Pertinent Personal Finances

At first glance, the normal reaction is why does the public have to be informed of the fact that a politician appears to be experiencing financial problems?  Is that not a private and personal matter?  And, in fact, whose business is it to begin with? Well, perhaps a second thought is in order there. 

One that reminds itself that this is not simply any ordinary politician, but one who aspires to lead the country. And then that little nosy incursion into someone's else's finances takes on a new meaning.  Someone who is a highly visible public figure, all the more so when he makes himself visible through his visible and risible denunciations of others, may be seen as fair game.

Wishing to accomplish what Cesar did, achieving the highest office of the land, he should, like Cesar's wife, be beyond reproach.  It is no one's business and no one has the right to reproach anyone for an imputed inability to manage their own finances.  But when the individual in question aspires to manage the finances of the country at large, then things begin to open up, and greater scrutiny becomes essential.

The simple fact is New Democratic Party leader, and now leader of the Official Opposition, Thomas Mulcair, fumes and fulminates about the state of the Canadian economy, publicly denouncing one element of the economy as being gravely injurious to other elements of the economy.  Those elements are associated, as it happens, with disparate regions of the country.

Which hasn't made Mr. Mulcair very popular with the western provinces whose fossil fuel wealth he lays at the feet of central Canada's loss of manufacturing jobs, resulting from a high dollar value impacting on our international trade.  There are many economists who deny this assertion, and who also point out that what the west produces the east also uses, both in manufacturing and transportation.

In any event, the manner in which Mr. Mulcair as a responsible politician at the federal level, one of whose most important functions is to unite the country in a national coalition of purpose that benefits confederation, has proven very contentious to say the least.  A slight majority of Canadians reject his thesis.  That 42% seem to support it hints at regional jealousies something he should be loathe to spur.

Therefore, it is more than a little pertinent and perhaps instructive to see indications that his financial sense seems to be somewhat lacking when one inspects his personal economic arrangements.  Mr. Mulcair is well compensated for his political professionalism; was when he was a cabinet minister in the provincial Liberal government of Quebec, and certainly is now, as the Official Opposition leader.

Similarly, his wife, as a medical professional with a practise of her own, must surely earn a substantial income.  That they have a home which still has a mortgage on it, is somewhat of a surprise, since as high earners they are not young people just starting out to acquire capital investment.  They have chosen to re-mortgage their home's rising property value no fewer than eleven times.

Which practise does not seem to reflect the actions of a prudent, thrifty, well-planned economic decision-making couple.  Perhaps that is one indication of many that the current home they occupy should be the last that taxpayer funding pays for.