Why Harper is leading.

This article actually gives reasons why Harper should not be leading, a whole list of such reasons. He doesn't just change direction to go with the traffic. He contradicts himself. He goes in opposite directions to his own professed principles just to buy votes. This may cause a few people to vote to Harper out of self interest and ignore his inconsistency but one of the prime reasons that Harper is winning is that the Liberals are not an attractive alternative and have not been waging an effective campaign. I hope more votes switch to other parties. Neither of the main parties deserve our vote.

Why Harper is leading

Susan Riley
The Ottawa Citizen
Friday, September 19, 2008
High performance athletes usually outgrow their secondary school coaches at some point and look for more professional advice. It is a lesson Prime Minister Stephen Harper apparently hasn't learned.
The heavyweights in the Conservative war room -- puerile attack dogs like MPs Jason Kenney and Pierre Poilievre, sketchy operators like campaign guru Doug Finley -- keep tripping up the boss. And it isn't just pooping puffins, talking oil spots, or harsh jokes from Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz about poison cold cuts, either (yesterday's rolling gaffe.) It isn't even that the lies Harper's hit squad circulate about its enemies seem balder, more outrageous, than everyone else's. It is that, overall, Harper's team amplifies, and encourages, a shrill partisanship, and occasional meanness, that makes a lot of voters nervous.
What's puzzling is that Harper is well able to defend his views without raising his voice, or resorting to personal abuse.
He has done it during this campaign -- expanding on the Afghan mission, for instance, offering reassurance on Canada's economy, raising alarms over his opponents' multi-billion dollar promises -- and he comes across sounding reasonable, sensible, even serene.
He plays the "leadership" card well when he bothers.
His opponents claim that he has completely changed his tune on Afghanistan. Canada was never going to "cut and run", or embrace "arbitrary deadlines" that would only embolden the Taliban. It was unpatriotic to suggest leaving "before the job is done," an insult to the sacrifice of our soldiers. Until now. Canada will be gone by 2011 for sure, Harper says. Six years is long enough; the Second World War only lasted six years. If Afghanistan isn't ready to take over its own security by then, tampis.
It is a jarring rhetorical downshift. Same with the economy. Last week, in Quebec, he warned that the Liberal green shift would plunge us into economic catastrophe. Fast-forward to Harper's response to the market crash in the United States: our fundamentals are strong, he purred, and if we were going to have a recession, it would have happened already. So, are these dangerously uncertain times -- no time to take even tentative steps towards greening our tax system -- or are we only tangentially affected by global financial turmoil?
Add to this list income trusts, fixed election dates, independence for Parliamentary committees and yesterday's stealth announcement of $2 billion for homelessness on a day when Harper was attacking the "mind-boggling" spending promises of his rivals. It is easy to make the case that he is a slippery operator, no more trustworthy than any flip-flopping Liberal.
But while Harper's indignant, red-faced rivals drive home this point, they overlook something else. Changing direction to go with the traffic, instead of against it, is rarely fatal in politics -- and not even terribly disruptive. More voters may be relieved that Harper has dropped the bellicose stance on Afghanistan than disgusted by his cynicism. And taxing income trusts? About time.
Quebec Premier Jean Charest has hinted at another reversal: some announcement on arts and culture in his province before voting day to make up for Harper's unpopular and small-minded reductions in federal support for the arts. Nor should anyone be surprised if some future Harper government belatedly realizes that a carbon tax -- now endorsed by the Canada West Foundation, along with a growing chorus of corporate bigwigs -- isn't such a bad idea after all.
Ideology aside, the prime minister whom Harper most resembles is Jean Chrétien: an incrementalist, an autocratic manager disdainful of windy speeches and grand visions. This is not good news for anyone who believes that climate change, poverty or Canada's complacent business culture are urgent issues.
But arrogance, ruthlessness, and lack of charisma have never been barriers to high office in this country.
Like Chrétien, Harper also aims low. His bite-sized policy drops are easy to grasp -- and so trivial they stand a good chance of being implemented. What do you bet: 165,000 new child-care spaces after this election, or a Tory ban on banana-flavoured cigarettes? These tokens -- like the $150 tax relief for some seniors announced yesterday -- are too small to make much difference for individuals, but they do deplete the federal treasury, limiting future governments' ability to act. If that is Harper's Grand Plan, it is artfully concealed in a fistful of innocuous campaign jelly beans -- hard to see, harder to attack.
Harper's toughest test may be defending what is expected to be an anything-but-modest, even mind-boggling bill for the Afghan mission. A preliminary report puts military costs alone at $22 billion. If he can sell this -- explain why a destructive, unwinnable war is a sounder investment than preparing ourselves to thrive in a green economy -- well, maybe black really is white.
Susan Riley writes on national politics.