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Riding in Style: Liberal fashion critics claim Harper's making America hip again

   

Right Hook
JJ McCullough, OP Columnist

 

These days, when you watch the pundits in the United
States debate the future of the Democratic Party, the re-
occurring criticism is always the same. If the party ever
hopes to regain power, then the Democrats must learn to
stand for something and not simply define themselves as a
party that is against the Republicans. Now that they too are
out of power, much of the same criticisms can be easily be
leveled against the Liberal Party in this country. There was
a time when the Liberal Party stood for concrete policy
ideas. Granted most of these ideas, such as the National
Energy Program and the gun registry, were crap, but at
least they were something. For the last few years, however,
the party has increasingly defined itself solely by being the
non-Conservatives. Keep us in to keep them out!

It’s possible to form a semi-competent party on the
basis of opposition. Indeed, there’s no denying that the
new Conservative Party itself was formed primarily just to
unify Canada’s anti-Liberal forces rather than to promote
any positive alternative vision. Yet being successful at this
game requires a strong talent for criticism and the ability to
demolish the arguments of your rivals with devastating
skill.

While the Conservatives could clearly do this with the
Liberals, it’s been interesting to witness the comparative
intellectual laziness of Liberal criticism of the
Conservative Party now that the tables are turned. Rather
than critique Prime Minister Harper on the relative merits
of his various policy proposals (and to be sure, there is
often ample room for criticism) they have increasingly
lapsed into a single narrative, namely: Harper is bad
because he is American-style. This line of reasoning has
been literally employed as the catch-all criticism against
almost everything Harper has done to date.

Harper’s throne speech broke with convention and
included a callout to some visiting Canadian soldiers and
their families. Liberal response? The Prime Minister was
Americanizing the tradition with State of the Union-style
gimmicks. Harper visits the troops in Afghanistan. Liberal
response? The PM is engaging in Bush-style PR moves.
Harper announces a new process of appointing Supreme
Court judges. The Liberal response? The government is
mucking up the judicial branch with American-style
reforms.

And on and on it goes, from the size of the Prime
Minister’s motorcade to his policy of not lowering the flag
for recently killed soldiers, Harper’s government is being
blasted by the Liberal Party for being too Bush-like or
American-esque.

One imagines it is just a matter of time before Harper
is pilloried for his overly American haircut or Bush blue
eyes.

For years, the Liberals governed under the rhetoric that
they and they alone were the only party capable of keeping
Canada Canadian. The Conservative Party et al were the
forces of treason and dishonor, personified by their will-
ingness to embrace American ideas. Yet now that Stephen
Harper has Prime Minister before his name, it’s getting

increasingly difficult for the Libs to accuse the government
of Canada of being an un-Canadian entity. As much as
they may wish to believe otherwise, Canada is ultimately a
country, not a political party, and policies that are Canadian
are simply defined as whatever the nation’s ruling policy-
makers and politicians decide to do.

The lefties themselves should have learned this by now.
After all, not too long ago having a codified Bill of Rights
would have been considered a very American idea yet, to
his credit, Trudeau created one anyway. Similarly, Chrétien
and Martin had no problem airing slanderous attack ads
against their electoral opponents over the course of
numerous campaigns, despite the fact that such tactics had
always been deemed excessively American when the other
side used them. Judging from the Liberals own track
record, a good idea is a good idea regardless of which
country thought of it first.

And therein lies the irony. No one can ever hope to be
a true anti-American; for dismissing a// political ideas with
their origins in the US would require rejecting all sorts of
cherished icons of the left, from progressive taxation to
gay marriage.

When Liberals engage in knee-jerk demonizing of all
things American, they are really just doing little more than
attempting to evoke a sort of Pavlovian response among a
voting public they have consistently tried to indoctrinate to
believe “America” always equals “evil.”

Of course, if recent polls are any indication, the Prime
Minister’s ideas are proving to be tremendously popular,
American or otherwise. This fact should be endlessly dis-
tressing to the Liberals. If they’re not careful, they just
might end up giving the United States a good name.

 

President Crazy

The problem of madness in politics

Left Overs

lain Reeve, OP Fella

 

 

As we all know, our system of representative democracy
ain’t perfect. As citizens, we pretty much accept a submis-
sive position in this system, willfully surrendering our
power to a select number of people chosen through some
magic democratic formula we have trusted for a century
and a half. We consistently chastise these folks for ignoring
our interests—whether it be ignoring the needs of the

poor (Mr. Harper), the rich (Mr. Layton), the English (Mr.
Duceppe), or everyone (Mr. Emerson). The inherent fault
in the system is that when one person represents even a
few people, let alone a hundred thousand, it is impossible
for them to address the needs of everyone. Grudgingly,
we've come to accept this. What happens, however, when a
politician is not just negligent but downright nutty?

Take North Korea, for example. We all know about
North Korean leader Kim Jong II’s recent problems con-
cerning nuclear weapons, but the problems run much
deeper. It’s easy to point out the goofy glasses and ridicu-
lous hair, but we are also talking about a guy who has had
seven children with three simultaneous wives and/or mis-
tresses. And those are just the confirmed ones, with accu-
sations of tons of illegitimate little Ils running around. He
has a profound fear of flying, though oddly wears platform
shoes on a consistent basis. Also a man of the arts, he is
said to have a film collection of over 20,000 films and
apparently abducted two South Korean film makers in
order to jump start an industry in the North. What a fan-
boy.

Not to be outdone, Turkmenistan’s first and current
president, Saparmurat Niyazovy, has a lock on all things

politically nutty. In his 15 years in office, the good presi-
dent has set about on the noble mission of bringing cul-
ture to a people he feels lack it in droves. His solution?
Name things after him and his family. These things include
cities, schools, parks, even a meteorite. The town is also
adorned in portraits and statues of the leader, including
one atop the highest building in the country which rotates
so as to always face the sun. The leader claims he dislikes
seeing himself everywhere, he is merely giving the people
what they want. His presidential decrees read like a list of
demands from some kids that took over a school. Among
them is the banning of lip-synching, renaming bread after
his mother, banning video games and beards, forcing doc-
tors to swear an oath to him instead of taking the
Hippocratic oath, and banning the wearing of makeup by
newsreaders as he had difficulty telling men and women
apart. If that’s not abuse of power, what is?

I know what you're thinking, “Well of course there are
crazy leaders in the poor, non-democratic countries of the
world. That’s not so amazing, you idiot!” Well sir, besides
not liking your tone, I must inform you that Canada has
seen its share of crazies.

During the halcyon Pearson/Trudeau years, a certain

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