It’s occurred to me several times over the last few years that, even while Steven Harper rambles on and on about fiscal efficiency, his government hasn’t really spent my our money that wisely.  Actually, he’s spending it worse than a university student in the bar on shooter night.

With that in mind, I’ve found a new purpose for this blog.  At the risk of getting all political (and/or stepping on the Canadian Taxpayer’s Federation’s toes), I’d like to point out all the crap that Harper keeps wasting our money on, and some of the things that he could buy instead that would actually make this country a better place.

Here’s our first example:  According to the Ottawa Citizen, Col. Michel Drapeau (retired) estimates that we’re spending about $100 million/month on the war in Libya.  Here’s what we could have done with $100 million:

1) Hire an additional 2,699 teachers in Ontario (according to starting pay rates listed here)

OR

2) Large double double and a blueberry fritter for every man, woman and child in Canada

OR

3) Pay 0.017739007% of our national debt (according to debtclock.ca on May 21st, 2011)

Three things to note:  1) This is figuring on one month’s spending on Libya to pay these teachers for an entire year,  2) I didn’t actually check this one, but it’ll be close.  3) We pay about $84 million per day in interest on our national debt.  Just sayin’.

I’m not saying Ghadafi shouldn’t be removed, dead or alive.  I’m just saying, we’re spending a lot of money to deliver a single bullet to Northern Africa.  Maybe we should have called UPS first……

I was re-visiting an old product idea this morning, when I found some great news:  A major multi-national company has invested untold millions into building a similar product.

Most other people in the world would be beside themselves in my situation; that is, pondering ways to hatch your golden egg, when someone bigger, richer, and more powerful than you comes and scrambles it.  For me, this is great news.  Why?

When I wrote “Class of 2009,” my first self-published book, it was hard to get the target market to understand it.  For those that don’t know, it’s a photo book about classic cars and trucks in Manitoba.  Simple as this may sound, people just didn’t get it.  Everyone else before me had done calendars and DVDs on the same subject, and so that’s what everyone else did.  Now, if someone else wanted to spend their summer selling books at car shows, they would probably make a killing simply because people are now familiar with the product.  Personally, I’m leaving that up to my favourite Winnipeg bookstore.

Yes, it’s true that this company could squash me like a bug.  They might sue me for something random and illegal.  They might flood the market space with effective marketing, or tie their brand name to the product the way that Kleenex is tied to tissues.  They might not let me access the primo retail space, the best online e-tailers, or the top wholesale distributors.  They might not, could not, in a box.  They might not, could not, with a fox.

The thing is, they’ve spent millions to create a new product category, which means I don’t have to spend millions.  And since the other company isn’t Apple, I don’t have to waste time stealing members from their tribe of customers–I just have to create better value for the customers already looking for a tribe.

Sometimes, being second isn’t so bad….