Theo Caldwell interview with Brad Wall - tossing nerf-balls.

I really like Theo Caldwell on Sun's Caldwell Account. He's one of my favorites. However, in this interview with Brad Wall he could have at least made a token effort to challenge him. Instead he tossed him nerf-balls. For example, Ezra Levant would never have let him off so lightly on the BHP/Potash Corp issue. Wall's a good guy but any interviewer who purports to defend free markets shouldn't have let him skate so easily.

Potash Corp - politics over principle

William Watson:

There may be a Tory justification for blocking the sale of Potash Corp ...

... There may be a Conservative justification for blocking the sale. ... with the Premier going Danny Williams about the takeover, blocking it may have been politically expedient.

... But there is no conservative case for blocking the sale, despite the best efforts of Adam Daifallah and Dov Zigler to invent one ...

... As so often, principle lost out to politics. But let’s not compound the error by pretending conservatism had anything to do with it.

Right on, Mr. Watson! Politicians, unfortunately, often resort to lying, obfuscation and hypocrisy to avoid or combat attacks from the opposition. It would have been better, if the Conservatives couldn't stick to free market principles, had they at least been able to admit they were selectively compromising them to chase votes in Saskatchewan (ahem, I mean "honouring the preferences of the great people of Saskatchewan", or something). It would be more honest and then supposedly conservative commentators wouldn't feel they had to twist themselves into pretzels trying to justify an unconservative position.

SDA posts a clanger on Potash

It's a rarity but small dead animals posted a clanger congratulating Industry Minister Tony Clements' on his decision to kibosh the BHP bid to take over Potash Corp.

Let's face it, this is all about politics - votes, pure and simple.  Wall is pandering to Sask voter socialist/nationalist sentiment and Harper is afraid of losing 13 Conservative seats.  It's embarassing watching conservatives attempting to rationalize it as something more

Peter Foster observes how Tory Agriculture Minister, Gerry Ritz (like sda and others) twists himself into a ridiculous pretzel trying to defend the decision, concluding:

... This is a bad deal for Saskatchewan and a bad deal for Canada. Potash shares have been robbed of any takeover premium since they have effectively been declared off limits to foreign buyers. Investment Canada rules now appear more opaque — or irrelevant — than ever. As usual, the most significant losses will be the invisible ones: the investments not made, the jobs not created.

And, moreover:

One knowledgeable observer to whom I spoke yesterday said that it was difficult to get worked up over the notion of Canada as a banana republic because other jurisdictions do similar things. But the fact that other countries practice destructive economic policies to court populist electorates and mercantilist executives should hardly be a source of comfort. Mr. Harper understands that. Within 30 days his government is going to have to pretend that it doesn’t.

Danny Williams must be smiling.

Brad Wall's Saskatchewan: a new Banana Republic

Terence Corcoran:

Did we miss the constitutional change — the one that created the Peoples’ Republic of Saskatchewan, with Brad Wall as el presidente?

Sounding ever so much like the head of some mosquito-ridden developing country squeezing dollars out of a multinational mining giant, Mr. Wall has been running an aggressive campaign against BHP Billiton’s $38.6-billion plan to take over Potash Corp.

... Mr. Wall seems to think Potash is still a Crown corporation of some sort, and he’s the new socialist head of state.

... The banana republic comparison may seem a little harsh, but the idea comes from the widely reported news that Mr. Wall or his negotiating minions actually asked BHP to pay a billion dollars up front into government coffers.

... trying to get a multinational to pay a billion dollars in taxes in advance smacks of a Third World shakedown by a political leader looking for cash to distribute to voters.

... If all this is true —and there has been no government denial to date —it paints a dark picture of the political culture in Saskatchewan —and Canada....

So much for Wall's strong support of free markets.  Populist politics trump principles, again. 

Update (or maybe it's backdate): Here are some interesting thoughts from Norm Park of the Estevan Mercury (The People's Paper Since 1903) last September:

... Why doesn't Potash Corp team up with Agrium and Mosaic and buy out BHP?

Certainly they've heard of reverse takeovers, haven't they? Maybe they're not interested in staying in business though.
 
Or maybe the head of Potash Corp, Mr. Doyle, really does want to cash out his $500,000,000 in shares and severance payments and head home to Chicago. This is where he is apparently running Potash Corp from anyway.
 
... And as far as protecting the province's resource interests … didn't we once have an oil company known as SaskOil that begot Wascana that begot Nexen that kinda got dismantled and moved to Calgary? What happened there?

Anybody heard of Ipsco? Something called Evraz now owns it and no Saskatchewan-based corporate presence of note can be found there, at least not since Roger Phillips retired.
 
If we can't build a head office base here in Saskatchewan after 120 years of trying, then maybe we just have to accept our fate and be happy with royalty payments, decent payrolls and strong employment figures while the profits and decision making head elsewhere.
 
... Sherritt Coal and oil companies like Penn West and many others don't sweat the fact that their major administrative decisions are made in places other than Saskatchewan. SaskPower doesn't mind shifting management decisions to an Ontario corporation … it's all part of the never-ending game, especially in the resource sector....

Meanwhile, Stephen Harper backs up Norm Park saying Potash Corp is 'American-controlled' anyway.

Upperdate: Brad Wall responds to Corcoran.