This Globe and Mail column is correct in that the Liberals, NDP and Bloc have an important job in front of them that they cannot, for the sake of the country, fuck up, but it actually manages to understate the importance of the task for progressive politics as a whole.
Simply put: discrediting Stephen Harper as a leader will shred Conservative politics for years.
The interesting thing about Stephen Harper is that he is more popular than his party is (this, despite general public acceptance of the belief that Harper is a cold fish – he is regarded as a competent technocrat). The last election was largely about transferring Harper’s personal popularity to the party as a whole, but the lack of ability to attain a Tory majority can be seen as evidence that it didn’t really work.
The problem for the Tories is that beyond Stephen Harper, they really have nobody ready to lead the party.
Peter Mackay is the obvious next-in-line, but Mackay suffers from being a gormless twat whom nobody really likes; moderates don’t like him because they think1 that he sold the Progressive Conservatives out to the crazy Reform gang, and right-wingers don’t like him because they think2 that he’s a weaselly moderate. Mackay also had the bad luck to be involved in that patently stupid “calling Belinda Stronach names” mini-scandallette which didn’t really piss anybody off, but didn’t impress anybody either. Finally, Peter Mackay looks like a boring accountant. He is the definition of “inessential person.”
Jim Flaherty is the Minister of Finance and in Canadian politics, traditionally that role goes to someone who is known for being really smart and able to make tough decisions. Flaherty is both of these things, and also a folksy public speaker (never to be underestimated). However, he is also very conservative in his fiscal policies, and since the election has been embarrassed by his blatant campaign lies about how Canada wouldn’t have to run a budget deficit anytime soon. More importantly, if Harper gets ousted, it’s going to be because of Tory policies regarding the worldwide economic meltdown being the exact opposite of what every other country on the planet is doing (namely, massive public works infrastructure investment as a vehicle for economic revitalization). Flaherty is exactly responsible for that. If Harper goes, Flaherty’s political career is dead in the water.
Stockwell Day is a former Tory leader and well-liked by social conservatives, but he is a national joke because he is well-liked by social conservatives (we’re a rather liberal country, remember) and also because he is frankly a bit of a dipshit. Well, okay, actually he’s a lot of a dipshit. Three-quarters dipshit. Primarily dipshit. He is a Dipshit-Canadian.
And those three are the good options. Looking down into the ranks?
Chuck Strahl is a well-liked moderate, but he doesn’t speak French well and there’s that whole “I have incurable lung cancer” thing. Rob Nicholson has the right politics to succeed in the party and out of it, but he’s never had a really high-profile government position until his recent tenure as Justice Minister, and Justice Minister isn’t even in the top five most important jobs in Cabinet. Jean-Pierre Blackburn is smart but a political nonentity. Rona Ambrose isn’t ready yet and even if she were she’s too young3; Christian Paradis has the same problem but even worse. Jim Prentice is a shitty liar4, his tenure as Minister of Industry was a bad joke, and his firm opposition to same-sex marriage bans earned him the enmity of the social-con wing of the party. John “Mister Shouty” Baird is a blowhard and has a track record of looking stupid in public. Gordon O’Connor’s career is tied to the war in Afghanistan, and even those Canadians who support the war in Afghanistan on grounds of responsibility don’t actually like it. Tony Clement was lucky not to get turfed in the last election. Jason Kenney is intemperate and not that bright. Vic Toews is a deeply horrible man.5
About the only name I can come up with who isn’t a placeholder/rebuilding era candidate is Lawrence Cannon, the current Minister of Foreign Affairs. And I don’t know if he’s up to the job, or even wants it. (Seriously, you have to be kind of crazy to want to run Canada. We’re a freakishly neurotic country, you know.)
And that’s the problem for the Tories; their bench isn’t deep. Taking out Harper as a credible leader of the party (and causing him to lose the party will almost certainly do that) means the Tories have to rely on said bench. Good luck with that, guys.
Contrast to the Liberals, who have a heap of fresh leadership candidates who are both relatively young (but not too young) and ready for the job and capable of running a strong campaign. Of course, the Liberals’ problem is that all of those candidates have to get past Michael Ignatieff and Bob Rae, which is depressing when you think about it.
- Correctly. [↩]
- Also correctly. [↩]
- 39 is too young to be a national leader. Sorry, but it’s true. You ideally want your national leaders to be past the potential midlife crisis stage. [↩]
- Never underestimate the importance of being a good liar in political life. Yes, that goes for the “good guys” as well. [↩]
- Also, he looks eerily like Jack Layton. [↩]
Related Articles
16 users responded in this post
I don’t know if 39 is too young to be a leader of a political party.
Looking at the recent history in the UK, from 1999-2001, our three main party leaders had all been leaders from about that age.
Tony Blair became leader of the Labour Party aged 41, and was PM from the age of 43 (and 359 days).
Charles Kennedy became leader of the Liberal Democrats aged 39, and served very well for 7 years, until resigning because his alcoholism became too public. Regardless of that, he’s still one of the Lib Dem’s most popular politicians. It does seem to be a tradition that they resign over a scandal, but remain hugely popular regardless. His successor, Menzies Campbell, stepped down because he was too old.
William Hague became leader of the Tory party aged 36, in the wake of their landslide defeat in 1997. While appearing unpopular, and arguably being too young, he only stepped down after losing the next election to a landslide, in 2001. He was much less of a joke than his sucessor, Micheal Howard (who again, stepped down because he was too old and a joke), and remains popular – he could well make a good party leader in the future.
Actually, at that time, the leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party, the fourth or fifth biggest UK party, Alex Salmond also took his position aged 36. He’s currently the first minister of Scotland, leading the Scottish Parliment.
David Cameron, the current leader of the Tories became leader aged 39, and seems ridiculously popular, despite not actually seeming to stand for anything, and wanting to be all things to all people. He’s probably going to be the next PM.
There is no way 39 is definitely too young to lead a major political party.
There’s a difference between “leader of a political party” and “leader of a viable political party.”
With the exception of Blair – who was essentially 44 when he actually took office – every single one of those leaders was not going to be Prime Minister at such a young age and the country knew it. Cameron similarly won’t be elected to anything before he’s about as old.
The same thing happened here in Canada when Jean Charest was elected leader of the Progressive Conservatives; the party was in a rebuilding stage and everybody knew it, so it didn’t matter that Charest barely had to shave. But it becomes a different kettle of fish when the leader in question actively stands a shot at being in charge of the whole damn country.
Hague was a joke, Kennedy was a Lib Dem and therefore never going to be in charge of anything, and Salmond being in charge of the “fourth or fifth biggest party” in a system that is essentially two-party with a few additional flavours for variety isn’t that big a deal. I think my point stands.
You know, to have a real democracy, you gotta have two parties that can field a cabinet bench. The only way that’s going to happen is if the Conservatives last long enough to finally attract some good politicians.
So, go Stephen Harper, you slimy bastich arsehole!
Also, we don’t need a stimulus package, and I will be mightily cheesed off if this country returns to structural deficits.
Although that seems to be a bipartisan effort, right now.
Dipshit-Canadians, unfortunately, seem to be overrepresented in national politics. But yes, nobody is going to seriously consider Doris for PM.
This may not be politically correct for this topic, but what superheroes have the love of Barack and Michelle?
Chime in here:
http://fullbodytransplant.wordpress.com/2008/11/30/superheroes-in-love-barack-and-michelle-save-the-world/
Much obliged.
I think your point actually is in Reid’s article, where he says that without Harper the party is a collection of weirdos and “Red Tory desperates” (by the way, converting adjectives into nouns like that is a favourite linguistic style).
Prentice would seem the best choice to me, though, as you say, he’s never going to be a so-con favourite.
Which Earth had the Democratic convention in Saint Paul last year?
You know, this is the same problem that the Republican party in the U.S. has. If you look at the Republicans who ran for President, it was a group that had no fresh face or, more importantly, fresh ideas. Who is their bench? Who is going to turn them around and pull them out of their electoral morass? Frighteningly, I think Sarah Palin WAS the bench.
When I hear names floated for a 2012 run, the most common name mentioned (other than Palin) is Newt Gingrich. Newt Gingrich! If that who the GOP is banking their future on, then they are more screwed than I thought. The slavish devotion to Newt’s playbook is what brought them to their current mess. (That, and marching lockstep with the biggest failure of a president since Hoover.)
The Republican I know of that could possibly be an exception is Jindal, from Louisiana. He’s young and seems competent. More importantly, he doesn’t seem like a rapid ideologue. I think my governor, Charlie Crist (FL) would also qualify, except for the whole, you know, probably being secretly gay thing.
RABID ideologue. I don’t know that Bobby Jindal is particularly fast paced.
I remember one of Rick Mercer’s rants where he mentions that the Conservatives were talking about Jim Prentice as their next leader, so Harper responded by giving him a shitty cabinet position (Environment).
I like posts about Canadian politics because they are at the same time both interesting and somewhat incomprehensible – mostly because I am too lazy to go look up how the political system works up there.
Uh, Bobby Jindal is weapons-grade crazy and everyone knows it. The dude *performs exorcisms*.
What is Canada a Dominion of anyway? Is it because you still do what the Queen says if she asks nicely?
I don’t know that performing exorcisms would prevent one from being a rising star in the Republican party.
Chuck Strahl is a moderate? He represents essentially the next city over, and I have never seen any signs of him being a moderate. He’s less crazy than Randy White, certainly– not that that’s hard.
(Then again, it could be that he’s moderate compared to the alternatives, whom I don’t know as well)
Generally speaking, any time you’re working from the assumption of a given Republican not being crazy, you’re wrong.