HARRIS: Harper's Canada: The legacy of tyrants

[Oscar]

Stephen Harper’'s Canada: The legacy of tyrants

[ http://www.ipolitics.ca/2014/06/29/step ... f-tyrants/ ]

By Michael Harris | Jun 29, 2014 5:06 pm

The year 2015 will be a Rubicon election for Canada. That is the year that Canadians will have to choose between a national security state run by an autocratic cheerleader of the oil industry, and any semblance of a healthy, inclusive democracy – provided, of course, the opposition parties present that option. It is a matter of serious debate whether the Harper government’'s work can be undone, or whether he has created a new normal in the country'’s public life.

Stephen Harper will have been prime minister for almost 10 years, with three electoral victories under his belt, assuming he stays to face the people yet one more time. Only once has he won a majority, in the May 2011 general election. Just as when his nude portrait caused a minor sensation – the reclining emperor attended by minions bearing his Tim’s, after 2011, Canadians finally got to see Stephen Harper in the political buff It was revealing. Unlike his minority governments, where a murder of political crows flapped overhead waiting for the fatal misstep, after 2011 there was no vote Harper could not win, and no cabal in the Opposition ranks that could topple him.

A portion of the press became, if not Lyndon Johnson'’s geese, then amiable stenographers, the public less sceptical about a hidden agenda, and until recently, his own caucus more submissive than in the first two “Harper” governments. The real Stephen Harper could finally stand up, unbound and all but unopposed.

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