BORDER GUARDS VS. CROSSING GUARDS

If gun control is your cause celebe, consider this.

I don't expect my fellow Canadians to get down with the NRA any day soon, but at some point, we should probably take a reasonable look at guns and their place in our culture.

We live a gun-a-phobic society, that much is clear. Recent tragedies have again confirmed for us the presence of guns in our midst, and the mortal peril the represent. And the last year had too many headlines involving those charged with our public security paying the ultimate price in their service.

So, it strikes me as perfectly natural that Canadians don't much care for an agenda that would expand the number of legal guns in our country. In fact, over the recent election campaign, a certain former Prime Minister promised to ban handguns, even though they were already largely prohibited.

I don't wish to speak to the specifics as to why the handgun promise was silly, the link above provides a 'Reality Check' that more or less explains the virtue of such a policy ( that is, if demagoguery is a Canadian virtue, which it increasingly appears to be).

The Liberal handgun ban was innefectual policy. ButI think it wasn't meant to be useful. Like other Liberal policies regarding socially unpopular touchstones (the long gun registry, choice in childcare, private health clinics, Shiela Copps, etc.), the policy existed not just to grab a headline in the Globe, but it operated as a kind of group therapy for the Tofu and organic edemame set. It doesn't matter to these people that such policies don't work, only that we make a national public statement condemning the existence of handguns in this little corner of time and space.

What will be interesting will be seeing how the Prime Minister-elect's respods to Tuesday's news. A quick but decisive move that may be seen as somewhat contentious would go a long way to distinguishing his stewardship from his predecessor's and avoid the dithering labels that Paul Martin bore and put a little more authority behind his slim mandate.

EAST IS EAST

Early dark horse favorites aside, the Liberals have a choice between two former Atlantic Premieres to lead the Liberals into the next election. All of the other candidates have a lot to recommend them, and I'll waste a lot of space examining them (by that, I mean, discrediting their candidacy). However, if Liberal renewal has come to mean anything in the last 25 years, it revolves around the one thing that Liberals believe in most.

A friend of mine keeps reminding me of the truth above, and I'm inclined to agree with him. I want to think that the militants in the party will want to stake out an ideological ground, a staging point for a counter-attack against the Conservatives for the next election. This means that they will make a stand on a policy issue with which the Tories disagree, and they'll make the appeal to the electorate that the NDP can't do anything to stop the Tories. This is what the Liberals do.

I want to think that will happen, but it won't. They'll pick a new leader who says all the right things, and run the same campaign with a different face. And both of these men offer the Liberals the opportunity to do just that.

First, they've both run succesful provicial campaign as leaders of their respective Liberal parties and won. They've held power and used it.

Second, they have experience that extends beyond the provincial level, and into international arenas. It makes Liberals all gooey inside when they think they're leader may know Chirac.

Lastly, name recognition. It doesn't matter what they represent, that can be filled in later. What's important, is that the latte and scone set will be doubling their Xanax prescriptions as long as Harper keeps doing what he said he's going to do.

On occasion, I am prone to wishful thinking. So, I say with guarded optimism that neither man will accomplish much by way of pushing back the Tory gains. Methinks that the Liberal party is in for a massive reorganization which could keep them out of power for quite some time.

But more on that some other day. The game's starting.

YEAR ZERO, DAY ONE

I don't really feel like gloating over Liberals tonight, and not just because the Tories didn't win a stronger mandate. And it certainly isn't because the reduced mandate makes governing exceedingly difficult for a bunch of relative neophytes.

No, I'm really going to miss hating the government. And I don't think that I'll have that opportunity for several years to come (10+ years is my guess).

I'm an unashamed partisan, on a good day, and I see a lot of sunny days ahead (metaphorically speaking; I live in Vancouver where what you call the Sun, we call the myth of the Big Yellow Orb). The agenda for Stephen Harper will be easier to enact than the numbers in the House would suggest.

Harper's big asset in his next electoral test will be the priorities he outlined in this campaign-- priorities he must, can and will deliver on. The Federal Accountability Act will probably get near unanimous support in the House, and should extend his government's honeymoon long enough to get his first budget passed. I expect the Grits to act like the Tories from early last year and abstain from the budget vote that reduces the GST and cuts capital, corporate and personal rates while laying the groundwork for the Tory childcare/baby bonus plan.

Just before summer, I suspect a private member's bill to address the status of same-sex marriage will be introduced, and soundly defeated. Just then, the government turns it's focus on crime and the first of a series of bills makes it's way onto the floor of the House. The NDP and the Grits will have to back up these measures, even though they would rather eat their own feet than further cede room to the Tories on this issue. But they won't have much choice. The Tories will have the newness of their government and the better financial resources in their favour.

At some point over the next 8 months, the Prime Minister will have to sit down with the provinces and start negotiating the fiscal imbalance. If and when a deal is reached, and it will be in all parties interests to reach a deal, Harper will look to Duceppe for support, and get it.

So, this is my dry, boring prediction for the year ahead. Although I don't expect it to be as smooth for the Tories as I would hope, I don't think the Liberals are going to have such a great time, either. First, obviously, is the leadership change. Which direction will they go? Right or Left? East or West (of the East)? Anglo or...other? Whatever they choose, they will probably beat themselves up for quite awhile, long enough for the Prime Minister to dispell the illusions about his agenda.

Second, most of the former Liberal cabinet will get pretty restless. It's one thing to go from opposition to power, quite another to go the other way. I suspect that, after a new Liberal leader is forged in the fires of Mount Doom, a lot of the tourists will take a powder (I'm looking at you, Iggy).

Lastly, I think the really bad news for the Grits will be the investigations into past malfeasance(s). I suspect we'll see something like Gomery II, probably around the time of the Liberal leadership convention. And I'm not as convinced as others about the unity of the Grits on the other side of the convention.

But maybe this is all just wishful thinking. I'll pontificate/daydream about the annihilation of the Federal Liberals in other posts, but in the meantime, I'm going to have to adjust to respecting Parliament again.