Oh Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada is in crisis, and since the Liberals control the government there, that means the government is in crisis. The Liberals have had a nearly dictatorial hold on power since beating Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservative government in one of the biggest blowout landslides in the history of world parliamentary elections. The PC's were beaten so badly that their number of seats were reduced to two, and the Bloc Quebecois, a secessionist party, became the Official Opposition. The Party of Sir John A. Macdonald ceased to exist at the federal level.The Government of Prime Minister Jean Chretien had such a huge majority (and such a divided opposition) that repeated accusations of corruption and dictatorial conduct could not force the Liberals from power. Last year, in what was Prime Minister Paul Martin's first election, the Liberals finally lost enough seats to have a minority government, with a united right-wing and a new Conservative Party risen from the ashes. Canadians, however, seem to be of the mind that Conservatives will leave them solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. They opted to keep the Liberals in power, albeit with a minority, with only the Western provinces voting solidly Conservative.
Now, however, the Liberals look to be in some real trouble. Anyone who is even mildly familiar with Canadian history knows that Canada as a whole has struggled with the issue of Quebec separatism ever since the rise of the Parti Quebecois. Well, once again separatism is on the agenda in Quebec (it never really goes away), and throughout the 90's, the Liberal solution to the Quebec Question was to pour lots of money into the Province to promote what they call national unity. In 1995, after all, Quebec came within less than two percentage points of actually seceding from Canada in a referendum. The Liberal government used Sponsorship Program money to promote everything from cultural festivals to street billboards promoting Confederation all over Quebec. We now know that they also have used it to provide kickbacks to their political friends in Quebec in order to "get things done," and rumors abound that Sponsorship money was even used to pay off bribes.
To "investigate" this, the Fearless Leader of the Liberals, Prime Minister Paul Martin, proceeded to launch something called the Gomery Inquiry, so named for the judge overseeing the proceedings. I suppose he thought that having an investigation would keep the Tories and the Bloc Quebecois quiet. Instead, the constant stream of revelations coming out of the Gomery Inquiry has revealed that the Liberal Government stinks of corruption so badly that the angels can likely pick up the stench from Ottawa in High Heaven, and it has not kept the Tories or the Bloc quiet at all. Instead, the polls indicate that were an election held today the Conservatives, after years of division and consignment to the political wilderness before a recent unification of the Canadian right, would achieve a minority Government. Whoever would have thought!
The Liberals, however, think themselves entitled to power (as most leftists do), because no one on the right, according to their thinking, has any right to govern. They care, and nobody on the right cares, because the Liberals and leftists just say its that way! They have now attempted to block Conservative procedural moves that could trigger an election, a move which may yet prove unsuccessful. In his latest act of desperation, Paul Martin will address the nation tonight. In a Parliamentary system, that only happens in a time of national emergency because the Prime Minister gets to address the nation every week from the front benches of the House of Commons. I would reckon that in the Liberal lexicon, the idea of Liberals being toppled from power by the Canadian people would qualify as a national emergency. After all, the dictatorship must be kept in tact, with Paul Martin as the Great Leader who must be adored.
If Martin is successful in staving off an election, he may not be able to save the Canadian Confederation as we know it. The Sponsorship Scandal has set off such a firestorm of public anger in Quebec that the Bloc Quebecois is expected to gain even more seats whenever the election is held, and the Parti Quebecois expects to be swept into power in large numbers at the next provincial election there. Such a result would invariably trigger a referendum on Quebec independence (again), and this time Quebecers might just say that they have had enough of a Canada that elects governments that filthy and corrupt. If Canadians are clueless enough to re-elect Martin's government, they'll deserve everything they get next time around.
posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 8:33 AM
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