Categories: Andrew Coyne, Capital Read

Shorter Coyne

by Andrew Coyne on Monday, September 15, 2008 9:53pm - 73 Comments

For those who missed it, and since it is as yet impossible to post comments on any part of our site but the blogs, here is the gist of my latest column. In brief, I argue that Harper’s reputation as a “strong leader” (the central message, as I take it, of the Tory campaign) is undeserved, and that so far as it is earned, derives largely from his penchant for slapping people about: his party, his opponents, senior bureaucrats.

Usually, the term “strong leader” is reserved for someone who sets out a vision, sticks to his principles, takes risks, invests political capital, and ultimately prevails in the face of entrenched opposition, whether through the strength of his ideas, the force of his oratory, his own personal magnetism, or sheer doggedness.

None of these, I argue, apply in Harper’s case. He has not set out a vision: rather he has spent much effort persuading the public he has none. He has not stuck to his principles: he has abandoned them at every turn. He has not taken risks or invested political capital, but rather has stuck to sure-fire crowd-pleasers (GST cuts, tough-on-crime) and precisely targeted pandering (tax credits for children’s sports, the “nation” resolution).

He has generally bested his opponents by the simple but effective tactic of the jaw-dropping about-face: discarding convictions, breaking promises, saying one thing and doing another, even (in the case of fixed election dates) going so far as to make hash of his own law. This has given him the element of surprise, it is true, but only because of a serial inability on the part of his opponents to imagine he could be quite so untrustworthy.

None of this is to deny that Harper has the capacity to be a strong leader. Indeed, for pure talent he is easily the most impressive federal leader since Trudeau: intelligent, self-assured, strategic. But he has not yet put those talents to use in a way that would merit the title.

Tags: Election Watch, Stephen Harper

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Francien Verhoeven

Style,

Yeah,: “That said, Andrew is right to push Harper to take on the coal miners.”

Perhaps Harper did call them to come above ground, at least.
Francien Verhoeven

Style,

yes, of course, the opposition was really taking advantage of the fixed election laws, because afterall they could vote against the government.
But perhaps Harper could have started the parliamentary session with proposing just that: a motion that the Liberals could not possibly have agreed to. That then would have triggered an election upon the opposition’s call.

What are you saying, that the opposition (the Liberal party in particular) would have gone to any lenghts to vote WITH the government?

But that would have drawn out the leadership aspect from an interesting angle, not?

I personally think Mr.Dion was…. well… on his way!
Jarrid

I gotta say something about this fixed election law so-called “broken promise”. Appealing to Andrew Coyne’s exquisite sense of logic:

1. Either the law fixing the election date to October, 2009 applies to everyone or to no one.

2. That it applied only to the government and not the opposition, apparently the view of Andrew Coyne and Stephane Dion, is illogical.

3. I’ve never heard of a law that constraines some but not others.

Isn’t that it in a nutshell folks? The law could not apply in a minority context. If it was meant to, then the opposition could not force an election until October, 2009. But the opposition’s position had always been that it could bring the government down on a confidence vote. Would that have breached the law Andrew Coyne? No, I didn’t think so. Nor then, was the government calling the election. Let’s have a little bit, a modicum of, intellectual rigour here.
Angelle

I think that maybe the word ‘leader’ as a descriptive is being confused with the word ‘boss’. Harper may want to called himself a “leader’ but his style and approach to management is that of a very traditional boss, many of us who have been in the workforce, as I have for well over 40 as a women in the construction industry can attest. I think that his attitude and his approach is that of many “boss” lead by giving direction and imperatives that are to followed.
No questions asked, no credit to others who contribute. A very dysfunctional approach for many of us who have graduated to an leadership model that takes into account respect, and consulting of others who make up the team approach to decision making and finding solutions.
But then again, there are still a great many people who would rather have someone else do their thinking and analysis for them and tell them what to. These people I am sure see Mr. Harper as their “leader” who can direct them and manage them. This may include some of the media as evident in how they are doing their research and reporting on the issues.
Thank you, Mr. Coyne for taking the time to use your words to say more that pat and sensational catch phrase that I am far to often hearing in the National News these days both in the French and English media.
Ron N

I still have a problem accepting the election lie of the past election where Harper promised that income trusts would not be taxed, making them a good investment until he devastated them by announcing a tax.
Unfortunately there no other good leaders to form a strong gov’t.
A minority government is our only hope.
Francien Verhoeven

Jarrid,

you bring up some good points, because really, in essence, the fixed election law had left something to be desired, namely that within a minority government the opposition parties could call the shot. But in that case, the government does have an equal say as well, namely that in order for the opposition to call the shot, the government could set up the shot, so to speak.

So, in that sense the government does have equal opportunity under the fixed election law. It becomes a game of chicken then, sort of, whithin a minority government. I think the PM didn’t want to take that particular route, and perhaps with good reason.

But I think he could have found another way, I don’t know. Perhaps an amendment to that fixed election law could have been enough, either for all parties to remain in the house untill Oct,09, or by not agreeing to it and thereby vote the government out.

There is one other thing I want to mention here about the so-called reasons for calling an election. It has been commented upon that Harper did not want the dirt to rise up out of the committee meetings. But if you consider some of the issues under investigation by the ethics commission, one could easily argue that some of these issues should never have gone to commission to begin with. I mean, how many times can taxpayer’s money be spent on clearing or smearing a name such as Mulroney? Didn’t he have enough time as head of government to establish a reputation for whatever it may have turned out to be?

Why try and link so underhandedly a connection between the doings of Mulroney with that of Harper’s doing? If Harper can be accused of playing dirty politics by trying to circumvent ongoing committee work, then why not call it dirty politics by placing issues like that on the ethics committee’s agenda to begin with?

I believe that such underhandedness by the opposition parties is not being covered enough by our media.
Style

“Perhaps an amendment to that fixed election law could have been enough, either for all parties to remain in the house until Oct,09, or by not agreeing to it and thereby vote the government out.”

But that would require a chess-playing-like level of tactical genius…
Wascally Wabbit

Margaret Thatcher caved to the coal miners?
What perverted history source were you reading Style?
Try and find a coal min in the UK these days?
Try and find a miner for that matter!
If you want your history in an entertaining form – with great Brass Band music as a bonus – watch Brassed Off – a movie about what Thatcher did to miners in order to ideologically break their union.
Same Margaret Thatcher that privatized everything – now water is privatized in the UK – and boy are people paying for it…
That’s the Margaret Thatcher that Stephen Harper (and I suspect Andrew Coyne) still reveres..
even though her economic model is totally discredited…
T. Thwim

Jarrid: The law specifically made allowance for non-confidence votes. And there are a great many laws that apply to some people and not others, based on their positions and the circumstances. Emergency workers and the police, for example, are allowed to speed when required. People who work for the movie industry can ignore land use bylaws in some areas while working on a movie, etc.

That said, I’ll agree that no law was violated. However, the spirit and promise of the law — where conservative members specifically pointed out that the law would have the effect of preventing a PM (not a united opposition) from calling an election merely to suit the political clime — that was certainly broken.

The breaking of the fixed election date promise should be angering to conservatives on three separate fronts. First, it’s a betrayal of the words that the Prime Minister promised to all of us as Canadians(although apparantly conservative feel that betrayal by one of their own is acceptable.. almost expected). Second, it’s a betrayal of the idea of electoral reforms that I thought conservatives in general supported, however, I could be wrong about whether they support it or not, although if they didn’t, I’m not sure why Harper would promise it in the first place.

Third, and perhaps most strange to me, conservatives should be upset about the passage of this law, now shown to be meaningless as the opposition parties pointed out, was nothing more than a waste of taxpayer dollars — in government resources, and in paying the elitist politicians of all parties when they were crafting and debating this meaningless piece of electoral pandering. That we don’t seem to see any conservatives upset that their own government proposed meaningless legislation and wasted their taxpayer dollars on the passage of it demonstrates to me how hypocritical conservative supporters really are. Oh sure, they’re all about not wasting.. until it’s their guy that does it. Then it’s perfectly alright, because hey, at least it wasn’t those dirty hippies wasting it.
Style

Margaret Thatcher caved to the coal miners?”

Thatcher’s confrontation with the miners came iafter her re-election in 1983. In her first term, she caved to their demands to avoid a strike she thought they would win. “A strike nearly occurred in 1981, when the government had a similar plan to close twenty-three pits, though the threat of a strike was then enough to force the government to back down.”

You can read all about it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_miners'_strike_(1984–1985)

Accompanying brass band music from “All Brass Band Radio”:
http://www.allbrassradio.com/playlist.php
Harrow gal

Love your stuff, Andrew.

I’ve always thought that Harper has enjoyed the great fortune of seeming like such a wonderful leader because of the shortcomings of the opposition, not because of merit.

I am disappointed that Canadians are buying his nice-guy, centrist marketing campaign in such numbers. In my opinion, this guy calculates his every move, relies on the stupidity/lack of involvement/reliance on sound-bytes of the masses to fire them up with rhetoric, and gift-wraps social conservativism as fiscal conservativism. He is patient enough to play the game hoping for an eventual pay-off of power.

Harper is an economist by training (this fine publication notwithstading, I suggest reading the Walrus article of a few years back ), and yet he really has no plan for steering Canada through our economic paradigm shift away from manufacturing. The 21st century service economy? How can retail jobs possibly compete with the spending power of manufacturing jobs? And who will SPEND at retail, anyway, if we all live on subsistance incomes? And cutting the GST was, as one economist put it, “not the best way to spend 10 billion dollars” (5 billion tax revenue waived for each percent cut).
Harrow gal

Oh, and I highly recommend Brassed Off, too! Great movie, excellent cast, with a very young Ewan McGregor and a cute Tara whatsername.
Style

“I’ve always thought that Harper has enjoyed the great fortune of seeming like such a wonderful leader because of the shortcomings of the opposition, not because of merit.”

I’ve thought this of every PM except Turner and Campbell.
http://www.abandonedstuff.com saskboy

“None of these, I argue, apply in Harper’s case. He has not set out a vision: rather he has spent much effort persuading the public he has none.”

And still almost a third of voting Canadians are content to let him govern when we have Dion, May, and Layton who have given us platforms of vision? It’s almost depressing.
Harrow gal

Fair enough, Style. It seems we Canadians always elect based on what the guy ISN’T.
Austin So

So wait a minute…Harper’s policy advisor is Seinfeld?

The comedy escapes me…

Austin
Caper

What is the mindset of an organization whose “heavy weights” call the grass roots “turds” and “idiots”. I think that this is the mindset of the PMO and CPC. It speaks to the “true leadership” of the Prime Minister.
ABCinToronto

If Harper were running instead as Liberal leader, he’d probably easily get that majority.

Interesting to think why that is.
KT In Vancouver

Where your analysis falls short is in your assumption that Canadians are willing to elect a strong leader.
Real leadership, of the kind that you identify scares us. What we want most in our leaders is an implicit undertaking that they will pander to us–that they will validate our prejudices, deny the unpleasant realities that we cannot bear to face up to, and re-assure us that we will not have to make any real sacrifices to accomplish anything. That is not to say that Candians don’t appreciate a politician with a leader’s style, and we do like to think that if, God forbid, we are faced with a crisis that we cannot ignore, such as the FLQ crisis of 1970, that the shameless panderer that we have put into office will have some inner resevoir of strength that will pull us through. And once we are throuigh it, then of course, evey respectable Candian opinion leader will immediately commence explaining to all of the rest of us just how awful and unnecessary the strong measures that we temporarily embraced–e.g. the War Measures Act–actually were. Thus the Liberals, who have rarely been accused of standing for anything, and whom we all knew would pander to us, have almost always had the advantage over the Conservatives, who ever since the death of John A. Macdonald have been suspected of standing for something. Harper has used his time in office so far to re-assure us all that he can be depended upon to pander to us. His opponent, on the other hand, although he is now trying to back away from it, is suspected of standing for something that may require sacrifice. He seems to really believe in this “Green” stuff that we all want to be seen to be associated with, but don’t want to really want to have to sacrifice for.
What then can we hope for? If Harper gets his majority I think we can count on him continuing to pander to us on almost everything, but we can hope, that just like Trudeau and Mulroney before him, he will decide on one big thing that he will actually show some leadership on and get accomplished. I’m not quite sure what that might be, but I have enough faith in his instincts to hope that he gets a shot at it.
Dave K

“He has not set out a vision: rather he has spent much effort persuading the public he has none. He has not stuck to his principles: he has abandoned them at every turn. He has not taken risks or invested political capital, but rather has stuck to sure-fire crowd-pleasers”

Uh, could that not be because he only has a MINORITY, and so at this point his overriding (virtually only) strategy is to stay in power long enough that Canadians, having developed a trepidation toward conservative government after 30 or 40 years of social engineering by Liberal Orthodox media, educational establishment, and other institutions, can get used to him, and see that he is not in fact a reptilian kitten-eater from another planet? Wells analysis was much better.

“he is easily the most impressive federal leader since Trudeau”

True, but that’s not saying much. The Great Helmsman Trudeau was only an intellectual standout in Canadian politics because the pond is so small – in any major European democracy, or the US, Trudeau would have been seen for the mediocrity and dilettante that he was.
(there, I feel better now, my daily PET vent is done)
Evertman

The best disection of Harper’s term in government I’ve seen yet. The real question, however, is will Canadians see it this way, and if so, what will they do about it.
orval

Harper is not a Vladimir Putin type leader. He is a Sir John A MacDonald type. He is a “builder” not a “boss” (or “bully”, a word used alot to describe him but recently not very much).

In fact he is more than just a Sir John A MacDonald. He is also his own Georges-Etienne Cartier. He has set out to restore the Canadian national ideal, to ensure that francophones in Quebec truly feel that their “national” identity is in Canada. Politically, we wants to make the Bloc obsolete and irrelevant as the vehicle for Quebec francophones’ national aspirations, and to restore the Conservative Party to its traditional strong position in francophone Quebec as it was before the hanging of Louis Riel.

Making Quebec an integral part of a united and prosperous conservative Canada has been Harper’s almost single-minded purpose from the beginning. He is a visionary in this respect. He is overcoming great odds, but he is transforming Canada in much the same way Sir John A MacDonald, with powerful assistance from Georges-Etienne Cartier, did more than 150 years ago.If he succeeds, Harper will be the father of Canadian Reconfederation.

I guess this makes me more of a “wellsian” than a “coynite”.
boudica

“If he succeeds, Harper will be the father of Canadian Reconfederation.”

LOL!!!