A12

Max Wolfe

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Many of us watched the election debates a week ago; the Canadian version, not the American. All I saw of the American ones was a bit of the vice-presidential debate. The most powerful nation in the world is rapidly becoming the second-most-powerful nation in the world and a failed state to boot. It has opted to risk the possibility of a mindless hockey mom as its president. It is further proof, if proof be needed, that our civilization (so-called) is in a state of irreversible decline.

Our debates were like a breath of fresh air. Five very able people debated the issues forcefully, courteously and intelligently. They were all well informed and argued cogently. Their individual views (and mine) aside, any one of them would make a reasonably competent prime minister. We have real choice. It made me truly thankful for the existence of the 49th parallel.

But we are not without our problems. The possibility of the Harper juggernaut rolling to a majority on Oct. 14th is scary. For one thing, the man is authoritarian and seem to have a cold, calculating disdain of all views except his own.

Four of our leaders would leave us with a country that is still recognizable as Canada; one wouldn't - Stephen Harper. It used to be that the NDP (and the communists) were the people who governed from a set of rules and principles in their little red book. Now it is the theo-Cons.

We should ask why Joe Clark and the other mainstream Conservative big names of recent years are not part of the Harper team. The answer is simple enough; they are moderate conservatives and don't subscribe to the extreme policies of the Harperites.

Remember what the Conservatives used to call themselves? The Progressive Conservatives. Harper changed the name. There would be nothing progressive about his party. It has become reactionary to the core. In all of its history, Canada has been a middle-of-the-road political nation. Harper has changed that. Now it is bifurcated - centre right and extreme right with smatterings out on the left.

Have we ever seen a government so completely in the thrall of the Americans? Harper even apes Bush with his little maple leaf lapel pin. George Bush tells the world that the economic fundamentals of the U.S. are good, and weeks later it teeters on the edge of economic disintegration. Harper tries to assure the world that Canada's economic fundamentals are solid, and inevitably we are seeing the same disintegration here.

This man wants our vote on Tuesday and thinks that by wearing a baby blue sweater we will forget the glacier-blue eyes. That insults our intelligence. As does the fact that he obviously thinks we forget about his Kyoto statement: "Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of the wealth-producing nations." He only changed his tune when the polls showed that Canadians were indeed concerned about the environment and Kyoto.

We don't forget, either that after sending our troops to Afghanistan he tried to ban the media from taking photos of returning coffins.

He has had a spat going for years with Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams and carried the hostility over when he ignored a constitutional convention by appointing a Nova Scotian to the Supreme Court recently. It should have been Newfoundland's turn. Newfoundlanders now has another reason to love him.

His relationship with the press has been about as bad as it has ever been between a prime minister and a press gallery. They clearly dislike him and enjoy getting under his skin by asking difficult questions. Apparently it is easily done. For his part, he seems to only want the easy questions lobbed to him by friendly press.

Maybe it goes deeper. He has sacked or caused three communications directors to resign.

He passed legislation calling for fixed-date elections and promptly ignored the legislation by calling the current election, saying Parliament was not working. He conveniently ignored the fact that if this was the case, the manual his party issued on how to disrupt the parliamentary committee procedures no doubt had a lot to do with it.

He has probably achieved a better relationship with the U.S than have previous prime ministers, but it hasn't resulted in any noticeable benefits to Canada. He has used a broad sword on culture expenses. Given half a chance, I don't doubt he would privatize Medicare. And, he has made offensive comments about the Maritimes and its "culture of defeat."

Stephen Harper is the brightest prime minister we have had since Trudeau - some argue, "including Trudeau-" but he has got it wrong. He believes to his core that government is the problem and the market is the solution. Blinded by his own dogma, he can't see that the unregulated market truly is the problem this time around. Bright though he is, he will never learn.

What we have to do on Tuesday is ensure that he doesn't have an opportunity to wreak his havoc on the country for another four years.

Max Wolfe is a freelance writer who resides in St. Andrews.