Is it just me or has two weeks of good campaigning completely transformed Stephane Dion. I swear, every day I hear a new interview or see a video clip, his English has improved and he’s clearer and more forceful.

Not one to make hasty comparisons, but didn’t Stephen Harper experience a similar transformation in the 2004 election?

Here’s the latest clip (via Paul Wells)

Also, Read this post by Wells on the new Stephane Dion against the not so new Stephen Harper. I particularly like these lines:

The emerging and interesting theme of this campaign is that Stephen Harper, who some bloggers were calling Everyman as recently as Saturday, and who had all the gleaming apparatus of modern electioneering — legions of brain-in-a-jar strategic geniuses, a fundraising armada, gleaming suburban election suites, purpose-built teevee studios, the Legendary Guy Giorno Himself! as chief of staff (fun question: could anyone find Guy Giorno with teams of bloodhounds this week?) — and who had no stronger claim to legitimacy than his preoccupation for the concerns of ordinary folks and his willingness to play nice with the provinces — has managed to let himself get pushed off those dimes by Snooty French-Educated Clarity-Bill Guy.

And this bit at the end:

But let it be noted that as this campaign entered its home stretch, the accidental leader peddling a tax increase is getting crowds to their feet in North Bay and Bay Street, while the crack team assembled by the guy who’s spent the last three years playing three-dimensional Vulcan chess was reduced to crowd counts.

My friend Maggie has been working to make a difference on the issue of homelessness for the last couple of years. Recently, she and dozens of other activists spent a night sleeping on the street to help raise awareness of this truly important issue. What follows is some thoughts she wrote after the fact and e-mailed to people she knew. I’ve asked if I can post them here and she was happy to oblige.

Before you vote next week, please take a few minutes to consider this issue. There are about twice as many homeless persons in Vancouver today than there were 5 years ago.

10:30 am Tuesday, October 7, 2008

I am at home, it is warm and dry inside; I have a hot cup of tea to drink. Yesterday at 4 pm I arrived at the corner of Georgia & Thurlow with sleeping mat, sleeping bag, tarp, thermos of tea, wool long johns, two pairs of socks, waterproof pants, waterproof bootees, down jacket and waterproof jacket and of course, gloves. After all, I am a cycling commuter so am prepared for Vancouver’s famous rain. I was prepared for a typical Vancouver October day and also night. Why?

There is a federal election on October 14th. There isn’t a national housing strategy in Canada. There are a lot of homeless people. There is something not right in Canada. So there I was, with a group of likeminded others, camping out for one night on a city sidewalk in downtown Vancouver. We are drawing awareness to the problem of homelessness and that to be successful in the polls, the political parties have to address this issue by having a federal housing program to build affordable homes for low and middle income earners.

There were 30 of us who stayed overnight, our ranks were joined in the evening by friends and supporters and our numbers swelled to around 50. We were brought food, hot drinks, music and inspirational moments.

I arrived at the corner with trepidation, it was raining; potentially the police would come and issue tickets if not arrest us. Also, what would I do if/when I needed to use the washroom in the middle of the night? Being prepared to stay outside for one night was something I could do because it is only one night in my life. For others this is the reality they face everyday.

The building management was not happy at all that we were on building property sheltered from the rain. We did see a police officer across the street and, after taking a look at what was (not) going on, he left. At 10 pm or so, the management advised that if we didn’t move they would call the cops. This time the police did come and talk to us. They were very considerate and we agreed that we would move to the edge of the private property on the wide sidewalk and by this time the rain had stopped – which meant being on the sidewalk was not as challenging as it might have been. They were also concerned about the traffic being so close to our tents so arranged for the City Engineering department to come and put up a barricade closing off the lane of traffic nearest to the tents. We felt it was a real endorsement of what we were trying to do.

I had been prepared to sleep out in the open, but fortunately was able to share a tent. The nearby Tim Horton’s and McDonalds were open 24 hours, thus solving the middle of the night washroom dilemma. I had to lie down at 12:30 am. My feet ached from standing virtually all evening. I was warm and dry and cosy. It took at least an hour for my feet to stop aching.

I drifted in and out of consciousness rather than sleeping. At 6 am I got up. It was dark, there were some people about and we started handing out flyers. When it’s quieter people feel they can stop and talk a bit more. As it became lighter and the numbers of people walking by increased so did the number of blank and vacant faces. Every now and again, someone would say “we saw you yesterday, did you stay the night?” Yes, it is important enough that we stayed the night.

Around 8 am we were gradually beginning to pack up our things and the police visited us again in the morning and wished us well. By 10 am our event was over.

Now I am feeling light-headed, I have managed to write a few thoughts but feel I must have a nap in my own bed. I feel I cannot be productive or effective without it. I was out only one night; it didn’t rain. I was not cold or hungry. I am not homeless.

UPDATE:

I forgot a link to the Citywide Housing Coalition.  Please take a look.  also,  I’d commend to you these thoughts from a pastor in Seattle by the name of Eugene Cho.

“I’m in complete shock. This is something you don’t expect to have happen in Canada. We have a democratic system. This could have killed me, my girlfriend and everyone else on the road.” (link)

Forgive my tone, but this kind of crap shouldn’t happen in Canada.  It may be common in faux-democratic dictatorships like Zimbabwe or Myanmar, but you’d think after 250 years of functioning democracy, this kind of intimidation and violence wouldn’t be possible here.

I’m with Warren Kinsella on this one, attempted murder seems to be the appropriate criminal charge.

I posted a couple weeks ago about the role that abortion is playing in Pennsylvania during this presidential election. In reading the article, I was reminded by how odd it is to me that this issue is completely off the table in Canadian politics. More remarkable still, it has basically been off the table since Canadian abortion laws were ruled unconstitutional 20 years ago. My Christian friends who were raised in the US are completely floored when they learn that of the 5 federal political parties in Canada, not a single one of them is opposed to unlimited abortion rights. In fact, the Conservative party (who would be most likely to take a dissenting view), at it’s inaugural party convention, adopted a resolution pledging that a Conservative government would not put forward legislation on this issue.

So, south of the border, voters have struggled with this issue loudly, publicly and without pause for 35 years. A lot of smart people say that the last two elections were decided on this issue. Yet, here in Canada, there is a completely different story. On the surface, it would appear that either Christians in Canada don’t take the issue seriously, or the church in this country is so poorly engaged and politically ineffectual that not a single political party is convinced that there is a benefit to opposing abortion. It may also be that Canadians are disquieted by the division and polarization they see in the US and want to avoid something similar here.

Actually, I think there is a different thing at work. I think that far more Christians in Canada don’t think it is the government’s job to solve the problem of abortion by waving a magic legislative wand. Rather, I think that there is a lot more emphasis on the idea that if the church wants to eliminate abortion, she must start offering positive alternatives: pregnancy counseling, adoption services etc. It may be that the church in Canada has decided to focus on making a difference in the lives of individual women who are struggling to decide what to do in the face of an unwanted pregnancy, rather than making a difference in the acrimonious world of politics.

There are exceptions to this and there are certainly very active pro-life political advocacy groups in Canada. Yet I think it is a fair statement that the overwhelming proportion of the energy expended by pro-life Christians on the issue is directed to non-political initiatives.

With this in mind, here are a couple of links to some American Christians discussing the issue:

• Tony Jones recently posted his thoughts on supporting Obama and the abortion issue.  He says some things similar to what I described above.
• Over at Culture11.com, Mike Hall responded to those who think like Jones on the issue, attempting to bring them up short.

UPDATE:

Here’s a piece by a retired Catholic priest related to the post above:

One’s conscience is one’s own. Ultimately, we live and die as a unique person if we are true to our own conscience. While we seek input from sources outside of self, in the end we have to decide for ourselves. Following the conscientious decision of another is not necessarily being true to self.

The present tilt of the American bishops to intimidate Catholics against supporting Democratic candidates by implying that they cannot possibly have a well-formed conscience undermines the individual’s right to act according to one’s conscience. It usurps God as the ultimate judge.

Thoughts?

I wasn’t able to watch the fun last night during the french language leaders debate.  I would suggest that reading the group blog coverage from the Maclean’s crew is even more entertaining than the debate. 

Here the link.

Now I’m off to watch this evening’s combination of Canadian Leaders Debate / American VP debate.

Updated:

Here the link to the same blogging crew covering the English leaders debate.  Reading this stuff, I can’t help but feel that political journalists have way more fun during campaigns than the politicians that they cover.

So my dad and I were talking last night about the election. “I hate to say it,” he said, “but it looks like Stephen Harper is the star in this election.” I thought a couple of comments about Canada’s Prime Minister might be worthwhile. It’s a remarkable story. Here’s a guy who has done the impossible several times over: he won the leadership of one party (Canadian Alliance), negotiated a deal to merge with another party (Progressive Conservatives), and won the leadership of the newly merged party, all in a very short period of time. Two highly disciplined federal elections later, he found himself the the Prime Minister of Canada’s New Government(tm).

Someone who has spent a lot of time and energy trying to understand this atypical, yet remarkably successful politician is Paul Wells of Maclean’s fame. His first book was about Harper’s rise to power from his decision to run for the leadership of the Canadian Alliance right up to his winning the 2006 election. It’s a good read if you’re interested in smart, narrative journalism about Canadian politics. Also a good read if you’re looking for clues about what another term of Harper government might mean.

[Read more →]

(via marginalrevolution, via Ross Douthat)

From David Frum’s blog for the National Review Online:

A president does not need to know everything. In fact, it’s certainly impossible for him (or her) to know everything that he might possibly need to know. That’s what the White House staff - and beyond them the whole vast apparatus of the US government - is for. Collectively, the US government knows a lot. And all of that knowledge is at the service and disposal of the president. All the president has to do is - is ask.

But that’s not as easy as it sounds.

Somebody who knew President Bush well once remarked to me. “You’ll notice he never asks questions.”

“Why not?” I said.

“Because he doesn’t know what it’s okay for him not to know.”

I’ve mentioned the above quotes a couple of times in the last week discussing the presidential election with friends.  At the end of the day, when voting for a leader, you can’t know what the crisis will be that they will have to face.  This means that the ability to make good judgments in the face of limited evidence in areas where they are not experts should be at the top of the list for potential presidents.  Unfortunately, modern election campaigns make it literally impossible to evaluate someone in this light.

Chruchills’ quote about democracy being the worst form of government in the history of the world except for all the other alternatives comes to mind.

UPDATE:

I feel like the above anecdote may be worth thinking about in watching this video.  One of the biggest knocks I’ve heard against McCain’s VP nominee is that she seems incapable of admitting when she doesn’t know something.  It’s disconcerting to realise that she, like Bush, also may not know how much she doesn’t know:

Last Friday, I got a call from my mother. “What’s happening with all of these banks failing? I just signed up to make regular deposits into ING, do I need to be worried?”

I explained to my mother that the Canadian financial system was in better shape than its counterpart south of the border and that her deposits were insured by the federal government and as long as she had less than $100,000 in savings, the government would have to pay her back if the bank did fail. I told her it was pretty much an impossibility for the Canadian government to go bankrupt and that short of a global financial apocalypse her money would be safe in ING for the foreseeable future. She laughed at the thought of more than $100,000 in savings.

This conversation was a turning point for me. It was the first time anyone I had spoken with had been worried that the credit crisis (which we are now roughly 18 months into) might affect them personally. I was flipping through files at home this weekend and realized that our life insurance policies are with AIG. It turns out that if the US treasury hadn’t acted to keep that company afloat, we might have been without life insurance.  That’s not really a big deal but it is a part of my life.

Yesterday, the US House of Representatives voted against a plan aimed at addressing the continuing financial crisis.  The stock market then promptly drove itself of a cliff and went into free-fall.  For most of the afternoon, my colleagues in the office were pacing and checking their portfolios and watching thousands of dollars in investments evaporate in minutes.  It was not a pretty picture.

I continue to wonder what the church might offer the world as the limits of modern capitalism continue to be brought sharply into focus.  As political and business leaders continue to struggle with how to address a problem of this scale and complexity, I’ve been thinking about an essay I recently submitted for a course called Christianity and the Political Economy of Capitalism:

The credit crisis is linked to the fact that the entire capitalist system, as it exists today is a kind of shell game. Fractional reserve banking and complex global institutions have created a system of staggering complexity which no one understands. After eighteen months of following commentary on the cause of the problem, its potential effects and possible solutions, it has become apparent to me that the crisis in not understood by even the brightest minds modern economics has to offer. In fact, the crisis itself was caused by the clever manipulations of thousands of very brilliant people. Analysts at investment banks and rating agencies and brokerage firms were all doing their best to outsmart one another and managed to drag us all over a cliff that anyone might have seen if they had just stopped long enough to look.

My reflections on the credit crisis have underscored the unbelievable importance of humility and wisdom for the Christian who hopes to think about (or practice) modern economics and capitalism. For all the expertise and brilliance of those who ramped up the American housing bubble, they did not have wisdom. They did not have wisdom because they were arrogant and they did not believe there were limits. By contrast, we [Christians] must strive to be aware of our limits and the limits of our broken world.

So John McCain was booked for the Letterman show this past week. I guess the McCain campaign canceled at the last minute to “fly to Washington and save the country.” Letterman took great delight filling that empty program time roasting the republican nominee.

File this under “things not to do if you want to be president”

My last few posts on “Voting like a Christian” (part 1, part 2, part 3) have have been drawn from the dynamics of the presidential election in the US.  This is because in Canadian politics, the religious factor tends to be relatively muted.  And unfortunately, when religious issues make headlines in Canadian politics, it’s seldom “good press” for the faith involved.  It seems that it’s either an extreme religious voice making extreme comments that would make most Canadians cringe (or a moderate religious voice being grossly distorted) or it’s an angry secularist decrying the “secret agenda,” “nefarious plot” or “veiled bigotry” of an orthodox believer.

Well,  the most notable example so far in this election falls into the latter category.  [Read more →]