How Sweet It Is!

I attended a BBQ this evening where the Right Honourable Stephen Harper was the guest of honour. The PM was in Regina to, among other things, film a cameo on Corner Gas and tour the RCMP training academy. This was the first time I had ever seen the Prime Minister in person and the first time I’d ever spoken to him and shaken his hand.

I will admit, I wasn’t always a Harper fan. I thought he lacked charisma and didn’t seem like a real “man of the people.” Well, while virtually all of my hesitations about Harper have long ago disappeared, tonight they were swept away for good. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Going into the 2006 Federal Election I still wasn’t completely sold on Harper. However, he was the leader of my party, so I got behind him for the greater good of the Conservative Party of Canada. That said, I thought that he proved himself in the campaign and by the time he became our Prime Minister I was in full support of his leadership. After taking office he has impressed me time and time again by keeping his promises and taking firm stances on issues. In particular, I was impressed by the way that he responded to the situation in the Middle East between Israel and Lebanon; it was so refreshing that we had a leader with resolve after being led by the Dithering Paul Martin!

Tonight, though, Harper showed that he was a skilled speaker and is, most definitely, a man of the people. No, he does not exude charisma, nor does he fill one’s belly with fire. And, he does not emanate qualities of grandeur. Instead, he has a gifted ability to connect with the common man, for he is one himself. In fact, after delivering his speech (which lacked the grandiose rhetoric that is often synonymous with political speeches), Harper stayed around to personally meet and greet attendees for nearly two hours while others ate dinner. (Plus, I must say that these were not people whose votes Harper was trying to win, but people who were almost exclusively party supporters.) Finally, once it was dark outside, Harper made his way back into the city.

This made me think of all the criticism Harper received when he chose to travel to the North to meet with residents of Nunavut rather than speak at the AIDS Conference in Toronto. After meeting him, it was clear why he would make such a choice. It was not, as people have alleged, because Harper doesn’t consider AIDS to be an important enough issue or because he is homophobic, but because he places a higher value on opportunities to connect with real Canadians than to hob-knob with international dignitaries and celebrities. Is this so wrong?

Canadians should be proud that they find in their Prime Minister a man who isn’t afraid to take a stance, follows through on campaign promises, and knows how to connect with real people. After years of leaders who nary have exhibited even one of these traits, how sweet is it to have a leader so adept at all three.

Polarize, Polarize, Polarize!

I recently traveled to the capital of our socialist republic to catch a flight out of the city. I hadn’t been there long before I came across an issue of The Prairie Dog, a bi-monthly free publication targeted towards the X and Y generations crowd. I found it to be quite a good publication, focusing on arts and culture. Like most publications of its genre, it had a noticeably leftist slant. This didn’t both me; I’m open to different viewpoints and, in fact, encourage them.

However, I did come across one column that prompted me to want to comment on its content. The column: “Divide and Conquer: Calvert’s Road to Victory: Polarize, Polarize, Polarize” by John Conway, a sociology professor at the University of Regina and an ardent left-winger. In the piece, Conway explains that if the NDP are to be successful in the next provincial election, they must not hug the centre, but move further to the left. This, he says, will prevent a “ho-hum campaign” that focuses on the tiredness of the current NDP regime. By moving to the left, Calvert will force Brad Wall and the Saskatchewan Party to reveal their true stripes, which Conway asserts are not the centrist positions that they allude to espouse. Rather, Wall is a “closet right-winger.”

Conway then outlines the ways in which Calvert is to distinguish his party from Wall’s.
1. A new energy strategy that will include a doubling of resource rents and the re-establishment of a crown oil company.
2. An agricultural relief program targeted at the bottom two-thirds of farmers.
3. A major restructuring of rural governance by replacing rural municipalities with large counties.
4. Restructuring medicare with a move to public or cooperative clinics with salaried physicians.
5. The introduction of labour laws that would ban the use of scabs during lockouts and jail time for “nasty” employers that violate the now stricter labour laws.

Well, Conway is right, a platform such as this would surely differentiate the NDP from the Saskatchewan Party and yes, and it would force voters to make a real choice. However, he is most likely wrong in his assertion that this would result in a Saskatchewan Party loss. Contrary to Conway’s skewed perception of reality, extreme left-wing propositions such as these would not appeal to most Saskatchewanians. Putting forward a campaign such as this would not force Wall to “reveal his real ideological orientation and intentions.” Rather, it would paint Calvert as the extremist in the eyes of most Saskatchewanians.

However, leaving commonsense aside and forgetting for a moment that these measures would effectively run the province’s economy into the ground, why would these measures be popular with the voting public?

First, most people in Saskatchewan realize that the favourable economic conditions we are experiencing right now are due in large part to the oil and gas industry. Why mess with it? If its not broke, don’t fix it, right? (This question is especially pertinent when one considers the fact that the province’s oil and gas industry really took off when rents were decreased.)

Second, the creation of yet another crown corporation does not strike me as a particularly sexy campaign promise. I would expect that few people, minus those employed in the industry or at the furthest ends of the spectrum would really care.

Third, an agricultural relief program of any kind would be viewed as too little, too late. Conway’s suggestion of this idea speaks to his ignorance of rural Saskatchewan and the people who live there. For them, the NDP is no longer an option – that was clear in the two previous federal and provincial elections and will be all that more apparent in the next election.

Fourth, the abolition of rural municipalities would represent a further downsizing of services to the people of rural Saskatchewan and further entrench their sentiments that the NDP government has abandoned them. Indeed, it would surely negate any favour the party might gain through the announcement of their agricultural relief program.

Fifth, being heavy handed with the physicians in the province is not a wise way to win popularity among the public. It is my prediction that if physicians are forced into going on salary instead of the currently more popular fee for service payment method, they will leave to practice elsewhere. The recruitment and retention of physicians to the province, particularly to rural areas, is already a perilous task. It would not be difficult for the voting public to see that aggravating the situation would risk the quality of health care of those in Saskatchewan.

Sixth, unless you’re a union member (which likely indicates you already have a predilection for the NDP anyway), you’re most likely sick and tired of hearing about unions and the inconvenience that strikes pose to the general public. It’s not like untapped support for the NDP is really going to be pulled in by giving unions more power.

Ultimately, what Conway fails to recognize is that most people are not strictly left or right wing, but fall somewhere in the middle. This is basic knowledge to any student of politics, let alone someone with a PhD in political sociology. If one candidate is presenting himself as a centrist option and the main competition is an extremist, which is the general public going to choose? Those of us who truly care about the future of our province can only hope that Calvert and his cronies heed Conway’s advice, for this would surely secure that Brad Wall would be our next Premier. Given the Calvert government’s track record, they just might be absurd enough to do it!

Flip Flopping and Backpeddling - Typical Liberal fodder?

So yesterday Liberal MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj and NDP MP Peggy Nash called for the de-listing of Hezbollah from Canada’s terror list . This followed their visit to Lebanon, along with Bloc counterpart, Maria Mourani. The three were on a fact-finding mission arranged by the National Council on Canada-Arab Relations.

However, the loose-lipped comments calling for Hezbollah’s removal by both Wrzesnewskyj and Nash, were evidently made in jest, for it didn’t take long for the MPs’ offices in Canada to either retract or deny their comments. For Wrzesnewskyj, it’s a full out denial of his comments. Although he in on record on CBC Radio and other sources as stating that Hezbollah should no longer be on Canada’s terrorist list, he now says, “I’ve said all along that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and will continue to be.” (CTV Website) Sorry Borys, but that’s not what you said yesterday! Can this confusion be attributed to typical Liberal waffling or to an incompetent novice MP?

Some, such as the B’Nai Brith, have expressed their outrage that Canadian MPs would express support of such a notion. But does it really come as a shock? First, you have a Liberal that’s served in Parliament for just over two years. Not only should we expect that he’d flip flop on an issue but it shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that he might not be entirely informed on the issue – it was the Liberals who placed Hezbollah on Canada’s terrorist listing in the first place! Second, you have a bleeding heart rookie NDP Member. Need I say more? Even Jack Layton won’t pin down where his party really stands on Hezbollah, how should his Members be expected to demonstrate a coherent position?

What is interesting, however, is that while Bloc Member, Maria Mourani attended the same fact-finding mission, she was not suckered in to making the same controversial comments that her Liberal and NDP counterparts made. Perhaps the Bloc has it more together than the yahoos in the other two opposition parties. It’s sad when the separatists are the voice of reason in the opposition!