surely finish us off
Mary T, good point on the drop in US housing starts due to a lack of “climate change induced hurricanes in 2006”.
We managed to get a decent Energuide rebate which covered the cost of a new furnace, water heater and attic insulation, but not my sweat equity!
If Marzolini’s “perception becomes reality”, we better start hoping for a nice neutral climate, that drug users will rehab, crimes drops…you get the idea.
Mary T,
probably the hurricanes did have something to do with it, but our housing market was most affected by interest rates.
We were in a very low interest rate climate for such a long period of time that it created a real housing boom as people could get loans so cheap.
The housing market was so hot, and the demand so insatiable, that sellers began to bid up the prices to an extravagant degree. This attracted speculators who rushed into the market purchasing at say $125,000, and selling it 6 or 15 months later for $300,000.
Finally, the Fed began to see the spectre of a little inflation and started to raise interest rates. Interest rates in the US currently are not high, but they are high enough to dampen a little enthusiasm in the housing market.
Finally, in reference to these derogatory articles in the Canadian press: It’s really quite remarkable, because the US, like any country, always has a lot of things to legitimately criticize.
However, to satisfy whatever this insatiable need is in Canada to criticize the US, the Canadian press doesn’t bother to try to find out what is really upsetting people, they just make stuff up or stick some misplaced downward bias in inappropriately and call it a story.
Gee, I wonder why most Canadians are misinformed…
You want to see ridiculous house prices, check out those in Fort St. John, BC. Single trailers going for over 100,00, and single homes for over 300,000. But, most of those buying them are out making the easy money that is bad for the ecomomy according to dion. I know hurricanes are not the only reason for housing starts, but I just wanted to get a hit in on the envirowackos re gw.
“Your readers should understand that perception and reality are two different things – though in many cases perception is, or often becomes, the reality.”
(Posted by: Marzolini at January 15, 2007 01:08 PM)
Mr. Marzolini,
I can read, and I do read here.
Spin it any way you want, but your postulated end result (IN REALITY) is pure BS!
Down here south of the border where I live, in a rather chronically depressed area, anyone who wants to work is working. In fact, a large number of companies and health-related facilities are offering “signing bonuses”, and have been for the last two years.
You can try to force your perceptions into someone else’s reality, but here the facts are the facts… and they ain’t supportin’ you.
Yoop
Mary T, I hear you. St. John sounds like it’s really crazy right now.
My suggestion to these Canadian journalists is to find out how to read American economic indicators. I’ve seen this before. Canadian journalists making up stories about the US economy, apparently without any reference whatsoever to widely published economic indicators here in the US.
You know, last week the American stock market had record highs two days in a row. Surely broad indicators like this would at least cause a journalist to hesitate and check on American indicators like consumer sentiment and so forth.
A good deal of the time when the Canadian press is talking about the depressed American economy, it’s actually during a period of great prosperity in the US.
I mean, it would be so easy to find something legitimate to criticize about the US. For example, when interest rates are very low, they could legitimately bitch that retirees are not getting as much from CDs or something, but they just sally forth into the wind completely contrary to the facts.
Marzolini responded. Credit where credit is due I suppose – he’s got some guts – unlike the retarded CBC.
“and as such, public attitude toward the economy often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Well than I’m probably the big reason the pollsters economy runs the way it does in Canada.
You know, always seeming to owe the liberals the next election, just like the Quebec ad firms and the MSM owe them.
I’ll have to admit that I always had the “attitude” that pollsters were paid to get the perceptions of Canadians down on paper in a radical lefty and unrealistic representation of our real understanding, so that the polling figures themselves can be used to “push poll” us deeper into socialism and increased mood sensitivity.
Eg. “Canada does not want a spring election”
This “attitude” was polled out of Canada during the fed liberals lowest election predictions.
(As told to us by pollsters)
My fault!
Why all the crying re bad times in Ont. After all, the god of toronto, dion, has said working for money is bad for the economy and they are just following his orders and eliminating jobs.
Wrong, again!
July 18, 2005
Harper to blame for poor Tory numbers: Pollster
Canadian Press
OTTAWA — The gift of scandal and voter fatigue with the four-term Liberal government have done little for Stephen Harper’s Conservatives, a new poll suggests.
A Pollara poll gives the Liberals a commanding advantage — 11 points ahead of their arch-rivals, with staggering leads in battlegrounds like B.C., the Toronto area and Atlantic Canada.
Pollara’s chairman says the Canadian electorate wants to punish the Liberals and there’s only one explanation for such a large lead.
“The whole thing is Stephen Harper at this stage,” said Michael Marzolini, who was a longtime Liberal pollster.
“Liberal support is artificially high now because of him.
“If the Conservatives didn’t have this hamstring around them . . . they would be in the high 40s in the polls.
“A Brian Mulroney type of Conservative leader would have Conservatives in the 50s right now.”
Instead the Official Opposition lagged behind at 27 per cent — while the Liberals were at 38 per cent, the Pollara poll suggested. The NDP was at 15 per cent.
Barely two months ago, the Liberals were being pummelled by the sponsorship scandal and worried they might be turfed from office.
Now the Pollara numbers would put the Liberals within a hair — perhaps just one or two points away — from winning a majority government, Marzolini said.
The poll’s 2.8-per-cent margin of error could put the Liberals in majority territory, or at just under 35 per cent support, not enough to make the leap.
As well, the Liberals would have to pick up seats in Quebec — an unlikely event, given the sponsorship scandal.
That’s the one saving grace for the Tories.
In that province, the Liberals were at 24 per cent _ 36 points behind the Bloc Quebecois. The Tories had five per cent in Quebec, and the NDP had six.
In B.C. the Liberals held a 21-point lead, 44 to 23 per cent. Even the NDP was well ahead of the Tories at 28 per cent.
In Atlantic Canada it was 45 Liberal, 33 Conservative, 20 NDP.
The two biggest parties were tied in Ontario outside Toronto, but the Liberals held a 25-point lead in the Toronto area.
The Conservatives held a nine-point lead over the Liberals in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
One academic expert on public-opinion polling says the Pollara survey would produce a nearly identical result to last year’s election.
The Liberals would probably gain a dozen seats in B.C., lose a dozen in Quebec and wind up again with about a 135-seat minority, said Barry Kay of Wilfrid Laurier University.
He recently published a paper blaming Harper for the Tories’ troubles in recent months.
He said Harper failed to manage his caucus, failed to control the parliamentary agenda, and failed to properly sell his party to Canadians.
“Harper has consistently looked like Wile E. Coyote being outmanoeuvered by the Roadrunner,” Kay wrote.
“Then after being outstrategized, he shows the gracelessness to engage in name-calling and demonization.”
The Tories would have had enough votes to topple the Liberals on May 19 if not for Belinda Stronach’s defection and Chuck Cadman, a one-time Tory, who was sitting as an Independent.
Harper reacted to Stronach’s departure by questioning her intellectual depth. The key question, Kay said, is why he couldn’t get her and Cadman onside.
“Why didn’t Harper make sufficient entreaties to bring Cadman back into the fold?” Kay wrote.
“Why . . . couldn’t (he) have been more adroit in schmoozing, flattering and cajoling caucus members, especially ambitious ones like Stronach?”
In the meantime his Tories were losing allies on key votes — first the NDP, and then the Bloc Quebecois on several votes in late June.
Harper called the Liberal-NDP budget amendment a deal with the devil. And he questioned the Bloc’s legitimacy in Parliament.
But he missed a golden opportunity to tell Canadians what changes the Tories wanted to bring to the country, says Marzolini.
He said the key error came when Harper had a chance to address the country on national television and used that moment to speak about the Liberal sponsorship scandal — something all voters were already aware of.
Harper is touring Canada this summer and putting forward his own policy ideas on issues such as health care, child care, and immigration.
Marzolini says that would be a welcome change from talking about scandal and same-sex marriage.
Harper sees the same-sex issue as a winner with ethnic voters but it’s a loser with those he most needs to reach — women and urban and younger voters, Marzolini says.
And he says Pollara surveys have shown that even ethnic voters straying away from the Liberals have been more likely to turn to the NDP than the Tories.
“Every time Stephen Harper talks about same-sex marriage he’s not just opposing that issue. He’s campaigning for intolerance,” Marzolini said.
“That’s how Canadians see it.”
The survey of 1,259 Canadians was conducted between July 4 and 8. It is considered accurate within 2.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
Geez, sorry for the long previous comment Kate.
Wrong again, again.
“Michael Marzolini, formerly the federal Liberals official pollster, said the secrecy of the most recent sponsorship allegations gave them a short-lived cachet that won’t stand up now that they’ve been made public.
He said the renewed talk of kickbacks simply ”pushes the reset button for the Liberal party to bring them back to where they were at the last election.
”The attitude then was, ‘there are criminals involved.’ Nobody was giving anybody the benefit of the doubt. People assumed the worst.
”Is this the worst? I don’t know, but it just brings it back to zero and (the Liberals) were there before,” said Marzolini. ”And frankly, they haven’t made much progress since the last election at improving themselves from zero.”
Marzolini argues that regardless of the immediate fall-out in Ontario, no federal election is immediately in the offing. It would be in the interest of neither Liberals nor Conservatives.
”People with an understanding of public opinion know that only (Bloc Quebecois Leader) Gilles Duceppe stands to benefit if they can somehow bring down the government.”
Mike does what he can to Institutionalize moonbat Anti Americanism
February 09, 2004
Canadian Attitudes toward President George W. Bush
According to a new poll, only 15 per cent of us would vote for the President
Jonathon Gatehouse
Macleans
In a national survey, Maclean’s asked Canadians for their opinions of the President. MAYBE IT’S THAT SMUG LITTLE SMILE. His penchant for fantastically expensive military photo-ops. Or the swaggering, belt-hitching walk that cries out for a pair of swinging saloon doors. And though, God knows, we have too many of our own syntactically challenged politicians to be casting stones, shouldn’t the leader of the free world know that “misunderestimate” isn’t a word? Yes, we’re cavilling, but clearly there is something about George W. Bush that gets under the skin of Canadians. After all, vehemently disagreeing with the policies of American presidents is almost a national pastime. There has to be another explanation for our extreme reaction, the desire afoot in the land to see him turfed from office. That and the unprintable sentiment about him and the horse he rode in on. Even before we know whom he will be running against this fall, Canadians have made their decision. Only 15 per cent, according to an exclusive new Maclean’s poll, would definitely cast a ballot for Bush if they had the opportunity. And if Americans remain almost evenly divided — some 50 per cent approve of his performance in the White House and he’s running neck and neck with his likely Democratic challengers — there is no such dithering on this side of the border. Just 12 per cent of us feel Canada is better off since he took office, and only a third of respondents will admit to liking the world’s most powerful man, even just a little bit.
It’s an antipathy that appears to extend far beyond our traditional coolness towards Republicans, says Michael Marzolini, chairman of Pollara Inc., the Toronto-based opinion research firm that conducted the national survey.
More hidden economic good news:
http://newsbusters.org/node/10160
http://newsbusters.org/node/10180
Polls. Kate wonders; “.. Why should we trust you ?”
We don’t !!!
Put up a poll question Kate;
//////////////
Do you believe the Main Stream Media polls are unbiasedly conducted and truthfully reported ??
check
No o
Yes o
/////////////////
Speaking of polls,
The Globe’s “Have you come to believe that Canada would be better off without Quebec ?”
Yes 59% and No 41% (couple of hours ago.)
For awhile now, when I click “results” it leads to just a blank page. Will monitor it to see if it was just a temporary “clitch”.
If I had my choice I would vote ‘keep Quebec, discard the Media’.
Exerpts from todays Calgary Sun
“Building and development across Calgary skyrocketed to a record $4.76 billion in 2006 — a 32% increase over the 2005 construction record of $3.6 billion.”
Calgary’s residential construction in 2006 added up to about 16,000 new residential units built across the city — or about 45 new homes being constructed each day, said Bronconnier.
“‘That meant 97 new residents each day began calling Calgary home last year’, he added.”
“Calgary’s construction costs last year more than doubled Edmonton’s $2.3 billion, and also beat Toronto’s $3.7 billion and Vancouver’s $2.04 billion.”
Need I add more?
So, Kate, I take it that the people who responded to the poll, conducted between December 11th and 13th, 2006 should have paid closer attention to the Jan 14 , 2007 article showing that Economists were “hastily upgrading their forecasts…after a series of surprisingly strong reports suggesting the so-called “soft landing” may be over and growth is accelerating. Over the past week, surprises have come in stronger-than-expected reports on US job creation, the trade balance and retail sales — all key contributors to economic activity.”
Stupid Canadians with their pessimistic attitudes towards the US. Don’t they read the revised predications that haven’t been written yet?
Fin.
So, Kate, I take it that the people who responded to the poll, conducted between December 11th and 13th, 2006 should have paid closer attention to the Jan 14 , 2007 article showing that Economists were “hastily upgrading their forecasts…after a series of surprisingly strong reports suggesting the so-called “soft landing” may be over and growth is accelerating. Over the past week, surprises have come in stronger-than-expected reports on US job creation, the trade balance and retail sales — all key contributors to economic activity.”
Stupid Canadians with their pessimistic attitudes towards the US. Don’t they read the revised predications that haven’t been written yet?
Fin.
So, Kate, I take it that the people who responded to the poll, conducted between December 11th and 13th, 2006 should have paid closer attention to the Jan 14 , 2007 article showing that Economists were “hastily upgrading their forecasts…after a series of surprisingly strong reports suggesting the so-called “soft landing” may be over and growth is accelerating. Over the past week, surprises have come in stronger-than-expected reports on US job creation, the trade balance and retail sales — all key contributors to economic activity.”
Stupid Canadians with their pessimistic attitudes towards the US. Don’t they read the revised predications that haven’t been written yet?
Fin.