Conservative vapours

The Cons are apparently responding to the accusation that they've run out of ideas by doing as much as they can to prove that point. And the CP reports on what looks to be the most pathetic excuse for a policy idea yet:

The Conservative government is set to unveil new legislation aimed at keeping foreign strippers out of Canada.

Government sources say the announcement will come Wednesday from Immigration Minister Diane Finley. They say the legislation would let the minister instruct immigration officers to deny work permits to foreign strippers, but they offer few details about how the law would work.

I suppose if one squints hard enough, one can see a few potential political benefits in such legislation. In addition to offering the Cons a paper-thin excuse to discuss the Libs' tenure in government rather than their own, the measure will presumably play relatively well both to the religious right and to the anti-immigration crowd.

But from the standpoint of what the bill says about Harper's government, it's hard to tell what's more striking about: its sheer frivolity, or its tendency to raise exactly the kinds of fears which the Cons presumably want to dispel.

On the frivolity side, the closest the article mentions to an actual problem which the bill is intended to resolve is a claim that the intention is to "protect women from exploitation". But there's absolutely no basis for thinking that the bill would actually prevent exploitation: indeed, it seems highly likely that most applicants seeking to immigrate to Canada in search of work as a stripper will would to make that move largely based on the likelihood of being less exploited in Canada than in the applicant's former country. And even if the Cons genuinely have a warped enough world-view not to see that fact, it's hard to imagine that there aren't far more pressing issues which Finley and the Cons generally should be addressing first.

As for the larger overtones, the bill hints at two obvious hooks for the "hidden agenda" discussion the Cons presumably want to avoid. First, there's the attempt to inject what the Cons presumably perceive to be a morality issue regarding the propriety of stripping into a completely unrelated policy area. And second, there's the spectre of establishing arbitrary, class-based restrictions on immigration - which will surely offer plenty of fodder to those concerned about the Cons shutting Canada's doors.

Fortunately, the bill doesn't appear on its face to be one that any of the opposition parties would want to support - meaning that the Cons' most laughable idea yet should remain nothing more than a gleam in Diane Finley's eye for the time being. But whether this bill is actually the best the Cons have to offer while in power or simply a signal as to where they'd want to take Canada given the control that comes with a majority, it offers plenty more reasons why Canadians will want to make sure to put the Cons' reign out of its misery.