F&p Ure Die is a big year for Canadians and Americans. Both Canada and the United States will be holding Federal elections, and both have the potential to shape their respective countries futures for generations to come. Like a lot of people, I became pretty wrapped up in the whole deal, and followed what each politician had to say pretty closely. It wasn’t until my Dad commented on how sickening the election was becoming that I took a closer look at it. Unfortunately, the campaigns of all the major candidates are seldom based on the positive things they plan to do, but much more focused on slandering and tearing down their opponents. If you’ ve been following either election at all, then you know what I’m talking about. Whether it’s Harper, Layton, Dion, McCain, Obama or any of the others, the great majority of their television and radio ads are geared to telling the public that if you choose to vote for anyone but them, the world will come to an end. Even more unfortunately, this is nothing new. It is all a part of the permanent campaign that both Washington and Ottawa utilize 365 days per year, 24 hours a day. The conservatives, liberals, republicans, democrats and basically every other political party are in a state of permanent campaigning, regardless of whether or not an election is upcoming. Government policies are no longer put into place for the best interests of the public. More often than not they are brought in to increase public approval for whichever Watergate thing went down, it was, correctly, a national crisis and embarrassment. Fast-forward 25 years, and President Clinton getting a blowjob is on the same scale. How does that work? Scandals have become so rampant in Washington these days that it’s hard to distinguish between all the crap that’s out there. Look at Sarah Palin’s recent vice-presidential nomination to the Republican Party. Now, Palin’s views on... well, just about everything, don’t really endear her to the public, but so many people have become caught up in the fact that her daughter is pregnant that it’s getting out of control. Does the fact that her daughter is a little irresponsible mean she won’t be a good vice-president? Of course not. Does the fact that she believes it’s God’s will for America to find oil pipelines in Iraq make her a bad candidate? For sure, but that’s another story. Scandals are so entrenched in current culture that parties now have entire offices dedicated to swaying public opinion and creating misinformation. It’s become almost routine: a minor indiscretion is committed, the opposition and the media descend on it like Michael Moore at a George Bush speech, and the offending party refuses to fully explain what happened and wraps the whole thing up by trashing the opposition. By the time everything is said and done, most people don’t even remember what happened, just that both sides screamed at one another while the media egged them on. Also, politicians have way longer memories than the rest of us, and that’s another big reason for the never-ending scandal scene that Washington and Ottawa have become. Every comment is remembered, and retaliation is planned for every criticism and insult. What occurs is that governments become so divided that it becomes extremely difficult to get anything of substance done, or at least in a timely fashion. This increasingly vicious all-out battle between parties creates an environment that forces them to strive for the public’s approval like never before. They feel the need to top each other so badly that it spills over into the governing that needs to be done. Decisions are made and policies are enacted, solely for the purpose of pleasing the public and therefore getting ahead on the opposition. It ends up with a never ceasing campaign strategy. The acts of spreading misinformation, strategically releasing political leaks to an always hungry media and subtly party passed the policy. The permanent campaign is, in essence and by definition, governing in a way that builds and sustains public support for an administration and its policies. Permanent campaigning revolves around three things: bending and manipulating public opinion; the seemingly endless scandal culture that permeates around all political environments; and the perception held by politicians, and most ordinary citizens, that politics is a war. What the notion of permanent campaigning means is that campaigning and governing by a party have become one and the same, it’s now pretty tough to tell the difference between them. One of the biggest reasons for the permanent campaign is the apparent hatred between the ruling party and the opposition. There is such fierce competition between the two of them, and the stakes of holding office have risen so much in recent years, that constant bickering has ensured while insults are hurled around frequently. One of the big reasons why politics has become such a blood sport is due to the rise of the media in general that paved the way for the American scandal culture that virtually everyone, including Canadians, lives by today. That began decades ago with Richard Nixon’s shenanigans. After he was indicted and removed from the president’s office, America lost, in a manner of speaking, its innocence. After all, if the President of the United States couldn’t be fully trusted, then who could? After Watergate, politicians began to seize every opportunity they could to strike at the opposition. Think about it. Watergate was the first major American presidential scandal. After Nixon, they came faster and became more and more sensationalized. Before Watergate occurred, can you name another high-level scandal at the presidential level? And I’m not talking about things like the Kennedy assassination, or any other political killing. What I mean is a major scandal where the government is at fault. Today, you can hear about foolish mistakes and blunders made by the government almost on a daily basis. That’s a result of the media playing up all sorts of events and incorporating nasty comments by other political parties. Consider this: When Nixon and the whole 12 distorting the truth have become so common place today that they are routinely expected. Quotes are taken dramatically out of context; the public is manipulated into seeing every fault, whether or not that fault is real or imagined. Politics have moved away from doing what is best for the people and towards becoming a cutthroat world of savvy, university-educated wolves. This needs to change. When President Bush took office, it was with the promise that he would heal the wounds and close the chasm between the Republican and Democratic Parties. For example, when Bush enacted his No Child Left Behind policy, which was designed to make sure every child in America, regardless of race or color, could read, write and have proper math skills, many Democrats were pleased with the policy and supported it strongly. However, the unity was short lived, as Democrats jumped on Bush’s decision to invade Iraq, and have been hammering the President in the press ever since. Their entire campaign for the upcoming election in November is based around forgetting Bush. You will seldom see a Democratic advertisement that doesn’t have John McCain and George Bush in the same photo. If the public is ever to become the beneficiary of the political scene, our politicians in Victoria and Ottawa, and our neighbors in Washington, need to put aside their differences, as best as possible, and work together to help the people. That doesn’t mean allowing the opposition to have free reign, or not keeping the other party on their toes, it just means that a country cannot be run effectively when both sides drive a truck through the smallest opening. Knowledge of the permanent campaign and its increasingly negative effects on government is nothing new. There have been books written about it and what it is doing to both the United States and Canada. Can politics change from the way they are currently run? Absolutely. Will they change any time soon? Not a chance. The stakes are so high these days that being in power and having the public on your side, no matter how temporarily, has become all-important. Hopefully, whoever is elected in October and November respectively can work to change that.