Press Rooms Turned War Rooms: Continued from Pg 8

Canadians only understand the proposed two-tier system
as some sort of evil thing that will kill them. The
Conservatives are officially not in favor of two-tier
healthcare, but everyone knows they support it on the
inside. So why not at least stand up for it when it comes
under attack? A two-tier system, by definition, will keep
public healthcare intact while allowing for an independ-
ently-run, fee-based system for seniors who are willing to
pay for surgery but not willing to wait over a year for it.
It’s a pretty straight forward argument, and not one that
smart Conservatives like Harper should have a problem
making.

On gay marriage, similarly, rather than simply “giving
up the fight” as the press advocates, and pretending to
have never opposed the practice in the first place,
Conservatives should not be afraid to point out that, even
at its supposed peak of popularity, same-sex marriage

 

  

 

could barely manage to break a 1 percent margin of
majority approval. Similarly, even among those Canadians
who did approve, a large chunk of them were neverthe-
less firm in their convictions that homosexual marriage
should never assume fully equal legal status to the hetero-
sexual kind. Despite the cries of social libertarians,
opposing gay marriage was always a fairly mainstream
position, not some sort of radical fringe stance to be
ashamed of.

Lastly, the Iraq war.

Canadians may be too squeamish to deal with the
thought of their soldiers getting shot in the Middle East,
and that’s acceptable. What’s not acceptable, however, is
for the Conservatives to distance themselves from a con-
flict that, despite some obvious pitfalls, has achieved a
great deal of successes. Canadians are supposed to be a
people who believe in ideals of spreading peace, democ-

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racy, and human rights around the world. Let the Liberals
explain why they thought Iraqis were better off without
elections, a charter of rights, freedom of speech, or a free
press. If anything, Conservatives should have it easy on
this issue-as war-backers, they can claim credit for all the
good things that have come to Iraq, but since Harper
wasn’t our commander-in-chief during the conflict, he
can’t be blamed for any casualties.

In the end, most Canadian voters are basically moder-
ate; but so too are most voters basically non-ideological.
Voters cast ballots for ideas and rhetoric that make logical
sense. Despite Mr. Martin’s best attempts, throwing
around scary words like neoconservative in an attempt to
fear monger only goes so far. If an idea works, it’s a good
policy—no matter what you call it.

But hey, I’m just a newspaper columnist. What do I
know?

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