Canada Is Doomed: Three Signs That The Country Up North Is Screwed Beyond All Recognition

JOSH BARRO

Business Insider

You might be under the impression that everything is going pretty well in Canada, which had no banking collapse and only a mild recession in 2008-9.

You would be wrong.

The country is beset by political corruption scandals of the sort that people focus on when the economy is good. But it also has a massive ongoing housing bubble, and its economy is being propped up by a global commodities boom that now shows signs of slowing.

Let’s break down the three ominous signs.

First, the scandals:

• Montreal Mayor Michael Applebaum got arrested this morning, charged with 14 counts including fraud and conspiracy. Applebaum was appointed to replace Gérald Tremblay, who resigned last year after getting caught up in a separate corruption scandal involving kickbacks from construction firms with alleged mafia links.
• Toronto Mayor Rob Ford may or may not be on video smoking crack; last week, Toronto and Ontario police raided an apartment complex linked to the alleged video and arrested 43 people, including the two pictured on either side of Ford in this photo.
• The mounties are investigating whether Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s former chief of staff, Nigel Wright, committed a crime when he gave a Conservative senator over $90,000 to pay back expenses that he had improperly claimed.
• London, Ontario Mayor Joe Fontana is under indictment for allegedly using public money to pay for his son’s wedding reception. London is the 11th largest city in Canada. Fontana is seeking re-election.
• Laval, Quebec mayor Alexandre Duplessis asked that his city, Canada’s 13th largest, be placed in receivership after “he and almost every sitting municipal politician in the city was linked to illegal political financing by a corruption-inquiry witness,” according to the National Post. His predecessor as mayor has been charged with two counts of “gangsterism.”
• Read More Here