Quote:
Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan
Well, you can make it about Dion if you like: he's an easy target, having been perhaps the most inept politician our political scene has witnessed since Kim Campbell.
But in the end, the opposition to the coalition was just shrill hand-wringing from Harper. The Westminster parliamentary system clearly authorizes coalitions, and a coalition government is always going to be just as legitimate as a weak minority government would be. The fact that we don't have a coalition right now is just a testament to Harper's inability to play nicely with others. Instead of all that hand-waving and silliness he engaged in during "coalitiongate," he should have tried to form a coalition of his own with the Liberals. If he had, we would now have a stable center-right government instead of this idiotic gridlock and constant hot-button posturing from all sides. Not to mention that such a coalition would instantly have had more legitimacy because a) the Liberals were leaderless at that moment anyway and b) they wouldn't have needed the Bloc.
Harper's flaw is that in spite of being a relatively shrewd operator politically, he's kind of a moron when it comes to governance--that is, he's unable to perceive the moment when it is time to stop grandstanding and start governing. In my view, that's what will keep him from ever being remembered as a great, or even a good prime minister. It's too bad--he is a fairly bright guy otherwise, though a bit of a charisma vacuum.
|
I think that a big part of why the proposed Liberal-NDP coalition was met with such backlash is that Canadians just don't have any experience with them. It's all well and good to say that they're a perfectly legitimate way of forming a government given the system we have in Canada, but I think the way people reacted shows that they're either just not that well acquainted with the idea of coalitions, or reject it outright. There has been a great deal of discussion among Canada's political academics (the book
Parliamentary Democracy in Crisis is actually a great read for anyone interested in the possible ramifications of the Prorogation/Coalition episode and pretty well anything related to it) about how it's such a shame and near incomprehensible that the Canadian electorate reacted so negatively to the coalition idea, but what are they supposed to think? It's something that the average Canadian has no knowledge of or experience with.
As for your point about Harper trying to form a coalition with the Liberals, I agree that it should have been explored. But the thing I've noticed is that Canadians seem much more open to the idea of a minority government who tries to find support in the House on an issue-by-issue basis by looking to the opposition parties, instead of having everything predetermined at the get-go. I suppose the theory is that it keeps everyone honest, because it forces everyone to work together (ideally) at least once.
Now, it's obvious that that hasn't exactly been happening in recent memory. Like I said, I agree with you that a coalition might be much more beneficial to Canada than yet another minority government. I take issue with the fact that Canadians rejected the Lib-NDP coalition just because of Harper; I think Canada's inexperience with even the idea of a coalition government is much more the reason.