Government sources told the Canadian Press that Prime Minister Stephen Harper believes the Liberals are so desperate to avoid an election that they will roll over and accept a throne speech that describes Kyoto climate-change targets as unattainable.
If this is true, it will certainly put Opposition leader, Stephane Dion and the Liberals between a rock and a hard place with two unpalatable choices. Have an election that they are not prepared for and do not want or effectively abandoning their support on implementing the Kyoto Accord within the required timeframe by allowing the throne speech to pass?
I think the Conservatives need to be careful if they plan to use this approach. Dion's tenure as Liberal leader would certainly be severely damaged if he goes along, so he might just opt for an election.
An election over the Kyoto protocol might be the single rallying cry that may unite a Liberal party in disarray and cement Dion’s position as its leader. The environment is not one of the Conservative Party’s strong points, and a significant amount of voters view it as an extremely important issue and may become swayed by the propaganda that will certainly come from the opposition parties, so having an election on it is not a very prudent or pragmatic approach.
If the Conservatives do end up using this approach, they need to provide and communicate a very strong and clear message to Canadian voters. They need to spell out in financial and economic terms the implications of implementing Kyoto and how it will affect their daily lives. Otherwise the opposition will have a field day with this issue.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Tory throne speech to embarrass Liberals over Kyoto: report
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5 comments:
How reassuring to know that the government, from the Prime Minister down, governs this country and chooses policy purely on the basis of partisan advantage.
All tactics, no strategy. I wonder if little PM Harper has ever paused to consider WHY he wants to be in power, other than to not be the Liberals.
Policy wise, he is spending more than Liberals, lowering taxes more slowly than the Liberals, using the tax system to motivate (control) individual behaviour even more than Liberals, cutting one-off deals left right and centre to shore up political supoprt in regions of the country he needs more support.... generally betraying most if not all of his so-called principles in a lust for power.
And now apparently the Throne Speech is designed to embarrass the opposition - how statesmanlike! What a leader!
He behaves like a war-room hack.
Kind of sad.
It has been quite instructive to hear his chief guru, Tom Flanagan, talk about
Why would the opposition be embarrassed about Kyoto?
Oh, because, after 18 months of the opposition using Kyoto to hammer the Cons, the reality is, it's not worth having an election over, the opposition was just kidding, right ?...
The Kyoto war in parliament, was a big phoney stunt, lead by a big phoney, Dion.
Canadians are not stupid.
Asking them to blame PMSH for not reaching ghg targets in a short 18 month period, when,
in the previous 8 years, Liberals (Dion himself) watched ghg's soar out of control ... well Libs should be embarrassed.
Kind of sad listening to people who believe the tripe the person above has posted..did you ever stop to think that PM Harper, in order to get ANYTHING done in this parliament has to be 'partisan' ...(as if liberals are strangers to this practice..)
I really have to laugh at the notion you think he is betraying his principles in his 'lust' for power..(again a notion totally unknown to liberals..!)
What he is doing is positioning himself to hoist Dion onto his own petard, using his words and his inaction.You only cherry pick items to support your own partisan view of the conservative govt.
PM Harper is the most statesman like leader this country has had in a very long time, a breath of fresh air after decades of liberal rule..
What, Kursk, expecting one's Prime Minister to just once not play pure tactics with something? What a notion!
No, he should behave like the ugly Liberal Rat Pack and unaccomplished hacks like Pierre Poilievre - that is the sign of a statesman.
Engaging in domestic partisan battles outside our country? Can't remember the last PM of any stripe who did that -not Trudeau, Clark, Mulroney, Chretien (not sure about him - he was only mildly less partisan than Harper) and not Martin.
I guess this "statesmanlike" approach, particularly in international affairs, came thanks to his deep knowledge of and wealth of experience with international affairs that he developed the one time he traveled outside of Canada to an all-inclusive margarita station in Mexico.
To correct you, policy should actually be developed and designed to improve the lives of Canadians, not just to stick daggers in those who are your political opponents.
I am convinced that Harper's view is so myopic that he would not hesitate to pursue bad policy in order to injure an opponent. Hardly the mark of a statesman. But you don't care if he spends like an idiot and will defend anything he does - ecen if it is completely counter to all that conservatism is supposed to stand for - because he is "your guy".
Typical.
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