Harperland: The Light and the Darkness

As I write this they have started voting on the Godzilla Budget in the House of Commons, and what a horror show it is. 

The ghastly good ol' boys from the Reform Party whooping it up as they bury our democracy. Again.

MPs have begun voting on proposed amendments to the government's second budget implementation bill in a session that is expected to run into the evening, setting up a final vote on bill C-45 as early as Wednesday.

Stephen Harper giggling like he just got a Valentine card from Benny Netanyahu. Or Peter Van Loan. Security guards pushing a group of First Nation chiefs away from the door. The Cons selling our country off to Big Oil while writing their Christmas cards. The opposition sitting there handing out chocolates. 

Even in the living nightmare of Harperland, and the grim darkness of December, it's a shocking sight.

But funnily enough as I stare at that fascist circus, all I can think of is this cheery thought:  

Enjoy it while you can you Con bastards for your time is running out.

There have been several pronouncements about how Canada is ‘bluing’ or shifting to the right. Certainly that would seem to make sense in light of what is going on in the political marketplace, particularly at the federal level. Yet it seems to fly in the face of the tracking of ideology and the more rigourous tracking we have conducted of core social values.

All of the values which are demonstrating downward trends are conservative values...Not only are these trendlines significantly downward but this decline in subscription to conservative values is even more pronounced in younger Canada, metropolitan Canada, university-educated Canada and among women.

Our Canadian values are not just alive and well, they are getting stronger. The Con's alien seed is planted in shallow soil. And most importantly Canadians are becoming much more ideologically polarized. Which should eventually make it easier for progressives to unite.

For in an ideological war you are either on one side or the other. Not in the mushy middle trying to straddle both sides. Or playing the same old politics and expecting a different result.

Which is why I find this very encouraging.

Joyce Murray, the Vancouver MP who was first elected to Parliament as a Liberal in 2008, has a very important idea. She wants to allow Liberal riding associations to co-operate with like-minded parties at the local level in choosing a joint candidate.

“There are some ridings where the vast majority of voters would like to have a progressive voice,” Murray said as she kicked off her campaign. “So, if a riding is willing to have a run-off so that the progressive voice has a chance of becoming elected, then that’s something that I think is a good idea.”

Murray's proposal may not go anywhere, but the fact that more progressives in all three parties are talking about how to avoid splitting the vote, can only be a good thing. For it is an idea whose time will also come. And the light in the darkness.

Which is why even in the nightmare world of Harperland I'm always cheerful eh? 

I know that history is on our side, and that our future will be a bright one. 

While the Cons stare at their future.

And scream their little heads off...



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