Canadian Cincinnatus

“Putin’s Right Hook”

Graduate student David Ernst has a fantastic article on Russian strongman, Vladimir Putin’s political acumen. The article should be read in full, but here are some highlights:

“Vladimir Putin has suddenly emerged onto the world stage as a conservative.” 

“Russia’s rightward turn renders Putin’s regime immune to the criticism of western liberals, and polarizes western conservatives. … Moreover, it establishes an entirely new ideological precedent for autocratic regimes who seek to challenge the American led world order. … If Western Europe and the United States are serious about sustaining a world order that prevents conflict, enables prosperity and promotes liberty and the rule of law, then their governments should defend it on those terms. Evidently, the Kremlin has figured out how to either shut them up or turn them against each other.”

When the leaders of the free world lack the eloquence – or the self-confidence – to defend the values of the greatest civilization that ever existed, that’s a problem. And it is the fault of the post-modern ideology that grips so much of our elites. 

“Putin’s embrace of social conservatism … targets and exploits latent Western frustration with post-modern liberalism itself. In his most recent address to the Russian Federal Assembly, Putin spoke disdainfully of what for decades Americans have known as “political correctness”:

‘Society is now required not only to recognize everyone’s right to the freedom of consciousness, political views and privacy, but also to accept without question the equality of good and evil, strange as it seems, concepts that are opposite in meaning. This destruction of traditional values from above not only leads to negative consequences for society, but is also essentially anti-democratic, since it is carried out on the basis of abstract, speculative ideas, contrary to the will of the majority, which does not accept the changes occurring or the proposed revision of values.’”

The real irony is that political correctness is a communist concept developed by the Frankfurt School and found its greatest expression in the devastation of Mao’s Cultural Revolution.

“To hear a former KGB colonel bemoan the “erosion of ethnic traditions and differences between peoples and cultures,” and the “destruction of traditional values from above” is at the very least amusing, if not astoundingly mendacious.”

Let alone from somebody who rose to power blowing up his own citizens in an apartment-house bombing campaign he likely orchestrated.

“Putin is nevertheless speaking to sentiments that an increasing number of Westerners share. Moreover, he is the only statesman of any noteworthy stature who is publically addressing them. 

The opposition to political correctness is the greatest winning cause of our times that none of our cowardly politicians is willing to champion. Everybody –except the Frankfurt School left - hates it.

"In the United States, Putin’s right turn has exacerbated old divisions among its conservative intelligentsia. The reaction of some conservatives to Putin’s December speech has been positive, if not affirming. Putin’s call to return to traditional values and scorn for elites who willfully promote “abortion on demand, homosexual marriage, pornography, promiscuity, and the whole panoply of Hollywood values” compelled Pat Buchanan to wonder aloud whether Putin “was one of us?”

Pat Buchanan has lately become Exhibit A for the case that isolationists are fools – who end up being dupes of unsavoury foreign tyrants.

“Putin’s appeal to right in Europe is far more serious….Recent polling data, projections for the EU elections this May, and the Hungarian government’s recent solicitation of a 14 billion dollar loan from Moscow, however, suggest that Putin’s right turn coincides with widespread European disenchantment with the EU.”

The EU is the largest failed economic experiment since the demise of communism. Can anybody tell me what good the Euro has done?

“Russia’s growing influence in European affairs begs the question, how can policymakers in Brussels counter Putin’s charms? More specifically, how can they address the grievances that many Europeans have against the EU, and indeed the transatlantic alliance itself? The dispiriting answer increasingly appears to be that they cannot;”

The President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, is a soul-less bureaucrat. Who would follow him into the trenches? To paraphrase Marlon Brando, “He is an errand boy, sent by grocery clerks to collect a bill.” 

“the only electoral trump card that the EU bureaucrats can play against Euroskeptics and the European radical right is the promise of continued economic growth, and the survival of Europe’s generous social programs.”

The promise of economic growth isn’t looking too good these days, which just leaves welfare.

"Other essential elements of the human condition: religious faith, national identity and a spiritual sense of purpose have no place in their discourse, or indeed in the EU’s very reason for existing. Putin has shrewdly chosen a debate over hearts and minds with an opponent who is entirely ill equipped to respond.”

People fight for things like “religious faith, national identity and a spiritual sense of purpose”. They don’t fight for bureaucracies.

“On the matter of gay rights, Putin is likely more than happy to draw a stark contrast with President Obama. The choice to select gay athletes to participate in the Olympic Ceremony in Sochi undoubtedly won Obama praise from his supporters at home. On the world stage, however, it stands to reason that Putin was using the very same old Marxist tactic of “heightening the contradictions” against Obama.”

The need to draw “a stark contrast” with your opponent in order to win, is a lesson moderate conservatives stubbornly fail to learn, no matter how much bitter electoral reality bonks them on the head every time they try make themselves indistinguishable from their opponents.

"The choice to send gay athletes in a clear statement of protest against Russia’s “anti gay propaganda” law feeds right into Putin’s claims that global western “elites” are forcibly imposing their “abstract, speculative ideas, contrary to the will of the majority” appear credible.”

In the West, the popularity of politically correct values like gay marriage is a mile wide and an inch deep.

“In the case of Russian skullduggery in the North Caucuses, Ukraine and in Syria, Putin has already won the debate against his Western liberal opponents. Such was evident in the Russian President’s letter to the American People urging them not to intervene in Syria in the New York Times on September 11th last year. Rather than draw a contrast with Obama, Putin cynically harnessed the American President’s very own liberal idealism, internationalism, and scorn for his predecessor’s bold use of American power. Putin warned the American people that action in Syria would undermine the credibility of the United Nations, that it would inspire hatred among foreigners towards the United States for its presumption and arrogance, and that it would prove every bit as fruitless as our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Liberal utopianism results in a foreign policy that is just as foolish as right-wing isolationism is short-sighted.

“The Russian President’s sophistry notwithstanding, it was a flawless implementation of Saul Alinsky’s fourth rule of political warfare: make the enemy live up to his own book of rules. Many American liberals regarded the audacity of Putin to appeal their sensibilities with indignation, but they were speechless all the same. … When all was said and done, however, none could actually claim that what Putin said was wrong. Thus Putin left Obama with an ugly choice between publically buying his nonsense, or compromising his principles. Obama opted for a third option: make no choice at all.” 

Nobody is more effective at demonstrating the incompetence of President Obama than Vladimir Putin. Col. Ralph Peters has its right: “Putin has Obama’s number, and it is zero.” 

“Most disturbing of all, Putin’s successes demonstrate that he intuitively grasps the weaknesses inherent in modern liberalism itself. His objections to its shallowness, decadence, and materialism are especially potent, because they contain elements of truth. He sees that the European Union has a very tenuous hold on the identity of its citizens.”

“Effective grand strategies are distinguished insofar as they are able to articulate their objectives in moral terms, and then methodically filter them through rigorous assessments of what is possible. Currently, Putin is adopting a moral purpose for his country in international affairs, and it is lending him strategic clarity.”

As Napoleon once said, “The moral is to the physical as three is to one.”

 “Western Europe and the United States, by contrast, are increasingly confused about their moral purpose, and have thus lost the initiative in shaping global events. Their statesmen would be wise to blunt the divisive effects of Putin’s right turn by turning back to the basic elements of their civilization, and articulating why they are a force for good. As Ukrainian liberals struggle to gain political traction following their ouster of a Kremlin backed stooge, Washington and Brussels could challenge Russian influence by calling for self-government, ordered liberty and the rule of law. Moreover, they could call out the Kremlin for its lawlessness and aggression.”

A leader convinced of the superiority of western civilization and possessing moral clarity, a Churchill, a Thatcher, a Reagan, or even a George W Bush, would have no trouble doing this.

UKIP Victory in UK council elections echoes rise of Reform Party in Canada

For a few years now, UKIP - that is the United Kingdom Independence Party – has been a growing fringe player on the UK political scene. They have capitalized on the increasing anti-EU sentiment in Britain, but until last week, they weren’t in the big leagues with the Tories or Labour or the Liberal-Democrats. As a result of the council elections where they won 153 seats, that has now change.

I heard UKIP leader Nigel Farage speak at the Manning Networking Conference of 2013 and was impressed. I learned there that Farage was a keen student of Canada’s Reform Party and its founder, Preston Manning.

Like the Reform Party before it, UKIP appeals to blue-collar workers who are normally repulsed by big-business Red Tories. And like the Reform Party, it is a reaction to a dysfunctional political consensus that had built up - in Canada, by Pierre Trudeau, and in Britain, by Tony Blair (e.g. ‘cool Britannia’).

Appropriately enough, there are now calls for a UKIP-Tory alliance. Predictably enough, the Red Tory mush-head currently leading the British Conservative Party, David Cameron, is resisting this call, playing the role of Jean Charest and Joe Clarke to a T.

(Believe it or not, disgruntled PC’s, refusing to come to grips with political reality, are still around in Canada, this time sporting the ‘Progressive Canadian moniker. They are led by that most unsympathetic of Brian Mulroney’s cabinet ministers, Sinclair Stevens, a man who was forced to resign from office in disgrace.)

To a Canadian observer who became politically active in the 1990’s, it is déjà vu all over again.

Hopefully, it ends as well in Britain as it did in one of her former colonies.

 

The Walkerton Tragedy is fair game in the Ontario Provincial election

Now, you and I know that the culpability of the Mike Harris Conservatives was blown all out of proportion by the opposition in the Walkerton Tragedy, in order to discredit the then-Ontario government’s privatization program and spending cuts.

The main culprits in 2000 were the Homer Simpson brothers managing the Walkerton Public Utilities Commission, as the resulting public inquiry noted:

“The Walkerton Public Utilities Commission operators engaged in a host of improper operating practices, including failing to use adequate doses of chlorine, failing to monitor chlorine residuals daily, making false entries about residuals in daily operating records, and misstating the locations at which microbiological samples were taken. The operators knew that these practices were unacceptable and contrary to Ministry of Environment guidelines and directives.”

In other words, not just incompetence but active sabotage - by people who were not even provincial employees, and whose employment predated the Harris government. Ignoring all that, the media focussed on the fact that water testing had been privatized, never mind that the water testing results were perfectly accurate.

In spite of all this, it nevertheless remains the case that it is a perfectly legitimate move on Kathleen Wynne’s part to call present-day Ontario Conservative party Leader Tim Hudak out on Walkerton, after Hudak proposed to cut hundred-thousand jobs in the Ontario civil service. Why is this legitimate, even though the popular Walkerton narrative is mostly bogus? 

Because conservatives often paint themselves into a political corner with their own anti-government rhetoric, that’s why. A prime example is Ronald Reagan’s famous quote, “government is not a solution to the problem, it is the problem.” Look, I’m against government overreach and over-regulation as much as anybody. But if conservatives don’t rhetorically draw a sharp distinction between legitimate government functions and extra-constitutional power plays, we run the risk of making ourselves out to be reckless anarchists in the eyes of the public. If we do that, and we are in government, and something goes wrong, people will point to us and say, they meant to do that! 

None of this is to say that I don’t agree with small-government policies or that I disagree with what Mike Harris did, or with what Ronald Reagan did for that matter. I am not arguing for Red Tory moderation/surrenderism here. I ask for no substantive policy dilution in Tim Hudak’s election platform to appease the sainted (and completely misunderstood) ‘moderates’. What I am arguing for are political arguments that defend the minimal night-watchman state but which don’t open us up to credible charges of irresponsibility.

How do we do that?

We do that by announcing clearly that we are all in favour of legitimate government functions even while we are against illegitimate power grabs by empire-building bureaucrats and politicians who want to bribe us with our own money. In this vein, we can argue that government bloat imperils necessary government because it makes the whole organization more complex and difficult to manage. We can also argue that government deficits and fiscal irresponsibility ultimately endangers all government functions, including legitimate, necessary ones. In drawing a line in the sand between legitimate government functions on one side, and bloat and overreach on the other, these arguments and many other besides, can now be marshalled for our benefit. Of course, for tactical reasons, the precise line between legitimate and illegitimate government can be kept hazy, or even shifted around from election to election, for reasons of expediency.

How does Tim Hudak do this?

Actually he is already took the first baby steps in this direction by stating that doctors, nurses and cops will not be part of his cuts. To win, he must go further by doing two other things simultaneously: extolling examples of legitimate government functions and explain how they are placed in danger by the Liberal’s reckless spending; and by holding up examples of regulatory excess and government waste.

If he does both these things adequately, Tim Hudak will not only win a mandate for small-government change, but also inoculate himself to any Walkertons in the future.

Warren Kinsella agrees with me on Tim Hudak

This is a rare moment on this blog: me agreeing with Warren Kinsella; but in his Sun Media article yesterday, Kinsella presents the best analysis I have seen to date on the dynamics of the recent provincial election. Here’s the punch line (but, by all means, read the whole article): 

 “According to the last couple of Ipsos polls, Hudak’s support is growing – while that of his Liberal and New Democrat rivals is shrinking, in some places dramatically… If Tim Hudak is still stiff, awkward and therefore inauthentic, why is that happening?

“Because of the other part of [pollster Allan] Gregg’s observation, that’s why. The part about ‘direct and honest engagement of difficult subject matter that has the potential to cause media controversy.’ And that is precisely what Hudak has done, with his announced plan to cut 100,000 positions in the broader Ontario public service.”

“He may never be seen as the most ‘authentic’ politician, true. But he’s the one presently engaged in ‘direct and honest engagement of difficult subject matter that has the potential to cause media controversy.’ 

And he’s winning because of it.”

This is exactly right. People really appreciate politicians who level with them. Few of them do because they realize that it opens them up to controversy, painting a bulls-eye on them. But, by and large, they appreciate it when somebody tells them the truth.

The classic mistake that many politicians – particularly Red Tory moderates – make is to try to avoid controversy. (This was why Hudak snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in 2011.) Big mistake! In an election there will always be controversy. You cannot escape it. You have to be a fool (or a Red Tory) to think you can avoid it. But, if you are willing to be proactive, you have the ability to choose your controversy. If you choose right, you will be controversial in ways that play to your strengths and your opponent’s weaknesses.

In the present provincial election, both Tim Hudak and Liberal leader Kathleen Wynne promise to balance Ontario’s out-of-control budget. Hudak has told voters what he will cut to achieve this goal. Wynne is more vague, preferring to emphasize her new spending initiatives. So, who sounds more believable now?

 

P.S. I did not know that Kathleen Wynne has hired Paul Martin’s brain-trust to get her re-elected. More good news!

 

This time, people will believe that Tim Hudak will cut their taxes

According to the National Post: 

“Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives are promising to cut personal taxes once they balance the budget in 2016-17.

They say they plan to phase in a 10% cut over four years, but could do it sooner if they have more money.” 

Hudak made a similar promise in the 2011 but nobody believed him. Why? Because Hudak couldn’t say how he could balance the budget. Where would he cut the waste? Oh, the proverbial waste, fraud and abuse. Yeah, sure.

But this time people will believe him. Thanks to his promise to cut 100,000 provincial jobs, its obvious. This is the fruit of levelling with the voters and telling them the ugly truth first.

The people want to be told the truth. They don’t want to be gladhanded.

 

Putin isn’t as strong as he seems

One of the mistakes often made in military strategy is to assume that the other guy doesn’t have problems or weaknesses of his own. This is especially true if the enemy has been on a roll for a while, as is the case with the beady-eyed, KGB rat, Vladimir Putin. We are all aware of the weaknesses and divisions within NATO. We are also aware of the problems with Ukraine’s basket-case economy. We are also aware of the reports indicating the visible improvement in the Russian army from the 2008 Invasion of Georgia to the 2014 Invasion of Crimea.

Therefore, it is time for some perspective from Michael Ledeen:

“Which leaves us with Putin and his Russia. We’ve all seen the polls that show he’s greatly popular, and the cynical remarks alleging that the Russians just adore a czar with good pecs.  But if, as you should, you pay attention to serious analysts like Paul Goble, you’ll find a horse of a different manure.  He recently quoted extensively from a Russian economist who smartly observed that, if you want to be a great power, you’d better have a highly developed state.  Which Putin doesn’t.  Here’s the picture:

“…the budget calls for increasing defense spending by 61 percent over the 2014-2016 period. That money has to come from somewhere, either other programs or higher taxes which affect growth.

The Russian Federation is already spending far less on public health and education than most countries, and spending more on defense will further depress those rates. On the one hand, it will worsen life expectancy – Russia now ranks 134th out of 207 countries on that measure. And on the other, it will lack the educated population needed to be a super power.

Under these conditions, Gurevich argues, “sooner of later the [Russian] economy will simply not be in a position to bear the burdens of being a super power.” And Russians do not need to look far to see what that could lead to: The USSR ultimately was incapable of bearing them and disintegrated.

“Do Russians want to go down this path again?” he asks.” 

We answer:  they aren’t likely to like it when they get to its inevitable end.  The will to power can cover up a multitude of weaknesses, but not all of them.  The West is very weak, and doesn’t want to fight a determined aggressor.  But then, we didn’t want to fight in what became the Second World War, and our weakness was far worse than it is today.  Power-mad tyrants have historically done poorly anticipating our response when push came to shove, and even worse judging their own countries’ ability to both dominate others and bring glory in their own realm.

All of which, I think, should give us pause to reflect on the hollowness of our enemies’ regimes and the fragility of their ambitious enterprise to destroy us.”

I only want to add here that improvements in the Russian Army have likely been confined to elite units like the 76^th Airborne Division and Spetznaz brigades. Remember that this is the country that invented the Potemkin Village, and that all we have seen so far in action are the elite units manned largely by professionals. How much do you want to bet that the conscript units – that still form the bulk of the Russian Army – and that hitherto have not been committed to war, are as pathetic and ramshackle as ever? 

Remember also that this has been brought to you by the Putin administration, the outfit that, in spite of the windfall created by a more-than-tenfold increase in the price of oil, has a smaller serviceable road network than the Yeltsin administration did in 1999.

In military conflict it is important not to underestimate your opponent. Doing so leaves you blissfully unaware until it is too late. It is also equally important not to assume superhuman qualities in your opponents. Doing so makes you blind to your enemy’s weaknesses. And in his weaknesses lie your opportunities.

Hudak is right to promise 100,00 layoffs

When I first heard that Ontario Progressive Conservative Party leader Tim Hudak promised to lay off 100,000 Ontario civil servants, I cringed. My gut told me that he had made a fatal mistake and would lose the provincial election over it.

Conservatives often box themselves into a corner with reckless anti-government talk. While the members of the public who work for the private sector don’t like civil servants, they also sympathize with middle-class people who lose their jobs. Somebody who takes open glee in firing people comes across as a sadist.

But then I heard Hudak’s actual words. He was measured and somber. He expressed regret that Ontario’s dire situation requires drastic but regrettable action. He also pointed out that the Liberals have added 300,00 people to the government rolls since they have been in power.

His words changed my mind. In the last provincial election, Hudak lost because he came across like a glad-hander. While he chastised the Liberals for their reckless and irresponsible spending and the need to balance the budget, he couldn’t name a single substantial cut that he would make, when reporters asked him how he would balance the books. All he did was to sputter about the proverbial “waste, fraud and abuse.” Since even the NDP is presumably against waste, fraud and abuse, he looked like somebody who wasn’t forthright about his intentions. Well, promising up front to get rid of a hundred thousand jobs, he won’t be accused of that this time around! 

Going forward, what Hudak needs to do to capitalize on this move is to: first, continue acting somber and regretful when the subject of actual layoffs comes up; second, highlight Ontario’s dire fiscal state every chance he gets - that Ontario currently has the same size deficit that California had at its worst, when California has over three times the population; third, he needs to point out that, in making this promise, he is the only honest leader out there. Facing a $12 billion deficit, jobs will be cut. This is inevitable regardless of whom you vote for. The only difference is that he is the only one leader honest about it. Fourth, he needs to make the case that because he willing to do it right away, ultimately fewer people will have to be surplused. Finally, he needs lay the blame for the cuts on Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne. Their fiscal irresponsibility created this mess. Every laid-off Ontario worker will be put through the ringer only because the Liberals couldn’t think of anything else to do but buy votes with money they didn’t have. 

In pondering this, it occurred to me that Hudak is creating the right kind of controversy. What I mean by that phrase is that all election campaigns generate controversy. Because this is unavoidable, only a fool tries to skate through an election hoping nobody attacks him. A wise leader courts good controversy, one that focuses the debate on your issues and not the other guys.

In attacking Hudak’s heartlessness, Wynne only highlights her recklessness, irresponsibility, and intellectual bankruptcy.

How Harper can punish Obama over Keystone XL: drop out of the F-35 program

There are many disturbing reports that indicate that the new Northrop-Grumman F-35 is a dog. It is apparently slower and less maneuverable than the 30-year old CF-18 that it is currently scheduled to replace. This is not surprising as it is designed to be everything: air superiority fighter, close air support, carrier-based fighter and VTOL aircraft for the Marines. Aircraft that are designed to be good in every role rarely work out satisfactorily (think F-111, a medium bomber that was originally meant to double as a fighter!). How can the F-35 be better than an F-22 in air superiority, an A-10 in ground attack, an F-18 in a carrier role and a Harrier as a ‘jump jet’? The short answer is that it can’t; a jack-of-all-trades is the master of none. Therefore, it is in Canada’s best interest to get out of the F-35 contract as soon as possible.

There are many options. First, there is the F-18 Super Hornet, an upgraded version of the CF-18 fighter the RCAF already flies. That is the conservative option.

If Prime Minister Stephen Harper and President Barack Obama enjoyed good relations, this would present Harper with a dilemma. The F-35 program is a huge deal. In fact, it is the most expensive military procurement contract in history and it is under pressure due to the aircraft’s poor performance. If Canada backed out of a deal now, it would look bad for the President, and might precipitate a death spiral for the project as other potential F-35 buyers follow Canada’s lead.

But Harper faces no such dilemma. Obama disses Canada every chance he gets. He leaves the post of Canadian ambassador vacant for many months, he does everything to delay the second (and much needed) Windsor-Detroit crossing and, most infamously, he is preventing the Keystone XL pipeline from being built. I guess Canada isn’t enough like those third-world dictatorships that he favours.

To date, Harper has been patient and nice. I have argued that he should start getting tough with Obama. One way to get even on Keystone would be to choose the Eurofighter Typhoon, a much superior aircraft produced in Europe. Ouch! Take that Barack!

 

What exactly is wrong with a photo ID requirement for voters?

 I used to do a fair amount of scrutineering in elections. Before the Conservative requirement that a prospective voter show photo ID or have another voter vouch for him, every election day bought rumours of shake-and-bake Liberal voters, bussed from one polling station to the next. We never had direct proof, but many scrutineers brought back stories of voters who seemed questionable but whose identity couldn’t be challenged. Strangely, these incidents dried up after the new requirements came into effect.

The new photo ID requirement in the Fair Elections act only removes the possibility of voting based on another voter’s affirmation. For the vast majority, this presents no change at all because they have been voting with their photo ID for some time. 

The argument against photo ID is that it disenfranchises some voters, but how exactly does it do this? In Canada in 2014 you need ID to drive, to rent a hotel room, to travel outside the country and to fly anywhere. With the Canadian Medicare system, you even need it to go to the hospital or see the doctor. Photo ID isn’t some exotic thing that only the elite can possess. It is a common aspect of everyday life; it is not rare; and procuring it is not an insurmountable hurdle.

If the opponents of the photo ID requirement demanded, as a condition of tightening up the photo ID law, that Elections Canada provide photo ID to those Canadian citizens who lack photo ID of any kind (like, say, a health card), I would support them. I would consider it a reasonable amendment to the Fair Election Act, though I would note that it solves a nonexistent problem. But the opponents of photo ID rarely make this point, so I wonder about their motives. 

The counterexample usually raised in this context is the literacy tests that were required in southern states during the Jim Crow era. It is widely agreed that these requirements were designed to unjustly disenfranchise poor blacks, whose literacy rate was much lower than the general population. This analogy is specious. Reading skills take a long time to acquire and this training was systematically denied to blacks via a deliberate policy of inferior segregated schools. In other words, it was a large-scale, organized conspiracy. Photo ID in Canada c. 2014 doesn’t compare. First, because photo ID is comparatively easy to get (from a wide variety of sources and levels of government), and second, because there is no organized effort by anyone to systematically deny ID to any group of citizens, or even to any isolated individuals.

But wrongful voting does disenfranchise people. When somebody votes who isn’t allowed to vote, or somebody votes twice or thrice, I’m disenfranchised. That is because just one illegitimate vote cancels out my legitimate vote. Wrongful voting also subverts our democracy by casting into doubt who really won.

In the old days, election officials went around ahead of every election and determined the names of the voters at every residence. The list of voters thus compiled was then posted publicly in every poll so that everybody could see who was on the voter list and who was not. One year when I was a kid, everybody on our street got a good laugh when a neighbours’ 8-year old son was mistakenly placed on the voter rolls. Since then, in the interest of ‘saving money’, these measures are no longer taken, and Election Canada’s mistakes are no longer as transparent.

One would think that ensuring the accuracy of the voter rolls and making sure that only those eligible to vote actually vote would be an all-party issue as it protects every honest candidate.

But apparently I am mistaken.