Recently, The Daily Courier printed a letter that copied a piece of propaganda circulating from the Internet about U.S. finances, regarding alleged losses and financial mismanagement.
Not only was the source not acknowledged, but there were obvious errors in the math.
The U.S. Congress is meeting over the next three months to reduce spending while ensuring the economy can still grow this year. Canada is continuing to stimulate its spending to ensure a recession doesn't happen, postponing the reduction of our federal deficit by one more year.
Liberal Democratic governments in the U.S. and Conservative governments in Ottawa are essentially doing the same thing.
There will be "cutbacks if necessary, but not necessarily cutbacks everywhere" to reuse and change an old saying about conscription.
The problems facing the American economy and its debt limit also have a major impact on Canada.
The former Liberal federal government also saw the way out of its debt problems, and it is two fold - not an anal focus on total debt exclusively, but the need to grow one's economy. The decline in the ratio of national debt to gross national product of all goods and services may be arcane to many, but was the key to improving Canada's economy and the U.S. at the same time, not using artificial debt ceilings.
The U.S. and Canada are both increasing employment now, the recession is ending, growth is happening.
Unemployment is dropping faster in Canada than the U.S. and this is a result of increasing the gross domestic production of goods and services.
Unlike Canada, the U.S. had been faced with a fast and almost hyperbolic rise in the national debt to its limit of about $14 trillion. Holding it there while increasing employment and production will cause that ratio to fall and ensure that bonds continue to have their interest paid and be viable.
It is always better to also repatriate your national debt from foreign hands to be held in your own country so that currency valuations remain controllable.
Politicians in some sectors of both the Republican and Democratic parties need to watch the ratio of debt to overall growing production (while employment increases too ) in 2013. That ratio needs to fall.
Paying attention to misleading, inflammatory figures does nothing to ensure the public dialogue in both countries is well informed.
Let's get on to national and international solutions.
John O. Powell,
Kelowna