Thursday, November 06, 2003

SEGAL ON CONSERVATISM; I BEG TO DIFFER

Hugh Segal has a comment piece in today's Globe and Mail on what he thinks the new Conservative Party is all about. For some reason the article is not on-line but I'll point out all the parts I want to respond to.

He begins by saying,
The Conservative Party of Canada is about democracy and about choice.

It seems to me that turning two parties into one is actually shrinking the amount of choice available and that if the Canadian electorate really wanted to eliminate one or both of these parties they would have stopped voting for them. If they wanted them to unite it seems there would not be so much opposition to the merger, but Segal quickly moves on.

It is about building the capacity to challenge those Liberals who see perpetual government as their right.

So this is what it's really about. Fine.

It is about a party where those Canadians not part of the politically correct centrist mainstream can feel comfortable.

Umm... I hate to tell you Mr. Segal but those "centrist Canadians" are most Canadians. If you do not at least try to appeal to these people you are never going "to challenge those Liberals..."

Segal then goes on for a while saying the new party is for people who believe that:

the prospect of changing the definition of both marriage and illegal drugs in the same quarter of 2003 may be a litte over the top.
and
people who wonder why Americans have mortgage-interest deductibility while Canadians do not

Basically a whole bunch of policy rhetoric I disagree whith, we'll leave it at that. Then,

[the party is for people] who wonder why...America's public sector now spends more per capita on health care than do all of Canada's "universal health care" goverments.

Yet every Canadian has access to health care while some 43.6 million Americans do not. Could Canada be getting better service for less money? Shocking.

Then, he asserts our election system, "only really counts those who voted for the winning candidate."

What he means is that only those candidates who win their ridings actually get to represent their riding, which, I think, is how the system is supposed to work. Then,

It is for people who believe that smart focused government is of more value than the large, sloppy and unfocused variety.

Ignore the fact that his parallel structure is not quite parallel. This is code for more efficient, smaller government. Democracy was never supposed to be efficient, it works best when it is not. Government is the tool of a democratic citizenry, less government means less democracy. Segal is arguing for greater constraints on our democracy.

Then comes this little bit of historical interpretation,

when Conservatives consolidated under such leaders as Sir John A. Macdonald, Brian Mulroney or John Diefenbaker, we have had a competitive democracy and the reality of government change. When the Conservatives have fragmented, the Liberals have had a free ride.

Segal believes that only when Conservatives have been in power has our democracy truly been competitive. Whenever Liberals have won it was because of conservative fragmentation creating a free ride. I guess Sir Wilfred Lauriers three majority governments where just luck, and Mackenzie King's four majorities were the result of fortunate coincidene, and Pierre Trudeaus 15 years in office had nothing to do with his appeal to Canadians, just like Jean Chretiens success has nothing to do with his political skill. Its those noble and stoic Conservatives who have been the real champions of Canada.

To conclude he cites the governments of Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, Benjamin Diraeli, Brian Mulroney and Bill Davis, saying "some of the most successful partisan organizations in history had vast differences of opinion within. Leadership and a sense of common cause and the discipline of power... kept these organizations cohesive and focused. Which is the primary duty for conservatives today."

At last, I could not agree more. Except I think this speaks to the point I was just making above. The history of Canada has shown that it has been Liberals who have had this "discipline of power" and and ability to lead, while Conservatives for the most part have not.

What are the chances that this "new" party led by (who?) is going to turn out to be one of those historic exceptions?

Posted by Matthew @ 8:25 p.m.