as Canadian politicians gird themselves for this winter's election, the Liberals are reverting to their tried and true style of electioneering--buying votes with tax money. The flurry of new spending announcements that preceded the no-confidence vote was unprecedented in size with well over $20 billion pledged for almost everyone capable of voting.
Even the ill-advised and unpopular Kyoto Protocol is being sacrificed in an effort to squeeze out votes. In a recent Toronto Star story, Peter Calamai wrote:
"The United States intends to use next week's U.N. climate change conference in Montreal as part of a push to force the eventual elimination of the pollutioncaps that the Kyoto pact was specifically created to enforce. and Canada has made preliminary moves to join the american efforts."
That's a big step, considering that 17 months ago the Liberals were touting Kyoto and its draconian provisions to limit greenhouse gas emissions as the second coming. Of course, things look different, when you have to go before the people.
In the past these strategies have worked like a charm. Usually it was Ontario that supplied the lion's share of the seats (and Ontarians generally are a cheap date). I am beginning to get the feeling though, that this time around the strategy may not work as planned, as more and more voters recognize the sinister motivation behind the largesse offered by this inept circus called the Liberal Party.
Paul Martin's condemnation of the Conservatives' cooperation with the Bloc to bring down his government sounds a lot like sour grapes to me. If Martin could save his sorry rump by crawling into bed with Giles Duceppe, he'd be there, pajamas and all, in a New York minute.
I don't know who will ultimately win this election, but if I were a betting man, I'd lay odds on the Conservatives this time around. Yes, the Liberals will be running their american-style negative advertising campaigns warning voters of the Tories' "hidden agenda". But in the long run this strategy will not work, as there seems to be little sympathy among the electorate for the kleptocracy that has been running Canada this past dozen years. The Libs know that they will lose a lot of seats in Quebec, due to the adscam affair. But they believe they will be able to make up for those lost seats through gains in British Columbia, a strategy that I doubt will work, given the booing that emanated from 50,000 fans in Vancouver during the weekend's Grey Cup game.
It is certain that, whoever forms the government after this election, will remain a minority government. But then, I think the voters are much more favorable to a Conservative minority than one run by the Libs.
It seems to me that Canadian voters tend to vote against people and parties, rather than for them. This election will certainly be no different. The real question comes down to two factors. The first is how much is Martin prepared to promise voters in order to keep his job as Prime Minister and will voters actually believe him? and the second is how effective will the Conservatives be in deflecting the Libs' charges that they are run by a sinister cabal of homophobic, extreme right-wing, fundamentalist Christians?