As with the Meech Lake accord, the Mackay-Harper accord was presented to Canadians in such a way as to give the impression that nothing can be done to stop its implementation. By far the most cynical part of the bargain, put together by the likes of Ray Speaker and Don Mazankowski, has to do with the ratification process within the PC Party. Until November 30th Alliance members are free to purchase PC memberships to participate in the vote on whether or not to accept the terms of the Mackay-Harper deal. This feature was clearly included to put the nail in the coffin of the old PC Party before the ratification process even formally begins. It creates what amounts to an insurmountable hurdle to block any bid to fold the PC Party into the Alliance's western bastion of anti-French, anti-Quebec, anti-Aboriginal, anti multicultural, anti-immigration, anti-gay and lesbian, anti-Kyoto, anti-gun registry, anti-secular humanism, anti-abortion, pro-Bush, pro-Stars and Stripes, pro-war, pro-capital punishment sentiment.
David Orchard quickly emerged as the Elijah Harper of this new Meech-like accord. In arguing against this "illegitimate creation," which Orchard says was "conceived in deception and born of betrayal," the Saskatchewan farmer points to the deal makers' intent to kill the old PC Party, the polity that once created the Dominion of Canada in order to prevent the northern portion of North America from being swallowed into United States. In the place of our own indigenous conservatism rooted in Tory opposition to the revolutionaries who incited civil war in British North America in 1776, we get a carbon copy of the US version of right-wing politics. This tendency is well embodied in the politics of consummate "Unite the Right" booster Ralph Klein. Alberta's premier shares near identical policies with US president George Bush on virtually all the larger issues of the day.
It is widely anticipated that so-called "Blue Tory," Mike Harris, would be the front runner to take over the so-called Conservative Party once it is stripped by the Alliance zealots of its progressive label and heritage. Who has stopped to consider that of all the skeletons in Walkerton Mike's closet, none seems to be more poised to rattle its way into public notice than the information that will probably come to light in a forthcoming public inquiry into the chain of command responsible for the murder at Ipperwash Ontario of an unarmed Ojibway protester, Dudley George. The role of the Harris Tories in covering up this affair up has attracted sharp condemnation from the international community, including from the UN Human Rights Commission. It is a brewing scandal with large implications for the political future of Ralph Klein's favourite contender.
Klein's own recent suggestion that Canadian farmers might consider shooting, shovelling and shutting up to cover up future cases of Mad Cow disease speaks volumes about the sense of short-term political expediency that has blinded the proponents of the Harper-MacKay accord to the long term consequences of their plan. How interesting to see David Orchard emerge as such a compelling voice of cautious conservatism in Canada, a conservatism much truer to the heritage of John A. Macdonald than the roll of-the-dice Mulroneyism behind this devious effort to move Canada's entire political culture yet farther to the right, yet deeper into commercial, political, and military embrace of the United States of George W. Bush.
Anthony J. Hall is Founding Coordinator and Associate Professor of Globalization Studies at the University of Lethbridge. His volume, _The American Empire and the Fourth World_ (McGill-Qeen's University Press), is being published in mid-November.
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