WHAT A difference a month makes. The past six weeks have been a blessed relief from the overheated political drama that was played out day after day on Parliament Hill in November and early December 2008.
Every day brought more over-the-top developments.
First, the Liberals under Stéphane Dion ran a disastrous election campaign, polled their lowest popular vote ever and none-too-subtly told Dion to walk the plank.
Then, the guessing game of prominent Liberals to replace him at a May convention entertained us.
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Then, the Conservatives with a strengthened but still minority government overplayed their hand, assuming the Liberals were weak and leaderless and ready to roll over. A Nov. 27 fiscal update turned out to be mainly a partisan attempt by the Tories to permanently cripple the opposition.
Then came the highly suspect decision by the Liberals, NDP and Bloc Québécois to form a coalition government featuring Dion as prime minister, New Democrats holding six cabinet seats and the BQ propping them up.
They would defeat the government Dec. 1 and ask to be given the chance to govern without an election.
The Conservatives panicked, delayed the vote by a week and then convinced the governor general to delay the vote for another seven weeks by adjourning Parliament until a budget could be presented Jan. 27.
Conservative critics and some constitutional experts said it was an illegitimate ruse to avoid losing power but it happened and Canadians who care about such things had a chance to take a relaxant and calm down.
Since then, almost deafening silence has prevailed.
Prime minister Stephen Harper, an anti-government conservative, presumably has spent the time keeping his head down and reading the writings of John Maynard Keynes, a British economist who argued in the 1920s and 1930s that governments should spend when the economy slumps and repay debt when the economy soars.
Harper, not known for his belief in government spending while overseeing almost three years of significant spending increases, is about to unleash the biggest deficit since Brian Mulroney.
Recent converts, particularly if they converted for expediency, rarely do a good job of implementing a philosophy they instinctively reject. We’ll see.
Then there is Michael Ignatieff, who was chosen to replace hapless Dion and then almost immediately went underground, reportedly finishing a family memoir.
It would have seemed logical that he would use his first six weeks as Liberal leader to brand himself with Canadians as an alternative prime minister.
Instead, he kept out of sight until a tour in mid-January, assuming that the mere presence of a new Liberal leader would be welcomed. Polls did bump up but other than his unease about being part of a coalition government, we know little of his plans.
Then there is NDP leader Jack Layton, who came as close as he likely ever will in December to snagging a cabinet post.
Barring another massive Conservative miscalculation Jan. 27, the idea of a coalition overthrow of the Conservatives seems all but dead. So imagine a voter’s surprise to receive a flyer from an NDP MP laying out all the things a coalition government will do once it takes power. Who knew?
