So, what the economic numbers show is that from January to June of this year, Canada experienced a mild recession, even though the economy grew in June by 0.5%, indicating it may already be over.

The June increase, however, was not enough to offset an overall contraction of Canada’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of 0.5% in the second quarter of 2015 (April to June) and 0.8% in the first quarter (January to March).

This fits the technical definition of a recession -- two straight quarters of negative growth -- but it is no cause for panic.

By comparison, GDP in Canada in the first two quarters of 2009, during the Great Recession that started with the subprime mortgage derivatives scandal in the U.S., contracted by 8.7% in the first quarter and 3.6% in the second.

Nor are the latest numbers even surprising, given the negative impact of the global collapse in oil prices on our economy.

In that light, Prime Minister Stephen Harper clearly has the correct and most responsible approach to government budgeting in light of these numbers -- steady as she goes.

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, who was against deficits before he was for them, just as clearly has the wrong one.

Trudeau is running around with his hair on fire promising a Liberal government would spend its way out of this recession by running multi-billion-dollar deficits for the next three years.

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what his fellow Liberal, Bob Rae, did back when he was the NDP premier of Ontario at the start of the early 1990s recession.

Rae initially tried to spend the government rich, tripling the deficit in 1991 to $9 billion, declaring he was proud to be fighting the recession rather than balancing the budget .

As a result, he threw the province into years of economic turmoil.

Which brings us to federal NDP Leader Tom Mulcair, who promises to deliver a balanced budget next year, but only through a tax-and-spend approach of massive tax grabs on working Canadians though cap-and-trade and by raising corporate taxes.

All this to pay for nanny state promises like his national daycare program.

We believe Harper’s approach is the most responsible one and the best for avoiding a long recession.