Every democratic nation has its own version of the story: a competent, admired citizen decides to run for high public office, originally with much excitement about their candidacy, only to fail to live up to the billing. Canada has had a few. Names like Robert Stanfield, Joe Clark and John Turner come to mind. However, we now have the absolute perfect example. For some reason I don’t fully understand, expectations were immensely high for John Tory, and he did not come within a mile of meeting them.

While having immense success in the private sector (bringing about the Rogers monopoly of communications), nearly everything he touched in the public sphere withered and died. After spending much of the 1980’s working in the offices of Ontario Premier Bill Davis and Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, Tory had gained credence in the old Progressive Conservative Party. He was given the task of directing the 1993 reelection campaign for Prime Minister Kim Campbell. Now, granted, I doubt anyone could have saved the PC’s that year. But Tory ruined any slim chance they may have had. Tory was the one who approved the much-criticized ad making fun of Jean Chretien’s facial impairment. With his first crack at taking a lead in politics, John Tory achieved a world record: he was the campaign head for the largest electoral earthquake in democratic history. No incumbent government in any democratic nation has been crushed as much as the ’93 PCs. That was strike one. With that notorious mark on his record, Tory returned to the private sector for a decade, serving as CEO of Rogers and the Commissioner of the Canadian Football League.
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This past Thursday, Information Commissioner Robert Marleau released to Parliament his report outlining the failures of the Conservative government to make available information on the workings of the government. Claiming the attitude of the Conservatives towards transparency to be “risk averse, disclosure-averse”, Marleau goes into great detail to describe how various government departments and agencies are flat-out ignoring the requirement to release information within 30 days of a request, as required by the Access to Information Act. This raises two issues in my head.

The first is a question of democratic theory. What does it mean to hold a government accountable? Is it enough for citizens to voice their opinion on Election Day, and then let the government govern? Stephen Harper seems to think so. Are Opposition Members supposed to make the decision to bring down the government based only on the information the government decides to make public? I think it’s pretty clear Harper cares nothing for what the Opposition thinks. The revamped Access to Information Act, passed by the very same Conservatives, disagrees. Canadian citizens and Members of Parliament have a right to know what the government is doing in order to make a rational, informed decision. That’s why the Information Commissioner is responsible to the House of Commons, not the PMO. The problem is that the Act is toothless. Marleau admits that “it will take the leadership of the government to change and turn this around. No amount of my barking or biting is going to change that”. Senior ranking civil servants follow the lead of the PMO on whether or not to comply with the legislation. I understand that certain pieces of information need to be kept confidential for security reasons, but given that access to information is so important to a vibrant democracy, shouldn’t the decision to release the information (or not) be put in impartial hands?
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Ever since Barack Obama was elected President of the United States, there was a fear in Canada that we had picked the worst time ever to elect a Conservative government. Here was the United States, our closest neighbour and ally, riding this wave of hope and liberal sentiment. And here we were, stuck under the leadership of a neo-con from Calgary. The U.S. was heading in the direction that we had always wanted them to go, and we were going to be left behind. So naturally, as Obama’s visit to Canada approached, the media began to speculate over whether or not Harper and Obama would clash ideologically as Bush and Chretien did. The answer, which should have been obvious to all, was a resounding no.

You all saw the pictures. The smiling, the waving, they’re on a first name basis with each other. Their 10 minute private meeting went 30. There is an open dialogue on trade, climate change and Afghanistan. This week Stephen Harper and Barack Obama laid the foundations for a relationship that could rival Chretien-Clinton for respect and influence (although admittedly, I doubt they will approach the Mulroney-Reagan level). Many people are surprised that this liberal saviour and neo-con ideologue can get along so well. Those people do not understand the differences between the American and Canadian political spectrums.
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Democracy is about choice. It’s about the right to look at differing visions of the country and make a choice about which you think is best. Some people say the more political parties there are, the more varied the choice and, thus, the stronger the democracy. Is this true? When different political parties take similar stances, is that still a choice?

It has become painfully obvious that the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party no longer represent distinctive options to the Canadian electorate. Stephen Harper has proven time and again that he is willing to compromise his beliefs in search of his majority government (to see how far Harper has come, look up some old Reform Party platforms; the Conservatives are pushing for none of it). The Conservative Party is now far more centrist than it was intended to be, the most glaring proof being the acceptance of deficit economics. Meanwhile, Michael Ignatieff and the Liberals are suffering an identity crisis. Harper’s strategic move to the centre has taken a large piece of the electorate away from the Liberals. Stephane Dion’s response was to propose a radical environmental policy that was intended to win over all progressive voters. The left-of-centre vote never unified behind Dion (remaining split between the Liberals, NDP and the Greens) and drove more traditional Liberal supporters into the arms of the Conservatives. With that strategy deemed a failure, Ignatieff has been forced to subtly acknowledge that his version of the Liberal Party wouldn’t do things very differently than the Conservatives (see Ignatieff’s support of the budget). The Liberals are being squeezed out of the political picture, and since they can no longer offer anything distinctive in terms of policy, they are left hoping Canadians will think Ignatieff is the more capable leader.
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