Categories: Capital Read, Inside the Queensway

I think it's safe to say that has already happened, Minister.

by kadyomalley on Friday, November 28, 2008 8:51am - 52 Comments

From today’s Order and Notice Paper:

GOVERNMENT BUSINESS

No. 1 — November 26, 2008 — The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons — That this House take note of the Economic and Fiscal Statement tabled in the House on November 27, 2008.

At the moment, ITQ is in tentative agreement with Colleague Wells on the most likely outcome: the government will back down on the most contentious elements of the still-to-be-unveiled package — not just the subsidies, but suspending the right to strike over wages as well — and maybe even sweeten the deal by promising to show a little stimulating love for the manufacturing sector. If that happens, we’ll be curious to see whether someone ends up walking the plank at Langevin for coming up with what would go down as the most spectacularly unwise political gambit by a minority government since the Great Miscounting of 1979.

I mean, someone over there had to come up with this idea in the first place — Patrick Muttart? Darrel Reid? Jason Kenney? Tom Flanagan? The Giornoracle himself? — and if the end result involves the PM doing the walk of shame across the aisle, you’d think that said someone would eventually face the full force of Harperian wrath.

The thing that really strikes ITQ as remarkable, though, is that this seems to be exactly the same sort of metamiscalculation that led the Tories to believe that slashing $40 million in funding for the arts would set off a culture war — which, to be fair, it did — without first making sure that they were on the winning side. You would think that the Most Chessmasterful Prime Minister Ever would have learned a valuable, if sobering lesson from the ensuing Quebectoral heartbreak that ensued: Pointless pettiness rarely pays off. But no, apparently not. Here he is, apparently poised to make exactly the same mistake – and one that would likely further damage his party’s fortunes in the very same province, since Quebeckers are among the most passionate supporters of public financing for political parties: after all, they’ve had a similar system in place for years.

Then again, maybe this really is unfolding according to some as-yet-unseen master plan, as some true believers were suggesting last night (albeit in quietly hysterical tones) — a master plan so vast and of such diabolical shrewdness that, once revealed, will once again render us dazzled by the PM’s political prescience. Then again, maybe we end up with the first ever menage a trois government facing off against the angriest leader of the official opposition in Canadian political history. Either way, I have a feeling that we’re going to be living in interesting – and eminently livebloggable – times.

Tags: at least they're cooperating right?, capitulating by increments, it's melting!, Jim Flaherty, the end may in fact be nigh, we have ourselves a standoff, who's the chessmaster now?, your move prime minister

More by kadyomalley

Dr Riff

what surprises me is how many suckers want to give these plugs $1.95 now out of their own money for doing squat, most of all someone who can’t even show up for critical votes.
Ti-Guy

63% of Canadians did not vote for Harper or the Conservatives, so there may be less Canadians upset with the fact he may be on the way out then you think.

I always like to point out that Harper only got 22% of the eligible electorate. And I reject those claims from experts who constantly assert that voter turnout doesn’t matter. It probably doesn’t matter for election results, but it does matter in terms of what people think of governance. And 41% of Canadians seemed to think voting for this government was a waste to time. And they were right.

These Harpocons don’t represent anyone but a small minority of people locked into an economic and social orthodoxy that has failed.
http://prairiewrangler.wordpress.com/ Olaf

Kady – I still don’t think ‘culture war ‘is the appropriate term, maybe a “Quebec-only backlash”. But I see what you’re saying, and dont disagree, except for my persnickety diction hangups (which, incidentally, are a real hit at parties). Anyways, sorry for the diversion from the topic du jour.
Ti-Guy

And Quebec always gets pissed off about something.

You’re getting a little shrill and intemperate, Oaf. Are you OK?
Dr Riff

it failed so good we’re still in surplus while the world goes belly up
Ti-Guy

Sorry…”Oaf” was an honest typo. I swear.
Ti-Guy

t failed so good we’re still in surplus while the world goes belly up

Sure. Keep believing that. I remember the last time Flaherty claimed there was a surplus.

Anyway, the economic orthodoxy is not the one that has prevailed in Canada, and there’s no way Harper can claim that his economic policies are what, so far, and according to what we know, have saved Canada from economic meltdown. That took decades of work.
Dr Riff

you’re right actually it took me a lifetime to come up with the sound policy they’re just getting the hang of it.
http://www.macleans.ca Kady O’Malley

Olaf: Feel free to divert at will! It’s actually almost a play on words — the Conservatives wanted a “culture war” of the American variety, which usually involves pitting the godless elites against “ordinary citizens” who don’t want to shell out tax dollars for naughty art, but they got a real culture war over, well, culture – and it turned out that in the region where it counted, they were on the wrong side.
Dr Riff

how many books did yann give him that he actually read? he reads every word i say.
Michael

The Liberals for many years relied on political donations from their friends in big corporations and big unions. They did very well and didn’t need a great deal of help from individual party members. With this rule change they can again fund raise in corporate Canada. They should be pleased the door is open again for fund raising and for making large corporate welfare payments in return. What’s the problem??
Jonathan

It will be interesting to see what happens over the next week or so. I tend to think that James is right about the polls – we all know the Conservatives have their own polling data, and it would surprise me if Harper went ahead on this without information that the majority of Canadians would like the idea of cutting public money to political parties. In other words, Harper probably isn’t a genius, but he isn’t as blindly stupid as certain partisan folks would like to believe.

Still, it’s a fluid environment, and making sure-fire predictions about the outcome of this is premature; we can’t know what the next card will be (from either side) until it’s played. Case in point – how many yesterday predicted a Chretien-Broadbent intervention?
Dr Riff

here’s how it is. instead of working to improve canada, they spent the last session playing “i wanna be prime minister dion” and wasting time on a bunch of BS scandals that were proven untrue. steve also has the inside scoop on global circumstance he can’t just blab. this stuff has been brewing since the start of the olympics when russia invaded georgia,

“”If the priority is blind support for the bankrupt Saakashvili regime and if they are ready to pay the price of a break in relations with Russia, then that is not our choice,” the foreign minister said.
Dr Riff

bankrupt being the operative word. it’s why steve won’t run a deficit
Jack Mitchell

Kady, assuming they do back down, as who wouldn’t, what then? Are the opposition parties sufficiently emboldened now that they might vote down the Government anyway? Or do we just file this under “creative but crazy ploys” and that’s it?
Mark Graham

Why does it have to be some grand strategy? The government backs down on public financing. They play the NDP and Liberals off each other on the right to strike. (Think seriously for a moment about whether the Liberals, in their state, would actually be willing to fight an election over the right to strike when the government has already guaranteed a modest salary increase over the period during which the right is suspended. Try telling the boys just laid off from the plant that you’re going to spend $300 mil to have an election that delays action on the economic crisis over the right of some bureaucrats with 100% job security and a modest raise to go on strike–do you really think that would work?). They can say later, “look, throughout this economic crisis we were focused on making the necessary sacrifices to maintain public finances. The opposition thought that it was more important to keep themselves on the dole. We could have trounced them in an election–they didn’t even have a leader!–but our Conservative government understands that the interests of hard working Canadians must come first. The Liberals are continuing to play politics with every issue, every bill that comes before the House. We have proven that we will work for all Canadians and we need a Conservative majority free of political games played by the opposition so that we can work at a speed that will allow us to seek new partner with the vigorous Obama administration in the United States.”

Maybe it won’t work, but it’s hardly a fake punt double reverse flea flicker. And they have hardly lost control.
Jack Mitchell

Mark, you’re saying it’s basically a feint? Stun them with the party financing, agree to pull back on that, and push through with everything else? That would be quite a smart tactic, unless the opposition boldly follows up and breaks through the front line with a confidence vote anyway . . .
TJ Cook

Michael – I don’t think that’s true, I don’t think Harper’s proposal re-opens corporate and union donations.

If it were true, the problem would be that it’s a step away from healthy (ie democracy-supporting) funding of political parties and a step toward the kind of distortions that big donors can introduce into public policy.
Michael

A coalition government made up of parties that were not supported by voters in western Canada (Cons 71, Liberals 7) and by separatists would be a disaster for national unity. I fear for the future of our country.
Michael

T. J. Cook:

If the proposal doesn’t again allow for corporate and union donations it should. It is a quid pro quo!
http://www.macleans.ca Kady O’Malley

Michael – We haven’t actually seen a bill to amend the Canada Elections Act (which, as far as ITQ can see, would be required to abolish the subsidy), so we don’t know whether it would roll back the ban on corporate and union donations – or even raise the cap on individual donations – but so far, there has been no indication that such a move is even under consideration.
T. Thwim

Kory 10Eek is on CTV right now, trying to raise the specter of a godless coup, calling the idea of a coaltion undemocratic.

Would somebody explain to Kory that a coalition of forces, a cooperation of parties, is rather what Canada expects from a minority government? And if the Conservatives can’t do it, let’s get in some groups that can.
Dr Riff

why don’t they try doing it the right way – collecting donations before an election? instead of spending all their money at the royal york and coming to the taxpayer after?
http://prairiewrangler.wordpress.com/ Olaf

Kady – Yes, but in the Tories defence, productive culture wars are notoriously difficult to start. I tried to initiate a culture war one time by cutting off my funding for the “electricity bill”, which my elitist, ideologue roomate demands we pay every single month. Needless to say, it did not proceed as planned.
http://kitchenersown.blogspot.com/ Lord Kitchener’s Own

Dr. Riff,

it failed so good we’re still in surplus while the world goes belly up

Yeah, because HARPER’s the reason we’re still in surplus. When the Liberals left, there was a $12 billion surplus. Today, it’s down to $100 million and most economists concede that that is mostly smoke and mirrors. The only reason we’re still in surplus is because Harper and his gang couldn’t quite burn through $12 billion in two years. They tried, but they couldn’t quite eliminate the huge surpluses left behind by the Liberals.

Think of it this way. If the Liberals had left us where the Tories have us now surplus-wise, the last two years of Tory government would have $11 billion in the hole TODAY, with not a dime spent on recovery yet.

Taking credit for a $100 million surplus after your predecessors left you with $12 Billion to play with is HILARIOUS.