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Monday July 18, 2005 |
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WHEN TACTICS BECOME STRATEGY: SEIZE THE DAY
by Angelo Persichilli
THE HILL TIMES
There’s a general
consensus that politicians are trained to think short-term. Usually their
plans don’t go beyond four years. This, of course, has always been a problem
because national, and now international, problems need long-term planning.
If this
systematic problem in Canada was already serious, lately, it’s worsened
because the planning span for Canadian politicians has shortened even more.
Under
former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, long-term planning decreased from four
to three years: elected in 1990, Chrétien won the general elections of 1993,
1997, 2000.
With Prime
Minister Paul Martin, things have changed again. Even if his plan to become
Prime Minister lasted 13 years (1990 to 2003), once at 24 Sussex Dr. in
Ottawa he shortened his planning to one year. He became leader in 2003,
survived an election in 2004.
Who knows what’s next
for 2005?
It seems that Paul
Martin and his gang have adopted the motto of the Roman philosopher Horace
who preached the theory of “Carpe
Diem, quam minimum credula postero.”(Seize
the day, put no trust in the future).
Martin was
very clear when he rebuked Sir Bob Geldof’s request to commit to 0.7 per
cent of the Canadian GDP to international aid. “I would very much like to
see Canada get there by the year 2015,”he said “but I’m not going to make a
commitment that I’m not sure the government will be able to keep. Too often
commitments are made on the grounds of photo ops and I will not do that.”
Even though most of his social plans for Canada will be paid by the
successor of his successor, Martin was right: “Carpe Diem.” So it’s in this
context that you have to analyse the present political situation in Canada
and try to understand what’s going on in Ottawa.
But it’s
such a confusing picture that it’s hard to distinguish the hunter from the
prey. The Liberals, ahead in the polls, tried to stop the Conservatives, who
were trailing in the polls, from toppling the government. The Liberals
“invested” $4.6- billion to buy NDP support and bought, or tried to buy,
Conservative MPs to come up ahead in the House.
With the
death of Independent MP Chuck Cadman the government’s stability is again in
danger, meaning that the Conservatives, who are still trailing, might try to
topple the government.
Of course,
in order for the opposition to defeat the government, it’s necessary for the
House to be in session. This means that the first opportunity will present
itself to the opposition at the end of September leading to an election in
November, right in the middle of the release of the preliminary report of
the Gomery Inquiry.
Sometimes
it appears that Judge Gomery is the one calling the shots in Canadian
politics.
To stop
this dreadful plan there are also rumours that the government would prorogue
the session. Under that scenario, that would mean that the new Parliament
wouldn’t start before the end of October, or the beginning of November. At
that point, excluding the possibility of an election around Christmas, the
first opportunity for Parliament to sit again would be next spring, if you
follow the possible plan of Prime Minister Martin’s government.
But no,
wait a moment. A few days ago, Reuters reported that the government might be
planning its own funeral: “The question is, do you want to engineer your own
defeat,” one Liberal strategist told Reuters last week.
Some might
argue that the media are confused and in search of news. It might be true,
but definitely it is hard for us to talk about a plan that changes, not
according to the needs of Canadians, but responds to the needs of
individuals or to political organizations.
So, over
the course of a couple of months, we’ve gone from the Conservatives, who
were always trailing in the polls, trying to force an election, and now a
Liberal government, the same one that shopped in Conservative stores for
help and showered Canadians with money to please the NDP, possibly planning
its own demise.
Taking for
granted that Canadians are a very stable-minded people, we have to assume
that there are changes within the political system. And we can also safely
assume that the changes have nothing to do with the health and the wealth of
Canadians, but only with the political ambitions of a few politicians and, I
might stress, of some of their handlers.
So, since
last February, after five months of heated discussion, betrayal, drama and
suspense, we are back to square one.
Sure,
there’s a new plan for the cities, but nothing new was invented. Canada just
did what other countries did a long time ago (and there was no disagreement
amongst the political parties). There’s now more money for Medicare but the
government just put back what was already there 10 years ago. The
Chrétien-Martin government simply borrowed the money from the healthcare
system to pay part of the debt back to the banks. Now they have put the
money back, but Medicare still has no plan for the future.
So we’re
left with the Conservatives fuming because the government spent $4.6-billion
“more than we were supposed to,” with the NPD feeling jubilant because
$4.6-billion will be spent “to help Canadians.” And the Liberals? They
simply don’t see a difference between $4.6-billion more, or, $4.6-billion
less.
What’s
next? Carpe diem!
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