Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said distributors and retailers should lower prices “as soon as possible” to reflect a soaring Canadian dollar, and held up a copy of the latest Harry Potter book as an example of how some items are still much cheaper in the U.S.

[…]

Flaherty said he looked at a copy of the recent Harry Potter book in Washington this past weekend, which was selling for US$29.74 before tax. He came back to Ottawa and purchased the Canadian version, which was $36 before tax.

What the wire story forgot to include was the following:

Upon learning that Dumbledore was gay, a visibly shaken Flaherty promptly returned both the American and Canadian copies of the book.

In other Flaherty news, it appears Jim will be presenting a fall mini budget as part of he who cannot be named’s devious scheme to plunge us into an election. The thinking is, I guess, that the Liberals will want to fight an election against tax cuts. Some advice to the dark lord – if the Tories really want an election, just put forward the “Kitten Genocide Bill” and it will happen. Proposing popular tax cuts is not going to do it, especially when the Libs support all the proposals except the GST cut.