Harper's Greatest Sin

o.canada.com

               I make no secret about my opinions on the government of Stephen Harper. He’s the worst Canadian prime minister in history. Saying something, given that recent memory stretches past the bumbling Joe Clark and John Turner, the there-when-the-country-tired-of-the-brand defeatism of Kim Campbell and Paul Martin, or the arrogant and despotic Chrétien, Mulroney, and Trudeau. How bad Harper is stretches past these of recent memory, past Bennett, Meighen, all the way to Sir John A.

    Bastards and boneheads, liars, crooks, men (and a woman) remembered sometimes for their deserving faults, sometimes undeservedly for being much more than they were.

                But Stephen Harper will be remembered as the worst. He is the lowest point the PMO has ever reached, and God help us he may have put us on a path of no return.

                His list of wrongs is great. The muffling of government scientists, the selling off of natural resources, the end of transparency, the backroom deals of which the Duffy trial is just a hint, the ugly and churlish attack ads, the turning of a political party into a one-man power trip, the turning of the PMO into an all-encompassing power hub, the neutering of any free-thinking MPs, the ignoring that he is a prime minister, not a US president; all this while assuming his supporters are too blind, too zealous, or too uninformed about Canadian democracy to see anything wrong here. This is a short list of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s wrongs, but none of these is the worst.

                Harper’s greatest sin is how masterfully he has turned us against each other.

                He came into power at a perfect time for his brand of politics. George W. Bush had convinced much of America that there was a snake under every rock, and we were learning to fire off any opinion we liked behind a shield of online anonymity. The Bush era taught us that you can say anything no matter how ludicrous and you were only accountable for it if you allowed yourself to be. Enter Stevie Harper.

                It was all there when he became leader of the newly-minted Conservative Party of Canada. Harper had learned that his old Reform brand of politicking (the one that saw him take out full page anti-gay [read: hate] ads in western newspapers) was too polarizing. The only consistent motivation he has shown in his career is to gain and retain power. He has seen that the best way to paint yourself as the hero is to always have a villain.

                I’ll never forget a shot in Macleans just prior to the 2006 election showing a self-satisfied Harper in his seat as the leader of the Official Opposition, presumably having just mic-dropped on poor, hapless Paul Martin. (Perhaps he asked how a senior staffer in the PMO could possibly sign off on a giant cheque unbeknownst to the prime minister, say.) All around him, his young Reformed neo-cons waved and hooted. One wild-eyed MP was gesturing “Come at me, bro,” across to someone in the government.

                If you’re not with him, you’re against him. Liberals and socialists and environmentalists and scientists and terrorists are the enemy. Harper is all that stands up to that enemy.

                Much has been made of Harper’s carefully-crafted image, his branding of his party and of the government of this country, his control of every aspect of his administration, his micromanaging of everything that happens in the PMO (with the exception of whatever it is Nigel Wright does with his cheque book). There is no room for dissenting opinions in his party, and his relationship with the media and the voting public fluctuates between the mysterious and the contemptuous.

                But what hasn’t been said enough is how carefully he’s crafted the image of his foes. Harper has been prime minister for almost a decade and has very few discernible policies—brutalizing criminals and attempting to turn Canada into a police state the rare exceptions—to show for it. Where he excels is at attacking fault in his opponents, real or imagined. His entire mode of campaign and governance is summed up in the outline of his attack ads: petty, inaccurate, misleading. By going after shortcomings he avoids any approach to his own. The best defense is a good offensive and his office has been constantly offensive.

                It’s trickled down to the rest of us. Never in my life have people north of the 49^th so defined themselves and their “enemies” by their political affiliation. Support of parties and leaders is as passionate and as illogical as backing a sports team. Harper has rewritten if not totally erased the democratic process by trying to erase the concept of the swing voter. Everyone must choose a side or be relegated to a side if they refuse to pick themselves. Trenches have been dug by supporters and opponents alike. It’s all about what side you’re on, forget how multi-faceted the issues.

                It’s not surprising that his administration has paralleled the rise of social media as our main form of expressing opinion. Look at any political debate on Facebook or Twitter, any comments section of an online news story, and you see people being absolutely awful to each other. Something about the shield of anonymity or at least the allowance for knee-jerk pettiness provided when facing off against a digital face rather than a fleshy one has made us nasty, and it’s suited Harper’s aims just fine.

                Our parliament has become a ridiculous thing to watch. Childish, a caricature of government. It’s a comedian’s punch line summing up politicians in general. Shouting, pointing, with absolutely no intelligent debate. It’s all about partisanship. It is all parties and all MPs involved, but it’s the work of Stephen Harper.

Even in Trudeau and Chrétien’s arrogance, Clark’s flustered interjections, there was more respect for fellow Canadians than this. Hell, even oily Mulroney said “sir” when he called John Turner out. Not so under Harper. It’s not about governing, it’s about winning. Having the power to lead but not doing any real discernible leading.

This is Harper’s greatest sin. Whether his enemies are liberals, socialists, terrorists, or those he simply labels as such, he defines himself by his attacks on them, and so defines the Canadian people by this as well.

His legacy will be the institutions he’s destroyed. Our public parks, our public broadcaster, our lakes and rivers, our economy, our national image, the dignity of our veterans—all sins. But the lasting damage done by Stephen Harper will be his encouragement and exploitation of our indecency.