Tuesday Night Cat Blogging

Cats and plastic.

Moved to action

It remains to be seen how far the NDP will get in pushing for all parties to engage in meaningful discussion about policy. But if you're wondering whether there's already evidence of progress in the first days of the new session of Parliament, look no further than the Libs' budget subamendment.

By way of comparison, the Libs' budget amendment strategy since the 2008 election had ranged from not even bothering to present one, to procedural nit-picking which left the Cons' policy direction untouched, to serving up content-free disapproval which they weren't even willing to back up with votes.

Now, the Libs actually seem to have put some effort into finding policy areas not covered by either the Cons' budget or the NDP's main amendment, and taking the opportunity to bring them up for debate. (And there's little reason for the NDP to disagree with the amendment the Libs put forward - just as the Libs figure to have every reason to back the NDP's more general amendment.)

On recruitment tactics

So that's the Cons' long-term economic action plan...

A Conservative MP recently nominated by the federal government to sit on a secretive Canada-U.S. committee on continental defence told U.S. officials he was hoping a downturn in the economy would lead to increased recruitment for the Canadian army, according to a “confidential” U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks to APTN National News.

Edmonton Centre Conservative MP Laurie Hawn said he saw “hope” that the rising numbers of unemployed would lead to an increased in army recruits, according to the diplomatic cable from March 12, 2009.
...
“He expressed the hope that rising unemployment rates at home on one hand, and the welcome new deployment of U.S. troops in Kandahar on the other, would help the Canadian Forces to recruit and retain troops, at least in 2009 and 2010,” the cable said, which was based on a March 4, 2009 conversation.

Needless to say, many of the Cons' economic choices make a lot more sense if their goal is to drive unemployed Canadians into the military. But it still leaves a few open questions about their other priorities: after all, what happens when potential military recruits instead find plenty of jobs waiting in the Cons' new prisons?

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- With health care once again receiving plenty of attention on the U.S. political scene thanks to the Republicans' plan to dismantle publicly-funded Medicare, the differences between Canada and the U.S. are once again serving as a major point of discussion. And Aaron Carroll has posted a neat defence of Canada's universal system from the standpoint of patients and health practictioners alike.

- Megan Leslie highlights the Cons' continued failure to do anything meaningful on the climate change front - which looks all the more glaring when even oilsands operators are crying out for a clear and predictable system rather than another half a decade of delays and uncertainty.

- For all the talk about opposition parties' votes now being irrelevant in Parliament, it's noteworthy that the Bloc is planning to vote for the Cons' budget - even after the party had declared earlier this year that the HST money for Quebec which reflects the main change from the budget rejected in March wouldn't necessarily be enough to earn its support.

That would figure to mean the Bloc sees so little prospect of achieving much in the years to come that it has no choice but to paint the HST money as its main accomplishment for the next little while. Which may be an entirely reasonable conclusion - but seems to suggest that a Bloc resurgence is a long ways away.

- Shorter Murray Mandryk, serving up as embarrassing a sop to Brad Wall as one could imagine this side of John Gormley:

(insert Saskatchewan Party advertisement here)

- Finally, Rob Rainer nicely counters the perennial anti-tax spin from the Fraser Institute (which the Cons are working feverishly to promote) with a suggested Tax Benefits Day:

(H)appy Tax Benefits Day 2011! A day to remind ourselves that, far from being “bad” – as even Prime Minister Harper is on record as believing – taxes and our willingness to pay them make possible our democratic institutions and the many public goods and services that Canadians value.
...
(O)f all the recommendations of McQuaig and Brooks, the most important may be to “strive to bring about a change in social attitudes toward taxation and its essential role in a democracy.” Hence the inauguration of Tax Benefits Day – to fall on the day immediately after the Fraser Institute’s Tax Freedom Day, to counter the misguided view that taxes are bad.

One of these things is not like the others

One of these things just doesn't belong. See if you can spot the difference in the following single-election results - and consider what it might mean for each party's future strategy...

Vote Share	Seats	Provinces w Seats	Provinces under 20%	High Prov%	Low Prov%	Rebates
30.6%	103	8	2	42.9%	15.4%	306
25.5%	66	5	5	58.9%	3.9%	182
30.2%	103	9	1	52.5%	15.3%	283
29.6%	99	8	1	61.7%	8.8%	251

For those wondering, the parties who posted those totals are respectively the NDP in 2011, the Canadian Alliance in 2000, the Libs in 2006, and the Cons in 2004. And of course, each party served as the official opposition following the listed general election.

So let's ask the rhetorical question: is there an obvious reason why one of those parties might have had both a glaring need to pursue a merger, and an obvious opportunity in doing so?

And conversely, is there an equally obvious reason why the other three might see fit to work from an existing national base, rather than pursuing wrenching structural changes?

On flattering comparisons

Yes, it'll take time to break the habits that have formed over the past few years - and it may well be that the Harper Cons will continue to stonewall and distort no matter what they face from the Official Opposition. But if this turns into a consistent theme to Question Period coverage in the Parliament to come - comparing the NDP's substantive questions and civil tone to the Cons' lack of willingness to engage in reasonable discussion - doesn't that offer about the best possible chance to push for change for the better?

Monday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading.

- Brian Topp's initial observations on the new sitting of Parliament include this note on the Libs' interim leader:

(A)s a footnote, Interim Liberal Leader Bob Rae was also interesting in these exchanges. He too noted the small sum being invested in alleviating seniors’ poverty, and asked: “Why would there not be more, as has been proposed by the opposition parties?” As his first words of substance in the new House, this was not without interest. It spoke to some of the common themes on the broader opposition bench that led the parties there, only a few short years ago, to think seriously about building and supporting a progressive government together.

Of course, we shouldn't presume that Rae's every signal of agreement with the NDP means that he wants to pursue a merger. But it's well worth keeping an eye on whether the Libs want to be part of a united front to push policies that the Cons would sooner ignore - and it's surely for the best if they keep moving in that direction.

- Can there possibly be a more sure sign that the Cons' bloated cabinet is purely a matter of patronage rather than need or merit than the fact that the group is too unwieldy to actually make decisions?

- It's well and good that Pat Davidson recognizes the problems with the Cons' continued funding off (and shilling for) the asbestos industry. But wouldn't her efforts figure to be far better directed at working with MPs from other parties who agree, rather than shouting into internal channels where they're easily ignored?

- Finally, Peter Chernoff spots the trend in Saskatchewan politics which voters will need to break this fall:

Years ago, we elected as premier Ross "The Boss" Thatcher. The media raved about his first term, so we elected him to a second. The result, you recall, was utter disaster! He was thrown out in the next election; things were fixed up and turned around eventually.

Then we elected Grant Devine. Again, the media raved about how well things were going during his first term. We forgot our history and elected him to a second.

Total and complete disaster - we are still paying off that one. In fact, we had to jail some MLAs!

Now, we are being told that our economy will be fantastic forever if we just vote right-wing again. Forget history!

On responsibility

Shorter Con instructions to ministers:

If your underlings break the law based on your instructions, it's their own damn fault for taking orders. So go nuts!

Burning questions

Since when does a faction of the Cons get to declare that Denise Savoie should stand down as a candidate for speaker for their own benefit?

And if Lee Richardson and his supporters were genuinely concerned about Andrew Scheer's inexperience (rather than merely wanting to make a power grab at the NDP's expense), wouldn't they logically have voted for Savoie themselves on the final ballot?

On dominance

Meanwhile, the obvious potential for growth in NDP support figures to have some rather important effects on the Cons' strategy as well. After all, their current coalition of support left them little room for error even with a split opposition - and if the NDP can win over the Lib votes that figure to be most readily available (resulting in something approaching an equal 40%/40% split), then there's little reason to think the Cons' longtime goal of demolishing the Libs' brand will actually position them as a default governing party.

On fading reasons

There's plenty to catch up on in Canadian politics from the past week, and I'll try to cover the biggest news over the next couple of days. But let's start with one polling tidbit that looks even more important than the NDP's improving support totals:

Respondents were asked which party they voted for in the May 2 federal election, and those who voted were asked their main reasons for their party choice (on an unprompted question which allowed any response). A majority of Conservative voters (54%) say they liked the party’s performance in government or the party’s philosophy or promises, followed by the party leader (Mr. Harper, 12%) and liking their local candidate (10%). Similarly, Bloc Quebecois voters also focus on that party’s philosophy (66%) as the main reason for their support.

Reasons for supporting the other two parties show a rather different profile. New Democrat voters are divided in their reasons between liking that party’s philosophy (34%) and a desire for change (28%). Given the considerable media attention paid to the importance of Mr. Layton, fewer New Democrat voters than expected (10%) mention him as their reason to vote for the party. Liberal voters emphasize stopping the Conservatives (33%) and this party’s philosophy or promises (27%) as their main reasons, with a significant number mentioning their local candidate (20%).

Comparing the three numbers, one gets a sense as to just how fragile the Libs' continued support figures to be (which also seems to be confirmed by later polls). The leading reason for Lib votes is one which might foreseeably evaporate completely if the NDP is able to make itself the leading voice opposing Harper in the lead up to the next federal election campaign. And another chunk of the Libs' support - adding up with the "stop Harper" factor to total more than half of the already-reduced vote share for the party - is based on local candidates rather than anything to do with the national party, presumably signalling votes which might also switch easily if the NDP can parlay its increased strength into higher-profile candidates.

(Granted, the Libs also benefited from another factor not mentioned in the commentary: "longtime party supporter", which accounted for 9% of Lib support compared to 3% for the other national parties. But I doubt that number offers much solace.)

In contrast, the NDP's most important factors are ones which only figure to be strengthened as the party both raises the profile of its own policy priorities, and makes the case for change in the next election. Which means that there's plenty of reason for optimism that 2015 will see the strongest possible anti-Harper coalition uniting in the NDP's camp.

New column day

Blogging may be on hold for the week, but columnizing isn't. Here's my latest, on the Cons' disaster response and the broader question of what we expect from our elected leaders in a time of crisis.