Skip navigation

 Login or Register | Member Centre

COMMENTARY

A cautionary coalition tale from British Columbia

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

When a coalition goes bad ...Read the full article

This conversation is semi-moderated What is moderation? | How do I report a comment?

  1. john chuckman from Canada writes: Mr. Horn, this just isn't a very perceptive article.

    "They [coalitions] can also have totally unintended consequences..."

    Yes, and please, what on earth in politics is not covered by that platitude?

    Dalton McGuinty has a record of more bizarre twists and turns than I can recall from any other politician, yet he has a majority a second time.

    Mr. Harper has turned on every principle he ever laid down.

    He broke his own election law to gain a quick advantage, or so he thought. He broke his promise on Senate appontments, going so far as to give us the Super Circus of Senate appontments. His original stress on ethics clearly has been made a laughing stock, again and again.

    Danny Williams is a human time bomb, ready to go off whenever something irritates him enough. If he weren't a premier, he'd be taken away in a straight-jacket.

    Brian Mulroney? Enough said.
  2. BC Mary from Canada writes: The majorly disastrous unintended consequence is having a B.C.government right now which presumes to call itself "Liberal". It isn't. There's barely a thread in its lurid tapestry which could be called Liberal.

    It's one of the biggest electoral scams - and a cynically INtended consequence - to change names when the going gets a little muddy.

    So today's government in BC is actually a hidden coalition of old political partisans from Reform, Social Credit, Alliance, CCRAP, Democratic Reform, and Conservatives with only a sprinkling of actual B.C. Liberals at the time of their election in 2001.

    To begin to understand the Harper government or the Campbell government, means beginning with the Reform Party, whose m.o. was "Divide and Rule" which didn't work. Now it's "Unite the right and Rule". Which is what got B.C. into the mess it's in today.

    A real coalition of parties with genuinely diversified philosophies sounds like a real treat. Sounds like a democracy.

    .
  3. Ruth Walker from Edmonton, Canada writes: A coalition of the Liberals and NDP is seen by many Cons as a gift to Harper, despite the shrill messaging they flow out to their droids.

    OTOH to those in the anybody-but-harper crowd, a coalition is an obvious improvement over what we have now. Parliament might actually be able to function with a coalition, and perhaps some of the committee investigations that the Cons have been obstructing, could go ahead. I for one, would like to see those investigations completed.

    Another advantage to a short-term coalition, as has been proposed, is that Canada could immediately set to work repairing our international reputation. Mini-Bush has messed that up big-time, e.g. at Poznan.

    The coalition is an important back-stop, but no matter what the outcome over the coming months, chances are that we are headed toward something better than one foolish man who thinks himself smart.

    Even though I am not a Liberal, I have decided to send PM Harper $400 worth of coal for Christmas, via a donation to the Liberals. The best part is that it only costs me $100 after the tax rebate, which I will get back in a few months.

    BTW that calculation is based on the 75% political subsidy that the hypocritical Cons would never eliminate, because it is their rice bowl.

    Merry Christmas, Canada, and a Happy New Year!
  4. little bowpeep from YUK, Canada writes: One province, great people, beautiful scenery, and currently, two horrible political parties.
  5. janfromthe bruce from Canada writes: Horn stopped his Historical tale of woe in walking down Coalition govt "memory lane."
    The Socred Credit party got wiped out - fini - no more. Well, except disguised with the liberal party brand now.
    What the story does tell me is what lengths power hungry politicians will go to - to prevent democracy from unfolding. Try STV but when they almost lost to the CCF, changed the game, again.
    Anyway, the coalition govt of Liberals/NDP and with support of the Bloc only has an 18 month agreement and precise mandate.

    A coalition government is constitutional and viable - instilling fear is not.
  6. Heric Holmes from Regina, Canada writes: I completely agree with Mr. Horn.
    In Saskatchewan the Liberal/NDP coalition in the late 90's led to the catastrophic failure of the Liberal party in Saskatchewan.

    As soon as a centrist party like the liberals form a coalition with a left or right party, the party loses their reason to exist because they are no longer a center party and the people in the party that tilt in the opposite direction of the coalition leave and don't come back.

    You can see it in the polling right now for the conservatives.

    The liberals would be best served to find a way to get out of the coalition before they wear it permanently.
  7. Jim Goodwin from Canada writes: If you look at the BC Liberals website the first thing you see is there is no affiliation with the LPC. After the Social Credit brand name was destroyed by Vanderzalm they moved to the Liberal Party and basically took it over. In Saskatchewan the Conservatives were destroyed by corruption so a new party evolved the Saskatchewan Party, but they are the conservatives. Oddly people do not pay enough attention and the new entities are elected, but really is only like a change of clothing, same people at the trough.
  8. Guy Smiley from Tories are Scum, writes: I'll tell you one thing about Brutish Colombia -- no-one should visit there until they can stop their police from killing people left and right.
  9. Bill Harrison from Canada writes: What B.C. desperately needs is a third political party, either real Conservatives or real Liberals. Bouncing back between the NDP and the current Coalition has not worked to the province's benefit, and gives voters seeking real change no alternative but to hold their nose and vote the rascals in, out, which really accomplishes nothing but changing the list of characters as in a bad TV series!
  10. Mike Sharp from Victoria, Canada writes:

    I like Socreds.
    I like BC Liberals.

    Gawd is in her heavens.
  11. Heric Holmes from Regina, Canada writes: Jim,
    In the case of BC and Saskatchewan parties rose to try to keep the NDP from forming government.
    In the case of the Sask party 4 of the original members were disillusioned liberals. These members saw no way of winning without joining the conservatives. This has made the Sask party much more centrist than otherwise would be the case.
    http://www.saskparty.com/theparty.html
  12. Ed Long from Canada writes: Great article and further proof the B.C. is pure polarized self-destructive politics. Thank God for the scenery because government adds nothing.

    I had forgotten the Sask. Liberal/NDP coalition, thanks Heric, and it did indeed destroy the provincial Liberal party.

    Notice the commonality of each of the cited coalitions including today: Liberals attempting to hold power, Liberals desperate to survive, Liberals being eaten up and destroyed.

    You'd think they'd learn.
  13. Western Bear from Canada writes: Folks need to think this one through, beyond your “Lust for Power”. You see victory for your agenda, with or without the approval, of your fellow Canadian voters. No matter about the minority majority, that voted Conservative, they are not REAL Canadians like us. They are just a bunch of Hicks, so we can arbitrarily cancel their rights. What do they know? So it is off to the Coalition wonderland we go. After a short time of RULE, the little engine that thought it could, finds out that there are a few wrenches in the gear works. Maybe just a little dissention/deception, amongst the actors? After all, their parties are actually Fundamentally opposed to each other. So guess what, Mr. Duceppe goes back to Quebec saying “See I told you they do not care about us. They could not agree to bend, to any of my suggestions”. “Oh and by the way, (after getting a good look at the Books), do you know what those Federalist buggers are planning?” So Quebec gets all hot and bothered, and votes to leave. But what’s that? Oh your right, 47% of the Quebec people wanted to stay. So we carve out a large section of Quebec and call it Ontario-East. Hope the rest of Quebec, is OK with that? Never mind, what do those Hicks know? Good on you Coalition. Except the “Rest of Quebec” actually does mind. That’s bad enough, but we are not done yet. The west (from the Ottawa River to the Arctic &Pacific; Oceans), looking at all this mayhem and chaos says “Enough is enough”. These folks couldn’t manage a carwash, let alone a Country so vast. See you all later. NL looks and says,” Geezes boys, we could do far better, on our own, ye know”. The Atlantic looks at this and says “Good thing we didn’t vote Conservative”. Meanwhile the Cdn dollar hits .15 USD. The USof A closes ALL the borders (except Alberta’s), and scratches their head. Good on you Coalition, you sure outsmarted those Hicks.
  14. Lucien Saumur from kANATA, Canada writes: Political parties have no business in government. The legislators should represent the people and not political parties. We will not get this kind of legislators until we are allowed to use the preferential ballot. The "multiple transferable vote" is the wrong way to use the preferential ballot which should be used to identify the candidates, preferred to all others by the majority of the voters. The multiple transferable vote, by proceeding through the elimination of the candidates who have received the least first preferences, could actually eliminate the preferred candidates instead of electing them.
  15. Andre Carrel from Canada writes: Bill Harrison from Canada writes: "Bouncing back between the NDP and the current Coalition has not worked to the province's benefit."

    You are right Bill, but what is it with the obsession that only one party at a time can have all the right answers to all the issues and all the problems? This is a crazy system and it invites retribution whenever there is a change in leading party. So (at the national level) we cancel a helicopter order not to improve military hardware but to prove a point, and we cancel a federal-provincial agreement on daycare, not to improve daycare for our kids but to prove a point.
    Citizens will remain condemned to snarl at each other, hurl insults at each other, and partake in a silly tug-of-war with each party taking turn falling flat on our faces in the mud until we learn that we need to find consensus, work together instead of continuously shoving each other. Richarde Nixon was a bad apple in many ways, but when he said that "It is out of the clash of two good ideas that a better idea will emerge" he did say something wise, even if he rarely lived by his on wise advice.
    Instead of insisting on beating each other up in endless squabbles over every imaginable issue, we owe it to the next generation to learn to listen to each other so that we may find something most of us can agree on and pay for. A modest dose of respect would not hurt either.

Join the Conversation, Leave a Comment

This conversation is semi-moderated What is moderation? | How do I report a comment?

You must be logged-in to submit a comment — login now!

Not registered with globeandmail.com? Register now. It is quick and free.

close

Alert us about this comment

Please let us know if this reader’s comment breaks the editor's rules and is obscene, abusive, threatening, unlawful, harassing, defamatory, profane or racially offensive by selecting the appropriate option to describe the problem.

Do not use this to complain about comments that don’t break the rules, for example those comments that you disagree with or contain spelling errors or multiple postings.

Back to top