Prime Minister Stephen Harper appears to be backing away from a confrontation with Alberta over its Third Way health proposals...Remember back when the Cons were slamming the Libs for refusing to make a single phone call on the softwood lumber file - at a time when anybody paying the slightest bit of attention could tell that the phone call alone was going to accomplish absolutely nothing? Apparently now that he's taken power, Harper is suffering from the same inability to make a call that plagued his predecessor...even though the issue is one where the conversation could actually make a difference.
Many critics say a simple statement by the prime minister that Alberta is violating the rules of medicare could have a major political impact - perhaps more impact, in this case, than a cut in federal transfer payments to the province...
Marissa Etmanski, a spokeswoman for Klein, said there has been no contact with federal officials on the issue.
"We haven't heard from them."
Apparently Harper's vision of standing up for health care is to do as little as possible until it's too late to make any changes, then to wring his hands over the fact that nothing can be done. (Which doesn't sound all that dissimilar from the Libs' management of the issue.) But for those of us who want to see the federal government doing something on the file for a change, now might be the time to get in touch with the PM and point out that he wasn't elected to continue the tradition of sitting on his hands by the phone.
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