So Toby (best before date Aug 2007) Barrett and his fellow members of caucus are having a high profile and televised hissy-fit about the HST legislation. I wonder why.

The nature of majority governments is that they can push through whatever bill that they want to - because they can. Mike Harris did this for years when he had the large majority. It comes with the big win. The Progressive Conservatives are due to be the next in power and Tim Hudak will be able to undo most (or all) of what McGuinty has done in the same way that McGuinty has managed to undo most of what Harris did.

The posted by Adam Liefl states; “Premier Dalton McGuinty says voters can pass judgment on the plan to harmonize the sales taxes in the 2011 Ontario election.”

I am not too crazy about Premier Dalton (tax and tax and spend and spend) McGuinty but in this case he is correct; There is an election coming in 2011 so the electorate can toss him out and change the legislation back to a split GST and PST. So in 2011 we will have but yet another reason to toss McGuinty out and make Hudak the new Premier.

But – everyone has been urging Hudak to promise to repeal the HST if (when) he is elected.

He refuses to do so.

Why?

at least the opposition is trying to do something about it.

Like I told Dalton in an email, this is a free country and he is free to commit political suicide if he chooses to do so.

I believe the HST is nothing but the result of the current Provincial Government not being able to manage it's spending or budgetting like every voter in Ontario has to do but without the ability to do what the government is doing by raising taxes to offset it's spending habits.(E Health is a good example on overspending)
As far as the members go for either the Provincial or Federal Governments....it seems to be a lot of "acting" or "posturing" for the cameras and press staff ....soon they will have
"Academy Awards" or "Smoke and Mirror Awards" for Canadian Politicians. Stay tuned for further developments.

On the news at noon, finally Flaherty admitted that this was a subtle strong arm. He said that the Federal government expects all Provinces to go this route in the next few years.