A More Conservative Canada?

On Tuesday, I noted that there was a new political landscape that necessitated new tactics for all of the parties in the upcoming year. Yesterday, several items caught my attention which seemed consistent with that theme.

Lawrence Martin's Globe column told a story of a "lost decade" for the Liberals and law and order, foreign policy, and free market sympathies that reflected a more Conservative Canada and an "imperilling" of the old Canadian consensus. In the National Post, Adam Daifallah wrote of "A record of Conservative achievement" in which he recounts a similar list, but notes Harper's most important achievement as "the way he changed official Canaidan discourse into one that is more politically conservative in nature."

Even the Liberals inadvertantly played to theme, releasing a list of 233 government appointees during the past year who were Conservative insiders, in most cases having donated to the Conservative party. The message clearly is that the broader machinery of government is being impacted by Conservatives. (I must note a certain irony in the Liberal release. Given the government makes about 3,000 appointments per year, finding only 233 with Conservative donor records actually makes the opposite point the Liberals headline in their release. Given that no allegations of incompetence were directed at any of the appointees, the implication is that simply donating to a political party disqualifies one from a political appointment.)

Not to beat a dead horse, but in our 2006 election analysis, Michael VanPelt and I noted that we were undergoing a period of significant change in Canada, a process that had started and would take a decade or so to sort through. I don't think the trends observed by Mr. Martin and Daifallah are indicative of any clear benchmark having been met -- in other words, this trend is still quite reversable and is hardly set in stone -- but it is an indication that Canada is continuing on a path that was in motion with the election of the Conservatives. I know that for many Conservatives, the journey is slow and causes them impatience. For some on the left, this is clearly a very worrisome trend that even elicits proposals that amount to "a radical subversion of democracy."

Interesting times indeed.,