Whose afraid of balanced budget legislation?

In today’s Globe column I weigh in on the issue of whether balanced budget legislation is worth while or not. My view is that the history of parliamentary democracy is the slow groping attempt to submit arbitrary power to transparency and rules. But well-designed rules should not and need not be the death of the discretion politicians need in order to respond to events. So with respect to budget-making we need to get to work on designing the appropriate rules and that may take some time and experimentation. That’s a reason to get on with the job.