So we're all in agreement then

The Economist writes about the dangers of allowing a Prime Minister to flee Parliament anytime he faces inconvenient questioning:

The danger in allowing the prime minister to end discussion any time he chooses is that it makes Parliament accountable to him rather than the other way around.

So let's see if Harper disagrees at all with that characterization of the consequences of his actions. Here's Harper in his interview with Peter Mansbridge, providing his spin on why Parliament shouldn't have any say in the PM's choice to shut down proceedings at will (starting at approximately 9:57):

Mansbridge: Do you think the decision to prorogue should be left in the hands of the government of the day, or should it be a decision that perhaps Parliament should have a vote on?

Harper: No, I think it's (sic) ultimately should be in the hands of the government of the day because it's ultimately about the government presenting its agenda to Parliament and the government calibrating its own agenda.

In other words, Harper is probably even more direct than the Economist's critical editorial in saying that as far as he's concerned, the executive's agenda is ultimately all that matters. In turn, Parliament's role by Harper's reckoning is solely to respond to that agenda - and to sit down and shut up when the Prime Minister decides that he doesn't like the direction that elected officials are taking.

Needless to say, most Canadians - including Harper himself before he assumed the trappings of power - would seem likely to understand that MPs are supposed to hold the government to account in accordance with the will of constituents, not merely provide easily-cut-off responses to the government's agenda when instructed to speak. And the fact that even Harper doesn't dispute that he's operating on a fundamentally flawed assumption as to how Canada's political system works should lead many Canadians to question whether they want him to hold any significant power within it.

(Edit: fixed wording.)