Tuesday, October 25
"I don't need a book to tell me Chretien was a..."
(My latest Catholic Register column, about Paul Tun's book, Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal
)
"Why Catholics vote Liberal is still largely a mystery, at least for me. I propose the creation of a special prize for the individual or team that solves the mystery."
-- André Blais, president of the Canadian Political Science Association
In August, the Catholic Register ran an article about Catholic Canadians' baffling habit of voting Liberal, in spite of the party's pro-abortion, pro-same sex "marriage" platform. According to the article, "On average, Catholics in Ontario and Atlantic Canada since 1965 have been 18 per cent more likely than non-Catholics to vote Liberal. The Catholic tendency to vote Liberal in western Canada is a little less pronounced, but still significant with Prairie and British Columbia Catholics 12 per cent more likely to vote Liberal than the alternatives."
And this tendency goes back generations: "37 per cent of Catholics interviewed since 1965 said they think of themselves as Liberals, as opposed to only 21 per cent of non-Catholics. Blais says that pattern hasn't changed over 40 years. Nor is it attributable to Catholic ethnicity or immigration patterns."
Paul Tuns is perfectly positioned to win Blais' proposed prize one of these days. The editor in chief of The Interim, Tuns is a Catholic conservative, but he's not a party hack or an ideologue. And Tuns knows more about the corrupt Liberal Chrétien government than almost anyone else does. Or cares to, apparently.
Chrétien won three elections, in spite of a record that makes it look like the Prime Minister's Office was guided less by The Red Book than by The Governor General's Bunny Hop. Tuns' explanations of AdScam, the denial of Lord Black's peerage, Shawinigate -- and how a $2-million gun registry ended up costing $2-billion -- are far more digestible than those I read in the newspapers (or tried to). This alone makes this book a worthwhile investment.
Yet despite Chrétien's scandal plagued record, the Liberals remain Canada's "Natural Governing Party". "They have governed Canada for 80 of the past 108 years, a record unequalled either by the Mexico Party of the Institutional Revolutionary or by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union." Tuns adds that the "Chrétien Liberals interpreted the historical fact of the party's electoral dominance, especially the period from 1993-2003, as proof of its almost divinely-ordained dominance in Canadian politics." And Chrétien didn't seem to desire power as a means to an end, but as an end in itself.
"If you recall the decade in which Jean Chrétien held power, what comes to mind?" asks Tuns. "You would be hard pressed to name any significant new policy initiatives or grand visions that animated the government's actions. (...) Yet despite what was either incorrigible corruption or demonstrable incompetence, Canadian voters re-elected the Liberal government twice. Why?"
The answer is elusive, because the facts of Canadian political life are so paradoxical. We have a de facto "one party system", but also three other major parties that split alternative votes to the winds.
Tuns offers numerous explanations for Liberal hegemony: the Liberals "were perceived to be better than the alternatives;" given the choice between Stockwell Day's "scary" Christianity and Chrétien's sleaze, voters chose sleaze because it was "familiar and predictable." Canadians had "low expectations," says Tuns, and just wanted some "peace" after the Trudeau and Mulroney years. They fell for Chrétien's "little guy from Shawinigan" image even though he'd been a career politician for decades.
None of this is terribly flattering stuff. Tuns is too polite to spell out the obvious conclusion. Canadians, Catholic or not, are shockingly apathetic. They're happy as long as that good old "free" "health" "care" (more accurately described as "costly death rationing") keeps dribbling down the rusty old pipe, and they can feel smugly superior to their "stupid" American neighbours.
At a recent gathering of my fellow political junkies, Tuns' book came up in conversation. One partygoer opined, "I don't need a book to tell me Chrétien was a jerk" (although not in those words). Perhaps not, but it would seem all too clear that most Canadians do. Jean Chrétien: A Legacy of Scandal is the obvious choice.
So, Professor Blais, my answer to your puzzle is one word: apathy. What do I win? A Green Card would be nice.
)"Why Catholics vote Liberal is still largely a mystery, at least for me. I propose the creation of a special prize for the individual or team that solves the mystery."
-- André Blais, president of the Canadian Political Science Association
In August, the Catholic Register ran an article about Catholic Canadians' baffling habit of voting Liberal, in spite of the party's pro-abortion, pro-same sex "marriage" platform. According to the article, "On average, Catholics in Ontario and Atlantic Canada since 1965 have been 18 per cent more likely than non-Catholics to vote Liberal. The Catholic tendency to vote Liberal in western Canada is a little less pronounced, but still significant with Prairie and British Columbia Catholics 12 per cent more likely to vote Liberal than the alternatives."
And this tendency goes back generations: "37 per cent of Catholics interviewed since 1965 said they think of themselves as Liberals, as opposed to only 21 per cent of non-Catholics. Blais says that pattern hasn't changed over 40 years. Nor is it attributable to Catholic ethnicity or immigration patterns."
Paul Tuns is perfectly positioned to win Blais' proposed prize one of these days. The editor in chief of The Interim, Tuns is a Catholic conservative, but he's not a party hack or an ideologue. And Tuns knows more about the corrupt Liberal Chrétien government than almost anyone else does. Or cares to, apparently.
Chrétien won three elections, in spite of a record that makes it look like the Prime Minister's Office was guided less by The Red Book than by The Governor General's Bunny Hop. Tuns' explanations of AdScam, the denial of Lord Black's peerage, Shawinigate -- and how a $2-million gun registry ended up costing $2-billion -- are far more digestible than those I read in the newspapers (or tried to). This alone makes this book a worthwhile investment.
Yet despite Chrétien's scandal plagued record, the Liberals remain Canada's "Natural Governing Party". "They have governed Canada for 80 of the past 108 years, a record unequalled either by the Mexico Party of the Institutional Revolutionary or by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union." Tuns adds that the "Chrétien Liberals interpreted the historical fact of the party's electoral dominance, especially the period from 1993-2003, as proof of its almost divinely-ordained dominance in Canadian politics." And Chrétien didn't seem to desire power as a means to an end, but as an end in itself.
"If you recall the decade in which Jean Chrétien held power, what comes to mind?" asks Tuns. "You would be hard pressed to name any significant new policy initiatives or grand visions that animated the government's actions. (...) Yet despite what was either incorrigible corruption or demonstrable incompetence, Canadian voters re-elected the Liberal government twice. Why?"
The answer is elusive, because the facts of Canadian political life are so paradoxical. We have a de facto "one party system", but also three other major parties that split alternative votes to the winds.
Tuns offers numerous explanations for Liberal hegemony: the Liberals "were perceived to be better than the alternatives;" given the choice between Stockwell Day's "scary" Christianity and Chrétien's sleaze, voters chose sleaze because it was "familiar and predictable." Canadians had "low expectations," says Tuns, and just wanted some "peace" after the Trudeau and Mulroney years. They fell for Chrétien's "little guy from Shawinigan" image even though he'd been a career politician for decades.
None of this is terribly flattering stuff. Tuns is too polite to spell out the obvious conclusion. Canadians, Catholic or not, are shockingly apathetic. They're happy as long as that good old "free" "health" "care" (more accurately described as "costly death rationing") keeps dribbling down the rusty old pipe, and they can feel smugly superior to their "stupid" American neighbours.
At a recent gathering of my fellow political junkies, Tuns' book came up in conversation. One partygoer opined, "I don't need a book to tell me Chrétien was a jerk" (although not in those words). Perhaps not, but it would seem all too clear that most Canadians do. Jean Chrétien: A Legacy of Scandal is the obvious choice.
So, Professor Blais, my answer to your puzzle is one word: apathy. What do I win? A Green Card would be nice.
