Harper's All-in Approach to Carbon Puts Our Economy in Danger

I filled up my car yesterday for fewer than $40. The last time it cost me so little was in 2008. In November, I was shelling out well over 60 bucks every time I pulled up to the pumps, and in the summer, even more. Canadians, especially Ontarians, are becoming accustomed to the volatility of fossil fuel markets. One month, your gas bill is astronomical; the next month, a steal. Contributing to the uncertainty in the market is the Harper Government's failure to regulate our oil and gas industry and its inability to do what it needs to do in order to get Canadian resources to market.

For someone with a Master's Degree in Economics, Mr. Harper seems to ignore one of the most important rules of investing: hedge your bets. Harper's all-in bet on the carbon economy means that when the price of oil goes for a tumble, so does our economy and with it, our petrodollar. CIBC's recent estimates show low oil prices could negatively impact our 2014 GDP by about $13 billion. Our economy shed just shy of 50,000 jobs in November alone. If this is what recovery looks like to the Harper Government, we should be seeking a second opinion.

The Treasury Secretary’s Misperceptions About Wealth

By Treasury Secretary Jack Lew’s reckoning, being a millionaire does not constitute living high above the ranks of ordinary people. Lew said last week that back when he was in the private sector enjoying six- and seven-figure pay packages, “My own compensation was never in the stratosphere.”

Lew made that pronouncement as he sought to defend President Barack Obama’s embattled Treasury undersecretary nominee Antonio Weiss from charges that as a financial executive, he is out of touch with the interests of regular people. Lew was seeking to cast his own lot with the ranks of ordinary Americans at a time of growing economic inequality.

Food Prices Grow At Fastest Pace In 3 Years, As Meat Soars

Want to save on your food bill? Switch to chicken.

Inflation slowed down in November, thanks primarily to plummeting gas prices, but the rapid rise in meat prices that has stalked consumers this year showed no signs of slowing.

Overall inflation fell to a 2-per-cent pace in November, Statistics Canada reports, below the 2.4-per-cent pace a month earlier and below the 2.2 per cent forecast by economists.

The gas price index fell 7.5 per cent in the space of a month. Prices for clothing and entertainment equipment also fell.

How Preston Manning convinced Wildrose MLAs to join mass defection

A whirlwind three weeks of negotiations to set the terms for one of the most dramatic mass defections in Canadian political history ended in the Edmonton apartment of a Wildrose MLA on Tuesday night.

Pizza, pretzels and “beverages” were served as the “Wildrose Nine” — the collection of MLAs who crossed the floor on Wednesday to join Alberta’s long-governing Progressive Conservatives — held an emotional meeting with Premier Jim Prentice.

Mr. Prentice spelled out his plan to improve the Alberta government, everything from the pending oil bust, to the fiscal crisis, to a creeping culture of entitlement.

Scalia on Retirees Losing Their Health Insurance: 'I Can't Feel Bad About It'

In Apple Grove, West Virginia, there are some retirees from a chemical plant whose Christmas wishes probably include this: They want to keep the health insurance they were promised.

The United Steelworkers union negotiated a series of collective bargaining agreements stipulating that retired employees "will receive a full company contribution towards the cost of [health] benefits." The union believed the benefits were guaranteed for life. The company contends it could take away these benefits whenever it chose--which it did in 2007.

Americans Aren't Quite As Comfortable As Dick Cheney With The CIA's Wrongful Detentions

Most Americans agree with former Vice President Dick Cheney's sentiments on the CIA's post-9/11 detention program: "Bad guys who got out and released" and returned to the battlefield are more of a concern than "a few that, in fact, were innocent" and detained, Cheney said on "Meet the Press" Sunday after the Senate released a summary of a report detailing serious errors and abuses in the program.

But the high percentage of wrongfully detained prisoners -- at least 22 percent, according to the report -- gives many people pause, a new HuffPost/YouGov poll finds.

Pakistani Military Kills Dozens Of Militants In Retaliation For School Massacre

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan hanged two convicted militants Friday in the country's first executions in years, while warplanes and ground forces pounded insurgent hideouts in a northwest region bordering Afghanistan — part of a stepped-up response to the Taliban slaughter of scores of schoolchildren.

Unchastened by criticism from all corners of the globe, the Taliban threatened earlier Friday to kill more children if executions were carried out as promised.

"We can create a mourning situation at the homes of many army generals and politicians," spokesman Mohammad Khurassani said in a statement emailed to reporters.

Vladimir Putin Invites Kim Jong Un to Moscow

Amid U.S. and European sanctions that are driving Russia into the arms of its Asian neighbors, President Vladimir Putin has invited the North Korean leader to Moscow next year to mark the 70th anniversary of the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

The invitation may figure into the high-stakes geopolitical and economic game Russia has found itself in after the imposition of U.S. and European sanctions and other global changes that have destabilized the Russian economy.

Obama Takes A Swing At 'Tar Sands' And Keystone Pipeline

WASHINGTON - U.S. President Barack Obama spent five minutes disparaging the potential benefits of the Keystone XL pipeline Friday.

He then kept it alive with five words.

At a wide-ranging year-end news conference Friday, Obama maintained his recent pattern of expressed skepticism about the project: He played down its job potential, said it wouldn't lower gas prices for Americans and, employing the language of pipeline opponents, said it would merely help Canadian "tar sands" companies export their product overseas.

Forget what you've heard: Here's why Danielle Smith will soon get her cabinet post

Don't worry, Danielle Smith will soon be deputy premier of Alberta or occupy a similarly influential post.

Likewise, Rob Anderson will be finance minister or something similar, if not by next week, as soon as Christmas and New Year are out of the way. Perhaps one or two of the other Wildrose Party defectors will join the cabinet of Premier Jim Prentice as well.

Nothing is absolutely certain, of course, especially when all the important business of Canada's"most ethical and transparent government" is conducted behind locked doors as far as possible from the prying eyes and ears of taxpaying citizens and smart aleck bloggers. Prentice certainly doesn't phone me up and tell me what his plans are.

Still, the man himself is already dropping hints, and when you think about it, this is the only future narrative that makes any sense.