Stephen Harper to Make up with Mulroney – Western Conservatives Everywhere Cringe
September 16, 2009 · By Greg Farries
This finally proves it, Stephen Harper has been in Ottawa far too long. It appears that the distance between Ottawa and Calgary has clouded the Prime Minister’s judgment to such a degree that he has allowed himself to be brainwashed into thinking Brian Mulroney has anything to offer the modern conservative movement in Canada. Apparently Prime Minister Harper has forgotten that it was this Mulroney’s actions/policies that set in motion the whole Reform movement, and to suddenly change gears and congratulate him for his deceitful, destructive and corrupt tenure as Prime Minister is laughable and downright ignorant to the core base of the Conservative Party of Canada
OTTAWA–Prime Minister Stephen Harper will publicly reach out to Brian Mulroney, and by extension his Tory predecessor’s powerful sphere of influence, in a video to be shown this week at a gala.
Sources close to the event tell The Canadian Press that Harper recorded a congratulatory message to be aired tomorrow at the celebration of Mulroney’s historic 1984 electoral victory at the helm of the Progressive Conservative party.
Can Western conservatives look at the Conservative Party of Canada and see anything that resembles that party they built nearly two decades ago?
My answer is no… my next question is, what are we going to do about it?
I abandoned the Progressive Conservative party late in the Mulroney years. However, I have not forgoteen he brought us Free Trade, GST and was instrumental in ending apartheid in South Africa.
The man should be treated with respect for that alone. Vilifying Mr. Harper for reaching out to Mr. Mulroney is childish at best.
I live in Ontario have will not vote PC, they are to liberal for me.
Mr. Mulroney did some good things for Canada, unfortunately near the end of his tenure he became a caricature.
I don’t like Mulroney either but I’d rather have him on our side that not. Just as long as he remains retired.
Think of the field day the Liberals would have with any sort of ongoing rift. Last time they practically adopted Mulroney. They’ve used it to their advantage before and would gladly do so again.
Hate to break it to ya, but there’s more to our movement that those of you in the west. Mulroney wasn’t perfect, but he sure as hell was better than PET before him & Chretien after him.
Big gamble. Harper does not need Mulroney at this time.
btw, to answer your question, the obvious recourse is to call up Preston Manning and start up a reform party on the platform of cleaning up Ottawa from all those refor–
Never mind.
It’s a small civil gesture and big tent.
Mulroney had problems, but i’m with the people on this thread that have recounted his accomplishments. I’ll also add he got a handle on acid rain and was voted the greenest PM we’ve had.
Also he had wonderful rappore with Reagan, paragon fo American conservatism and slayer of communism.
I don’t necessarily like everything Mulroney did, or how he went about it. However I recognize what he accomplished. I also recognize that what he accomplished means something. The fact that Mulroney was able to do what he did says that there is an appetite for a Conservative brand in Canada. A BIG one.
The initiative to “Unite the Right” in Canada was a sound one. But it also didn’t mean that the unification was a hostile takeover, contrary to what many believe on both sides.
I myself was Canadian Alliance, and Reform before that. But I recognize that neither the Canadian Alliance (Reform), nor the Progressive Conservatives were pulling enough interest across the country, one way or the other. That tells me that neither brand was able to appeal to that Conservative appetite, so something had to change.
To expect the Conservative Party of Canada to resemble wholly either part of it’s formation completely defeats the purpose of uniting the right. The appetite is still out there, and we have to find the right recipe to tempt that pallet.
And Greg, look at it honestly. Identifying and segregating Conservatism across the country with titles like “Western Conservatives” goes totally against “The West Wants In”. Instead, what it’s saying is, “The West Wants It Their Way”.
That’s a very unproductive view you are taking, wrt to improving the Conservative Movement. Unless you want to join and win seats for the Western Separation Party, where else in Western Canada, can teh Conservatives win seats to win a majority or even maintain its minority.
There are a lot of criticisms on both sides, but the only thing we must do is move forward. There are a lot of seats and people in rural Quebec, and Atlantic Canada, that are naturally Conservative but do not necessarily vote Conservative. Mending this conservative network is important for the growth of the CPC and the Conservative movement in Canada.
The alternative, in being just a Western based Conservative movement, leads to the inevitable conclusion, that the West is better, so the heck with the rest of you, we’ll go our own way so you all east of Winnipeg need not pass wussy laws. Like it or NOT if we want to continue to be a country of 10 provinces and 3 territories, then efforts must be made to bring more Conservatives into the tent, than excluding them. It is difficult, but provided that Harper and the CPC still proceed with some of their major principles, this will be good for Canada.
have always thought that Mr Mulroney has been villified for mostly sham reasons – GST (kept by the lieberals), CBC endless thrashing (urged by resident lieberals), Bloc betrayal (still in play and still disastrous)
not a great plan to accept money from Schreiber, but pales next to lieberal adscams etc – only war room ass-kickers, that brag of Chretien majorities, can keep this going
Have patience. The Reform/Alliance platform was going no where without the support of those of us IN THE WEST who have voted conservative for 4 decades, not two. Mulroney was crucified by the press and entrenched Liberals who were not themselves sufficiently villified for their mistakes. PM Harper’s modest acknowledgement of Mulroney’s achievements is about right, as there is absolutely nothing to be gained by a continuing snub, now that the Inquiry is over. I think you will see more fiscal prudence by the current government once the economy improves.
” . . . what are we going to do about it?”
Vote for him anyway, since he’s the only right-y out there?
Notwithstanding Western dissaffection with Mulroney I always felt that his Meech Lake efforts divided the Conservatives and others more than anything. He tried to make Quebec more equal than the other provinces. So far I support Harper on that score but he had better be careful.
As others in this thread have stated I agree that he has much to offer for us in Quebec. He has a strong legacy of achievement which to his credit and he didn’t shy away from the tough choices as do the Libranos.
The media has done a good job on the Mulroney file. The left do not want anymore conservative majority governments so their tactic has been to discredit Mulroney and the glory years that conservatives had then. I say we discredit Chretien and Trudeau as well as rehave the image of Mulroney in retribution. (real conservative)
What am I going to do about it? Ummmm …. Why nothing Greg… absolutely nothing. And why should I?
Believe it or not Greg, we haven’t bought into the delusional narrative that going through your head. Your assumption that it was “Western Conservatives” who turned against Karlheinz’s business partner is really a figment of your imagination. The reality is it was ALL CANADIANS who turned against Mulroney and the PC Party, even though they then had a “Western Conservative” in the name of Kim Campbell as Prime Minister. The PC’s went from 169 seats, to 2 seats. Let me repeat that, just so you don’t inadvertently glaze over it. “The PC’s went from 169 seats, to 2 seats” And it’s all the fault of “Western Conservatives”?
Then we have your blind obedience to whatever narrative the Toronto media is peddling. That’s not a good thing Greg.
All in all, your aping of the Star’s attempt at manufacturing dissension amongst the Conservative’s is lame and disingenuous.
I’ll finish up here with something you’ll surely enjoy. It’s a line used by Karlheinz’s business associate.
“You had an option, sir–to say ‘no’ — and you chose to say ‘yes’ to the old attitudes and the old stories of the Liberal Party.”
I am all for burying the hatchet and moving this country forward. This is 2009 and I see nothing to be gained fighting 20 year old battles while the country, the west included, has prospered and moved forward.
The Canada Harper governs today is a much different country from than the one Mulroney captained. For one, there is no burning discontent in the west to propel another western protest party into Ottawa. Neither do I sense the same in Quebec.
CF-18s? They are due for retirement for crying out loud!
The GST? Apparently it is a Liberal value now. Go figure.
The West? We’re in and we like it just fine.
Let’s not make the mistake of the Liberals and remain hopelessly stuck in the 90′s; else, we’ll discover that Canada moves on without us.
She always does.
If there is one thing I learned growing up on the prairies, it is that this is called “next year country” for a reason. Like a prairie fire, anger burns out quickly, but faith, optimism, and perseverance are what built the West. We don’t look back.
I am proud of the Party we’ve built over the last two decades, but we are far from finished.
When Harper was asked recently what conservatism means to him, he answered, “faith, family and freedom.” I like that motto. Not only does it describe “next year country” to a T, but it also describes the very best of Quebec.
Harper is right when he says Canada is a much more conservative country than Canadians recognize.
It may take another generation to fully exorcise the Bloc, but Canada will never fire on all cylindars until Quebec is “in” and fully engaged in our shared future.
Paying due respect to Brian Mulroney, as controversial as he may be, is the right thing to do. His accomplishments speak for themselves and that alone is worthy of respect. As a politician, the man was certainly no slouch either and he knows Quebec like no other Conservative I know.
Let’s keep going!
@revanche
based on the tone of this piece, I’d say at least some western conservatives are not satisfied with the current government, and the decision to make peace with Mulroney.
Further, I am in disbelief that you do not sense any sentiment in Quebec that would propel a protest party into parliament.
What?
The bloc elected 49 of 75 candidates run in the last election. Charest has been in power long enough that the usual cyclical swing is bound to take place.
The city of Montreal is currently in a mayoral race where the leading candidate is a former PQ cabinet minister.
Quebec is a constant battle..as I suspect the west is.
Mulroney accomplishments are clear (GST, Free Trade, etc), however, they are all rightly overshadowed by his reckless brokerage style politics that ultimately lead to the creation of the Reform and Bloc movements.
I’m willing to weight the good and bad in terms of Mulroney’s legacy and it’s clear to me the bad outweigh the good by a long shot.
I never supported the “United the Right” movement and I feel it was forced down the party members throats by Harper and McKay. However, to sell it as a REAL merger is to be a bit disingenuous. The Alliance Party had more MPs, more money, more party members, more ideas, and had a wider reach across Western Canada and parts of Ontario. The PC Party had a huge debt, a brutal history of corruption and regional grievances and let’s face it, zero membership and zero new ideas. It was essentially a dead party waiting to be crushed by a reasonable alternative to the Liberals. Which I believe would have been the Alliance party, if Harper hadn’t been so quick to cozy up to McKay and his merry band of political dinosaurs. BUT, that’s an argument for another day.
Well, we’re going to have to disagree on that point – the West clearly wanted in, but they also wanted things to change. Sure we were represented in the Mulroney cabinet (Mazankowski, etc), and yet we were still treated shabbily. When it came time for Mulroney to broker a deal between the regions, he quite clearly had a knack for inflaming our differences, not bridging our commonalities. The point of the Reform movement was to reform, not win. While I can see the argument — you can’t implement reform unless you win government – that sentiment rings hollow if you have completely sold out your principles in the quest for government.
But I digress, I’m getting off topic!
If you look at the membership lists of today’s Conservative party, you’ll see clearly that this is indeed still primary a Western party. The vast majority of the membership resides in the West, the vast majority of the money fundraised comes from the West and the vast majority of the good will towards the Conservative government resides in the West. And yet, I’m willing to wager, if you were to poll the Conservative membership in the West, they would tell you exactly how they feel about Mulroney, and it wouldn’t be positive.
Meh, don’t insult me. Just because I’ve got a problem with Mulroney and the old PC Party, doesn’t mean I’m a separatist. The Conservative party will win a majority when it stops emulating the actions of the old PC Party and to a lesser extent the Liberal Party of Canada.
And how does Mulroney play into this? Cozying up to Mulroney isn’t going to bring these voters into play for the Conservatives, in the West, Quebec, or even Ontario.
Mulroney is bad for the party – hell, we’re still dealing with his shady past – the closer the party gets to Mulroney, the more damaging it will be in the long run.
After further thought, I agree.
I should have worded to post and avoided the “Western Conservative” terminology. However, I intended my post to speak directly to former Reformer/Alliance members, rather than other conservatives in Canada because I feel the current Conservative Party of Canada is drifting away from those core principals that made the Reform party appealing to me (and I assume, other small “c” conservatives in the West). That, and I know that the post would spark debate over the future of the party (and to a certain degree, our past) – which it did!
I think disowning Brian Mulroney from the Canadian conservative “family” is no different from disowning Sir John A MacDonald because of the railroad scandals of the time, or because he opposed free trade.
Can you imagine if conservatives worked to remove Sir John A from the 10 dollar bill because he wasn’t a “real conservative”?
No, I can’t imagine it, because it isn’t a reasonable comparison.
I never said anything about throwing anyone out of any party, Mulroney or Sir John A MacDonald. I simply stated that cozying up to Mulroney was an insult to many of the core supporters of the Conservative party because of Mulroney’s rather shabby history.
At the risk of getting lynched by my western compatriots, I just can’t see that there’s much there there.
It’s a taped congratulations on a 25 year old election victory. Seems pretty innocuous to me.
to greg;
while i understand that the majority of members and money come from the west, one thing is clear in ontario, conservatives are making great gains every day. more and more people are “seeing the light” as it were and more and more young people in particular are actually asking questions (in my hometown at least).
sean and i live in a riding where it had been dominated by a liberal mp since 1992 that did jack shit in his tenure (his son is the new candidate now), i guess you could call that an entrenched incumbancy. the last couple elections have seen our conservative candidate not only win but he clobbered the lib opponent.
when i see this kind of infighting, eat our own, posts on here it makes me wonder if it is this kind of talk (type????) that becomes the movements undoing. the greatest challenge yet to face is unlocking that elusive toronto vote WITHOUT having to give up the kitchen sink to do it, something that stuck in alot of peoples craw in PM mulroneys second majority.
I would say the exact opposite. The second a party’s membership stops caring and fighting for what’s right (outside and within the party) is the day the party becomes irrelevant.
Seriously – arguing, lobbying and general pontificating about the direction of a political party is healthy, it’s called self-reflection and unless the Conservatives want to become the tired old PC party of Mulroney (which imploded from general lack of passion and direction from its membership) then they had better start discussing these issues rather than hiding from them.
I’m willing to wager that all those partisan hacks that attack me for criticizing the the Conservative party would be the first ones to bail the second things got tough. Because to them, winning is the prize above all others, whereas I believe in the movement above all things.
There is no point in winning if you’re going to do it by abandoning the movement that got you there. Believe me, history shows it’s a good way of ending up with 2 seats…
Greg, here I absolutely agree. I haven’t always supported everything the party does, and truth be told, I believe that anyone who does is either ignorantly partisan by intent, or just plain stupid.
I wholly support democratic argument within the party. It’s healthy and necessary in any organization in order to remain energized and relevant, especially in politics.
I think this is really a non-starter unless you include “The second a party’s membership stops caring and fighting for what they think is right…”.
No one has the monopoly on what is “right”. And in a democratic argument within the party, if not enough people believe what you do, the fault is not theirs. The fault (and impetus) for making an argument falls on the originator/instigator. If not enough people are convinced, then you haven’t done your job by making your case. This doesn’t mean the discussion is over, not by any means. It just means that it’s delayed until the next opportunity to try your case again and all you can do is hope you do a better job of it.
You also have to consider that not enough people are ever going to share your view. In such a case, you have to weigh your options and evaluate your goals; it’s only pragmatic at that point. If you have a better chance of being able implement your goals within the current group, then you just have to tough it out until you develop the support you need to make it happen. If your chances are slim to none within and without the group, you may have to resign yourself to yielding to reality (again, the fight isn’t over, it just may not happen in your lifetime). If your chances are better elsewhere then that’s where you go, IF the issue is important enough in your overall philosophy. And hey, no one ever complained that that politics is too simple.
The big problem lies in what happened between the CA and the PC’s. There was enough to balance each other out, but there was no chance of ever getting the mandate to accomplish the goals (supplant the Liberals in power) without one another. Hence the merger. There will of course always be those who vehemently disagree with the fact that it happened, but when it get’s right down to it, “them’s the brakes kiddo.”
You can work within the party to achieve your goals or choose another path. And unless you have enough support to achieve your goals outside the party, what’s the point? Look at the NDP for proof of effectiveness. But then, if you have enough support for your cause to be able to supplant the current group with a new one, well you probably have enough support to do it from within and not “split the vote”.
to greg;
i have to say that i do agree that a healthy debate is necessary to keep a party on the right track and to call it when it goes off course. i guess i should have made more of a point on that. i dont like the spending practices as of late (as some of my posts have shown) but i do think that what i see is that, there are some that make such a big case AGAINST the party as a whole due to their disappointment that it ends up ruining the whole cause, particularly when we continue to see the regional divide that plagues this party at times (hurtful enough due to the fact that the base of the party happens to be in the provinces with some of the smallest seat counts). i always feel that any dissenting for the time being is voiced best at times among party faithful.
i dont know. perhaps the differences are just too large to ever get any kind of united voice for this party to attain any meaningful election victory.
I am going to join the Western Block Party. I like their views, they make sense. The East has always been their own country, for as long as I can remember. The West sends our tax dollars to the East, and all the west gets are crumbs. I am so weary of the go-around, to all the same old party’s. I want the Wests tax dollars to stay in the west. We would not be forced to put up with a premier like Campbell, who is a lying, sneaking, deceitful, and an out and out criminal. Campbell, should go to the fascist east, that is where he belongs.