Minority Report: Ugh.

Blogger.com has been really dodgy of late. Hope this one works.

Okay, the sole item on the agenda: should we have an election?
Polls show the Conservatives would win a minority if a vote was held, umm, three minutes ago. Ask us again in three minutes.
As the Gomery allegations mount, Martin is playing the only card he can: those were yesterday's Liberals, those dirty, mucky, icky, sucky pigs sucking at the unity titty.
That card might have some value if (a) Martin wasn't Finance Minister for most of the duration of the sponsorship mess and (b) he hadn't cheered Chretien when the latter testified at the Gomery inquiry.
What was with that, anyway? If you believe the Machiavellian machinations of the last, oh, ten years, Chretien and Martin get along about as well as vampires and Holy Crosses. So why the hell was P.M. applauding and praising the former PM for his brazen and contemptuous spectacle in court?
No, Martin is neck-deep in the ooze and sinking, fast. Harper has the golden opportunity to step on his head, and lo and behold, here come Mike Harris and Preston Manning, throwing Martin a lifeline.
Manning and Harris made the awful, and oh-so-Canadian error, of observing publicly that our health care system is broken. We all know that's true, but you're not allowed to say it. If you dare so much as whisper it, you obviously want all the poor people to die in the streets. Even mentioning public-private partnerships will seal your doom. The average Ontario voter will cheerfully continue paying for health care until he has no take home pay at all. At that point, he might complain, but just as likely he'll go and live in a hospital.
If I was Stephen Harper, I'd put duct tape over the lips of every Conservative Party member, and offer to take it off when the polls close. Once elected, I would immediately start a comprehensive review--an audit, if you will--to determine where all the health care money's going. I'd ask Canadians for their input. And I'd pledge repeatedly--making a recording of my voice doing so, if necessary, not to allow low-income Canadians to be deprived of care.

I don't think it'd do any good. Ontario remains convinced that Stephen Harper has a hidden agenda. The irony is that they're right: Stephen Harper's hidden agenda is to save the Canadian health care system. But hell, he's got to try. If the Liberals can get away with Adscam, the rest of the parties might as well just fold up. We'll declare Paul Martin King in Perpetuity.

I disagree with Harper's stance on same-sex marriage. He favours a "separate but equal" civil union: I figure if the civil union is entirely equal to marriage, why not call it marriage? I don't think gays joining into such things will refer to themselves as "civilly unionated", do you?
That said, a majority of Canadians actually prefer Harper's design. They see it as a compromise. And it's a compromise I can live with. If Harper manages, again, to keep his bigots silent, he should be able to ride this issue all the way to 24 Sussex.

You may think I'm nuts. You may believe that Stephen Harper is the devil incarnate; that you wouldn't vote Conservative if your life depended on it. That's fine. That's more than fine. Vote NDP, then. Jack Layton's party has made fantastic gains in the last few months and it's not inconceivable that they'd finish ahead of the Liberals in the polls. They'd make a damn fine Official Opposition and they'd hold Harper to account.

It's been said, ad scamium, that the Canadian public doesn't want an election right now. I can't think of a better time for one. Increasingly, it's looking like a June campaign. In that election, if and when it comes, I urge you to vote. I urge you to urge everyone you know to vote. I urge you to urge everyone you know to urge everyone they know to vote. Vote your fancy.

Just as long as your fancy's not Liberal.