What a packed Friday looks like

Normally Fridays are pretty dull and useful
only for burying embarrassing reports from the government. Not so yesterday –
it was an extremely packed day that kicked off with the Supreme Court’s decision
on Insite. While my story is here, you can find more smart commentary from Paul Wells and Emmett Macfarlane.

There was Harper’s announcement in Quebec
that a $2.2 billion deal on tax harmonization compensation had been reached, and
while there will be some changes on Quebec’s side of things (including the

tax-on-tax scheme that currently exists), it won’t be the same kind of HST
harmonization that happens elsewhere, because Harper likes to be “flexible.”

NDP MP Nathan Cullen entered the leadership
race as the “anti-establishment” candidate. His secret weapon – the grassroots membership
in BC, where he’s from, which represents a sizeable chunk of the NDP’s base.
Meanwhile, Libby Davies threw support to Brian Topp.

Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott added his
voice to Brad Trost’s, expressing a desire to reopen the abortion debate, and
he calls out Planned Parenthood for “weasel words” and “dishonesty,” even
calling it part of a modern eugenics movement. Seriously. Meanwhile, backbencher
Leon Benoit has placed a motion on the Order Paper, again repeating the Planned
Parenthood/eugenics assertion.

Elsewhere, economist Stephen Gordon takes
exception to the economic math presented in the NDP’s opposition day motion.

Statistics Canada says it got a better
than expected response rate to the voluntary household survey, but that won’t
change the fact that the data will almost certainly be biased.

And after the “golden showers” incident in
QP Friday, here is a list of 106 things you can’t say in Parliament.