SAINTS PRESERVE US

There’s Nothing You and I Can’t Do

Just drop the writ and I’ll meld with you. Canadians know that a general election will be held October 21st. Canadians also know that the current Liberal government must ask the electorate to exercise its democratic privilege and obligation in polling stations by September 15^th.

While everything always sparkles on paper or by tacit convention, western democracies are tricky constructs. A country’s welfare is in the palm of a partisan party that exists to achieve power and keep it; the party’s interests must ultimately sublimate that of the nation-state it controls. Fair enough. And here in this hemisphere voters play along because we grasp on some level that the courage and nobility required of a leader to do the right thing on behalf of a country whatever the cost to their own or their party’s fortunes is beyond the bounds of reality as we understand it.

The best way to distort our perception of reality remains propaganda and advertising, twin avenues of persuasion. Following the misty, rainy days of summer the national political machine is whirring again, sanding off corrosion and oiling rusty spots. In lieu of comprehensive platforms, Canada’s four major political parties and the lunatic fringe have announced their respective campaign slogans. In a perfect world a party’s slogan should encompass its philosophy and allude to its intentions, no easy task in a society possessing the collective attention span and critical thinking capacity of a social media gadfly.    

Choose Forward: I like the Liberals’ short, snappy call to progressive action even if their past four years in power has been an ineffectual, stalled escalator of one step up and two steps back.

It’s time for you to get ahead: Whoa, pay attention to auto-correct! This is an especially clunky phrase given that Canada’s unemployment rate has blissfully cratered into a 40-year nadir. However, outside forces, as Albertans and stock market players have learned, can change everything. The Conservatives’ traditional “me first” ethos is readily apparent.

In it for you: In what? What am I in for? The old joke about the New Democrats was that the party had all the answers but didn’t know or understand the questions.

Not left. Not right. Forward together: Three terse phrases constitute something of a Green epiphany. Planetary circumstances have nudged the former eco-radicals to the banks of the centrist mainstream. This could be mistaken for a Liberal Party slogan.

Strong and free: The political right has endured as many schisms and sects as the Protestant church. Splinter groups form because traditional Tories are just too damn moderate and tolerant. The People’s Party of Canada is a populist fringe faction whose leader (thankfully) finished second in the Conservative Party’s leadership race. National anthems are necessarily nationalistic and generally martial and so the dog whistle with this slogan is the missing line that everybody knows. The PPC is anti-immigration and denies the existence of climate change. I suspect the party’s vision of “the True North” is awfully white and awfully warm. 

The 2019 federal campaign is shaping up to be one of the most depressing and desultory elections in living memory. The leadership roster reminds me of a once-great hockey team with “problems in the room” and few fans in the arena. Canadians must remember to cast their vote for the best candidate in their particular riding. Happy trails.   

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