An Election - and the End of the Liberal Party
It looks as if Steve is going to take the walk and ask for an election.
I like elections. They clear the air. They bring issues into focus. They allow people to actually express their views.
In a technical sense this election is about 50 ridings mainly in Quebec, Ontario and British Columbia. These are the “battlegrounds” and these are where the leaders will be.
In reality this election will really be a referendum about whether or not the CPC under Harper deserves, or can be trusted, with a majority. I think they can and I think there is every reason to believe that a cross country consensus will give the CPC a thin majority.
This has, I am afraid, nothing to do with any endorsement of CPC policy; rather it is the reality that, a couple of years in, the Liberals have nothing at all on offer. The Green Shift is simply silly and a rather obvious tax grab. The idea that Harper is somehow George Bush in cunningly bad suits is a meme without wings.
To the converted, the Green Shift and Harper=Bush are truths as solid as the happy thought that 9/11 was an inside job. To the rest of us they are the last gasps of a party which has ceased to have a reason to exist.
Cynics have suggested that this election is about financially bankrupting the Liberal Party. I would not be at all surprised if they are right. It is time for the Liberal Party to end. It is time for Canada to have a left party and a right one. The Liberal Party is simply in the way.
The Liberals climbed on board the dying Green/Kyoto trope and, finally, have found the issue which could finish them. They will make assorted noises about national unity and assorted women’s issues and just how very scary Harper and the CPC are; but I suspect those noises will be their death rattle.
Canada has changed. We are no longer obsessed with a seemingly resurgent Quebec, Women are who they are and don’t need the feds to define them. Harper is rather dull; but not in the least scary.
For many of us, a confederation which allows provinces to seek their own destiny is a confederation we can support. Lock step centralism is an idea whose time has passed.
Most of all, with a bit of prudent management and a world hungry for our resources, Canada is poised to become a resource rich Switzerland. Rich, capable and very much its own nation.
The Liberal Party has, I suspect, outlived its usefulness. It is mired in identity politics, an unstoppable urge to take from the successful and give to the losers, and a belief in its own righteousness. Canada used to be a nation of losers. Now it is not. Canada used to think multicult was the Grail, now it doesn’t. Canada used to think the Liberal Party was the natural party of government, now that view is pretty much exclusive to the Toronto Star.
Harper has the shot at going to majority. The only question is whether the CPC war room has the wit top push the right buttons at the right time. Because if they do they will destroy the Liberal Party pretty much forever.
As much as I’d like to believe you, I can’t imagine the Libs being history. They will reinvent themselves. Just wait and see. They made a big mistake in their last leadership race, but that can be corrected. The Cons, on the other hand, have a long way to go to achieve natural governing party status. I’d like to see that happen and see its fulfillment for a few decades, but the long, seemingly endless reign of liberalism in this country has left so many liberal propaganda spewing
machinesinstitutions in place, that it will be hard to overcome it.I think the first thing the Cons have to do is dismantle those institutions. The CBC, the National Film Board, the various and sundry Human Rights Commissions, the Canada Council, the way the Supreme Court justices are chosen, the appointed Senate, the notion that Canada’s armed forces are for peacekeeping only, our seemingly unlimited capacity to hate America at every turn, ... Let me see. Did I miss any? Oh ya, it might be good to de-fund a lot of nonprofits and quasi-government organizations like the Assembly of First Nations. Let them raise their own money.
Anyway, big task. Are the Cons up to it? Will the Libs be in a state of disarray long enough to let them?
The LPC has been since King, a “brokerage party” ...influence for patronage and policy options for sale to the highest bidder. As the decades passed the PPC became the party of corporate patronage and their agendas seldom reflected the will or hope of the wider working class.
CPC have done, if nothing else, re-established a centrist party responsive to the working middle class…all Harper needs to create his dynasty is marry populist democracy to sensible centrist solutions an he can realize his dream of small C conservative dynasty.
The NDP abandoned labor for nutty soft marxist fad causes and could again become a powerhouse of unionism/labour…but they have to ditch specious academics like Layton and get some real labor people in charge. The Greens can be the catch basin for all the sundry moonbat fringe.
I think Harper will get a small majority…but I’d feel a lot better about majority government if there were 15-20 independents to buffer the loathsome partisan whipped voting.
I understand that destroying the Liberal Party is the fervent not-so-tacit wish of many “conservatives” and Conservatives not just because of their green-eyed envy of the LPC electoral success but also because having a clear “left” party and a clear “right” party makes it easier for the the “right” party to do politics, the “left” being essentially dead. But politics aside, what good does it do the country to get rid of the centrist option? How does it help citizens to destroy a party that is not necessarily hidebound to ideology whether left or right or up or down? The LPC is not without warts or baggage but I don’t see how regular people benefit in a polarized political environment.
So far your postulation about their pending fiscal demise is playing out…this campaign in day 2 reeks of a poverty stricken organization. Have they filled their candidate roster yet?...no.
Hans,
Regular people benefit greatly in a polarized environment, if the polarization is largely thoughtful, reasoned, and not based on ad hominem resentments. In other words, in a mature democracy (where the issues have a long history of discussion and lived experience) a two-party system will usually be best to further clarify issues, to refine the debate to the point where we can see the essence of what’s at stake in the choice and any compromise we have to make.
This is because most issues when fully thought out in a mature democracy do turn on a choice of a relatively liberal or conservative stance. As we increase the number of parties that have to try to differentiate themselves (all the while making it harder to build big tent coalitions), issues usually get more muddled than refined and clarified.
We should all think of ourselves as defenders of the various sacred centres that constitute our nation. Then we will see that the debate over renewing the shared centre, given our individual understandings of what is presently lacking, according to the specific place and time in which we find ourselves, usually affords us two basic options: the relatively conservative and the relatively liberal stance/direction.
The centre itself is not a political position: it is an ideal shared horizon we can never entirely grasp in this world. When a political party claims to hold the centre it only corrupts itself by starting to think it is above politics, e.g. the natural ruling party. Real thinking like real politics requires polarization, not as a final end point, but as a starting point for getting our bearings in relation to that ever receding horizon.
The Right Wing Religious Crazies have Harper in their back pocket. A Harper Majority government would follow the orders of the Religious Right and their hateful agenda , with no regard for the good of the country or personal freedoms.
Why fight the Taliban in Afganistan and then elect the Fundamentalist Christian version of the Taliban into power here ? I for one do not want to have Harper turn Canada into a Theocracy .
Bit of a long bow there Doug…You might want to look at coming up with some evidence that Harper wants to turn Canada into a Theocracy. Some…any.
Hi truepeers, that was an interesting apology (in the classical sense), but it still doesn’t explain what the benefits are of destroying a political party that has purported to do those things that you suggest are good and offer it as a voting option for Canadians. One could argue that the LPC offers the very things you want all within the friendly confines of the Party. Clear thinking (or “real thinking” as you call it, if we are talking abouth the same thing) involves constant analysis on every issue and in a polarized political environment, issue by issue thinking is eschewed in favour of simplification: “I generally believe left therefore I must believe left on every individual issue.” Finally, I disagree entirely with your proposition that: “This is because most issues when fully thought out in a mature democracy do turn on a choice of a relatively liberal or conservative stance.” In fact, that is exactly my point: Labelling stances on issues as “liberal” or conservative” is only helpful to ideologues and not citizens.
Hans,
no doubt my experience of the LPC is not as extensive as yours. But, fwiw, my take on Liberals here in BC is that they like to party, drink a lot and the extent of their “political” discussions entails much that is known to any observer of office politics, with occasional idolatry of the great leader, and a dangerous desire for a large government in Ottawa, thrown in. These people are interested in jobs and patronage; they believe in rule by experts and distrust ordinary people. At the parties I have attended they are more interested in who is screwing whom and who is hot than anything remotely like an intellectual discussion. They leave that to the experts.
But maybe there is another side I haven’t seen; after all I was as guilty as the rest of enjoying the drink. So, what are the great Liberal party debates of late?
The problem I have with your response is that it is tautological: polarization is bad because polarization is bad. You haven’t seriously grappled with my claim that polarization is actually part of a healthy intellectual life. You have, perhaps, been educated in the postmodern academy that teaches endless deconstruction and criticism of all “othering”, on the assumption that each and every representation represents someone’s will to power and an act of victimization that must be denounced, unless it is the worthy victim’s will to power. Ultimately, this becomes a nihilist religion that teaches that “polarization” is everywhere and it’s bad; or, that we can only love and desire more victims. But I don’t consider this real thinking.
And yet I agree with you in denouncing this “thinking”: “I generally believe left therefore I must believe left on every individual issue.”
This is indeed the problem: it’s the product of the kind of identity politics in which the inescapable reality that real thinking does involve othering is at once denied (by the left’s Utopia of deconstruction and its endless quest to champion victims) and yet, at the same time, mindless othering is indulged in (like a guilty pleasure) by a mindless group identity politics. The presumption that attempts to bridge the hypocrisy is that if I’m on the side of the weak, the victim, it’s ok for me to indulge in smearing the other side. Hence, I must by definition always be on the left, or go silent.
As I understand the human condition, we need to see that othering, or polarization, is a necessary and inescapable fact of thinking and politics. (I won’t go into the anthropological reasons for this now, but it is related to the fact that all human thinking takes places on scenes that are structured in terms of a centre and a periphery.) Once we accept this then we can learn the true tolerance and respect for our opponents that allows us to have serious and productive debates and avoid the trap of tribalism. I’m a conservative today, but I readily admit that in future, or on certain issues, I might take a more liberal position. And of course I can only do this if politics isn’t tribal but truly democratic: where it becomes our individual responsibility to consider both sides of a choice as free beings and choose as someone who doesn’t have to do what his tribe dictates. But to do that, we need both sides of a choice argued well and clarified. We need the kind of polarization that makes us free and responsible individuals.
“Labelling stances on issues as “liberal” or conservative” is only helpful to ideologues and not citizens.”
– I really don’t see why you would want to argue this. I am not using “liberal” and “conservative” as party labels here. I am simply suggesting that we can only well understand our politics in historical perspective; and from such a perspective, “liberal” would suggest a certain relaxing of past orthodoxies as the route to a freer and more productive society; “conservative” would suggest that a return to, or a renewal of, orthodoxy (in acknowledgment that in this instance the “liberal” position is a dangerous fantasy, out of touch with reality) will be more productive and liberating for people, given human nature.
Thinking historically requires some such terms. i prefer these to “left” and “right”, largely because the left-right dichotomy is itself a productive of the leftist world view and one that I, as a conservative (presently), deny: I am not a rightist as the left defines the right: I see the left’s right (i.e. fascism) as cut from the same cloth as the left.
regards,
Jay, I’m sorry to carry on like this at your place, but will you indugle me by allowing me one more volley? Tell me to shut up anytime.
Truepeers, once again you prove my point. Because you disagree with me, you make assumptions that I was educated in the “postmodern academy” (whatever that is supposed to mean) which you then equate with identity politics and the “left”. Talk about tribalism and othering. Meanwhile, you have no understanding of my perspective. Assumptions about left and right will only get in the way of such understanding. In a polarized political environment i.e. a society with only 2 political parties, anytime you disagree with me on any issue, you will write me off as “righty” and eschew any attempts at actual understanding of either the issue or that there might be a number of ways of looking at it and approaches to addressing it. I think this kind of willful ignorance is bad.
To be clear, I thought Jay was talking about the elimination of a political party and responded that I thought this would lead to a polarized political environment. I think this is bad for people because it is anti-democratic, removes choices and options for people and could needlessly and dangerously oversimplify issues thereby deadening debate. You have misunderstood my point as tautology because you were interested in purveying your “unique” theories about political thought rather than reading what I wrote.
I haven’t grappled with your claim that polarization is part of healthy intellectual life for a couple of reasons: One, it is nonsense that could only be understood by reading more of your theories and views about humanity. Two, it is irrelevant to what I was talking about. You chose to disagree with me, which is fine. I believe less voter choice, simplified debate, labelling and tribalism are ignorance-buidling society-ruiners. Disagree with me all you like, but don’t try to tell me that ploarized politics is good because it facilitates clear thinking. Life, the universe and everything is much more complex.
I said “perhaps” you are educated in postmodern thought. That’s a way of raising and making a point about something widespread today, not knowing where you stand. It allows you room to present your views and also the freedom to contest mine that I proffer without first knowing much of yours. And yet you take offense. And you make pretty clear that’s what you mean by “polarization”. Well, there are a 1001 ways for a conversation to get stuck. But what makes one go right, right all the way to where we can make free political choices…?
Respect for people should mean recognizing the inevitability and often necessity of rivalry. (Please keep me out of Utopian dreams, though I doubt I have to ask.) You can call that an eccentric personal theory, or, perhaps, you can observe reality and ask how we best face it or deny it. Yes, life is complex, full of genuine mystery, like the emergence of poetry; yes, we can indeed exchange and must exchange signs in relatively non-political (more personal and economic than party political) environments; but, to paraphrase Northrop Frye, if poetry starts bubbling up in the mountains, political rhetoric is the delta that all language eventually reaches. Eventually, political choices have to be clarified and made. And yes, to the guy who first wrote the poetry from which those choices have evolved, the positions may look very different from anything he, in youth, imagined. They will look “polarized”.
We cannot control or even know what it is we bring into the world and that then gets shaped by peoples’ “mimetic rivalry” (history is the laboratory and we have to wait until it lays bare the poet’s genius in the cool discounting of trade and politics); that’s not my theory; i’m not much of a poet; perhaps, you might google “mimetic rivalry” to find some of my teachers.