This ain't New Jersey, that's for sure...

Frequent perusers of my blog will notice there hasn't been a lot going on lately. This isn't due to a shortage of material or events that I consider blog-worthy, just a shortage of time in which to write. Unfortunately, thanks to the sudden need to read four or five books a week (and think about them!) this trend isn't likely to end any time soon.

But for those of you still interested, fear not: I will be commenting occasionally as part of the Hoboken Group. I urge you to take a look!

Richard Bradshaw, 1944-2007

Richard Bradshaw, the general director of the Canadian Opera Company, died on Wednesday night of an apparent heart attack. He was 63.

I was lucky to hear Bradshaw speak at Trinity College two years ago - he was a sincere, impassioned and successful advocate for the performing arts in Canada, and his sudden death is sad for opera, and sad for all of us.

And if you believe that, I've got a real cheap duplex in Idaho I can sell you for cheap...

The aspect of the current financial upheavel I find most thought-provoking isn't, as Ann Pettifor points out, that free-market institutions who scoff at the notion of state intervention in sacred cash cows - like, say, health care - are currently on life support thanks to governmental reserve spending - this kind of Monopoly-money hypocrisy on the part of business is hardly new ("oops, I ran out of money Mr. Banker - let me have some more!").

What's astonishing (especially when watching it in action) is the level of groupthink, overt and covert, being perpetuated by anybody and everybody involved in market institutions - bankers, traders, inverstement analysts, and crucially, business reporters - desperately attempting to convince the public of the transitory, minor, perfectly reasonable nature of the crisis.

Groupthink's not new, but I wish that when billions of dollars and the direct and indirect livelyhoods of billions are at stake, a little analysis might win the day. For instance, it seems clear that if millions of people don't have enough money to pay the debts their debtors knowingly bestowed on them, it's going to be a problem - just as it seems equally clear that if a society (species?) uses up the physical resources of a planet at an unsustainable rate, the result isn't going to be children's feeding time at the Boise County Zoo - or rather, not in the way one would like to think.

I do wonder how much of the opinion-setting is conscious. Does Jim Flaherty really have any base in his perspective on reality to say, for instance, that Canadian household savings are "very strong" - when they're at their lowest level since the 1920s?

It's remarkable how effective the perpetuation and propagation of this sort of mass belief can actually be. Unless confronted by cold hard physical facts (like having no cash on hand to pay the cleaning lady), people will plow ahead believing all sorts of bosh. The convincingly smooth platitudes of a thousand (self-serving? surely not) financial managers may convince everybody that the show can, and will go on.

Except that there are still all those people out there with no money to pay their mortgages. And to paraphrase Bill Clinton, when push comes to shove "it's the money, stupid."

On Brinksmanship

It only works if those on the brink a) believe they're at the edge of the cliff and b) care if they fall over the side.

In the case of the crisis now enveloping us here in poor, stupid old Hogtown, I'm unconvinced that either the a) or b) above applies. But I know for sure the answer to that naive question, "Is Toronto a world-class city?" How many other "world-class" cities are closing subway lines?

Fate is very cruel to Torontonians - dazzling us with mirages (10 new LRT lines!) before sticking the knife in (oops! wrong! we're going to close one of the subway lines you already have instead!) Or at least to those Torontonians who care. But the no-taxes at any cost lobby won the day. Not enough people told their councillors they understood that you only get what you pay for. Maybe not enough be people do understand. Maybe now they will.

The right-wing of City Council is acting in what they can only believe is a statesmanlike fashion, and it never hurts to turn bald hypocrite and accuse someone of petulance: paradoxically, it's the best way of discrediting an opponent in our juvenile political culture. But if you examine what's being said, you'll get the distinct impression that the right is upset not with cutting things, but with cutting things in a way that means everyone will notice. They'd prefer the city be disembowelled quietly - destroyed by stealth, so that by the time the people realise what's happened, they'll take it as a fact of life.

This Toronto apocalypse is, as Rick Salutin notes ($), a texbook case. Of how not speaking the truth, on all sides, can lead to disaster. Of the great difficulty (perhaps impossibility) of passing progressive policies in a country so beholden to monied interest, and to the media that supports them. And of how, more and more and more, we disenfranchise ourselves by our own volition, render ourselves impotent in the face of threats to our city and to our future.

Write your city councillor - yes, you have one. Write the Mayor. Vote on October 10, for someone who cares the city. 'Cause, as Jane Jacobs wrote, "you can run anything into the ground." I'm glad she's not here to see this - she would have taken no pleasure in being proven, yet again, to be right.

Power Off

Well, buh-bye, subway. I guess when push comes to shove, you're really not so important after all.

But I bet Denzil Minnan-Wong is real happy he holds the Don Valley East ward on the south side of the 401 - and not the one through which runs poor ol' Sheppard Avenue.

Seyonara, Transit City. We hardly knew you.

Placeholder

Well, that was a lengthy absence. Sorry, all. To coin a great BBC phrase, I was overtaken by events. Stay tuned!

Dawn Black, the problem with soundbites...

...is that they sound like soundbites.

Someone buy that man a big, organically-grown, carbon-offset, non-tobacco cigar!

Gary Doer wins, again.

Dumb mouths, that ope' their ruby lips

The other Harperite perversity on ample display this week has been vicious, short-sighted, destructive policy petulance. The cuts to the Canada Summer Jobs program are a prime example.

Heard about this? Like the Court Challenges Program, like the Status of Women Office, like the money for museums, Canada Summer Jobs doesn't cost, in the grand scheme of things, a whole lot - it subsidizes/funds temporary positions for high school and university students in organisations that wouldn't otherwise be able to hire over ther summer. So why has $11 million been axed from its budget? Disabled little league baseball; an award-winning camp for autistic kids; daycamps in Jamestown - none of these things are apparently "worthy" enough, to quote Human Resources Minister Monte Solberg, to qualify.

While the fracas in the House is bad, this is reprehensible. Paul Wells thinks that the Conservatives are preparing a grand new human capital strategy. Well, denying young people in urban areas home to 80% of Canada's population, not to mention all of Newfoundland, summer job opportunities - and money, experience, skills development and the chance to innovate - is really such an outstandingly original way to develop a workforce, isn't it?

Harper knows that with a minority government, he can't chop away at some of the bigger strands of the social safety net. But it's open season on the small fry - and I bet you a $1.3 billion tank purchase that the Primer Minister thinks it will be easier to do away with the big stuff by softening up the victim with a thousand cuts.

Cuts, cuts, cuts. Cuts to the regulation of prime-time television commercials. Cuts to the Official Languages Plan. That holy shibboleth, tax cuts. Students, and everyone else, might want to bone up on their Classics - Canada has become like a man who goes in for a hair cut and is instead attacked with the shears. Or like Caeser stabbed in the back, by a fat man with a lean and hungry look.

The Bully Pulpit

You know, my immediate greivance with the paralyzing imbroglio slowly consuming the House of Commons has less to do with the tactics being employed by the Conservative government, than with the philosophy of governance the Harperites reveal by doing so. It's reasonably safe to say that most peoples' idea of government is of an institution that, well, governs - sets public policy, uses its authority to supervise a state, yadda yadda yadda. It's the Opposition that's supposed, by definition, to do the opposing.

So what kind of responsible government cancels committees because things aren't going their way, lies blatantly about events that happened, literally, last week, obstructs inquiries into its own alleged malfeisance, and lets the friggin' Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons physically harass an opponent? This is not, as the Globe's byline writers suggest, a war of procedure - it's a kamikaze assault by the governing party on the basic processes of the House that it was elected to protect. It's obscene, it's disgusting, and it's entirely consonant with Stark Contrast's theory about Stephen Harper: that he wants Canadians to expect politics to be as nasty as possible - because he's the reigning king of revile.
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UPDATE - Hmmmm...I'll tell you what kind of government engineers the above-mentioned dirty tricks - the same kind of government that has 200 pages of material about said kamikaze assault, and an itchy printer finger.

Let's be charitable - maybe it was the clipper again? Someone call the RCMP!

The art of the possible?

Liberal leadership contenders, progressives of all stripes, and anybody who's recently bashed Elizabeth May, take note: the separatists seem to know a trick that most other politicians in Canada can't manage. Namely, how to cooperate.

A Gay May Day Roundup

Yours truly is twenty-three years old today (seriously, are we sure I'm not seventeen? Or maybe five?) To my loyal readers, I apologise for the dearth of blogging of late: le palais du bureaucracie has been keeping me on my toes (literally, you really don't want to see my feet right now).

On that gross note, we proceed to a roundup of the last little while's political news:

a) Boisclair resigns, Luke weeps. I have written elsewhere of a sneaky liking for Andre Boisclair (yes, he''s cute) though not of his pet political project. I don't greet his resignation with good cheer - if nothing else, it simply proves that, poorly-written CP stories to the contrary, you can't as yet be openly gay and a First Minister in the True North, Strong and Free.

But why are federalists chortling? Would they really prefer Gilles Duceppe, quite a capable politico these days, leading the sovereigntist charge in Quebec? Are they really so sure there's no one capable of replacing him in Ottawa? Or that Mario Dumont is actually a slimy federalist, as opposed to a slimy opportunist? Have they looked at the latest SES poll, which seems to show the BQ's public support holding steady? (it's Stephen "Quebec is a nation" Harper who's losing points to those nefarious allies, the Greens and the Grits) And finally, have they considered the possibility, so often written, so seldom read, that Qubeckers are less interested in independence these days because they, in so many de facto ways, already have it?

b) Speaking of that poll.... I'm not going to, except to say that SES is usually exceedingly accurate, that the poll (the second of late to show the LPC and CPC in a dead heat) has received almost zero press coverages from the columnists and commentators who were so eager to trumpet numbers when it seemed the Conservatives were ascendant, and that you might cast your eye over three very interesting regional numbers - if they're actually trends and not stat glitches, they bear watching:

1) The Conservatives are up in Atlantic Canada, despite Danny Williams' monstrances. Bad news for Liz May in Central Nova if that keeps up;

2) NDP and Greens are up big-time in Ontario. Vote-splitting on the left? More Red Tories than we thought? We shall see;

3) The Greens are doing very well in the West, at the expense of the usual suspects.

This might all be bad news for progressives - except that the percentage of uncommitted voters has jumped to 14%.

c) Money, Money, Money. No kidding that it's a rich man world, or will be if the Conservatives get their way in banning loans to politicians over $1,100. The whole campaign-finance conglomeration is a great example of the Devil being in the details. Surely it's intuitive that if big companies and rich people weren't allowed to give as much money to politicians, they'd have less influence in politics, right? Right?

No sirree bob. We will have the unappetizing prospect of political candidates being tested based solely on their net worth, credit rating, and assets - not their intelligence, empathy, skill, or ideas. It's an Ayn Rand wet dream. Consider this: which individuals, these days, have the excess income to donate to political parties? Young people? Don't make me laugh. The poor, the lower middle class, or immigrants? Unlikely. Nope, it's retirees and the top 10% of income earners, exactly the people the Conservative Party relies on to rake in the cash.

The problem is, of course, that changing one procecedure or structure in a society without changing a bunch of other procedures or structures isn't necessarily going to affect the goal you want - in fact, it might have the opposite effect. And with political financing, progressives have been hoodwinked by what I like to call the Lisa Simpson/Malibu Stacey effect: assuming big + rich means = evil /forgetting that regressive conservatives are way better at making sure folks like their brand, and keep liking it.

d) And finally....

That last point, about making sure folks like the Conservative brand, is so key that I think I will expand a little bit on it. I thin the crux of the matter is this: it's so....easy, living in our society, to believe what the Conservative Party tells you, up to a point.

As a culture, we in North America have evolved to feel increasingly powerless about our lives - and indeed, in work, education and even leisure, our actions are more and more being orchestrated by outside agents and institutions. Paradoxically, capitalist propaganda's barrage of "choice" and "access" signifiers has meant we also expect ourselves to be able to obtain, in a whole host of spheres, infinite access with zero effort. In this dual context, easy choices must always be attractive: we believe we are acting autonomously, in our own best interest, and most importanty, within the regular pattern in which the world should exist. Hard choices are exhausting, difficult, complicated. But worst of all, they're uncertain.

So to believe that global warming is a crock, that we should lock all those crooks up and stop those kids from carrying on, that it's impossible to do anything about our problems and that we should hunker down and be happy with our lot - these are human reactions that come from feeling powerless, and from the defences (denial, fatalism, anger) that stem from it: human reactions that liberate us from choice, and therefore from uncertainty. And neoconservatism asks nothing of us other than to be certain: to side with the status quo, hearken back to saccharine (and surely, true!) memories of some bygone Utopia, and know that if only things would stop being so unclear, that the little guy (and of course, everyone thinks he or she is the one in question) would be tops, know all the answers, and be sitting pretty. We're so certain, we believe so well, that we averr things that our own eyes (if we could, as the Book of Proverbs exorts us, look, see, and observe) would tell us were untrue.

In fact, it's a miracle (of Grace or good sense) that so many people, despite this onslaught, still believe other things - the ones involving justice, and mercy, and empathy, and cooperation. Those are things that make living in the real world more bearable. If there's any real world left, by the time the neocons are through.

"Canada's decision will make the development of a meaningful new global warming deal even more difficult"

It's nice to see that Canada's New Government is getting some overseas press coverage. And we're being recognised as being first at doing something significant! Research? Well, no....Innovation? Human rights? Not so much - but we're still first!

The natives are restless

So the Canadian Press is quick (lead sentence, even!) to tell us in its syndicated report on the new Decima poll that "pundits and the pollster alike are telling political junkies to relax over a new survey that suggests Conservatives and Liberals are locked in a statistical dead heat."

And then give lots of column to a "long-time Tory strategist" who tell us that "Canadians like the government they have," and have "agreed to go steady with us but not much more than that at this time."

Relax? But surely someone thinks it's significant that the combined NDP/Green vote (just to recap, folks, that's the super-environauts, the granola-munchers, the people who John Baird thinks are going to lead the country to ruin) is at 30 frickin' percent? And that between 60 and 70% of the population support implementation of the Kyoto Accord? Given the actions (and inactions) of our current government, are these really numbers to get all zen about?

"If you want to use the dating analogy to the full extent, the worst thing you can do is try to go from first base to home," said the long-time Tory strategist. No kidding - but doesn't it seem to you that Canadians are already sick of being felt up by Stephen Harper?

Riddle me this, loyal readers

Which, to your mind, is the greater sin: not knowing that your ministry was occasionally doing shady things with the advertising budget, or not knowing that your ministry was concealing the fact that the country you personally represent on the world stage was in violation of the Geneva Convention and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?

Yes, it's a semi-rhetorical question. But it's also now the most generous comparison you can make between the Liberal and Conservative Parties of Canada.

It has been a bad day

...for Canadians. It has also, if there's any justice, been a bad day for Canada's New (and Getting Old, Fast) Government.

The latest environmental plan is underwhelming. The ballooning travesty surrounding torture of Afghan prisoners is reprehensible.

As notes Paul Wells: "This government [now] lies to us without compunction or apology about the most important files a government can be asked to handle."

Stephen Harper has run out of EZ-Bake options. When your long-term goals involve taking a machete to the federation and forcing Canadians do the same abroad in locsktep with American adventurism, there are only so many "progressive" moves you can make without committing yourself to...progress.

The Conservatives are going to need their war room and their spin. Because every Canadian who belives not just in progressivism, but also in honesty, ought to take aim and fire.

The National Post, more bewildering than usual...

Or maybe it's just Canadian politics that are starting to get a little goofy, as the summer silly season comes upon us.

Certainly only in a farcical, amnesiac, ahistorical era like ours would it be possible to believe, and get others to believe, that you can become a Natural Governing Party in 18 months and with 35% support.

I also thought Conservative strategists liked the fact that Stephane Dion has been getting a lot of media attention of late. Do they really believe that any publicity is good publicity? Are they worried that, sooner or later, their snowjob will cease to be effective? Are they just plain ol' spinning the Post? Who knows....Maybe the Prime Minister's wardrobe consultant/palm reader will tell us - she's probably the most put together person in the Prime Minister's Office.

Puff Piece

I'm sorry Jane Taber, but is it really big news, worthy of inclusion in Canada's National (and Newly Revamped) Newspaper, that some people who work in politics are...bossy?

Do you not feel, in fact, as though your latest piece fanning the "dump Dion" embers this morning in the G&M might be just a little bit...contrived?

I know it must be so tempting to air the dirty laundry of disaffected supporters of losing leadership bidders...but just how many MPs did you use as sources for said article? Two? One?

Go forth Herb Metcalf, and solve those personality conflicts! And disaffected Grits: it would be nice if you gave at least the impression that you cared more about the country and its downward spiral under the Conservatives than you do about your own ambitious skins. Some of us are paying attention....when we can stomach it.

Hot Air that Stinks

Is this for real?

Two paragraphs in the aforelinked article contains some of the most partisan, if subtle, editorializing I've seen yet from Canada's National Newspaper:

"Mr. Drummond's letter appears to be a political boon for the Tories, and a blow for the Liberals, as parties gird themselves for the possibility of an election campaign fought on hot-button issues such as Kyoto.

[Psychologists call this "reactance," and normal people call it reverse psychology: by stating uncertainty, you make you reader surer of the statement's truth.]

It will be difficult for the Liberals to attack Mr. Drummond, a senior Canadian economist whom political parties, including Mr. Dion's, have consulted over the years. He wasn't paid for this latest opinion, which the Tories solicited from him."

[Somehow, not paying for Drummond's very vested opinion makes it more valid?]

The Conservatives really must have no idea what they're going to do about Kyoto.

Rage and Art

The very bad (in every sense) and very telling short plays written by Cho Seung-hui in the months before his murders have been posted online - oh Lord, the wonders and terrors of the New Media - and while their appearance raises a number of questions relating to appropriate use of content (again, in every sense), those who can stomach reading them will see both why Cho's teachers were very worried indeed, and why they could do nothing concrete about their anxiety.

What is the formative relationship between rage and art? I don't think there is a direct one - or rather, I don't think one can truly create (as opposed to express) when so angry as to be uncontrolled. On top of our response to control rage, there's an element of transmutation at the moment of expression/creation that I think helps artists, those who get angry anyway, to take the animal ferocity of fury and use it to propel expression, not guide it. Thus the difference between rage expressed as art - Cho's writing - and rage expressed through art - Guernica.

More to the point, allowing people mired in their own hellish imaginings of personal and familial horror to purchase efficient killings machines easily is a stupid thing, that the Founding Fathers, sons of the Enlightenment all, could not have dreamed of. That the United States would prefer its citizens have the privilege of buying, as in Virginia, one gun a month, rather than have those same citizens - a selfless Holocaust survivor, outstanding researchers in engineering and medicine, students of all stripes - alive to the benefit of the republic, is an indication of something terrible in the American collective unconscious: a will to individual and societal death.

DFEAT?

Australia has an embassy in Phnom Pehn. Also in Riga, Sarajevo, Maputo (that's in Mozambique), Port Louis (Mauritius) and Luanda (Angola). In fact, the Australians have embassies or consulates in 90 countries around the world.

Canada? Not too far behind, with embassies or consulates in 86 states. Like in Phnom Pehn. And Riga. And Sarajevo.

Well, for the moment anyway. Because Canada's Only Slightly Used Government is closing our Latvian and Bosnian and Cambodian embassies. And smaller ones in some piddling place called, what's its name again, oh yeah, Africa.

"No one is immune from the need to stay flexible, shift resources and strengthen representation in some areas, while consolidating in others, to reduce costs wherever possible," our hopefully soon to be ex-Foreign Minister burbled in bureau-speak to the Toronto Star. "We all have to find new and innovative ways to deliver our services beyond the traditional bricks and mortar of embassies."

Maybe a kiosk in Second Life would do the trick? Or opening an Internet cafe in Luanda?

Canada, like Australia, is a large, immigrant-dependant country with strategic interests in several regions around the world. (In fact, most countries, whether they like it or not, now find themselves forced to consider their strategic interests in several regions around the world.) Stephen Harper and Co. seem to just love John Howard's jingo-spouting, immigrant-baiting, climate-denying policies. But even the Australians have a better handle on how to deal constructively, or at least semi-intelligently, with the vicissitudes of globalisation than our own fearless leaders do. Wouldn't it be a good idea to have someone on the ground in the Balkans, for instance?

Never mind - as the Prime Minister would like to be believe we're already de facto Americans, I'm sure he'll be arranging a cozy treaty ensuring any Canadian stranded in Cambodia or Angola has equal access to American overseas consulates. Right? Or maybe he should ask the Australians?

Breaking the Bank

If senior neoconservatives - who by all appearances lack empathy, compassion, foresight, wisdom, or competence in military affairs - also lack the good grace to keep their hypocrisy down to a dull roar with the rest of us, what's left of them? Note that this is not a hypothetical question.

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UPDATE: I wasn't even thinking of Gordon O'Connor when I wrote this post - but most of the descriptors listed above fit him nicely too! How fortuitous!

Jaw-dropping

"Liberals agree not to run candidate against Green leader" says the CBC.

Well...won't this be grist for a number of people's mills.

My initial, fleeting thought - "what a horrendously bad political move for Dion to make" - lasted for about fifteen minutes. But, then I pondered.

And it occured to me that the Liberals (who came in third in 2006 in Central Nova, with just 24% of the vote) weren't going to win against Peter Mackay anyway.

Whereas Elizabeth May, sucking up the support of Liberals, NDPers (the second place party in 2oo6 with 32%), old-school PC types, the 1.6 percent of people who voted Green last time, and May's high school friends, just might. Not for sure, but far more likely than if there were a Liberal candidate in the mix.

What would have been really canny (though probably impossible) would have been to convince the NDP to not run a candidate either. Can't you just see the wonderful symbolism: Canadian progressives agreeing to give the Green Party a seat in the House (and the televised leader's debates), while almost certainly ensuring the defeat of a boorish, high-profile Conservative turncoat?

Anyway, Dion's gonna get PILES of flack. Pundits (and some Liberals) will ask why he doesn't simply join the Green Party, as he's tacitly endorsing its policies and leader. In fact, May will likely join with the Liberals on almost every vote in the Commons (someone, with more time than me, I challenge you to find a spot where the two parties' platforms are substantively different), so in a parliamentary context, it's actually a remarkably astute move.

I'm just a little concerned that, PR-wise, it's going to be a disaster.
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UPDATE: Well, that wasn't so awful. Could get worse when the columnists weigh in tomorrow. One thing's for sure: Jack is seriously ticked off. Maybe he should try to do something to garner as much publicity as May just picked up - like maybe getting in on the "deal"?

But man, did Dion's English sound better at that news conference today. Much better. And Elizabeth May is delightful - her anecdote to Carol Off on CBC's As It Happens about talking to Dion on a pay phone in a Chinese restaurant was gold. Besides, how many times can Conservative MPs spew out tidbits like "this is all about Dion's lack of leadership" or some such without people becoming a little tired of the repetition? Law of diminishing returns, anyone?

Money and the Quebec vote

I'm a big fan of SES Research - they tend to be fairly on the money, and Nick Nanos is rapidly turning into the anti-Allan Greg. The latest SES poll (and it's fresh off the press) of Canadians's comfort levels with a Harper majority government is therefore worth noting.

The gist: the numbers (comfort or discomfort-wise) aren't going anywhere significant, except in Quebec, where those somewhat comfortable with a Conservative majority have increased in number more than 15% since February.

Which shows to go you that, to paraphrase Bill Clinton "it's about the money, stupid."

As an aside, it will be interesting to see how the Toronto Sun's Greg Weston - for whom, it seems, the poll was done - will interpret the findings. I think I can guess how - can you?

The obligatory Belinda Stronach post

One of my enduring memories from the media coverage of the 2006 Liberal leadership convention is of Belinda Stronach (along with John Manley) looking incredibly sour after Stephane Dion's surprise victory. Given her fairly frosty attitude at the time - not to mention the fact that being the CEO of a Big Three automaker is far more exciting than attending, for instance, the Newmarket Liberal Riding Association Golf Day and Clam-Bake - I'm not too shocked by Belinda's departure from the green chamber.

Nor am I surprised that various big-and-small "c" conservative pundits (there seem to be so many scurrying around these days) are crowing about rats and sinking ships. You have to at least admire the consistency of the conservative forces (interesting, parentheticaly, that the word "neoconservative" seems to have gone out of style in the media). One of the things that has always bedeviled progressives is a tendency to "discuss" (read: bicker) policy and position in a very earnest, honest and public way. Conservatives, from what I've seen, have no such problem.

Nor, for that matter, did some of those said-same Conservatives have any problem belittling Stronach, in ways so coarse and misogynistic that the only thing more incredible than the attacks themselves was the apparent acceptance of their appropriatness as public statements by the Canadian press and people.

But I digress. Politics is often a game of egos. Retirements aren't uncommon, and it's perfectly fair to say that some Liberal MPs who had a good run under the old regime are moving on to other things, some perhaps for reasons to do with the new leadership, most likely not. But the presence of Belinda, or Stephen Owen, or Lucienne Robillard, in the House wasn't going to sway too many people to vote Liberal one way or the other. The press's constant inflation of the story will do a much more effective job of that.

Oh, and Conservatives: wasn't the previous administration so corrupt and despicable that none of its members ought ever be trusted with high office again? Shouldn't you be pleased, in the name of a safer, stronger, better Canada, that Belinda is retiring? Or would you prefer "put down"?

Rings a Bell?

How soul-sucking is our modern age? Apparently, quite.

Let's get together/I wanna feel the same way too

Take a look at recent piece by Slate's Dahlia Lithwick, which should be required reading for the Canadian political classes, especially those in the blogosphere.

I have to admit that I've occasionally been guilty of snarky ad hominem comments against political opponents. As Lithwick points out, "taking aim and firing" sure is easy.

One thing that makes me uncomfortable actively identifying myself with a political party is that "taking aim and firing" is all the rage from politicians these days.

For instance: when pundits of all stripes debate whether or not Stephane Dion is a "good leader," they're really asking whether Dion can lead publicity "assaults" effectively in a particularly brutal news cycle, against opponents who are particularly vicious. The answer may well be no, especially against an adversary as formidable as our Prime Minister. I don't believe this makes Dion a poor leader - I think it says something much more fundamental about systemic problems in the way we as Canadians are taught about public life. And of course the trend of persuasion by abuse crosses party lines - Dion's apparent embrace of it has been one of the things that, I think, has hampered his performance, and his image with the public.

To say "that's the way things are" as justificiation just doesn't cut it. I encourage all of my arch-conservative readers (there are surely hordes of you) to suggest topics for collaborative discussion, a la Lithwick's article. I'm more than happy to talk policy seriously and intelligently with any takers! Better yet, can anyone out there think of constructive, practical ways to reorient political debate in Canada back towards civility?

Altogether vanity

"Prime Minister Stephen Harper is launching an advertising campaign of his own to counter Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams's recent attack ads.... As well, the ad contains the claim that the province has "been blessed and stayed blessed in this budget."
- CBC News Online

Saint Stephen, eh? Maybe the Prime Minister should remember what happened to his hagiographic namesake. This sort of smarmy, patronising sanctimony would, if I were a Newfoundlander, make me sick to my indomitable stomach.

Laboring in obscurity...

...is not such a bad thing, really, especially when you read the kind of comments Jason Cherniak gets.

Quixotic Miscellaney

- I am redeemed! The word "kerfuffle" not only exists, but has an unimpeachable pedigree.

- Stephen Harper was apparently a Reach for the Topper in his high school days - yet another thing he and I have in common, along with....um...

- One of my better friends accidentally assaulted Donald Sutherland yesterday in a 5th Avenue mansion. And it was Donald Sutherland who was out of place.

La bleh provence

Well, my Quebec election prediction wasn't quite right. Though in my defense, it was damn close.

I wonder how Bernard Landry will do toe to toe against Stephen Harper - probably not as well as Gilles Duceppe will do toe to toe against Mario Dumont.

I also wonder if anyone will pause to consider the following: that you can apparently be a drunk driver, a crypto-racist, a verbally abusive misogynist, or a failed amateur golf pro and also a Canadian Premier, but you can't be a homosexual unless you somehow manage to convince the public you "represent families." Besides, wouldn't "reformed coke addict" fit right in on that list?

What a message to Canadian queer youth considering getting involved in politics, from Rachel Gagnon and, more broadly, from the people of Quebec: if you're a tepette, don't wear a pink tie at the office. Leave the bad behaviour, and the power, to the straight men - after all, they have so much experience with both.

Un canadien errant

The next 7 days could perhaps turn out to be one of the more exciting weeks in Canadian politics in some time. Or it could turn out to be a total bust. Either way, I won't be here to comment on it - I'm off for a well-deserved rest south of the border.

Before I go though, a couple of thoughts:

- Convential wisdom says that Stephen Harper wants an election immediately after the budget. Unconventional wisdom says that he doesn't. My guess is that Stevie will be happy to have or not have an election as long as whatever happens happens to be in his party's interest. Harper's funny like that.

-Jean Charest won't win the Quebec election.

That's all I've got folks. See you when the dust settles.

Shell game?

You know, there's an awful lot of support from some right-wing pundits for a merger of the Canadian political left - note who's in support out of this group.

(In passing, it's a remarkably cool idea that Maclean's has come up with - getting public luminaries to comment on stories. Whether it's actually a good idea is something I need to think about a little more).

Now why would the right be so gung-ho about merging the left? Maybe because it would allow the political dialogue in Canada to be pushed even farther to the right than it already is? Or because it would silence any discussion about proportional representation at the national level? Or because it would, psychologically, give the Conservative Party a hypothetical 50% of the national pie, which is 15% more than they have in reality?

Pat Martin's actual comments were in fact fairly forthright, honest and unrehearsed, which is of course they're being called a gaffe and why he's getting into trouble.

And speaking of autonomists...

I've just realised that most of my readership may in fact not be familiar with the links between the Harper Conservatives and Quebec's ADQ as I mentioned in my previous post. On doing a little digging, I discovered that my source for this information, a Canadian Press article written by one Alex Panetta, was only published in one Ontario paper, the Owen Sound Sun-Times (and if you don't know why I regularly read the Owen Sound Sun-Times, don't bother asking). Anyhoo, barring a searchable archive feature on the Sun-Times website, I will brave a CP cease-and-decist copywright injunction and post the article below in full:

Tory, ADQ ties run deep; Conservatives chock full of former Action democratique operatives (The Owen Sound Sun Times, March 6, 2007)
Copywright: The Canadian Press - Alexander Panetta
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Extensive ties between the Harper government and Quebec's third-largest political party belie the popular wisdom that the federal powers that be are pulling in unison for a Liberal re-election in the province.

From the lowest echelons of the federal government all the way up to the Prime Minister's Office, political operatives who worked for and in some cases helped build the Action democratique du Quebec are sprinkled throughout the Harper Conservatives. "I'd even say a majority of the Conservatives' francophone personnel are Adequistes," one federal government official said Monday.

The close bond with the small-c conservative ADQ explains why the federal Tories are claiming partial neutrality in the Quebec campaign. Ministerial staff have the green light to criticize the sovereigntist Parti Quebecois but are forbidden from endorsing either of the two other parties. The ban on open campaigning does not extend to Conservative MPs, one of whom - Jacques Gourde - stumped for an ADQ candidate in a Quebec suburb last week.

The common bond between the Tories and Mario Dumont's party extends far beyond personnel.

Dumont was approached informally several times before the 2006 election about running for the federal party - and he insisted every time he has no intention of ever making the move to Ottawa.

Instead, he appears to have brought a piece of Tory Ottawa to provincial politics. With his party closing in on its two bigger rivals in the polls, Dumont has adopted a nearly identical campaign strategy to the one Harper used in 2006. He espouses similar ideas on child care, fiscal policy and law and order.

Those platform planks are being driven home in a daily announcement around 9 a.m. where Dumont sets the tone for the day's news coverage the same way Harper did in the 2006 election.

"It seems to be working fairly well for Mario," said Philippe Gervais, who has been a senior campaign official for the federal Tories and both the provincial Liberals and ADQ. That announcement-a-morning strategy - lifted from the playbook of Australian Prime Minister John Howard - was imported into Canadian politics by Harper after his disastrous final days of the 2004 federal campaign.

Dumont suffered a similar fate in the last provincial election. His support tanked in 2003 as he chose to comment on topics seemingly hand-picked by his opponents.

In Harper's case, he grew visibly frustrated amid daily grillings over same-sex marriage and on the Liberal charge he would suspend women's abortion rights.

For Dumont, the daily torment sprang from that most pervasive and perennial question in Quebec politics: Are you a sovereigntist or a federalist? Eager to draw support from both sides of the nationalist divide, Dumont has steadfastly avoided describing himself as either. But Dumont - who began his political life as a federalist provincial Liberal, then campaigned for the sovereigntists in the 1995 referendum - has consistently said it's time for Quebec to move beyond the national debate.

Federal Tories admit some consternation about Dumont's checkered constitutional past but they believe he's come full circle to his federalist roots.

If the Harper government has any questions about the party, it doesn't need to look very far for answers. Dumont's tour guide from the 2003 provincial election - Jean-Maurice Duplessis - is now the tour manager in Harper's office.

International Co-operation Minister Josee Verner, who was once a provincial Liberal staffer, made the switch to the ADQ and was a Quebec City regional organizer for the party in 2003. MP Stephen Blaney ran for the party in 1998 and fellow MP Jacques Gourde was an organizer in the last provincial campaign.

At least three spokespeople for Tory ministers - Jean-Luc Benoit, Isabelle Bouchard and Isabelle Fontaine - worked for the ADQ, as did Michele Lalonde, the chief of staff to Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn.

Gervais was the Tories' deputy campaign manager in 2006, helped run Dumont's tour in 2003 and served a similar function with Charest in the 1998 provincial campaign. He says the federal Tories harbour no bias for either of the non-separatist parties. "I think Mr. Harper has had a very good relationship with the Liberal government and also has a good one with Mr. Dumont," he said.

"Is there a preference there? I don't think so. It's more of a hands-off approach and let Quebecers decide what they want to do. I guess the only one they don't want is the PQ."

Quebec City Nights

Had a good time last evening thanks to the wonders of l'Internet, watching the Quebec Leader's Debate on Radio-Canada's website. A few thoughts:

- I really liked the colour of Andre Boisclair's suit (and tie! - was the green for the environment, or to celebrate Quebec's Irish heritage? I suspect the former). If he somehow manages to pull out an electoral win, Boisclair will leapfrog over Nova Scotia's Rodney MacDonald to become, in my books anyway, Canada's most attractive Premier by far.

- Jean Charest's hair: better than it was circa 1995, but still terrible, terrible.

- Why aren't federal leadership debates held in some classy room on Parliament Hill, instead of on some god-awful set in a Nepean soundstage? The National Assembly seems like a cool building, and indirectly managed to help all three leaders appear slightly more like statesmen, and less like sleazeballs.

- In terms of the actual debate:

-I was quite impressed with Boisclair (I admit that I'm predisposed to like him, despite his status as a flaming separatist). He came off well - quite measured (he actually became more so as the debate wore on), animated and convicing in debate, especially with Dumont. He wasn't perfect - he sometimes interrupted Charest too often - but very good.

-Charest was also good, but seemed weary - "defensive" is the word columnists are using. When Dumont challenged him on his accomplishments on behalf of Quebec at the federal level, Charest rhymed off several quite reasonable examples (the Council of the Federation, more money, etc). Dumont pressed more and more aggressively, clearly trying to bait Charest to anger. I expected Charest to turn the tables on Dumont by taking a tack similar to that of Boisclair earlier in the evening - when he repeatedly asked of Dumont, I think to Dumon's detriment, what new powers the ADQ's ludicrous "autonomy" position would actually seek of the federal government - but Charest simply repeated his answer over and over resignedly. He looked like a Premier, but not a very dynamic one.

-As for Mario Dumont, I admit that I'm inclined to dislike his party and his policies, for a number of reasons. I had no reason to feel otherwise after last night. Dumont played to the bleachers all evening - he was sharp and a little wild in his attacks, and played to his rural nationalist base in a way that struck me as more than a little xenophobic.

What's remarkable, for an anglo, is just how anti-Canadian all three leaders, not just Boisclair, seemed to be. Charest and Dumont have similar views of Quebec's place in Canada (more money, more autonomy) whereas Boisclair would settle for the latter outside of Confederation even if it meant passing on the former.

The fourth person present at the debate, though not of course in person, was Stephen Harper. His shadow (and fingerprints) are all over this election, and many are touting Monday's federal budget as one of the campaign's defining moments. I'm not sure how it's going to go down, and I am starting to have a sneaking suspicion that the budget will not be as overtly good for Quebec as many are predicting it will be. I've mentioned before the ties between the ADQ and the federal Conservatives, particularly in the area of operatives on the ground. I wonder if perhaps our Stephen will find some way to reinforce the ADQ's message, and thus its electoral fortunes, if he feels as if Jean Charest is a bit of a canard. Remember, this is the Prime Minister who suggested building a firewall around Alberta - if that's not autonomy, I don't know what is.

Kill all the lawyers?

An article from the Washington Post sheds yet more light on what looks to be an increasingly ugly, damaging and wide-ranging scandal involving the White House, the Department of Justice, and a purge of US Attorneys not considered loyal enough to the Republican cause by Karl Rove and Harriet Meyers. (In doing so, the Post also shows just how badly the wheels have come off the Bush administration) . And they wanted to put this woman on the Supreme Court?

"Vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle"

Stephane Dion gets flack, flack, and more flack in todays' national papers. I'm sorry, but this is getting a little ridiculous.

The current political clime reminds me particularly of that famous line from W.B. Yeats' "The Second Coming," about the best lacking all conviction, and the worst being full of passionate intensity.

Every day, vitriol pours down on Dion from all sides. Of course the Liberal leader is not a saint, and is still finding his rhythm (and under some of the most stressful political conditions possible). Of course he's made gaffes.

But in the 24-hour news cycle echo chamber, what's really remarkable, more so than getting a story reported, is getting a story reported again and again, and again. And it's that last fact that is helping the Reformed-Name Party to win hands down.

Does any Canadian really believe that there are no debates or discussions around policy or strategy inside "Canada's New Government" (or as I've taken to calling it, Canada's Ewww Government)? No factions? No competing interests? No changes in position? No disagreements around the Cabinet table? Chalk it up to the Prime Minister's legendary anal-retentiveness that very little of that ever comes up in the press. But when Harper changes a position (on the environment, on Quebec, on Iraq) it's "statesmanlike." Columnists are already calling Dion "Flipper."

Jason Cherniak suggests that the Liberals need to grin and bear things for the moment. I agree. But the Liberals also have to start operating like an Opposition party. Stephen Harper does - his entire strategy has been to pretend to be in oppositon even while in government. And the Liberals also have to find a way to get the press, sympathetically conservative as they are, to be, if not on-side, then at least not offside. 'Cause at the moment there aren't too many people crying foul.

Paul Wells asks...

"Stéphane Dion and André Boisclair both in trouble. What's it all mean?"

One is tempted to say "nothing," but that's not really allowed.

One is tempted to say that the Canadian anglophone media establishment really dislikes left-wing Quebeckers, but that's not a particularly satisfying answer.

One is tempted to say that Canadians are often complacent about their progressivism, and allow a minority of conservative voices in business and the punditry to dictate the tone and pace of national debate to the detriment of the aforementioned leaders, but that's essentially the same response as answer number two.

One is tempted to say that Canadians now yearn for an unheralded era of freedom, capitalism and neoconservative opportunity, along with strong right-wing leaders with authoritarian tendencies and neo-fascist family-values policies - but that's possibly sensationalist, and possibly also wrong.

One is tempted to say (and many have said it) that Stephen Harper is one of the most strategically focused, and unscrupulously opportunistic, Prime Ministers that this country has ever seen, and that Jean Charest never met a strategic, unscrupulous opportunist he didn't recognize from the bathroom mirror.

One is tempted to say, metaphorically, that we as Canadians are a bit at sea at the moment - gasping and sputtering for air while simultaneously pushing people off the boat, letting the boiler run out of control, drilling holes in the hull, and throwing tomatoes at the people trying to hand out the life-jackets.

One is tempted to say that it's all about a little bit of all of the above. One might even be half-right.

"Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance"...

The country's mayors prepare to do polite but pitched battle with the federal government on transit funding.

I love and am committed to public transit, but manufacturing subway cars and building buses is a pretty industrially intensive proposition. Whereas if we all walked a little more, or cycled, it would not only cut down on our car AND subway use, but would also benefit our bottom lines (and waist lines) in the long-term.

Which goes to show how, in the modern world, even the causes of progress are sometimes double-edged.

Just sayin'. Miller and Co., knock 'em dead.

The Truth Comes Out

"Earlier this week, Louis Champagne, host of the top-rated morning show in the Saguenay area, taunted a local PQ candidate who is gay.

In an interview, he asked Sylvain Gaudreault, the candidate in Jonquière, whether it was harder to sell a leader with a different sexual orientation, especially to the local factory workers. 'When you show up with another homosexual, aren't you going to be asked the question, 'Listen, the PQ, isn't that a club of fags?'"....

A clip television stations replayed throughout the day yesterday showed Mr. Boisclair looking uneasy and speechless for several seconds when asked about the radio interview."

-from today's Globe and Mail

Frankly, I think I'd be a little uneasy too.

I'd always wondered why there wasn't more attention paid to the fact that Andre Boisclair could potentially become the first openly gay premier in Canadian history, and now I know why.

When you're lucky enough, as I am, to live in downtown Toronto, it's easy not just to feel secure about your own life as a gay man, but also to feel secure about the place of queers in Canada's collective life.

But there are sometimes news items - like the negative comments from at least one prominent TV pundit when Ontario's Health Minister announced he was marrying his partner, or this business about Boisclair - that makes me wonder if the anxiety my father expressed to me when I came out (that it would be hard to get a job because I was gay) didn't have a very small wrinkle of truth to it. We can have gay MPs, or even gay ministers, sure - but when the shit really hits the political fan, I wonder if old-fashioned bigotry doesn't rear its ugly head, sometimes, after all.

Sometimes gay men are criticized purportedly not because they're gay, but because they act "irresponsibly" - but irresponsibility can be aggravated, in the eyes of some, by the mere fact of sexual orientation. I don't think Boisclair, with his years of Montreal club-going, saw the danger - if he had, he probably wouldn't have been caught in that Brokeback Mountain farrago.

Hang in there, Andre: you may be an ex-coke addict and a separatist, but at least you've only ever abandoned a drug addiction, not a political party.

UPDATE: The Globe's Konrad Yakabuski goes into the gory details ($) - Andre can call me anytime!

As You Leek It

Today is St. David's Day. St. David is the patron saint of Wales - and if anyone is planning on moving to that lovely land and is looking for an agricultural position, they might want to take a gander at this.

The Age of Terror

This week's heated debate on the Terrorism Act reminded me of a pertinent, if affected, post on the subject of terrorism from nine months or so ago, and especially the fine article by Slate's William Saletan that it links to.

Saletan's point (and mine) is this: that it is impossible to stop every terrorist attack, just as it is impossible to stop every child being hit by a car, or every married man looking at another man. The likelyhood of each can be lessened (in the case of terrorism, hopefully to a very low threshold; in the case of the other man, realistically to a slightly higher one ), but eventually the law of diminishing returns makes further expense of blood and treasure (on the man or the mission) useless, at best.

Given this reality - that after a certain point more and more resources must be consumed, and more and more liberties curtailed, to chase a "safety" that is impossible - our society has to consider not only how to absorb, deter or neutralise evil, but how to foster good, in our own and in our culture's communal lives. Bolstering society's positives will in fact advance the former.

"In a liquid world," Saletan writes, "you can't seal off evil." And it's not a bad Lenten thought to remember that there's a little evil incorporated into all of us. The point of every enduring system of human belief, is to overcome that evil not by ignoring it, dwelling on it or violently suppresing it. The point of overcoming evil is to accept its existence, be aware of its effects, and work tireless to shun it, marginalize it, diminish it, and deal with it without fanfare if it grows too prominent.

We will never be rid of evil, in the body personal or the body politic. But we'll never be bereft of good either, and that's what we have to nurture, support, encourage, celebrate and exhalt.

I believe, and always have, that our criminal justice system and its thousand years of juridical evolution has determined quite a fine balance between our liberties as people and the duties of our state. Measures such as "preventative" arrests, the holding of people indefinitely without trial, or the suspension of the writ of habeus corpus don't just upset that balance - they deny its relevance and even its existence. They threaten to undermine our entire civil process because they hamstring one of our most successful, and flexible tools of the greater good - a rule of law that has at is centre two vital tenets, the presumption of legal innocence, and an individual's trial and examination by a body of their peers.

Saletan ends his article with a quote from Charles Darwin: "It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change." Everyone knows there's truth in this. But we as a species are unique for one reason only: we have some small ability to respond to change with new changes of our own, to create change proactively. This means we, as people and as a people, must become better at bending, not breaking; and turning and turning, until we come round right.

Harry Potter and the Role in the Hay

It's nice (very nice) to see Daniel Radcliffe playing against type.

I've fixed the comments function...

...so comment away, faithful readers!

She ain't the queen of denial...

Jutta Brunnee, the Metcalf Chair in Environmental Law at McGill University, makes the sensible legal point about compliance with the Kyoto Protocol that I tried (and failed due to technical error) to make a little while ago.

If it quacks like a duck

Another tedious canard of the current Canadian political clime: the notion that the Liberal party (or any party, for that matter) deserves to be out of power simply because they've governed for a long time, and that the Conservative pary (or any party, for that matter) should continue in office because they've only been in power a short time and deserve further opportunity to show what they can do. By this logic, the New Democratic Party is the most deserving of forming the next government, and one should only oppose a government's policies after they've become so entrenched as to be unrepealable.

Come off it, people. Vote against a government because you don't like their policies, and say so. If you feel the need to disguise your true motivation with an anodyne excuse downplaying the seriousness of your decision, you might perhaps want to examine just why you're so uncomfortable speaking your true mind, and just what you feel so guilty about.

Hold the Steamed Grits

Super-bored this morning at the Palais de Bureaucracie, so you're getting a lot of my political musings.

A blog well worth reading is Cherniak on Politics, written by former Trinitron and budding political maestro Jason Cherniak. Jason is well-connected within the Canadian political blogosphere (by some accounts, he helped create the Canadian political blogosphere) so his posts tend to generate quite a bit of (sometimes remarkably vitriolic) debate and discussion from various points on the political spectrum.

I intensely dislike the kind of personal baiting that some of Jason's more conservative readers seem to feel is appropriate to deploy when debating public policy (though I suppose they have only their fearless leader as a role model), and it's to Jason's credit that he is invariably polite, if impassioned, in his responses. And it's not like I've never descended to name-calling either.

Scream of Wheat

I wonder if the fracas over the Canadian Wheat Board might swing away a little Conservative support in the West? Just askin....

You call this progress?

Chantal Hebert obliquely suggests uniting the Canadian left into some weird, ungainly, many-headed behemoth (can you really see John McKay and Libby Davies chumming it up in caucus meetings?)

The suggestion is a bit of a walk-0ff in Hebert's column, but it's a canard that does get occasional press from some quarters, which is too bad: it would be quite challenging, and unpleasant, to merge two quite different parties (the centrish Liberals and the leftish NDP), to say nothing of throwing the Greens into the mix; and I'll reiterare my usual gripe that under some sort of proportional electoral system all this would be a moot point.

But apart from these qualms, Hebert's exempla need to be tackled in a little bit of detail. Hebert identifies two apparent problems for the left - progressive New Democrats and Liberals battling each other in urban ridings, and progressive Liberals and BQists battling each other in Quebec ridings.

The latter problem, of course, isn't really much of one, inasmuch as it's really part of the larger problem that is the BQ, a question (along with the murky world of Quebec politics) that I feel underqualified to comment on extensively. Let's just say that if it were in Quebec's interest to massively cut taxes and ban gay marriage, the BQ would likely support such things - that is to say, the fact that the BQ is a socially progressive party is thanks to the fact that Quebec is a socially progressive province but that it is Quebec, and not social progress, that comes first. As such, the BQ is a wild card, and I have no problem with Liberals taking out BQ candidates - I've often said that if Quebec ever achieves indepedence I'll be the first one to move there, but until that day comes I'm as staunch a federalist as they come.

The former problem, while more vexing, is not always a "problem" per say either. While I would prefer to see the maximum possible number of New Democratic MPs elected, for the purposes of the next election what I really want is the maximum possible number of Conservative MPs defeated. My first concern isn't therefore over ridings like Trinity-Spadina or Toronto-Centre - I'm more worried by places like BC's Fleetwood - Port Kells, where the combined NDP-Liberal vote outpolled the Conservative vote by almost 20%.

Of course, as I've already noted, the NDP and Liberals are different parties, with different principles, thus, my hatred of strategic voting - it's a particularly unfair game to force the electorate to play (die, FPTP!) That said, allliances between the NDP and Liberals have been one of the more common features of Canadian electoral politics.

Y'all want my advice? Libs and NDPers, sit down and figure out who got more votes in some key ridings last election (think BC, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and southern Ontario) - then concentrate your respective resources in the places you came closest to beating the Conservatives. If you're really committed to a progressive Canada, you know there's one goal that's more important that gaining partisan advantage: stopping Stephen Harper.

It ain't easy being Green?

Lawrence Martin remains one of the few Canadian national current affairs columnists keeping a cool head while others all around are losing theirs, and I say this not just because he agrees ($) with everything I wrote on Tuesday.

On the Green Party: whether it can succesfully maintain its high level of public support through an election campaign and into seats is an open question.

-Points in favour: a) Elizabeth May is a credible and apparently likeable type who made quite a splash in her London by-election try, and b) both andecdotal and polling evidence suggests a large segment of the Canadian population (my mother included) are taking to a sort of hands-on, lifestyle-oriented environmental custodianship in their daily lives, and would like governments to follow suit.

-Points against: a) as Martin notes, the Green Party's support is distributed in a way meaning our decrepit FPTP electoral system will ensure votes aren't necessarily translated into seats, and b) without increased media exposure (read: the frikkin' televised leaders' debates) many Canadians won't be inclined to get knowledgeable and comfortable with the Green platform and will revert to their previous party of choice in the polling booth.

It's interesting to note that according to even the Strategic Council the Liberals have lost the least support to the Greens relative to their numbers from the last election - 1% or so, compared to 2% from the Conservatives and 3% from the NDP. All these numbers are admittedly rounded and imprecise. But even if the mainstream parties gain back 4% of the Green vote, the Greens would still poll at 8%, and have oodles of federal money to play with for the subsequent (it's not going to end, folks) national vote.

Moreover, 66% of Canadians would vote for a party that supports the Kyoto Protocol and all that it represents.

All this being said, the Libs still need win over around half a million folks who voted Conservative last election. It's gonna take some English lessons for Stephan, and a coherent, authentic policy platform supported by what I think should be a very positive (and as a bonus, funny) ad campaign. Get on it, people!

Meanwhile, our "decisive," "visionary" Prime Minister is using shock-and-awe tactics to smear backbench Liberal MPPs on the floor of the House. No wonder Jack Layton scores higher on charisma...

Putsch comes to shove?

The Globe and Mail editorial board decides to give a shove ($) to the anti-Dion bandwagon, damning with faint praise as only the G&M can....

The Fine Print

If you're described as "decisive" and having "clear vision" in every press article ever written about you, you wouldn't surprised if people started labelling you as such.

If you're Stephen Harper and you're hoping that decisiveness divorced from any actual constructive action will win you an election, you would be thrilled to bits.

But if you're the Canadian media and, to quote John Ibbitson, have the "collective IQ of wildebeest," you wouldn't possibly try for just a little depth in your analysis, now would you?

Perhaps you might note that Canadians are reportedly split 28% Liberal/27% Tory and 24% "I don't know" on the question of "Which party do Canadians identify with most"? Or highlight that a whopping 33% of respondents don't know who would best deal with managing the environment? Or delve into how the Green Party now has an astonishing 12% of popular support nationally? Or recall that Stephan Dion has been Opposition leader for all of 2 1/2 months?

As usual, I agree with Paul. The Liberals desperately need to step up their game. But it would nice if the Canadian media establishment weren't quite so eager to delude themselves and the public with the Conservatives' twisted fairy tale.

Alternatives

Pursuant to my post below: in the interests of fair and balanced reporting, wouldn't it seem reasonable to have someone from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives quoted occasionally in response to various governmental chicanes? Sadly, I suspect CCPA doesn't have quite the budget of the Fraser Institute. Aren't there any rich Canadian George Soros-esque types willing to help bankroll progress?

Forest? What forest?

Thought (formulated, perhaps appropriately, while on the toilet):

Remember, back in the bad ol' days of federal Liberal excess, how the government couldn't spend a dime without hysterical flunkies from the National Citizens' Coalition and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation beating their breasts abou the coming fiscal (and often moral) apocalypse?

The current regime is spending like a drunken sailor - but where's the chorus of alarm? Not too much criticism from those guardians of fiscal probity now, is there. Almost makes you think there's some kind of connection between the National Citizens' Coalition and the current government, or something....

Maybe a spunky progressive reporter might want to give this idea a whirl? Anybody? Or is it just so obvious that no one's seen it yet?

Denial: it ai'nt just a dried-up river (of my tears!)

I just wrote a really awesome post on climate change, and then pushed the wrong button. Bummer

The gist: Canada's media is often parochial, blikered and swayed by the Conservative environmental agenda. Canada, as a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol, can't simply ignore it: it has to either withdraw, or comply. Our country risks becoming both an international pariah and a rapidly-meling mess. Read James Travers.

See, that's way more succinct than my first attempt.

Heavy duty

A leader who abandons his troops when facing certain defeat isn't much of a leader in my book.

"We stumble into active hostilities"

A second Gulf of Tonkin? Let's hope not....

People in Gas-Powered Houses....

"[United States Ambassador to Canada David] Wilkins warned Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day to back off, because a U.S. review determined [Maher] Arar should remain on the watch list.

'It's a little presumptuous for him [Day] to say who the United States can and cannot allow into our country,' Wilkins told reporters Wednesday."

-from the CBC today

So according to our good ol' boy Willie, it's inappropriate for one country to interfere with the internal policies of another country, even when the interest of its citizens are at stake? Well, it's not usually this easy to catch the Republican'ts out on bald-faced slimeball hypocrisy.

European Foot-in-Mouth

"In Tuesday's radio interview, Royal said she was not referring to "institutional reforms" but that Quebecers are free to decide on their own future."
- from the CBC

"Questionnée sur l’exclamation «Vive le Québec libre», employée par le général de Gaulle en 1967, elle a répondue que c’était «une belle phrase». Assurant toutefois assuré qu’elle ne le dirait «pas de cette façon là»."
- Ségolène Royal, doing damage control (!) in Liberation after apparently revealing her sympathy for an independent Quebec

My French has admittedly become shockingly rusty, but isn't MSR (as she is apparently termed in the lingo) saying that while she might quibble with the semantics, she would endorse the sentiment of de Gaulle's barnburner? I guess we know which version of the future MSR wishes Quebeckers would decide for...but then, I guess we knew that already...

The Female of the Species, Mark II

The ratio of men to women in the Liberal caucus is approximately 5:1. The ratio of men to women in the ranks of Liberal critics is approximately 3:1

I suddenly have a sneaking suspicion that Stephane Dion pulling a trick that, as an academic, he probably learned in infancy...at my alma mater, when there's something (or someone) we'd like to see out of harm's way (our harm, not vice versa), we send it to committee.

The Female of the Species

The ration of men to women in the Liberal caucus is approximately 5:1. The ratio of men to women in Stephan Dion's new caucus committees is approximately 7:1. The ratio of men to women contesting the leadership of the Liberal party in 2006 was 7:1.

I suspect Stephan Dion's decisions surrounding his caucus committees were closely connected to that last statistic. If the Liberals don't field 103 female candidates in the next election, then there'll be reason to worry - for now, everyone sit tight and keep an eye on Marlene Jennings.

Beware of Geeks, Bearing Gifts

"For my part I entertain a high idea of the [their] utility... I consider such vehicles of knowledge more happily calculated than any other to preserve the liberty, stimulate the industry, and ameliorate the morals of a free and enlightened people."

That's George Washington on the newspaper in 1788. It could as well be Paul Wells on the digital media in 2006 (though Paul Wells' prose style is considerably more punchy than old Georgie's, and that's a good thing.)

I only have a small quible with Wells' characteristically intelligent and prescient account of how we're all freer with the Net. And it goes like this:

Are consumers really the beneficiaries of the shift of power and influence to the digital domain? Or, perhaps the more pertinent quesiton might be: are citizens (yes there's a difference, Maxime Bernier) are truly empowered by the Internet Age.

The problem with the Internet, like any other media (or human activity for that matter), is that its adepts still exist in a series of concentric circles, much like Dante's famous Nine Circles of Hell. The Internet does not through its intrinsic formal nature necessarily promote intelligent debate, discussion and engagement any more than a newspaper or a magazine does - it just structures debate (or lack of it) in a different way.

What the Internet does do is present the potential for infinite choice, just as it presents the potential for consumer empowerment. The problem here is that both of these things are, thanks to the power dynamics of the "real world," illusions.

If as Paul Wells writes, "no fact is necessarily obscure" on the Net, then therefore every fact is potentially obscure - insamuch as if anything can be brought to light and the light that shines is finite, something else will remain in darkness.

This is the problem: believing in their unlimited ability to choose, net-izens either ignore the necessity of making choices (be it good, moral, immoral, whatever) in their digital content, or proclaim that all choices are equally good/bad/interesting/disinteresting, which is essentially the same contention. Why? Read on...

The phenomenon of apparently unlimited choice would be insidious enough,but it is symptomatic of a larger danger. Broadband internet costs money, as do modems, routers, monitors, webcams and the rest of the Web's physical paraphenalia. If all the moving and shaking in political circles is on the Web, it simply means a new kind of literacy and illiteracy in society; a new kind of elite exclusion; a human wolf in new pixellated clothing. So without realising, net users are directed and their activities proscribed by the same old actors: the rich (how many cool startups are now owned by Google?) and the powerful (sayonara Alliance Atlantis: hellow Global).

I'm not saying that the forces at work here are at all different from any that have shaped human history. But nor can I call all this citizen or even consumer choice. I call it rule by a class who only needs to type to control, a new paradigm in which all the old evils (greed, power, lust, and shortsightedness) will persist, and even thrive in ways which we as a species are quite unprepared for: a digitarchy. Paul Wells is right about one thing: the biggest danger would be to ignore what is going on.

How Conservative are you?

From "How Canadian are you? Visible-minority immigrants and their children identify less and less with the country, report says" (Globe and Mail, Jan. 11):

"We need to address the racial divide," Prof. '[Jeffrey] Reitz said. "Otherwise there is a danger of social breakdown. The principle of multiculturalism was equal participation of minorities in mainstream institutions. That is no longer happening."

Oh yeah? Just ask Stephen Harper...

Jack on the Rocks

As several outlets have noted, today's shuffle in the House of Commons now means that the NDP hold the the power in the current Parliament - crunch the numbers yourself here.

I wrote a month or so ago that the NDP needed to take some action to avoid being blended into a pulp by pressure from the Liberal and Green parties. One might be tempted to suggest that the NDP could now use their newfound clout to make themselves look good on the national stage by propping up some of the relatively scummy (as opposed to plain ol' repugnant) pieces of Conservative agenda, and then taking credit very loudly.

Conventional wisdom says that this strategy would be a good idea, for the NDP if not for progressive Canadians (who are watching the country go down the drain). Sometimes conventional wisdom is even right.

Here is the problem though: the NDP's influence with the Conservative party lacks credibility. I'm not saying it doesn't exist - but its existence reeks of such partisan self-interest that, for a party keen to take the moral high ground, such a dissonance between professed values and how they're put into practice might be too much to for its long-suffering supporters to bear.

Simply: if Jack Layton does a deal with the devil, there are gonna be a lot of people who will be very unhappy, and also very unimpressed. Including, to some extent, the national media. The NDP got a lot of positive coverage when it was playing roadie to the Paul Martin Farewell Tour. But Stephen Harper makes Kurt Cobain look like Shirley Temple. And for the NDP, I'm not sure that the adage that "there's no such thing as bad press" is gonna hold water.

No Khan Do

So Wajid Khan approached Stephen Harper for a job, told the press that Bill Graham "couldn't say no" to his request, and then quit the Liberal caucus six months ago? My only questions is: how did officially crossing the floor take so long?