By: Hubert O’Hearn
For: Lake Superior News
May 4, 2011
I was lying in a burned out basement
With the full moon in my eye
I was hoping for replacement
When the sun burst through the sky
There was a band playing in my head
And I felt like getting high,
Thinking about what a friend had said
I was hoping it was a lie
- Neil Young ‘After the Gold Rush’
It seems like an appropriate enough place to start. Neil Young is the greatest songwriter Canada has ever produced. After the Gold Rush, both album and song came out in 1970, with Richard Nixon in the White House and growing divisions splitting generations as military and surveillance needs with accompanying near-paranoid government secrecy conflicted with desires for freedom, peace and social equality.
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But that was America then and this is Canada now. We’re about to find out if the Opposition warnings about a Conservative ‘hidden agenda’ are true and we’ll have four years worth of evidence to look at by the time the next Federal election rolls around. 1500 days, more or less. I’ve set my alarm.
It would be unfair to sound an alarm. One has to be gracious about the election result - hope for the best and wish the winners well. And I remember Brian Mulroney’s back-to-back majorities. We managed to survive those after a massive job of painful financial restructuring by Jean Chretien and Paul Martin, so we’ll manage to survive four years of Stephen Harper. But I’m not letting my passport expire either.
That last sentence may have gone through Michael Ignatieff’s head during his concession speech Monday night - right after he said that he would stay on as leader as long as he was wanted or needed. You may, if you wish, write your own punchline here.
The NDP deserve congratulations with a stunning 150% increase from their previous high-water mark of 43 seats. Still, 57 members (out of 102) in Quebec will present its own problem. The NDP surge came about after the French-language debate, wherein Jack Layton offered to re-open constitutional talks with Quebec. Has this just been the separatiste vote changing light blue for day-glo orange shirts? One wonders. Regardless, there will be definite pressure on Layton to keep advancing Quebec’s brief which history has taught us does not tend to endear a party - any party - to anglo-Canada.
There will be pressure mounted from certain quarters for an NDP-Liberal merger. I’ve wavered back and forth on this one over the years. There is absolutely no doubt that several of the Liberals’ best programs over the years have come from CCF/NDP ideas - universal health care being the most cited example. But for the nation as a whole I rather hope this dioes not happen. Why?
I referred earlier to a political polarization building in Canada. Just dealing with announced policies, we will be having a right-wing agenda for the next four years: increased defence spending, mega-prisons, monetarist trickle-down economics and shoot ‘em if you got ‘em. The last thing this country needs is an American-style left-right blue state-red state rift. I grant you that I carry a nostalgic affection for the Liberals. But Idon’t let nostalgia run my brain either.
There is a chance that the Liberals may just wither and die, gone with the wind to wherever Social Credit’s ashes blow. They have run three bad campaigns in a row, unable to put together a cogent message and deliver it in an attractive manner to the public. At some level though that is just a problem that can be solved by getting a new advertising guy and a speechwriter. Their core problem is like that of an ageing sports team that one day looks up and realizes that there are no prospects to call up.
I read on-line that Justin Trudeau is likely a serious contender for the Liberal leadership. That is a terrible idea. As I say, I don’t let nostalgia run my brain. A Liberal insider whose opinions I take seriously has the following take: “Real nice guy, but a lightweight.” But I ask you to name three contenders for the leadership. Bob Rae will be too old although he can capably man the fort until a leadership convention a year from now. And if the Liberals still have any sense at all, they will wait at least a year.
Well, enough of all this for now. To apply a little Neil Young symmetry:
Don't let it bring you down
It's only castles burning,
Find someone who's turning
And you will come around.
- Don’t Let it Bring You Down
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