Liberals and Mike Harris

Paul Martin plays the "Mike Harris card"

As the unofficial Christmas (or winter for the politically correct) break in the election campaign ends, Paul Martin sees his Liberal Party in a statistical tie with the evil Conservatives. If that isnt bad enough, the Tories are slightly ahead in Ontario, where Martin so successfully scared many voters into voting for the Liberals in 2004. Although the candidates took a break from door-knocking and other campaign events, the media, especially the blogosphere remained hard at work. New revelations about the alleged leak of Finance Minister Ralph Goodales November 23^rd announcement about income trusts seemed to come out on an almost hourly basis and the Grits began a downward slide in the polls.

Paul Martin, who has never been accused as a deep thinker or of having a wealth of political street smarts intended to use his "Harper has a hidden agenda and is too scary to hold power" line that worked so well 18 months ago during the current campaign. However Harper started the campaign being prepared. He was quick off the mark and his daily pronouncements of his partys policies made it impossible to accuse him of having a hidden agenda. Being unable to use Stephen Harper to drive fear into the hearts and minds of squeamish Ontarians, Martin had to find someone else to portray the devil to his angelic administration.

Enter Mike Harris. In his desperation, Martin invoked the name of the ex premier who has been out of power for six years in order to deflect attention away from the Liberals latest corruption scandal. Martin no doubt has a special reason to hold Harris in disdain. The former premier achieved something that Paul Martin can only dream about--two back to back majority governments. Junior, who has spent so much time seeking that which was denied to daddy will be lucky if he ends his political career with two successive minority governments.

Martin levels the accusation that if Harper and the Conservatives attain power they will cut taxes and social programs, forcing those who spend their days drinking beer and eating popcorn (thats parents to non-Liberals) to have to "fend" for themselves. Wow--it seems like it was only yesterday that Martin was accusing Harper of promising to spend so much money that the country would be forced back into running deficits. And wasnt it the day before yesterday when Paul Martin said that Harpers proposed tax cut on the GST was too little to make any difference? What a difference an RCMP investigation makes. Paul Martin is flailing around like a drowning man as his government goes into a slow but steady decline toward opposition status.

By invoking the name of Mike Harris, Martin is counting on Canadians in general and Ontarians in particular to forget all about the spending cuts that were undertaken during the 1990s by Finance Minister Paul Martin Jr. These cuts included the slashing of transfer payments to the provinces for use in health care. Were not supposed to remember that though. If we do, well, golly, those cuts just had to be made. All the unwashed masses are supposed to think is, Liberal cuts--good; Conservative cuts--bad.

Not content with attacks on Mike Harris, Martin went on and attacked Jim Flaherty, whom he referred to as "Mike Harris plus". Flaherty, a former treasurer under the Harris government and now the Conservative Party candidate in Whitby-Oshawa, is a true ideological small "c" conservative. While running for the leadership of the Ontario PCs, Flaherty proposed the selling of the provinces liquor control board for no other reason than a philosophical one; that if something is advertised in the Yellow Pages, the government shouldnt be doing it. Martin is attempting to scare Ontarians into thinking that life as we know it will end if Flaherty ends up being a minister in a Conservative government. Raising the specter of fear of Flaherty getting elected is like warning voters not to vote NDP because Svend Robinson could end up being Foreign Affairs Minister, visit Washington and end up walking away with Condoleezza Rices jewelry. Its difficult to believe that anyone could be scared into voting Liberal by the possibility of an "Honourable Jim Flaherty".

Now that Paul has us thinking about Flaherty being "Mike Harris plus" what does he have us thinking of Stephen Harper? Well, the centrist leader of the CPC is "Paul Martin minus" --minus the corruption and the culture of entitlement.

Paul Martin has put a whole new meaning into the phrase, "desperate times call for desperate measures".

Arthur Weinreb is an author, columnist and Associate Editor of Toronto Free Press. His work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Men's News Daily, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck and The Rant. Arthur can be reached at: Columns 2006 '05 '04 '03 '02 '01 '00 1999 Media 2006 '05 '04 '03 '02 Toronto 2006 '05 '04