Conservatives Pushing Forward With Cuts to Democracy

According to Norman Spector, the Conservative attempt to repeal democracy (and thanks to Devin Johnston for that wonderful phrase) will be put to a vote before the scheduled rising of the House of Commons on Dec. 12. The Conservatives are trying to take advantage of the short time frame since the last election to push through this assault on democracy.

Is this supposed to be yet another example of Stephen Harper's ability as a brilliant political tactician? He has forced the opposition parties into a corner, from which there is no escaping. This policy would cripple the NDP and finish the Liberals and BQ. No matter that it is confidence, they cannot vote for this, they cannot let it pass.

Harper is taking an awful risk with this proposal. He is gambling that:

1. The opposition parties don't have the guts to bring his government down over this; and
2. The Governor General wont risk a repeat of the King-Byng Affair by refusing him dissolution and giving the Liberals a chance to govern with the support of the NDP and BQ.

This is a bad gamble. This is an existential threat for the opposition parties. They would rather fight another election on this issue than face the political extinction that would come from allowing this measure to go through. Further, the fact that it will have been two months since last election (at the most) will disincline the Governor General to dissolve Parliament yet again. The Conservatives could face the prospect of a Liberal-led coalition government ruling with the support of the BQ.

If the opposition parties find some steel in their spines and fight this, they may force the government to back down and remove it from the economic update. That is the best possible result at this point, because we don't need a constitutional crisis at the same time as an economic crisis.

I encourage everyone who reads this to get in touch with their MP as I have done to let MPs know that this is not on, and that Canadians support public election financing, and that we support democracy.

Update: Talk of a coalition government is swirling around Parliament Hill in the wake of this plan. I will be very interested to see what comes out of this, since the government could fall on an unrelated Ways and Means motion as early as tomorrow.

Days Remaining in Bush Presidency: 55