On predetermined outcomes

Shorter David Frum:

Stephen Harper's five years of making enemies around the world totally wouldn't have stopped Canada from winning a UN Security Council seat - if only we'd been unopposed.

So many narratives

Stephen Harper. Pariah.
Stephen Harper. Quitter.
Stephen Harper. Failure.
Stephen Harper. All of the above.

On outcasts

The Star Phoenix editorial board laments the fact that Canada has become an international pariah on a number of health and environmental issues, with a particular focus on asbestos exports:

For Canadians still squirming over Canada's dubious honour of being named "Fossil of the Year" at the Copenhagen climate change talks in 2009, the finger-pointing over its refusal, mostly for political reasons, to wind down its Quebec-based asbestos industry is yet another international embarrassment.

This isn't the image that most Canadians hold of their country, which they rightly point out has led initiatives such as the ban against landmines and pioneered peacekeeping. But that was then and this, sadly, is now.

Even though it's the current Conservative government that's under attack for continuing to support the Chrysotile Institute, Canada's asbestos industry lobby group, the reality is that it's merely following the practice of federal Liberal and Progressive Conservative administrations that have dared not let damning evidence interfere with allowing the industry to continue.

Harper's Canada: That Creepy Guy Nobody Wants to Be Seen With Since 2006

For those wondering whether it's just governments around the world treating the Harper Cons as an international pariah, the answer is, not by a longshot - as even the Cons' ideological allies are doing the same. Shorter UK Tories on whether they're listening to unsolicited debate suggestions from Harper strategist Patrick Muttart:

No idea who he is. Not interested in his advice. Wish we'd never heard of him.

(Edit: fixed title.)