Monday, December 1, 2008

What To Do Now

David Frum has some interesting ideas of the future of the political landscape.  I personally do not see a way around the government falling in the House.  So the obvious question is this: What is the best course of action in light of recent events?

The Conservatives are going to have to face the music at some point or another and the opposition sound pretty adamant in voting no confidence.  In this scenario, sooner is better than later.  No good will come out of whatever happens in the next few weeks so the emphasis should be on the long term.  So I say face the music on Monday and roll with the punches.  Frum is right, whoever comes out of this the winner will lose hard down the line.  To find the silver lining in this, it is quite probable that Dion would never even see the inside of 24 sussex due to the fact that the National Capital Commission will put up quite the fight to keep him out for renovations.  In the meantime, the Harpers move to Stornoway while the PM's residence gets modernized.  Harper has the bonus advantage of accusing Dion of using taxpayer money to better his living situation when Harper had refused.  Then as the coalition inevitably self destructs over taxes, afghanistan or shoveling Quebec cash, we are back at an election.  Except this time, Canadians will be pissed and Stephen Harper will be able to articulate exactly how the coalition has utterly screwed us, the donation money from Western Canada will be massive because lets face it, life wont be great with this prospective government.  The election will be a lock and there is a good chance that it will end in the Conservative majority that Canada needs.  Harper moves back into a fully renovated home while the Liberals probably enter into another leadership contest(at that point I will wonder whether they do this for fun).  Because after this is all over, no one is going to want to be the leader of that party.
   So there it is, the PM should opt for short term pain for long term gain.  Hell, thats basically a conservative principle in itself.

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