Anger and The Canadian Election

[jsburbidge]

The Toronto Star had a front-page article with the title "Why is Everyone So Angry?" (well, third page with a massive banner on the front page). Unfortunately, its diagnosis was facile.

It was clearly prompted by the phenomenon of Justin Trudeau being regularly assailed viciously, and in such numbers, that in one case he had to cancel an appearance (as the protestors outnumbered the police).

(As a specific phenomenon this is a little odd. After all, when you think of it, Trudeau is in many ways the Jim Hacker of Canadian politics: appeal to the public, not very bright, steered by his advisors. You may be assured that anything he backs will have come from either the party or the civil service or (most likely) both, without being so extreme to be able to be called "courageous".

Although the Conservative Party condemns the behaviour, it feeds it by running so emphatically against Trudeau, as though the government's policies all sprang from his forehead. The PMO may be at least as dictatorial as it was under Harper - there has been no return to Cabinet government[1] - but it is hardly a hotbed of flourishing originality and exciting ideas.)

But the anti-vax, anti-mask movement in particular is pretty well frothing at the lips. Why?

The article points all of its fingers at pandemic fatigue. It omits noting that Brexit, and the Trump election, and for that matter the Tea Party formation around 2008, were all driven by a similar type of anger. Covid-19 has provided a couple of new presenting issues, and pandemic fatigue is undoubtedly an aggravating factor, but it's hardly the most important one.

(If it were pure pandemic fatigue you'd expect a cadre of vaccinated people who are fed up with the risks posed by unvaccinated people and heckle candidates who are "soft" on vaccine mandates balancing out the anti-vaxxers protesting the Liberals; and you'd expect protestors in the anti-vax, anti-mask camps to protest the federal Conservatives as well, as they have moved to avoid having any significant space between the Liberals and themselves on this issue.)

My interpretation is that it's an effect of cognitive dissonance with transferred anger. People don't want to acknowledge that things will never revert to where they were in (choose one based on your issue) 2019, 2000, 1989, 1981, 1966, or 1958.[2]

If that's something you won't acknowledge, to the level of cognitive dissonance, then displacing the anger at life moving away from where you are convinced it ought to be is a direct effect. (This is also tied up with confronting, or avoiding confronting, the fact that your idea of "rights" does not line up with that of the law.)

Also, naturally, even people with a much milder degree of denial will be attracted to an appeal of return. The natural heirs are parties of the right, as their natural platforms involve either minimizing or denying the necessity of significant change.

All of this feeds into the election dynamic. The Liberals suffer from both kinds of reaction; the CPC benefits. Maxime Bernier's party is showing a small uptick.

A secondary effect is that although climate is a potential wedge issue - the potential wedge issue - between the CPC and the Liberals, it's not being used as such, because to run a campaign on that basis amounts to repeatedly telling people that they haven't seen real disruptive change yet, and that they need to get ready for it and support it. In the current context that is probably not a way to win middle-of-the-road voters, who are the key group in this election.

It is still possible for the CPCs to end up failing to form a government, especially if (as Singh advertised in the spring) the NDP refuses to support the CPC in a minority government. Unless things improve greatly for the Liberals, though, it is probably time to write Trudeau's political obituary, given both the drop in support and the fact that it was ultimately Trudeau's decision to call this particular election in the first place.

[1]I remember Gordon, LaMarsh, Trudeau, Pelletier, and Marchand.

[2] Pre-Covid, pre-9/11, before the fall of the Soviet block, pre-IBM PC, pre-New Left, before the shine came off the suburbs.

Comments

[dewline]

I really don't want O'Toole to be the next PM. I can't afford that to happen. In several senses of that phrasing.

[jsburbidge]

Ironically, a lot of libertarian and social conservative members of the CPC would agree with you - they're afraid that if O'Toole wins on what is a relatively "moderate" platform their wishes will be sidelined for a political generation.

[dewline]

*nervous twitching about those factions continues*

[jsburbidge]

Not disagreeing.

Any CPC government will be, in practice, hamstrung by the western base - they'll be terrified that if they govern from the general centre, somebody in the West will do to O'Toole what Manning did to Mulroney. But if they don't govern from the centre, the voters in Ontario will abandon them. So in a context requiring action they will procrastinate, and then do as little as possible.

Even given a minority, the real risk is what a government can do by Orders in Council. A minority government constrains legislation but has very little effect on a government's regulatory powers.

[graydon]

I wish people could look at the present and see that the supply chain resiliency is not improving.

I wish people would look at the present and think "we need a government that will try to make sure everyone gets fed".

What we've got instead is a whole bunch of "tell me I'm pretty". (and good, and noble, and just, and should be given all that I desire.)

[jsburbidge]

None of the parties are thinking like that.

There was a recently-reported study of the various parties' carbon policies which placed the Liberal plan first (most effective, relatively low cost), and the Conservatives second... because the NDP and the Greens are bad (much more expensive, much less effective). The two latter parties are engaged in legislating morality rather than effectiveness, for all that their rhetoric is higher. Of course, their schtick is telling people that those people over there are worse than they are. So telling people they are relatively pretty.

If any party announced policies regarding maintaining supply chains, especially food supply chains, they would be attacked as alarmist by other parties. I could hope that the Permanent Civil Service has such a plan, but I doubt it.

[graydon]

I entirely agree that none of the parties are thinking like that. It makes me want to buy extra durable items, because I don't think much but the food supply will stay up if the food supply stays up the first hard year, and then there won't be recovery as such.

The LPC has far and away the best advice. (I think a lot of it is coming at some remove from the forecasting departments at the chartered banks.)

In attempting to go mainstream, the NDP have become the party of nostalgia -- things were good once -- which isn't great at any time and is just disastrous now. The Greens are selling an idea of systemic change without knowing what a system is. I could wish one or the other could manage to get a policy for actual systemic change out there.

And, yes, relatively pretty rather than absolutely pretty, but it's (I think) the same error.

I much doubt the post-Harper civil service has that plan, so definite agreement on that point.