In his latest Party Power Index, war, terrorism and security have now replaced health-care as the second most important issue amongst Canadians.
For a lot of reasons, this boggles the mind.
There is more. According to several surveys, including the most recent Forum Research poll, the long-held Trudeau lead over the Conservatives for 19 consecutive months has come to an end. It is now a statistical dead heat between support for Trudeau and Harper; 36 to 33 per cent respectively, or in pollster-speak, within the margin of error, a tie.
That blows What circuits might be left in the brain after seeing health care supplanted by war and security on the national list of priorities.
How could this be? Pollster Lorne Bozinoff attributes this remarkable teeter-tottering of public opinion to the fact that Canada is again at war, as it has been for almost all of Harper’s tenure as prime minister.
“Opposition leaders always have difficulty gaining traction in wartime, there’s little they can disagree on without seeming unpatriotic or insufficiently supportive of the troops,” Lorne Bozinoff of Forum Research said.
Politicians of all stripes have long known that external enemies, especially ones you are at war against, have a way of silencing internal critics. Here’s how the head of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Goering, put it when he stood trial at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity:
“Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger…it works the same in any country.”
Goering pointed out that his axiom was valid in fascist and communist dictatorships, as well as parliamentary democracies. In the first blush of war, the mere decision to take up arms gives a political advantage to the incumbent. People don’t like criticizing their leaders during a time of perceived national threat.
Afterwards, it is a very different matter, as Winston Churchill found out. Once Europe was cleared of Nazis, the British public wanted automobiles, washing machines, and nylon stockings, not cigar-chomping jingoists set on invading the Soviet Union and giving the little guy war without end.
If war makes the incumbent temporarily more popular, it suggests opponents of war lose support – at least they do when the casus belli is reduced to indisputably gallant motives: war to allow little girls to go to school; war to keep Christians from being slaughtered on lonely mountain-tops in far-off places; war to keep fanatics from beheading aid workers, missionaries and even children….
Since both the Liberals and the NDP have opposed the current war in Iraq from the get-go, it is a corollary to Bozinoff’s analysis that their support would slip while the PM’s rose. I would like to give this phenomenon a name; disaster democracy.
It is a powerful proposition, since it can take over the political landscape in a heartbeat, erasing the grimiest of government records.
When Cpl. Nathan Cirillo was gunned down at the national war memorial on Oct. 22, Prime Minister Stephen Harper immediately connected his killer to radical Islam and terrorism. Long before any facts were in, Harper claimed that all Canadians had been attacked by the actions of Michael Zehaf-Bibeau. There was never any talk from the PM about Zehaf-Bibeau’s mental instability or addiction to crack cocaine. His mother and Cpl. Cirillo’s girlfriend were left to develop that side of the debate on the fringes of the alternative media.
The government’s narrative was immediately picked up and amplified by the CBC. The news coverage on the day of the shooting, and over the subsequent days of fear and grief that followed, looked like a pep rally for the PM’s version of events.
Just recently, the CBC ran a piece without a byline citing an unnamed source claiming that Zehaf-Bibeau had shown extremist videos to fellow workers in British Columbia. The piece, somewhat awkwardly, also said that this new and anonymous information cast doubt on the image of Zehaf-Bibeau as a drug-addled street loser in need of mental health assistance. Hmmm.
In the wake of the terrible events in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu and Ottawa, the prime minister’s stagnation in the polls came to a sudden end. Almost instantly, disaster democracy gave his popularity a five-per-cent boost in the polls. That is approximately what political parties can expect after a full-fledged leadership convention. It also boosted public support for Harper’s war in Iraq, which shows every sign of leading to boots on the ground there – and now perhaps also engagement in Syria.
Admittedly, the prime minister had been dealt a hand he could play to the hilt with plausibility and great affect. After all, even though he came to his conclusion that Zehaf-Bibeau was a terrorist before the facts had been gathered, the shooter had killed a man in uniform and then attacked the seat of government in Canada – the Parliament Buildings. Surely it was not unreasonable to characterize such a man as a terrorist?
Understood, but then there is this mystery to explain. If Michael Zehaf-Bibeau had committed a terrorist act in Ottawa by attacking important symbols of Canadian authority and governance, then what about the man known to the public only as “GG” who is currently going through the court process in Calgary?
GG is a former Canadian military intelligence officer — hence the secret name — who was planning to blow up a downtown skyscraper. It turns out that the skyscraper in question, the Bantrel Tower at 700 Sixth Avenue in Calgary, also housed a Veterans Affairs Office. GG had sought help from that office because he was “wound up very, very tight.”
He was looking for compensation for health care expenses incurred while still in the military. He was convinced that an H1N1 flu shot he had been given in the Forces had led to his contracting multiple sclerosis. Unsatisfied with the response he received from the Veterans Centre, GG gathered weapons, firearms and explosives and apparently planned to blow up the building that housed it.
When they arrested him, authorities also found a detailed map of the Bantrel Tower he intended to bomb. Oddly, though this was a major attack on a government installation in which the casualties would have been significant, GG faces no charges under Ottawa’s terrorist legislation.
When Justin Bourque shot down five Mounties in Moncton earlier this year, killing three of them, he specifically said he was out to kill government officials and wanted to start a revolution. Although he also mused about blowing up gas stations, he faced no terrorist charges arising out of his murderous rampage against authority.
Michael Zehaf-Bibeau and Martin Couture-Rouleau, who murdered Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent, should be killing cousins of Justin Bourque and the man known as GG. All of the them struck out against representatives of the government of Canada, or planned to in their own very violent ways.
Yet Stephen Harper weighed in on only two of the cases, Zehaf-Bibeau and Couture-Rouleau, whom he deemed to be terrorists. He had nothing to say about Bourque or the man known as GG, though their crimes and planned crimes (GG has entered a guilty plea on three charges) were similar strikes against the government and authority. The question is why?
Glenn Greenwald, the man in charge of the Edward Snowden Archive, was recently in Ottawa and was asked by journalist Jesse Brown how the word “terrorist” could be defined. Greenwald replied that it didn’t seem to be just about what a person did, but what they believed. Timothy McVeigh was a mass killer, Omar Khadr was a terrorist. A terrorist was a Muslim who acted out violently
For the record, Zehaf-Bibeau and Couture were Muslims, while Bourque and GG were not.
In the world of disaster democracy, the most important thing in national politics may turn out to be the one that happens just before the next election.
Original Article
Source: ipolitics.ca/
Author: Michael Harris
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