Blogger Battle Royale

CBC's Day 6 recruited yours truly for a political bloggers' bout against Dan Arnold and Stephen Taylor. Have a listen.

Well said

Paul Wells seems to agree with the theory that we should take the Cons' court stenographer at face value in saying that the goal of trashing the long-form census is nothing less than a full-on attack on the idea of effective government:

(C)learly Stephen Harper thinks it matters, because he has burned two useful ministers, Tony Clement and Stock Day, rather badly in advancing this little project. And I take Taylor’s July 22 post to be an example of the disarming frankness that makes him an easy guy to like. The whole post is worth a look. In his trademark prose style, Taylor describes Harper “integrating seemingly transactional initiatives into something transformative.” You see, the country is suspiciously full of “net tax receiving organizations.” Harper, Taylor writes, “has tried the ideological argument against these groups for years. But ideology is by its nature debatable; removing the framework of debate is his shortcut to victory.”

Removing the framework of debate? “If one day we have no idea how many divorced Hindu public transit users there are in East Vancouver, government policy will not be concocted to address them specifically.” This would be, Taylor adds, “a huge blow to the welfare state.”

This seems to me entirely more credible as a motivator than Clement’s and Day’s late-breaking concern for jackbooted census thugs hauling Jewish or many-bedroomed citizens off to the stockade for failing to divulge their pertinent information.
...
I think most readers will see how Harper’s longstanding fascination with “back channels” as a means for advancing the agenda of actors who constitute “a political minority in Canada” and for whom “electoral politics is not an advantageous arena” plays, not only in the census battle, but in much of what he has done as Prime Minister.

So, like the Stephen Taylor of three weeks ago, I believe the census fight is absolutely at the centre of what Harper is trying to accomplish as prime minister.

One last thought. Taylor is (was?) sure the ultimate goal of all this manoeuvering is to “dismantle the welfare state.” It’s entirely possible to suppose that, at least over the medium term, which could last decades and indeed maybe forever, the real result would simply be the realignment of massive state action to serve the electoral interests of the Conservative Party. If one day we have no idea how many rock-ribbed family-values farmers and small tradesmen of Icelandic, Ukrainian, Scottish and Irish descent there are between Kenora and Kelowna, it will be easy enough for Tony Clement and Stockwell Day to claim there are 147 million of them and every one needs a tool-belt tax credit and a little something extra to help raise the kids.

Thursday Morning Links

- If there's anything surprising about the latest federal fund-raising numbers, it's how little has changed over the past few years. While the Cons are hopefully seeing a drop in their receipts over the past couple of months, there seems to be little indication that any party's fund-raising capacity has changed meaningfully since the Cons took power - which is particularly telling for a Lib party which perpetually seems to be almost ready to adapt to a grassroots-based fund-raising model.

- The New Brunswick NDP looks to be doing an excellent job focusing public attention on both the Libs and Cons in that province for a stunningly slimy move to pass an increase to MLA salaries and pensions (among a pile of other legislation) at a time when a flood prevented any recording of the goings-on in the legislature.

But if I have any criticism of the NDP's strategy, it's that the party's sights are set so low in what may be its most visible issue campaign. After all, while it's true that it would only have taken one NDP MLA to keep bills from being forced through, surely it's for the best to elect many more MLAs who won't be inclined to play along with such abuse of democratic procedure - and with the NDP's polling numbers in the mid to high teens, there would seem to be a strong chance of doing just that.

- David Eaves' takedown of Stephen Taylor and other Con spokesflacks is well worth a read:

(F)or Conservatives the whole reason for getting rid of the census was that it was supposed to curtail big government. Stephen Taylor - Conservative blogger and cheerleader - says as much in his National Post Column. The beginning of the end of the Canadian welfare state. What was his line? "If it can’t be measured, future governments can’t pander." It took about 9 days to disprove that thesis. A $5.1-billion dollar a year increase to create prison capacity for a falling crime rate is the case in point. Turns out even if you can't measure it you can still do something about it. Just badly.

This isn't the end of big government. It isn't even the end of pandering governments. It's just the beginning of blind government.

- Meanwhile, QMI is predictably carrying the Cons' water on the census issue like to many others, push polling about how respondents would treat "questions that you considered to be very personal and embarrassing" without pointing to any evidence that such questions exist. So let's make it clear: if there were any questions on the long form whose embarrassment factor could possibly jeopardize the results, the Cons wouldn't have had to fabricate them.

- Finally, PostMedia reports that while the Cons' vandalism in government isn't the kind that can be prosecuted, their electoral book-cooking may yet result in charges.

Let's make this easier

Apparently my suggestion last week to focus on Stephen Taylor's gleeful violence toward public services hasn't yet gone anywhere. So here's a more concrete thought for anybody more cinematically inclined.

The scene: a popular, familiar embodiment of positive social services. Say, a hospital bed where a nurse is attending to a grateful patient.

Two figures enter the room in Conservative Party jackets - one with a distinct Harper head of hair, one with a Taylor beard.

The Harper figure whacks the nurse over the head with a chair, WWE-style. The patient reacts in horror. The Taylor figure pumps his fist and shouts, "About time!".

Cut to a visual of Taylor's quote about "dealing a huge blow to the welfare state".

Now was that so hard?

The plan of attack

Since there seems to be plenty of agreement with the sentiment that the Cons' war on public services demands a strong opposition response. With that in mind, what should we be looking to in order to turn the admitted goal of sabotaging governments across the country into the defining public perception of the Harper government, rather than just another ephemeral story?

1. Keep focused on the story.

The Libs in particular have taken loads of well-justified criticism during their stay in opposition for reflexively responding to the minutiae of the day rather than setting out a larger narrative. But a declaration that the Cons are actively working to prevent would seem to provide the perfect opportunity to connect an immediate story into a broader message - that is, if the Cons don't manage to change the subject again.

2. Connect all talk about the census to Taylor's declaration.

One of the Cons' great "successes" has been in consistently framing opposition positions as implausible extremes with no basis in fact - and I won't suggest the opposition parties should want to sink quite as low as Harper's crew. But now that the Cons' leading spokesparrot has said outright that his party's goal is to tear down the factual foundation for civil society, there's no reason for the opposition parties to allow the Cons to pretend their attack on the census represents any less.

So by the time the next election rolls around, Taylor should be better known than he is now as "Stephen Harper's court stenographer". Phrases like "ideological force-feeding" and "dealing a huge blow to the welfare state" - or better yet, stronger versions on terms not set by Taylor - should be highlighted often enough to penetrate the public's consciousness as defining the Cons. And every Con MP, candidate and spokespuppet should be forced to either distance himself or herself from Taylor, or agree with the statement that the Cons' ultimate goal is to destroy Canada's public infrastructure for good - and that the choice to gut the census is a "shortcut" to that end.

3. Raise the census at every opportunity.

Here's the plus side of a conflict which goes to the basic capacity and decision-making philosophy of government: every political issue can easily be linked back to it. So it shouldn't be difficult to make sure that every piece of news - including the Cons' own moves to change the subject - gets greeted with a response leading right back to Harper's ideological vandalism.

The Cons make a spending announcement? Point out how census information is important to making it, and how the Cons have basically said they don't care if the money produces results.

The Cons meet with a community group? Ask whether the group is satisfied being dismissed as a "special interest" which should be permanently shut out of public decision-making.

The Cons proclaim their fiscal responsibility? Highlight their ridiculous choice to pay more for less usable information, and tie it back into the broader theme of refusing to even have outcomes accurately evaluated.

Needless to say, I'll encourage readers to come up with more to add to the above. But the most important point is to make sure that our ideas now come to define the Cons by the time Canadians next go to the polls.

An incomplete gift

I'll second Greg's take that Stephen Taylor's proud declaration that the purpose of gutting the census is to permanently undermine any future government program development should be considered a gift for the cause of removing the Cons from power.

But there's an important flip side to that fact: there probably won't be a better opportunity to focus Canada's political debate on the worst of the Cons' long-term intentions. And if the opposition parties don't make the black mark stick on the Cons' permanent record (which really shouldn't be that difficult, especially to the extent the theory directly conflicts with Jason Kenney's efforts to win the support of exactly the groups mocked by Taylor), then there's a real risk that the perception that we're headed inexorably toward a deliberately failing state will become the default setting in Canadian politics for a long time to come.

On definitions

Shorter Con reaction to the 20th anniversary of Ed Broadbent's motion to end child poverty within 11 years:

Poverty can be made to go away if we simply redefine the terms involved. For example, if one defines "child poverty" as "Canada's employment rate", then we've accomplished wonders in reducing it since taking office.

For the sake of balance

Of course, while Con MPs go about their business of encouraging firebombing, there's also controversy on the coalition side. Take for example the shocking revelation that the main websites supporting the coalition are run by...parties and groups who support the coalition.

Yeah. That's the ticket.

Especially in contrast to the scrupulously non-partisan spokesman for the Cons' attempts at organization.

In other breaking news, the Cons have retaken the airport

Isn't it reassuring to know that however much the Cons' cabinet may be shuffled next week, Stephen Taylor's unofficial role as Information Minister is entirely secure?