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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Anti-Harper Progressive

Harper is a strong leader for growing the military and dishing out corporate welfare.

But his limited tenure has been ripe with scandal, obfuscation, corruption, repression, flip-flops and general Republican style governance. Give him free reign and he’ll govern like Bush.

Vote ABC : ANYTHING But Conservative.
Calgary Junkie

Harper’s next objective is obviously to win a majority. I’ve played or watched many games and sports–chess, football, baseball–to name a few.

And as a general rule in all these games, the favorite should follow a safe strategy (wheras the underdog should take more risks) And that’s what Harper is doing in this campaign.

Maybe a football analogy would help … It’s early in the first quarter. Harper moves the ball to the opponent’s 20 yard line, and is faced with a third down and two yards to go. He kicks a field goal. Why take risks now, to try for a possible touchdown, when playing a mediocre opponent like Dion, who will do well just to handle the snap from his centre.
peter

My God but there is something in the Coyne DNA that just can’t get enough Trudeau, or perhaps Trudeau DNA?
“He has generally bested his opponents by the simple but effective tactic of the jaw-dropping about-face” “Zap! You’re frozen”. Liked it then, AC, not so much now?
“He has not taken risks or invested political capital, but rather has stuck to sure-fire crowd-pleasers” The mind reels. AC, the NEP was nothing if not a crowd pleaser, Quebec and Ontario are far more crowded than the west, tell me with a straight face it happens if the demographics were reversed.
Quebec as a nation needs the test of time, but from the state of the sovereingty movement, it looks alot better than any thing the the object of your Onanizing managed.
Just what did this man do that that has earned your undending fealty?
T. Thwim

Peter: NEP might not have happened, but Alberta’s economy hitting the dumpster still would have, because that was the result of falling oil prices, not the NEP. It’s just a funny kind of thing that happens when you base your entire economy off of a single export resource.

Some might go so far as to call that pretty stupid.
http://skinnydips.blogspot.com Skinny Dipper

I liked the following quote that TVO’s “The Agenda” display on screen:

“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”–Bill Gates.

Being a boss where someone tells other people what to do is not the same as being a leader. Leadership requires someone to trust the people who work with him, to let them make important decisions. I don’t see Harper trusting his cabinet, fellow MPs, and the Canadian peopole. If Harper cannot trust us Canadians, why should we trust Harper with the power of being prime minister?
http://skinnydips.blogspot.com Skinny Dipper

I posted on my blog yesterday my one day support for Stephen Harper’s “Blue Sweater” Party. Thankfully, it’s not CRAP. Click on my nickname above for more info.
Oh Boy

Mr. Coyne, will Macleans’ editorial board endorse Harper’s Conservatives? Do you think pro-market and conservative leaning news outlets should pull their endorsements of Harper? Two out of three Canadians oppose his party and even his supporters can not honestly deny his duplicity and policy reversals, his massive spending sprees and his disregard for the customs of our democracy. Is this not enough for you and your colleagues in the centre-right and right-leaning media to call a spade a shovel and remove your support form the Conservative Party as lead by Harper?
Ben Hicks

Brammer:

“Reminds me of a dog chasing a car. Once he catches it, he won’t know what to do with it.”

Steven Harper is the Joker?
Me Dere Robert

Exactly. I hope you mention this point on the “At Issue” panel to give it some exposure and maybe get people to really stop and think about it for a minute.
http://deleted Sandi

Leader is an overused word…..Putin, Mugabe, Bush – considered strong leaders. Hmmm….they stick to what they believe.

So, if you’re travelling down a country road with your kiddies in the back seat and find out you’ve taken the wrong direction that may put your kids in danger….do you continue on or do you turn back and go in a new direction? Harper, et al would stick to their beliefs, unflapped, have made their decision….which would mean carry on in the same direction.

You can be a leader and decisive for the good and for the bad.
Jarrid

With all due respect Mr. Coyne, this is not a particularly insightful article.

This much we can say about Harper’s accomplishments:

1. He has played a key role in uniting the right of the political spectrum in this country. Arguably the most important role. This is no small thing. Canada was on the verge of becoming a one party state with all the negatives that that entails. We saw it, and still see it with the Liberal Party of Canada. They started to identify their party with the state. That’s one of the reasons we got Adscam. By uniting the right, Harper will force the Liberals to better themselves – clearly a work in progress at the moment.

2. Since his election, the PQ has plummeted to third party status in Quebec and has put the sovereignty project on ice. Meanwhile in this election, the beady-eyed Gilles Duceppe and his Bloc cohorts are having an existential crisis. They are questioning their very existence. Stephen Harper has handled the unity file with adept adroitness. We know your personal preference for the white-knuckle brinksmanship that the Trudeau Liberals brought to the unity file. Guess what Mr. Coyne, Canadians prefer the quiet, placid and peaceful Canada/Quebec relationship that has taken root in the last two and a half years.

3. With the one of the weakest numerical majorities in Canadian history, Harper marshalled through legislation largely in accordance with his campaign promises. The GST, the Criminal Code amendments, the open federalism towards Quebec… In other words he lead and Parliament followed, reluctantly to be sure, but followed nonetheless. Again, considering the circumstances of a weak numerical minority, no small thing.

What’s the alternative in this election? Have the Liberals learned any lessons after being voted out of office by Canadians in January 2006? The passage below reported in today’s Toronto Star suggests that the answer is no:

“Things are so bad in Liberal circles, a story making the rounds describes a policy meeting in which Dion insisted on doing things his way because, “I was elected to lead the people of this party to leave a better planet.”

“No,” said Bob Rae. “You were elected because you’re not me and you’re not Michael Ignatieff.”"

A leader who honestly (and weirdly) thinks his leadership mandate is to save the planet leading a party which still has yet (will it ever) to come to terms with his leadership.
Style

“What I like is a leader who gives off that “I don’t give a f@ck” vibe.”

Who doesn’t. Not caring is essential to great leadership. I think it’s cute that you and Coyne wish Harper were more abusive of his opponents.

But Coyne goes too far when he compares Harper to Trudeau – implementing wage and price controls, after mocking the PCs for proposing them, and adopting the same tax measures he defeated the Clark government over. Those are policy reversals worth remembering. Income trusts. Not so much.

The military searched the homes and seized the address books of many Quebecers who’s only offense was to publicly support sovereignty. All Harper can offer is the RCMP asking some photographers to leave. Come on, Steve, Macleans demands you kick it up a notch!
http://carnewsandviews.com jwl

I agree that Harper does not merit the reputation of ‘strong leader’ in the traditional way we understand the expression but …

1) In Canada, a PM who governs the way Harper is at the moment is usually considered a successful leader. I always think of Scott’s poem about Mackenzie King when thinking of what makes a strong Canadian PM:

He blunted us.
We had no shape
Because he never took sides,
And no sides
Because never allowed them to take shape.

2) I don’t believe proper conservatives should have ‘visions’ for anyone or anything. Unless reducing the State, and granting us more freedom is a vision, than Harper is governing as he should.

However, I do agree that he’s abandoned his principles and the best that can said of Conservative policies at the moment is that they are less socialist than the other parties, which doesn’t exactly thrill us conservatives.
Style

Andrew – you’ve also abused the “Shorter” format somewhat. In the classic dsquared approach, the summary should be only one or two lines. I’ve come up with a couple of options for you but others may have better ideas.

a) Stephen Harper can best be understood by comparing him to Putin, Thatcher, Mike Harris and Pierre Trudeau. The only one he resembles is Putin, but he has the potential to be another Pierre Trudeau.

b) Harper is disappointing because, unlike Thatcher, he is unwilling to confront the coal miners. Or Argentina.
Robin

Spot on, Andrew. It’s rather a shame that die-hard neo-con supporters cannot fathom that their great ‘leader’ isn’t really a leader at all.
Francien Verhoeven

Andrew,

I understand where you’re coming from when reading your column on leadership, and Harper’s leadership in particular. But perhaps the most important thing to remember is the underlying expectations: where you are coming from. And that counts for all of us.

Yes, I was extremely disappointed when Harper chose to bend the rules around fixed election dates. Specially around the issue of fixed election dates because the rules seemed so clear to all, and seemed so purposefull besides. Not? Maybe not.

(I do not want to make excuses for Harper’s undermining of the fixed election law, because I still think his stand and approach were wrong on that. Other approaches could have, and should been taken.)

Maybe the rules around what we understand to be leadership have changed also. And that I think is the surprise effect you so highlight at the end of your column. But this surprise element does not merely reside in Harper himself, nor is it isolated within Harper’s form of leadership. The surprise element also comes forth out of changing times. Can we still compare leadership dated within Tatcher and Reagan if the world we live in has in fact changed? And I don’t say this lightly.

I will say this much: perhaps he is considered to be a good leader under present circumstances, and that some of those circumstances can clearly be marked as being that of the shifting kind. Perhaps Harper is trying to find – together with the citizens at large – what this shifting ‘new world’ is all about, because frankly I don’t think most citizens around the world have fully come to terms with this pivoting of positions.

But if you have a person like Harper who can think reasonably, who is not willing to go in one strong direction over another but is indeed trying to find a middle ground which can then draw as many citizens into the well being of a nation, then perhaps that is all we can expect from a leader at this point in time.

It is the public at large afterall who are also, for the most part, confused. Not so much confused about Harper, but confused about the shifting state of our wider world.

Personally, I don’t think you experience this shifting world as a problem perse. Perhaps you feel that our environment is always of the shifting kind, and, of course, it is. But you are a strong thinker yourself and you have a fundamental way of looking at things. But many, many voters in many, many countries no longer possess this sense of self. How then is a man like Harper (or any other leader) to address that situation?

The opposition parties, while being operative in parliament, certainly didn’t give away any signs of real leadership, that’s for sure. Except for Jack Layton. I must admit that Jack Layton has his moments when he decides to stand on his fundamental foundation. But when a man with such potential steps down from that platform and starts talking like the man who I meet in the elevator sometimes, a man who fervently believes that 9/11 catastrophe had been orchastrated by the US administration, then I seriously think Mr.Layton should pause and reflect for a moment: Is it wise to take advantage of the voter’s state of confusion, or is it wiser to admit that not all problems are to be so easily understood, and are therefore not so easily fixed.
Style

“Yes, I was extremely disappointed when Harper chose to bend the rules around fixed election dates. Specially around the issue of fixed election dates because the rules seemed so clear to all, and seemed so purposefull besides. Not? Maybe not.”

This is a complaint I don’t understand. Harper introduced the legislation because he was tired of Liberal leaders launching snap elections when they thought they had the best chance of winning. Why would he respect that law if doing so returned that power to the current Liberal leader? I don’t see this as a betrayal of his principles, I think it fits in with your broader description of him adapting to shifts in context. Here, he expected teh government to fall much earlier so felt it was safe to put in place an election law that would bind the next majority government.

That said, Andrew is right to push Harper to take on the coal miners.
Mike T.

comment by Style on Tuesday, September 16, 2008 at 2:59 pm:

This is a complaint I don’t understand. Harper introduced the legislation because he was tired of Liberal leaders launching snap elections when they thought they had the best chance of winning. Why would he respect that law if doing so returned that power to the current Liberal leader? I don’t see this as a betrayal of his principles,

*******

Where’s Ti-guy when he’s needed most?
http://www.aaronbroad.com/ Aaron Broad, Canada

Andrew,

I think you’re the canary in the coal mine for the collapse of this new Conservative party. Harper is neither conservative, nor visionary, and as such his party is collapsing. Canadians of all political stripes want a balance between a strong safety net, forward planning, and short term profit. Harper has concentrated only on maximizing short term profit for a few select industries, while making only minor attempts in the other two areas. Its hard to imagine where we could be, if we had a visionary leader, and were 3 years into the transition to 21st century.
Ti-Guy

Where’s Ti-guy when he’s needed most?

Off looking for pictures of Harper picking his nose and eating it to counter the non sequiturs and sophistry the Conservatives drag into these discussions, especially when they explain how Harper didn’t break his own election law.
Brian

Andrew said “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”

Harper has reshaped the political landscape in Canada. He takes firm positions on foreign policy. He has cut taxes and although he has increased spending, he is STILL running a surplus — with promises of holding spending to inflation. The nation has never been more united.

If strong leadership means the Trudeau way – increasing the country’s debt by 1000%, smoking cigars with dictators like Fidel Casto and nationalizing the economy – then I don’t want strong leadership.

Give me the not-as-strong-of-a-leader Harper anyday. Harper knows exactly what happens when ideology trumps everything in policy-making — a divided right-wing that is full of good ideas they will never implement because they will never win power.

We shouldn’t put a lot of stock in what you’ve been predicting lately, given that you:

- proclaimed that recognizing the Quebecois as a nation within a united Canada would destroy the country, and

- endorsed Stephane Dion for leadership of the liberal party, and

- are Pierre Trudeau’s cousin through marriage.
Ti-Guy

are Pierre Trudeau’s cousin through marriage.

Typical personal attack. They really have nothing else at all.
Brian

Ti-Guy said: “(I am) off looking for pictures of Harper picking his nose and eating it”

and then five minutes later, he’s disgusted that I would stoop to the gutter of a personal attack.
sbt

“Harper is neither conservative, nor visionary, and as such his party is collapsing.”

This statement is even more ridiculous then Andrew saying Harper has accomplished nothing with his leadership. According to most polls the CPC is going to be picking up seats on Oct. 14 and the party’s fundraising is healthy which suggests the base is at least content. Not exactly a collapsing party.

“Harper has concentrated only on maximizing short term profit for a few select industries”

You’re right. Harper’s corporate income tax cuts are directed solely at industries that are making profits and are economically viable. It’s definitely not in the national interest to encourage those industries to expand and create jobs. That’s terrible forward planning.
Style

Ti-Guy and I actually agree! I also believe that Harper’s nose-picking is a valid explanation of why it was reasonable to call an election now. But I do not accept the insinuation that Dion, or any other political leader, has a filthy, congested nose. That kind of talk has no place in our political discourse. Shame on you Ti-Guy.