There's been solid media coverage all week for Harper during and after his Afghanistan visit. Fawning, actually. But the more I think about it, the more I think commentators missed a key after-effect of the trip: he shored up his base.
In Vancouver last week and talking to Tory friends across the country since Jan. 23, I got the sense that the small-c conservative faction of the party was getting pretty dispirited. The Emerson/Fortier fiasco, putting Peter MacKay in foreign affairs, naming Liberal pick Marshall Rothstein to the Supreme Court, putting Mulroneyite Derek Burney in charge of transition and sending Mulroneyite Michael Wilson to Washington ... the list of eye pokes to the party's rightwing was started to get mighty long, and they were getting tired of it. It was nearing the point of restelessness, I think. For the past two weeks or so I've been saying Harper had better "throw a bone" to the right quick before a Globe piece about "discontent" brewing in the grassroots popped up on Page 1 (likely a Gloria Galloway story based on a single anonymous quote).
Anyway, this trip fixed the problem. It has made conservatives very happy. As it should.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 1:01 AM
