Jesse:
I don't think anyone who reads this is quite as nutty about US politics as I am (current US politics, Kyle), but I'm going to suggest you take a gander at www.fivethirtyeight.com anyway.
It started out as a purely numbers site, and you'll still see a lot of that (some of which I follow, some of which I don't care to bother with), but they're also writing good, "outsider view"-ish posts. For example, this one, which was the first I saw of the (in hindsight, obvious) point that it's ridiculous for the press corp (not to mention the Republicans) to be shocked and dismayed and all question-y about President Obama's proposal to raise taxes on people who make over $250 000 to 90's levels, because, and get this, that's exactly what Obama said he'd do. The bit finishes off with a great suggestion; count the number of times Obama said he'd do it, and try to drill that number into the collective consciousness.
I'm trying to get around to reading this piece they published by George Lakoff, since I was too lazy to finish reading one of his books for Book Club. I'll try to comment later, but it should be worth a look since Lakoff has been super influential of late in Democratic circles.
To wrap things up with a shot at the Harper government, since apparently that's all anyone thinks I do, this would be a great technique for them, too, except that they failed to promise anything in the campaign. At all. Oh, except the "Charter of Open Federalism", which I'm still holding my breath on, post vicious attacks on the legitimacy of the Bloq.
Friday, February 27
Five Three Eight
Thursday, February 26
The Guy From DS9?
Jesse:
Since the Globe decided to make it front page news today (what, is Obama gone?), I'm going to bring the question of whether the ICC should issue an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir.
Now, let's all keep in mind that I'm not an expert here. However, I'm leaning towards "good idea". The big concern here (and the reason the warrant may get quashed / deferred by the UN Security Council) is that this will cause Sudan to re-descend into violence.
But... Sudan's been pretty brutal for a long time. Do we really think this peace process will hold? That justice will be delivered for anyone? That whenever we DO attempt to bring Bashir to justice, violence won't flare up again?
In my opinion, our goal world-wide has to be to try to bring peace and prosperity everywhere (contentious, I know). The difference is, I think we actually have to be willing to do something about it (even after the disastrous Bush Interregnum). But that's going to mean bad things will happen (like potentially triggering, or accelerating the return of, violence in Sudan). My position is that bad things are happening anyway, bad things will happen anyway, and that living in terror is, itself, a bad thing. Therefore, I continue to conclude that we have to take positive, potentially dangerous steps.
And this is definitely what this is. No one's arguing that Bashir should be left alone. But people are arguing that now is not the time, and that it may hurt Sudanese or the ICC itself. And I think reasonable people can disagree over whether we should be pursuing justice at the (potential) expense of human lives.
But my vote is for "now", not "later because of what might happen". We need to start "legalizing" war, and "legalizing" the international community (post-Interregnum, maybe I mean "re-legalizing".
Of course, just like the post-Bush isolationists (some of whom I know personally; you know who you are), maybe I'm living in a fantasy land. Because my solution would be to issue the warrant, then enforce it, and be willing to send in enough troops to make the peace if trouble started. Since we're not going to do that, this is a big-time roll of the dice, with real lives on the board.
Wednesday, February 25
Guns 'n Gangs
Jesse:
Drugs, actually, but if I'm too busy lazy to post, did you really imagine I'd "zone in" on picking a decent title? The federal Conservatives announced (to the Speaker) that they'll be pushing legislation to push gang-related murders up to first degree and bringing in mandatory minimums for some drug crimes.
I'll have to see it, but the gang-related murders to first-degree move is probably fine. Mandatory minimums for drug crimes are stupid, and it'd be great to see someone frame this as an attack on judges, but everyone will probably cave. It'd also be great to see someone frame this as another example of the Harper government's refusal to listen to experts, but everyone will probably cave.
And, I wanted to throw out a big ol' "Wag of the Finger" to Ujjal Dosanjh who said the streets of Vancouver and Surrey have turned into "shooting ranges" and that the main streets of Toronto, Vancouver, Surrey, and other cities have turned into "war zones". This is deeply idiotic. Politically, it probably plays into Harper's hands. I'm as big a fan of fighting someone on their own turf (basically the only thing the Cons "own" is crime). But you have to change the channel; not fall into the same trap. Are the Liberals going to come down tougher than those yahoos on crime in the next election? I doubt it. Smarter? Maybe. So let's not throw around words like "war zone". And, oh yes, it's incredibly irresponsible.
Sunday, February 22
Iran and Dealmaking
Cameron:
I found this story very interesting today, for a number of related reasons. Firstly, it just seems all really cloak and dagger to me - diplomats trading policy positions; allies sharing info (all the info?), etc. etc. So that's cool. Secondly, I think this helps to puncture the fig leaf (that I sort of had some time for, for somewhat roundabout reasons) where Iran was saying that they were developing civilian nuclear power capacity, not weapons.
Presumably, eating the tremendous financial cost of setting up some reactors could be understandable as just the price of doing modern technological business, but there is a significant shift here. Previously, the nukes were a national right, and just plain worth doing, so the Iranians told everyone to go to hell. They ate the sanctions (most of which they were going to eat anyway, but incidents like the failed Total deal still stung.) But maybe that was still worth it on balance.
But four years ago the Iranians had the Yanks by the balls in Iraq. Some would say they still do. Iraq is their major regional frenemy, and it has been vulnerable to exploitation in the chaos. I'm personally a little skeptical about long-term Iranian influence in Iraq, as those guys don't really like each other much, and they're not the same just 'cause you know about Shias and Sunnis and they're both Shia. But, whatever influence they do happen to have is crucial to their regional position. So their offering to check out of Iraq for civilian nukes would be like DFAIT offering to chuck NAFTA in return for an Obama T-shirt.
I'm not sure if I'm making any sense here; suffice to say that civilian nukes might be great for Iran, but they're not that great to be worth this deal - marginal infrastructure upgrades are not the diplomatic equivalents of strategic withdrawals. Strategic withdrawals are only offered if necessary to protect longer/larger strategic interests - like a weaponized nuke program.
Thursday, February 12
Steele
Jesse:
No, not that Steel. I was just (randomly) inspired today to throw a few quick comments at some stuff that Andrew Steele, a reformed former member of Team McGuinty who's writing for the Globe.
First, I'm going to direct you to a great post he wrote on "political eras". He walks you through the generally accepted eras in American politics, and then discusses whether the "Conservative" budget marks the end of a Conservative era in Canadian politics (spoiler: he says no, we were in an era of revived regionalism, but read it anyway).
And second, (and this time I'll comment) he wonders whether we'll see a flip between the two federalist parties. His suggestion is that based on the way the Harper Cons scorched the earth in Quebec to stay in power (claiming it was illegitimate to govern with the Bloq), and based on the fact that Iggy has people who are more flexible, things might reverse. The Cons will decide that running anti-Quebec demagoguery in small-town Canada works (and it looks like they may have no chance in Quebec anyway), and hope that they can find their majority elsewhere (GTA). And the Liberals under Ignatieff will find a way to bring "soft" nationalists into their camp.
As far as the Conservatives are concerned, this would in no way surprise. I think this is the instinct of most of the party anyway. Their ethnic outreach is almost comically cynical, and so has their attitude towards Quebec always been. The difference between what Steele is suggesting they might do, and what the Liberals under Trudeau and Chrétien did, is all about individuals.
Trudeau philosophically believed that every individual should be granted rights, and then allowed to do whatever he or she wanted to do with them. "Group rights" necessarily take away from those individual rights, and therefore were to be eliminated. He (and, in case you're wondering, I) never got a compelling explanation of what Quebec (since that was the "group" he dealt with the most) actually needed to speak French and to have Quebecois culture that it didn't already have, and that could not be given to all Canadians. Obviously, Quebeckers needed to be able to go wherever they wanted in the country; hence, the federal civil service needed to be bilingual. Thus, the ability of the individual Quebecker to operate comfortably outside Quebec was enhanced. Similarly, an official policy of pushing bilingualism everywhere was good for Quebeckers, and good for everyone else. But there was no reason given (and still hasn't been) for why "Quebec" (as a group) needed to be given special powers (over and above the other provinces).
The difference is that the Harper Cons' instincts aren't along these lines. They like group politics. They see themselves as the proper representatives of a group (white, conservative Canadians). So it's a natural next step to try to woo ethnic groups and entire provinces. And it's also natural to kick the crap out of any group who gets in your way; this, to me, is what makes their turn on Quebec unsurprising.
Historically, this doesn't fly, because Ontario has demanded that federal parties play nice with Quebec. Hopefully that holds.
As far as Iggytastic "flexibility" might go? I'm skeptical, but willing to listen. If he can put forward a convincing argument for why the federation needs to be reshaped in a symmetrical fashion, I'm all ears. But "special treatment"? "Nation status"? They'd better be meaningless, if you ask me. People should be treated as individuals. There's nothing wrong with recognizing differences between individuals. But there is something wrong with treating them differently based on where they happen to live, or based on ethnicity, or language.
Having taken the time to read The Rights Revolution by the newly minted Liberal leader, I'm a little worried about where he stands. He seems to be more than open to group discussions; he thinks the assertion of rights needs to be part of a conversation. I can see this going in a good direction only if his part of the conversation is "actually justify why I should take something away from someone else to give it to you". So, to my mind, affirmative action? Historic wrongs? Something to talk about. But powers that should accrue to some Canadians and not others? Not cool.
Thursday, February 5
Coyne and Economics
Cameron:
There is nobody that centrist Canadian bloggers love more than Andrew Coyne. You can respect Paul Wells and Adam Radwanski. You can find Colby Cosh and Chris Selley insightful. Most everybody's a big fan of ITQ. But in our heart of hearts, Coyne's our favourite, even though he's usually either annoying the hell out of us or sulking in silence.
I think we adore Coyne because he's such a softie. He goes around bleating and moaning about politics, always the critic who's clearly a jilted lover. As he says this week; he's a guy whose whole life is politics but who doesn't have a party and likely never will.
Anyways, Coyne has recently turned us as bitter as Canada's turned Coyne. Over the past few months, we've seen a strange turn in Coyne: now, when the world's turned to shit and Harper's proposing we fix it by junking pay equity, now he backs the Conservatives stronger than ever? This is the Harper he's been waiting for? Have we been wrong all along about this guy?
I think this week's article can help us get some critical distance from Coyne so that we can better understand what's going on in his head when he rings in on everyday events. I'd like to argue that if you connect the dots in some of his recent pieces and positions then it emerges that he has two typical stances that may or may not map on to one another. Usually he's a blanket critic: politics is ridiculous, here's why these guys are a bunch of washed up used car salesmen. The end. We love this stuff.
Secondly, we can get a variation on this theme that is noticeably more constructive. Namely, sometimes he offers a solution or alternative. Lets take three examples.
1) Carbon taxes/green shift. Coyne actually bought into carbon taxes before Dion ever did, but in the end he criticized the program and Dion with it, while more or less ignoring Harper's plan.
2) The Coalition - against it from day one.
3) The Worldwide Bailouts - highly skeptical, and would rather a laissez-faire attitude.
Ok. So why would Coyne take these positions but then claim that he's no Conservative?
I think that if you read his piece this week, we can find that there are two distinct poles of Coyne's thought. Firstly, he is socially liberal. Secondly, he is fiscal conservative.
More specifically, he is a monetarist. I think this makes a huge difference, because it isn't really a value statement. He thinks like Alan Greenspan about how the economy works and what this means for the integrity of certain policy options - first and foremost, what drives the market is not demand but rather the money supply
In particular, Coynes hopes for a party that:"understood market economics, that stood for balanced budgets, honest money, and freely set prices, undistorted by subsidies, quotas, tariffs, ceilings, floors, or tax preferences; that had a general preference for competition over monopoly, voluntarism over coercion, open systems over closed, unless a compelling case could be made to the contrary; and that understood their virtues not only in terms of efficiency, but of fairness, freedom and environmental stewardship."
Now, except for the last part (which is important but secondary here) this is all consistent with monetarism. In addition to all this, which seems garden-variety liberalism, we've seen in recent pieces a worry that Keynesian intervention will never result in the multipliers Harper/Ignatieff/Obama/Summers/Brown/Sarkozy/Merkel/Krugman/Stiglitz/et al. are praying for. Basically, as Coyne implicitly tells it, Harper's gonna take a bunch of money out back and burn it in a trash can so that inflation will rise and with it we'll get out of the liquidity trap. Problem is, for all the difference the money's going to do, we might as well let Obama and Brown do all the heavy lifting, as our money's going to disperse out into the world pretty quickly: here's a grand for renovations; go buy $300 of labour and $700 of foreign goods, why don't you? Also, the funds we raise to spend this money have to come from someone who will loan it to us, and hundreds of billions in deficits are hundreds of billions that can't be spent on, er, those loans everyone's saying the banks won't give to us that are strangling the economy. There are no free lunches, and in this Coyne's not wrong.
I think, in the end, this is Coyne's big thing. It explains why he's turned conservative while hating the conservatives: he thinks the leftward turn in the liberal party under Dion makes them ridiculous. With the green shift, he thought all the good it would do was eaten up by all sorts of targeted tax breaks and special funds that ended up making the whole thing useless. With the coalition, he thought that they were simply an undisciplined mob who couldn't be trusted with the treasury, insofar that each group wanted to spend more than the last. With the recent budget, he thought that basically, all the economists in the world were indeed right: we need good, disciplined, investment that will quickly intervene in the market slide and create long term value...does anybody at all think that happened here? Would it have been any better with Ignatieff, or, particularly, Dion/Layton?
If we see Ignatieff move to the fiscal centre or centre-right, then we should begin to see a general meeting of the minds between the Liberals and Coyne, as we saw in the late nineties. Then all the Tories will be saying he's a city-dwelling, latte-sipping communist, just as the Lib-blogs are calling him a shifty, heartless, Harper-apologist these days. If we are fair to the events of the time and Coyne's wider work, I think it's clear that neither "Liberal" or "Tory" really captures the person who is socially liberal but who thinks we need robust long term growth to fund a vibrant society.
Quick Thought
Jesse:
Think there'd be any traction to basically arguing that there's really no point in listening to anything Harper says? He says buy stocks; stocks plummet. He says no deficit; massive deficit. He says no senators; he appoints senators when it looks like he's on his way out. And so on, and so forth.
I suppose this is really a basic "can't trust him" / "hidden agenda" argument. But my vision for it would be to let Iggy let The Count side of him come out to play, and sort of just arrogantly say that it doesn't really matter what Harper promises; the Canadian people can't believe anything he says. Needle him with that a couple of times during the debates and see how he responds.
Wednesday, February 4
Coyne For Your Thoughts
Jesse:
And you should read Coyne's most recent. I think that might be something Cam will want to comment on.
The Vox Populi
Jesse:
Since someone's actually responded in the comments to something I wrote (and I had something long to say, another post on free voting!
In the comments for my laters "let MPs be MPs and not chumps" Jeffrey worries that allowing MPs to vote how they want will lead to regionalism. My response follows.
Is it regionalism, or is it their political beliefs and goals?
Newfoundland's provincial government thinks its getting screwed. Hence, its Premier is pushing the Liberals to oppose the budget on Nfld grounds. Nfld MPs either a) believe their province is getting screwed b) think the right political thing to do is to kowtow to Danny Williams or c) all of the above. Agreed?
So, the Liberal leader is letting them vote against the budget, because he's become convinced a) that they're right, so he wants to pass the budget but express disappointment in a tangible way in a region that's getting hosed b) that Danny Williams is scary or c) that saying now would be worse for party unity, or somesuch.
Both of the preceding paragraphs are, to me, acceptable political outcomes, and not something we should be freaking out about. They might not all be what they want, but I don't think they're a threat to the system.
Our Parliamentary system is premised on a government being able to maintain the confidence of the House in confidence votes. There's no reason why the government can't sometimes be supported by different slices of the House.
If the Liberal caucus felt that it could not afford to be fragmented, they would have forced Ignatieff to slap the Newfoundland caucus around. Presumably, they feel like they, too, might want to think for themselves some time.
Now, obviously, the theory here is that things get taken care of in caucus, and then a united front should be presented. But this means the "real" decisions are being taken in secret, and then the parties pretend to be in internal agreement. Why is this necessary for democracy?
Tuesday, February 3
Bad News Bears
Bill Casey stood up in the House today to denounce Conservative operatives (at least) who tried to get the RCMP to pursue him over what he says was $30 000 moved from his riding association account into a campaign account, then moved back to the riding association account when the Conservative Party head office decided that his riding association couldn't be allowed to choose its own candidate. And then leaked the information, whiting out all the names except for Casey's.
I don't know anything about this yet, but it could be a doozy.
Monday, February 2
Because "Defence" Is Easier To Chant?
Jesse:
Something I've probably mentioned before [ed: apparently I haven't, or can't find it. Hmm. Sometimes I get mixed up.] is the idea that we need to reframe issues, rather than play defence (in no sense did I think this up). But I think there's an opportunity here.
That opportunity? Newfoundland Liberals may vote against the budget. And Iggy's trying to push the same kind of message discipline Harper is.
Now, before I get all ratcheted up, message discipline is important. People need to be clear. And I 110% think that the "anonymous Liberal" crap (even though now we're seeing "anonymous Conservatives" since Prime Minister Harper's broken open the piggy back) has to stop. Reporters shouldn't report it; "aLs" shouldn't do it.
But I think there's a chance here to do one better than just imitating Harper (who was imitating Chrétien, American politicians, and probably that Australian guy he's hetero life partners with, anyway). My modest proposal is:
1) Quietly work on eliminating the anonymous crap
2) Change the frame instead of playing defence.
And how, you ask, do you do that? By attacking Harper for his message control, whilst judiciously opening up some channels for your MPs to publicly speak out on issues of concern to them. Ideally, you set some quiet ground rules for this: put your name to it; talk about how you support the leader; talk about how great it is that you're allowed to speak; make sure you push the new meme. And that meme is... Harper's an ogre, his MPs and ministers are chumps.
The Liberals can become the party of respectful dissent, of openness, and of the melting pot of ideas. Whenever the press tries to push the "internal dissent" lines, fight back, don't turtle (whilst, y'know, turtling a little bit to try to minimize the "harm". Why is there anything wrong, from a theoretical level, with people within a national party thinking different things? There isn't. Other countries (US, UK) tolerate a lot more dissent than we do. The problem comes if you accept the frame that this is bad, or weak, or whatnot. But process stories aren't what they used to be (Dion ran a basically flawless, if lousy, campaign which was almost entirely free of screwups, and he's PM now, right?). And changing the theme is crucial, as is coming up with something new (beyond liar, gross incompetent, and hidden agenda (not that those still shouldn't come up)) to take on Harper.
So, I think what has to be done is finding a way to frame dissent as a
strength:
1) The Harper Cons are a creepy monolith, the Iggy Liberals are strong
enough to have differences of opinion.
2) Are the Cons such sheep, or so insipid, that they actually agree
about everything?
3) Why would you elect a Conservative MP when they're never going to
speak out about your riding's issues?
Three other points on this topic, then I'll quit (Cam says we ramble on too long for "good blogging theorists", but tough!). First, I think the press will actually be attracted to this. They're all free speech-y anyway, and they push free speech in articles and editorials all the time. That's the real conflict of interest, not the so-called "liberal media bias". So put it to work for you. Editorials already mention how Harper's control is bad (I'm not finding you one, but I'm sure there is). Second, this might help attract candidates. I don't think a lot of successful people want to become MPs so that they can a) do what they're told and b) "do constituency work". They might, however, want to speak out. And third, you can put this to work for you.
This is where the Newfoundland stuff is great. Let them vote against the budget. Then send them out to let them sing your praises for allowing them to vote what they believe in. Then let them hammer any opponents in the next general by saying that Liberals can speak out for Newfoundland, but Cons won't be allowed to by big, bad, central Canada / Alberta (Harper). The same can be applied to Ontario, BC, Quebec, and so on (although I'd keep a closer eye on Quebec).
Hopefully this(if anyone ever listens, and, full disclosure here, I don't think Iggy reads my blog) becomes more than "doing what the premier wants", but there's some space for that, too.
Take a weakness; make it a strength. Take an opponents "strength", and turn it into a weakness. They should have a word for that (it's judo).
And, oh; it's the right thing to do anyway.
