August1991

Am I wrong in making this comparison? About 30 years ago, Trudeau mused about selling wheat and then went on to explain why the Federal Government, why the State, has a role to play in critical private matters. Trudeau was roundly condemned for his musing - and he's probably still hated for it. Harper recently mused about Atlantic Canada and how Federal Government welfare has not been helpful. Harper has been roundly condemned - and no doubt some Maritimers will never forget his comment. Is it wrong to muse in public in such a way? Neither Trudeau nor Harper were wrong. (BTW, I think Trudeau was more right than Harper.) In crudely electoral terms, where are the seats and how did the rest of Canada react? Harper was wiser in his sortie than Trudeau. But I'm convinced, naively perhaps, that neither Harper nor Trudeau did it thinking about votes. We Canadians are so unforgiving of thinking politicians. No wonder the Vander Zalms of our small political world dominate.

I thought you brought the thread to a nice conlusion, BD, and basically solved the problem. Haiti offers no other jobs to find. Haiti is a no job country. IOW, Haiti will be poor for all time. End of story. PS. It would appear, according to your sites, that the US just eliminated another job in Haiti too, the job of Haitian President.

Whoever said democracy was about choice? As far as I'm concerned, democracy can only be about getting rid of the buggers. When people realize the guy's a nutbar, how do they get rid of him? "Democracy" provides a peaceful, civilized way to tell the guy to leave the stage. The rest is merely detail. But you want truly weird? Consider these questions: First, why bother voting? (Your single vote will change absolutely nothing, let's be honest.) Second, the person who gets to be US Pres gets to control (more or less) an annual budget close to $1 trillion. Bush has raised about $100 million to get control of $1 trillion during four years! So, why don't politicians spend more to win?

Good post Hugo. At the risk of sounding anti-English, which I'm not, smug is the word that describes many English Canadians. Pierre Berton wrote a book about it but Robertson Davies really drove the point home for me. Some English Canadians like to feel sorry for others - they even say, "There but for the grace of God go I." (Imagine the moral superiority of such a declaration.) These English Canadians believe that Canada is a more civilized, safer country than the US. Chretien played into this English Canadian smugness, and the CBC is rampant with it. I'm no psychologist but I suppose the smugness ultimately stems from an inferiority complex. Anyway, the facts speak otherwise, as your post attests. Health care is another one. Talk to any American and one quickly discovers that, in practical terms, our system borders on Soviet. It will be soon.

It was a "joke" BD, don't you have a sense of humour? But let's be honest. A union is a form of monopoly that, like many monopolies, eventually dies because it prices itself out of the market. Most unionized labour in Canada now is in the public sector. What stops any worker from buying shares in publicly traded companies and benefiting that way? Argghhhhh! And I suppose advances in technology have nothing to do with it - or were they due to unions?.

Here's a question: Should Harper put Mulroney-appointed Quebec Senators in his Cabinet? Does this question seem weird? It shouldn't. It will be a question soon enough. That's Canada. Better? How will Harper deal with such questions!

Is this election about ideology alone? Do you understand that Ontario voters (106 seats) will vote not on ideological grounds but because they want a safe, united country. People in Quebec (75 seats) will do the same. This is simply a reality of Canadian politics. Talk of NDP/Harper in an ideological context is completely silly.

Dennis: Stronach and Layton sound like Torontonians, regardless of what they say. Harper, regardless, sounds like a Westerner. And French Quebecers understand nothing because, well, they know absolutely nothing about this debate you and I are discussing. Stronach? Layton? Dennis, go figure, then we'll talk about this country you consider yours.

Pig? Fly? This is serious. What would a Harper Cabinet look like? In a few weeks (months?) Canadians will be asking themselves this question. Newspapers will talk about it. The CBC will have special reports. I'm asking the question now. You guys are the experts. Whaddya think?

The French system! Two tours! Well, the Americans have it. Primaries, and then November. The methods of voting are endless. Even Constitutional rules. Senates, Parliaments, blah, blah. Democracy? Bottom line? Is it possible to get rid of the sucker in a painless, civilized manner. Consider Brezhnev, Castro, Mao, Hitler August 1944. If it requires a bomb, then it's a bad system. (Nixon left by helicopter.)

You sure? Don Martin? Got me there totally. Sorry, who is Don Martin? The rest of your post? Fell off my chair laughing!

No, he just sounds like a loud Torontonian. The ploy works well with the Toronto Star. But, it doesn't work in Canada. Layton just sounds like, well, someone from Toronto.

I disagree strongly with what you say, FallingLeaf, but I believe fervently in your right to say what you say, including quoting others! I prefer the Dutch solution. If an act is legal, this does not mean the act is moral (morally good). The law is about what is practicable. Abortion may be morally bad, but it is impossible to forbid. Any attempt to make abortion illegal will just lead to back street abortions and more death. The Dutch are right. What is the better good? What is feasible in practice? Marijuana may be bad but it's impossible to forbid it. Be practical. The perfect is the enemy of the good.

Galahad: What is "narrowed"? What is "liberal"? What is "majority"? Add it up. IMV, Quebecers have decided. Martin will jump around, get frenetic, raise his voice, but Quebecers have decided. (BTW, Jean Lapierre is smart, and safe. He'll get in in Outremont. Martin too in LaSalle.) The West - more or less decided. The Maritimes - same. So, the toss up is Ontario. And Harper is right. Voters in Ontario prefer Liberals, are suspicious about Harper but will not examine the question until they have to. When they look at the question, what'll happen? Galahad, you big picture guy, got any numbers on the back of the envelope? Wanna share them with us ? (These numbers have to add up to 106.)

Consider the more likely scenario (threat) of a Martin minority relying on Layton votes for a year or two. Liberals get humbled, and NDP gets the Commons vote, and then we go back Liberal.

If Harper wins an election, and becomes PM, he'll have to have at least 60 or so MPs from Ontario. What will his Cabinet look like? He'll have to name social liberals to key positions. I think Stronach would love a government Challenger, and government customs clearance - better than Bill Gates! Does she speak German? External is obvious for her. Clement? He'd be good at Finance. Should Harper announce this in advance? (Trudeau gave all the main posts to non-Quebec MPs in his first cabinet. Benson, Sharp. Turner from Mtl was at Justice.)

Now, MapleSyrup, you're trying to get your marshmallow out of the fire fast! Stronach has nothing to do with it. I suspect Layton is either badly advised, or more likely, as a typical Torontonian, he can't help but be all the white keys on the piano.

I heard something similar from a saxophonist. He said, "Since I started playing, I've never really been lonely." In fact, he was a very lonely man and I knew it. But I understood what he meant too. This I find intriguing. Do people create Art because of a desire to communicate? But that's politics! I once asked a visual artist to whom he was directing his work and he answered me, "That's a good question. I don't really know. It seems to me that some people understand what I'm doing." Huh? The analyst weighs in. Except, admirably, the analyst doesn't analyze! Artists do Art for myriad reasons. Mr. Analyst (Hugo): Are their motivations, uh, random? Pellaken will probably not read this. But the quote is good. There's gotta be some "payback". What exactly? Or, do Artists simply have this "thing" inside themselves that has to come out? [Mozart apparently did it for his Dad. Paul McCartney said he did it for the chicks. Mordecai Richler said he never did it unless there was dough.]

When Jack Layton pulls stunts like that, he just comes across as a fast talking Torontonian. That does not go over in the rest of the country. In rural Ontario, Toronto is hogtown. In the West, Toronto is snob. And in the East, Toronto is big-city cold. In Quebec, Toronto is la Ville-Reine (!!!).

There are some 20 million or so English Canadians. I would be surprised, no stupified, to discover they were all stupid. "And your proposal was?" Federal parties must deal first with the linguistic, national, regional nature of the country. Then, they can consider political ideology. Dennis, judging by your posts, am I wrong in assuming that you sometimes (often?) believe the CBC is silly?

I read the G&M editorial which endorses Harper by default. Kinsella? I'll take it at face value that he didn't like the way his words were being used. (Sorry, I don't know Kinsella well - can someone inform me?) But I think you're right Goldie. Ultimately, Ontario voters are uncomfortable with Harper and I think it's because he's a Westerner. (In Quebec, the question is moot and in the Maritimes voting is traditional.) I saw the "firewall" quote and the "culture of defeat" quote. In both cases, I saw nothing wrong. They were comments along the lines of "Why should I sell your wheat?" (Don't get me wrong: Harper is no Trudeau.) IMV, Harper was right to say what he said. I think Ontario voters are looking for an alternative to the Liberals. They don't know Harper at all but are afraid he's a born-again American. If he gets the leadership, it will be his election to win. He'll have to campaign and present his true colours. What are they, really? Ontario voters may well be ready to accept an honest English speaking voice from the West. But they'll have to feel "sort of" comfortable with the guy. One thing to consider if Harper makes PM, the Tory caucus will come mostly from Ontario. Stronach, Clement may will be in the Cabinet. I think Ontario voters will clue into that fact.

My mother would be upset to learn that I had been accused of "English-bashing". If I recall, Dennis, you suggested that, to form a government, the NDP would have to supplant the Liberal Party - as Labour did in the UK - and then Canada would have a proper left/right split. I answered by saying that was impossible because Canada is NOT divided on ideological but rather linguistic and nationalistic grounds. I then offered the observation that Canadians share many of the same viewpoints as American Catholics. These are features of the Canadian political landscape that English Canadians too often ignore. I think these points are extremely relevant in discussing the NDP. Now, does this constitute English-bashing? If you believe so, then I apologize. No offense was intended.

Underneath it BD, I think you have a simple self-loathing. You don't like the West, Western Civilization, Western Capitalism, Big Corporations, Profit Obsession, Western Economics. According to you, everything wrong in the world is caused by this thing called the "Western Way of Life", and in particular its North American variant. BD, can you name one thing that is good about Western Civilization?

That's how the French press looks at it. Chretien=Duplessis and Martin=Sauve. That is, after Duplessis died, Sauve became the UN leader (and PM of Quebec) and said he was going to clean up this atrocious mess, and "from now on" things would be different. Martin is trying to present himself the same way. (BTW, Sauve died before he faced an election. The Liberals and Lesage tossed out the UN in 1960.)

Me? Smart? Listen, I meant that American Catholics (20% of Americans, Michael Moore et al) vote Democrat. In Canada, we are about 50% Catholic and we tend to take the same view as American Catholics. But more, Canada is fundamentally divided by language (and nationality). Until this "schism" gets sorted out, we won't have ideological parties. For this reason, Canadian politics are not like American politics. Maybe I'm wrong but these facts seem obvious to me. Few in English Canada seem willing to admit to them.