The company you keep

Conservatives think this is a good move because they have deluded themselves into believing their years of screeching about anti-Americanism has had any effect. But the reality is that Canadians hate Bush and the Republicans more than ever so any closer ties to them will be good news for us on the left.

Y'know, maybe it's just the too-polite, too-retiring Canadianism in me, but I can't see years of constant attacks on men who are no longer even politicians, let alone office-holders, going over particularly well with most of the electorate.

That's an angle I hadn't considered. It would amount to fighting the last war instead of the current one and is usually a recipe for disaster.

It also leads to people wondering about the reliability of such claims as they would be wielded politically.

It's not good government as it's a strategy to retain power, not to govern with good policy.

Of course, as a green, having the Tories and the Liberals engaged in constant mud slinging has its appeal.

Greens just hit 9% nationally, according to one poll.

Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Yes, I hope the Conservatives do everything exactly as Bush has -- he's just been soooooo successful, hasn't he.

Well, the problem is that Count Iggy, Dryden, Kennedy and others weren't part of the corrupt government. They certainly can try to label the whole party as corrupt, but the Liberals have some wiggle room.

But maybe the CPC is looking for way to define the Liberals before they can get their house in order. Because if the Liberals can tar the CPC as war-luvin' Krazy Kristians, the Tories can forget about Quebec.

Someone should remind Luntz how many American Conservatives are currently in need of defense lawyers. Do these pius blowhards ever look in the mirror?

It's one reason why the Liberals desperately need renewal. The new leader must be Ceasar's wife, both pure and believed to be pure. No Stephane Dion, no Volpe, no other guy whose name is too difficult for me to rememmber. Ignatiefs writings and positions may be too easily skewed (saying torture is a lesser evil is still saying torture is evil and governments shold never engage in torture seems forthright to me).
Kennedy looks good, or maybe Dr Caroline Bennett( didn't we already have a PM Bennet?) Hey even Finlay doesn't look too bad. Rae is a non-starter- Ontario's still paying for some short-sighted policies of his. ( electrical power- aww shucks we got lots of that, we don't need to plan for more).

The Green party a 9% shouldn't bother anyone, once an election roles around they'll drop like a stone. Excuse me Kermit, but its Easy being green in a non-election year.

Iggy's torture comments aren't the main problem. It is his initial, and continued, support for the Iraq war. Even many Democrats who voted for the war resolution have done their mea culpas. That Iggy refuses to do so says a lot about where he's coming from.

As for the RepubliCons, I think they will end up finding out that mirroring the Republican approach in Canada has severe limitations.

I have been aware of Frank Luntz for several years now thanks to my time reading American political blogs. I understand exactly how dangerous/capable this man is as a wordsmith for the American political context. He was the "genius" that came up with the 9/11/01 thinking argument so beloved by the GOP to paint their Democratic opponents as being pre-9/11/01 in their thinking while the GOP is post 9/11/01 thinking and therefore the only ones Americans can trust with national security. This argument has been used to great success to cover up and deflect from many of the more egregious actions taken by the Bush Administration and sanctioned by the GOP Congress.

His ability to frame things in the American political context is really really strong, the fact that he employs it for what most of us would call a criminal enterprise notwithstanding. So he should never be underestimated for his abilities.

HOWEVER, that being said it is the American political dynamic that this man really understands. If he, like so many of our Canadian Conservative brethren, is operating under the assumption that there is little to no real difference between our social and especially our political cultures then he is making a fundamental mistake in his advice. Take the digging up of scandals by the CPC on the prior government. This works well in America, but it does not have a history of working well in this country. It tends to be seen as mean spirited, unreliable since there is a clear political slanting/usage, and generally something Canadians find tedious. this can only work when it is a truly major scandal, things like expense reports not being filled out properly and other such "scandals" we have already had the CPC try to interest Canadians in while in Opposition only help underscore this point.

If the CPC chooses to try this path they are likely sowing the seeds of their own destruction. Leaving aside for the moment that all governments fall eventually and that if this government implements this kind of examination of the prior government than eventually it will be facing the same, there is one reason above all others why I think this will backfire badly. Canadians are inherently fair minded people, they believe in giving fair chances and they believe in fair criticisms/attacks. Sifting through the prior government's history for anything to use against them in a partisan manner is not going to be seen as fair criticism but mean spirited politicking. It will also be seen, and rightly so, as not doing the job they were elected to do, which is to lead the country forward, and not spend copious amounts of time and governmental resources (taxpayer funded natch) sifting the past for partisan political ammunition.

I did my own post on this at Saundrie, and I am glad that POGGE has one up too. It is evidence of this nature which makes the claim of close ties between the CPC leadership and party to the GOP credible for all the CPC and its defenders keep trying to claim otherwise. As I have said before my single biggest reason for opposing the CPC is not so much what they want to do but how they are willing to do it. It is the tools they are willing to embrace that the GOP pioneered to such great "success" over the last quarter century that scares me, because in our political dynamic they will almost certainly rip the country apart. As I keep trying to get across to many Conservatives, there are subtle yet profound differences in the social, cultural, and political makeup of the two countries and what may work well in one of them may be actively damaging/destructive in the other. The GOP tools Harper and the CPC are so enamoured of are a good example of this IMHO.

Incidentally, anyone notice that Luntz spoke to the same group, the Civatas group that Harper three years earlier delivered his culture war speech to? I caught that when I was hunting for a link to that earlier speech, interesting no?

Go, Stevie, go! As Scotian (why can't I access your blog?) points out - this is political suicide.
Note to Jack Layton: "If the left was smart they would talk about justice." Start talkin' Jack!

Political Strategy for Dummies: Item 1

And for those who happen to think that when the 'campaign' starts, it will be with a bang and all of us sensible Canadians will rebel, I would say: think again! That is how it will be done. You will not even know it is happening. Just to remind everyone that there is no comfort there, i.e. in thinking that Canadians will not like what Harper will be doing, that we aren't the USA! Perhaps the political and the regional dynamics are indeed different, but people are people. There is such a thing as "social engineering". Read Weyrich from Item 1!

BTW, the PowerPoint presentation was prepared for the right-wing think tank, the Atlas Foundation, the same foundation that provided seed money for some of the right-wing think tanks in this country.

The Atlas Foundation? 'Bringing Freedom to the World'? GAAACK! I'm re-reading George Grant's Lament for a Nation and Michael Adams' Fire and Ice to reassure myself that this is all just a bad dream.

Je me souviens:

October 26, 2003
I'll remember you said that

Peter MacKay discussing the merger of the Alliance and the PCs:

Canadians want moderate, tolerant and inclusive policies that reflect their values.

Have you mentioned this to Stephen Harper?
Posted by pogge at 11:24 PM | TrackBack

FurGaia:

I am not underestimating the threat potential represented here despite the cultural differences. My point about them was that the effects will not automatically translate the same way. In our case I truly believe that the binary factionalism represented in the "us versus them" mindset relied upon by these people to polarize the electorate will add some very powerful additional stresses into an already heavily stressed decentralized federation already having to deal with regionalism/Provincialism strains beyond its capacity. When I said I believe it would destroy this country I am not employing any exaggeration in my concerns. It is the inability of too many Conservatives to appreciate the gravity of this threat that worries me most. I have lived under Conservative PM's before when they were PCPC and did not fear for the country staying together. Harper's CPC though is a whole other kettle of fish for me, especially given all the commonalities and connections I have seen between him and those close to him with American significant counterparts from the GOP media and fundraising machines.

It is because I recognize the reality of people being fundamentally people that I am so worried. I can see this working for a short term period of time, after all Mike Harris managed such in Ontario with his words saying one thing and his actions painting a clearly different picture. The problem I have with it is that it will introduce new dynamics into our system it cannot adapt to and instead will end up corroding the ties that bind Canadians beyond any repair until they fly apart. I am not inherently anti-conservative, as I keep trying to convince some I am a true swing voter, I shift over the years as I see which party and local candidates most closely represent my personal views and/or how well I believe they will manage the country during the particular challenges known in that time. What I see in the CA and now the CPC is something that scares me far more than Reform ever did, and I was opposed to them from the outset.

What the CPC represents to me though is literally GOP lite and the idea of such in this country appalls me, same as if I thought either the Liberals or NDP were acting as Dems lite with similar political connections as we have seen from the Harper CPC. For all that Harper and the CPC talk about the importance of "made in Canada solutions" for things like Kyoto and indeed many issues this party is the most directly influenced by its American counterparts I have ever seen in my life, and when I consider what the current GOP is made of and how they have held their power this truly terrifies me.

I know this seems alarmist to many Conservative voters and supporters, many of whom I have no problems believing do not see this problem for themselves and even if they do see the connections do not see why this is such a problem given our close natural ties to America in the first place. To be otherwise for many of them is proof of anti-Americanism on the part of those with such a belief. The problem is though Canada was a country birthed as a counter to America, was formed and shaped by those wishing to govern in a different manner than America, and our institutions were developed along these lines throughout their history. This is one of the reasons why I find major importation of American political tools by any party a very real concern, and in this case given the tools the current incarnation of the GOP have and are being imported by the CPC/Harper just happen to be particularly dangerous/destructive.

I am a very big believer in this country and the promise it represents to the future as well as the honourable heritage it has for the most part, especially if you remove the truly worst stain we have being which our history with the aboriginal peoples of this land. (This is not to gloss over that particular horror/sin, but that it is not only our worst but qualitatively worse than any of our other sins as a nation) I believe that the manner we live with each other, the community of communities approach is one that has far reaching implications for the future of the world. After all, Canada is in many ways the closest thing to a true microcosm of the global cultural environment under a common set of laws and governing structures. The better we are able to do so by living together as one nation, diverse in nature where all citizens are truly equal under the law while being able to retain much of their cultural heritage the more we show the way by example. I know that for many this sounds really blue skyish, but I truly believe in this, and I know many other Canadians that do as well. This means the country must stay together and learn to deal in multiple perspectives in our political discussions, which is the exact opposite of where the CPC will take us, especially if they continue to borrow this extensively from the GOP.

This situation really worries me. It has been the greatest threat to Canadian stability and integrity since the last referendum in Quebec and I fear one of the worst ever faced by this country overall. Economic integration is something I can accept if with some reservations and restrictions where cultural sectors are concerned, but political integration is not. I truly believe that do to so will be the death of this country as a single entity even in the loose federation it already is. People keep forgetting, and the Conservatives especially that this country is truly one of the most decentralized federations on the planet. So weakening the federal structure significantly and strengthening the Provincial governments is something that if done must be with a microscalple, not a chainsaw. Factor in the American confrontational style of politicking and I do not see this country surviving. So I try to sound the call, because unless enough of us do before the "campaign" starts I fear your assessment is all too likely to come about, and if I do nothing to try to stop it I betray not only my own beliefs but those of my family since this country was founded, and I refuse to betray that heritage any more than my own personal convictions.

People can call me many things, long winded, pompous, arrogant, etc., but I have the courage of my convictions and am willing to stand by them. This is what I truly believe, and not because someone told me this but because I have watched this evolve over the last few decades, first in American politics then in our own. I have had a strong interest in both countries' federal politics since I was a child, I do understand the difference in both structure and in political cultures, and I have bothered to study the evolutions of each countries' political cultures from their respective births. I would argue I understand Canadian better since I was born and raised in this country, but given the close proximity to our American neighbour, their clear power since WWII, and the media saturation we have had from them since television it wasn't all that hard to follow the American political scene either. Not to mention having many American born and raised cousins to talk to growing up as well about how things looked from their vantage point.

I used to be able to find much to respect in their politics even when I disagreed with elements and found some things far too absolutist/extreme for my tastes, and this was true from left as well as right because it was more a cultural thing than a political partisan thing. Their first amendment though and their devotion to free speech and true separation of church and state were two of the thngs I most cherished and respected about them. So you can imagine my horror when I look at what the GOP have done in the past several years to the very fabric of American society. I want no part of that here.

macadavy:

I know of no reason why you cannot access the blog, at least when Blogger is working properly. I have no restrictions on anyone to date there.

Scotian! I normally like what you have to say but that if far too long.

''I know of no reason why you cannot access the blog''

It's because the link in your signature here has a comma where it should have a period.

Macadavy: try this.

When did we all start calling governments 'administrations' anyway? Last I checked Canadians had governments, Americans had administrations. Odd linguistic shift.

Here's a little summary of a few Luntzianisms....my favorite is the last one.

.

.

I think the lesson here, as others have hinted at above, is to tie Harper/Conservative to Bush/Republican as tightly as possible so they can all go down in flames together a la Colbert's Hindenberg.

Par example.

Scotian, thank you for your statement of your views, and your concern about the debasement of politics which has taken place in the USA during the past few years. Your concern and disgust with those actions is shared by many Canadians and many Americans, who looked to America as a bastion of democracy, only to see deception, distortion, avoidance of true debate and other horrors rob Americans of their democracy.

I share your concern.

It is up to us – and especially up to bloggers – to be vigilant in the defence of democracy in Canada, and to relentless hunt down and expose the use of those unsavoury tactics in Canada. We do not want that rot to set into the Canadian political environment.

Starting with an examination of Luntzian tactics as used by Harper and his governing party is a good beginning (see Cerebus for a good example of how to do it – with faint ridicule – ala Harper Hockey).

Up with freedom; down with Luntzspeak.

Good eye, pogge! THX

I think FurGaia's point is that the US right has not just been doing politics--they have been pushing hard to morph the culture itself into one that's amenable to their politics.
Confidence in their approaches not working based on our culture being different, then, may be misplaced. We can't just count on that culture to defend our politics. We have to defend the culture itself from the attacks of a right-wing ideology that will try--is trying--hard and consciously to corrode that culture directly.

An elderly relative of mine came from a Quakerish background--a religious grouping that was conservative, but peaceful and community-minded. Lately, she's going to a US-style Baptist church with, near as I can make out, direct ties to US right-wing religious establishments. My wife's ex-husband is part of a religious circle which apparently believes in all the "left behind" garbage--he gave the kids some unintentionally hilarious videos.
I don't know how much headway these bastards are making in Canada, but they're sure as hell trying.

And incidentally, we shouldn't write off the Republican approach in the US just yet. Sure, the Shrub's at 32%. Heck, maybe a Democrat will even be elected next time.
So?
The story of the last 20+ years of US government is one of activist Republican administrations alternating with passive Democratic ones. The Republicans do bad stuff until the public finally get fed up, and the Democrats don't dare change any of it (and secretly didn't want to anyway). Then when people have forgotten the bad stuff the Republicans get in again and do a raft more bad stuff. Some of which cumulatively breaks the democratic structures of the country.

So, they may not quite get a dictatorship this time around. But they got plenty of gerrymandering and disenfranchising and police state and so forth in position. In 2012 or 2016 they probably will finish the job. In the short term, their outrages got Bush a 32% approval rating--just too late for it to make that much difference electorally. Heck, the Repugs could yet pull out a repeat in 2008 with a shiny new presidential candidate, although I doubt it. But in the longer term, a switch after 8 years is pretty normal, and they've used those 8 years with no stops pulled to grab everything they wanted.

When their time comes again, they'll have all that everything to use for grabbing more. Of course, that all assumes the country hasn't imploded by then from the coming economic crises.

To distill:
1) People underestimate the long-term effectiveness of ruthless short-term opportunism.
2) The right are targetting culture itself. Existing culture is not really a defense against that.

That earlier point Scotian made, about Canadian and US political cultures having less in common than some on the right might wish, is noteworthy, what with Aussie PM John Howard visiting Ottawa in about a week's time - in some ways, his example might be regarded as more relevant for the Tories than anything Bush has done to date. As Paul Wells points out over at his Macleans blog, "Howard's 1996 campaign was a key influence on Harper's 2006 campaign. The two men were friends before Harper became PM, and there aren't a lot of world leaders about whom that was true."

The part of Howard's story Harper probably likes best, and that Liberals would do well to be mindful of, is this: the faintly-left-of-centre party Howard defeated in 1996 had governed Australia for thirteen years straight; upon being thrown out, its leadership smugly assumed they'd be back in charge in no time - Howard the right-wing ideologue would wreck the place, and the electorate would beg them to take over again.

Ten years later, that party is still waiting, albeit as an all-but-leaderless rabble; Howard, meanwhile, has indeed wrecked the place, but his political and cultural remodelling of the nation has coincided with fortuitously prosperous times - and nobody cares about what governments get up to when times are good. And so Howard just keeps on going, and going, and going... a right-wing role model that Canadians ought to hope Harper proves too inept to emulate.

Neocon parallels – north and south of the 49th, OR the story of Harper's shiny new Black Helicopter:

Let's start with PM Harper's new plan for a black helicopter, to be used to fly Liberal MPs around the country so as to discover the vast rightwing conspiracy. Harper was reported in May 9th Hansard as saying he will recommend buying such a helicopter for such a purpose. He was trying to deflect attention away from MP Mark Holland's question as to whether there was a connection between one Tory MP's (Vellacott) recent attacks on the Supreme Court, and Harper's membership in a group called Civitas, with the focus being on their common aim to "destroy the independence of our judiciary."

Nice quip, Stephen. A few chuckles, and the subject deflected. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

But is there smoke we see out there? And could that mean there is a fire?

Is there a concerted "act of working in secret to obtain some goal, usually understood with negative connotations"? (as Wikipedia defines conspiracy).

Perhaps not. But is there a concerted acting together of rightwing elements in Canada, with a view to promoting changes in the Canadian body politic of revolutionary proportions? Decidedly yes. And one does not need Harper's Black Helicopter to find it ...

• It is up to bloggers to follow this trail, and expose this concerted action of neocons to subvert the existing Canadian political system and replace it with an intolerant, theocratic neocon system.

• First thing: we should agree to follow the following people in Harper's brand new, shiny Black Helicopter, on our quest for the Harper Neocon Plot.

Start with some of the characters ("Round up the usual suspects", says the cop in Casablanca) – as Public Eye Online (http://www.publiceyeonline.com/archives/2006_05.html) says:
"Republican pollster Frank Luntz will also be in attendance to deliver a speech on "Massaging the Conservative Message for Voters." Other topics of discussion will include "Euthanasia: The Next Battle in the Culture Wars" and "Supreme Future: The Role of Courts and Judges in Modern Democracies." Members of Civitas reportedly include former federal Conservative national campaign director Tom Flanagan, as well as Atlantic Institute for Market Studies president Brian Lee Crowley and former Montreal Economic Institute president Michel Kelly-Gagnon. The group's current president is Lorne Gunter, a columnist with the National Post. Civitas was founded following the 1996 Winds of Change conference organized by Ezra Levant and David Frum. Civitas's 2003 annual general meeting made headlines when future Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered a presentation suggesting the Conservatives would need to adopt a more "incremental" approach if they wanted to win government. No word yet on whether Civitas members will be sacrificing goats or nubile virgins at this year's meeting."
• Flanagan? Calgary School? How do they fit in with Harper and his shiny new Black Helicopter? Well, back in 2004 Harper was heading Alliance Party, and some people were talking about the future – the takeover of the old Progressive Conservatives, gaining power in Canada – those sort of things (see The Man Behind Stephen Harper: Tom Flanagan, The Walrus Magazine, October 2004):
"The looming power struggle is not only for the soul of the new party. It is also over Stephen Harper's political future: how much is he willing to water down the ecumenical wine required to win the PMO? Rick Anderson calls it "the defining question of his leadership -- whether he'll fudge the party's policies or not." But back in Alberta, Ted Byfield, the unabashed voice of the West since the Calgary School's professors were pups, sees it another way -- in terms Leo Strauss might have approved. "All these positions which Harper cherishes are there because of a group people in Calgary -- Flanagan most prominent among them," Byfield says. "I don't think he knows how to compromise. It's not in his genes. The issue now is: how do we fool the world into thinking we're moving to the left when we're not?" To those who are unnerved by that prospect, Byfield offers no cheer. "Those people who said they're dangerous -- they're right!" he says. "People with ideas are dangerous. If Harper gets elected, he'll make a helluva change in this country.""

Now, let's fly Harpers little Black Helicopter over Calgary, in May 1996, and hover over the Winds of Change conference. Here's what David Taras of the University of Calgary has to say in The Winds of Right-wing Change in Canadian Journalism, about that conference, summary first, quotes afterwards (see http://info.wlu.ca/~wwwpress/jrls/cjc/BackIssues/21.4/taras.html):

• the aim was to unite the right in order to achieve a merger of the Progs and Alliance so as to gain power and implement a rightwing agenda;
• the attendees were heedful of the success over years of the neocon movement in the USA to fund talk shows and think tanks and to take over the political agenda there, leading to taking over the government (via Congress and the White House) and implementing the rightwing social, cultural and political agenda);
• they would agree on steps to be taken to unite the right, win power and implement change.

In the words of David Taras:

"The Winds of Change conference, which took place in Calgary in May 1996, brought together approximately 70 leading right-wing thinkers and activists in an effort to bring unity to conservative forces before the next federal election, expected in 1997. The goal, according to organizer David Frum, was to discuss the prospects for a merger between the Reform and Progressive Conservative parties. The stark reality facing Conservatives is that a continued fracturing of the right-wing vote is likely to ensure not only a victory for Jean Chretien's Liberals in 1997 but that the Liberals remain in power indefinitely."

"Frum believed that a vigorous airing of views behind closed doors, steps to develop a common agenda, and the bon amie of personal contact would create the momentum that was needed."

And:

"The triumph of a right-wing agenda [in the USA] is not simply, one can argue, the result of liberal failures or flavour-of-the-month ideas that have caught the momentary fancy of the public."

"The legitimacy of conservative viewpoints is the product, rather, of a sustained and concerted effort. A right-wing information infrastructure has been built up over the period of the last 15 years -- an infrastructure that has the capacity to shape public opinion through a variety of means. Think tanks such as the Fraser and C. D. Howe Institutes, the conservative ideological tilt and corporate boosterism of Canadian newspapers, and the rise of right-wing talk radio are all evidence, one can argue, of the extent to which conservative institutions and ideas now dominate the public sphere."

"The Winds of Change conference in Calgary brought together some of the often disparate elements of this formidable infrastructure."

There, now: the seeds of the rightwing movement laid bare. Add top this Harper's speech of 1997, and in 2003. Mix this brew, stir well, and consider it carefully.

Now it is over to you, bloggers, to continue this story and tell the Canadian voters what really is happening in Ottawa right now, despite the muzzles put upon the New Tories by Harper.

When did we all start calling governments 'administrations' anyway? Last I checked Canadians had governments, Americans had administrations. Odd linguistic shift.

I remember first hearing this usage during the Mulroney years. Though judging by how it felt to live through that period, perhaps that should be "decades."

Right-wingers, however incompetent they may be at governing, seem to have this ability to bend time. It already seems about two years since Harper et al were elected.