Why Stephen Harper is going to lose the upcoming election
Robert Peffers
By James Laxer
September 13, 2009
Stephen Harper's Conservative government will go down to defeat in the
election that is almost certain to take place this fall for one very
solid reason, his party is going to lose too many seats in Ontario and
Quebec for it to hang on to power.
Whatever pretty pictures the prime minister and his ministers are
trying to paint about the economy, Ontario is deeply in the grip of
the recession, with an enormous number of people without jobs,
families facing uncertainty and mounting debts, and communities
watching key productive facilities shut down. Although the mainstream
media doesn't get it, there is a great deal of pain and anxiety out
there as Ontario's manufacturing sector is being brutally downsized.
Ontario's misery has spread far beyond the communities that have
housed the major manufacturing plants and is felt right across the
GTA.
Ontario is no mood to vote for a government that has never understood
the basics of the province's economy, a government that has repeatedly
turned up its nose at the very idea of doing anything to help out. As
soon as the writs are dropped, the sentiments of Ontarians will become
clear even to those covering the campaign for the networks and the
newspapers.
In Quebec, the prospects for the Conservatives are equally bleak. Last
fall, faced with the prospect of a Liberal-NDP coalition government
that would be supported on confidence votes by the Bloc, Stephen
Harper mounted a hysterical attack on the very idea of a government
being propped up by separatists, something he has done many times
himself since taking office in 2006. Harper's vitriol called into
question the very legitimacy of the MPs Quebeckers have elected,
treating these representatives as second-class beings who should have
no say in the governing of the country.
Harper's assault on Quebeckers re-opened the deepest wounds in
Confederation. What he did has not been lost on the voters of Quebec
who now see him as a political leader who has nothing but contempt for
them. His party is doomed in Quebec this time.
In the 2008 election, the Conservatives won 51 seats in Ontario and 10
in Quebec. This time, Conservative seats will fall like bowling pins
in Central Canada. Expect Conservative losses as well in British
Columbia and New Brunswick.
Once the campaign gets underway, the colossal bone headedness of the
Harper government is going to do it in. Consider for instance the
record of Finance Minister Jim Flaherty who once said he couldn't
understand why businesses would want to locate in Ontario, his home
province. This is the finance minister who nine days after last year's
federal election, on October 23, said this in a speech on the economy:
"Our economic fundamentals are the envy of the G7. We run balanced
budgets here.....As I say, other nations are envious of our
situation."
Here is how Flaherty concluded his speech: "Let me conclude by
repeating that our economy has solid economic fundamentals, and
Canadians can take some pride in that. I can assure you that our
budget will remain balanced. We do have the strongest economic
fundamentals in the G7. I can also assure you that our spending will
be controlled."
Today, the man who could not foresee a deficit, even after the stock
market had crashed and the global economy was grinding to a halt, was
forecasting a deficit for this year of just under $56 billion with
large deficits ahead until the middle of the next decade.
Were it not for the utter weakness of his caucus, it is inexplicable
that Stephen Harper would keep a proven incompetent like Flaherty at
the helm of the Finance Department.
The Conservatives will do everything they can during the campaign to
turn the spotlight away from their own appalling record. In the
meantime, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they are trying to
fashion a deal with the "separatists" to stave off their moment of
reckoning.