You can just smell the bacon with the latest pork that's been dumped into Quebec by its regional development agency.  The feds spent $1.6 million there on snow grooming machines.  David Akin of CanWest is reporting that "all the clubs to receive money this week are based in or maintain trails through the ridings of two Conservative cabinet ministers: Denis Lebel and Jean-Pierre Blackburn. Lebel is the minister whose department writes the cheques; Blackburn used to run that department."

Of course the complaints of some will be "where's my fair share?" but the reality is that "your fair share" as a snowmobile club or company that maintains trails is what you as a private entity are willing to invest in them. That these machines were purchased for the re-election stimulation of a few politicians in Quebec is only half of the problem.  That the Conservative government feels that it can better make economic decisions than private companies and investors on the ground is just as disturbing.

To add insult to injury, opposition condemnations of the former ring hollow as they gladly engage in pork-politics whenever they have the chance. On the latter, they openly encourage the myth that they in Ottawa can make sufficiently informed investment and micro-economic decisions.

A pox on all your houses of parliament.