We're Going To The Polls

Expressing great fondness for our politicians is not a Canadian virtue, so Prime Minister Stephen Harper can relax about the fact that he isn't generally beloved of the populace, leading him to express himself as not having entered politics "to be loved". We do, however, want to respect and hold in confidence the abilities, intelligence, and capabilities of those we bring to high office. And despite initial fears that Mr. Harper held a hidden agenda that would be revealed once in office - to the great social detriment of the country - that never did materialize.

Instead, Stephen Harper has governed reasonably well, with a steady hand at the helm. He's made his share of errors, many of which he embarked upon deliberately, and he obviously has no intention of correcting them, for he sees no need to capitulate to public opinion in those instances. Banking, of course, on the simple fact that these are minor irritants; revocation of funding for special interest groups, or not expressing sufficient determination and will to bring the country into a pact to fight environmental degradation.

He knows his audience fairly well. And he plays to that knowledge with skill and manifest aplomb for a relatively young man true to his convictions. As much as most Canadians feel, and state, that the environment is a hot topic, with all the reminders of failure coming in the form of cataclysmic weather events, we're sitting pretty tight, not all that concerned about making sacrifices to slow down an impending crisis we are told is nigh. The economy has been bubbling along very nicely, and most Canadians are managing to make ends meet, and more.

Unemployment has been at a low ebb, although manufacturing has met some disastrous decisions by corporate interests seeking to outsource elsewhere. The Alberta oil patch has been comfortably making up that lapse, largess flowing to other parts of the country as a result. In the process further destabilizing the environment. The leader of the opposition in Parliament, Stephane Dion, has what he feels is a brilliant, workable solution. He's met with scant success in selling it.

In the usual pre-election build-up, parties across the spectrum are sprinkling expensive promises to ameliorate this condition or that, to bring voters around to the potential of voting for them. "We'll stop price gouging at the gas pumps with a tough monitoring agency, a gas-prices ombudsman and reform to the competition legislation of this country", claims Jack Layton, leading the NDP. Now that resonates with motorists right enough, but it's debatable how many would vote the socialist agenda.

None of the party leaders have yet broached the uncomfortable situation of universal medical care coverage in this country, trundling feebly along with long waits, and slowly being breached by the introduction of private clinics supported in part by the federal government - although carefully, moderately, and not in total. None wish to discuss in anything remotely resembling a solution, the situation in Afghanistan, where Canada's military resources have been stretched thin in an effort to subdue and combat the Taliban.

The party currently in power appears to be polling ahead of its opposition parties in popular appeal, albeit marginally. Canadians simply do not see themselves as a majority conservative country. That is conservative, certainly not Conservative in the mode of, for example, the Republicans in that great country southward of us. It's anyone's guess what the end of the day on October 14 will result in. But obviously Mr. Harper is banking on a slight majority.

All of the candidates have impressive academic backgrounds, though not all of them were academics. They're articulate, with exception, and forthright and postulate agendas that appeal to at least a portion of the population that normally vote left, central and right. And it's instructive to realize that the right-leaning party is no longer leaning in that direction, quite entirely. It has positioned itself neatly toward the center.

While the left of the spectrum has become quite crowded indeed, with the nominal center having unleashed itself from that post and edging into leftist territory, along with the fledgling party of environmental purpose. All the leaders purport to be ordinary Canadians whom fate has somehow shoved out into the limelight, reluctant though they may be to shine there. Their ambition has been shoved under the barrel of modest declarations, while they quietly and with confidence promise to guide us to the promised land of plenty.

Stephen Harper has led us on a steady course, internally and externally. He has proven to be a trifle too wedded to his own authority, but he has also exercised some notable level of constraint on his party's conventional unease with relaxed social conventions. He has exercised restraint where it has been demonstrated to him by the majority of the population that they will brook no interference by government in personal choices.

His government has managed to behave responsibly, morally and ethically on the world stage, in the United Nations and other fora where Canada is increasingly being recognized as a steady influence for balanced world good. In short, for his brief stint as prime minister of this country he has acquitted himself on balance, very well indeed.

Um, would I, personally, vote for him and his party? I'm tempted. He has gained my respect, while the other leaders have steadily eroded my positive regard.

Am I prepared to vote for a party I've never before even thought in my wildest dreams I would support? That's a good question.