I am just as surprised as everyone else with Harper's move today. At once he has disarmed the Bloc, pissed off some usual allies (I'm sure Andrew Coyne is having blood pressure problems), and, as soon as the pundits are done venting, removed this issue from the table for a very long time -- hopefully for good. We would be wise on this day to remember the words of our founding PM on Québec:
“Treat them as a nation and they will act as a free people generally do — generously. Call them a faction, and they become factious.”
— Sir John A. Macdonald
UPDATE: Actually Andrew appears to have lost it. That response is way overboard.
UPDATE II: Now that I've had a chance to think more about this, wow! Was that ever clever on Harper's part. He's also erased the significance of the nation debate from the Liberal convention, giving his preferred candidate -- Iggy of course -- a much better chance of winning.
UPDATE III: Given the Liberals' support of this in the House today, I guess Trudeauvian federalism is officially dead.
UPDATE IV: Predictably, Paul Wells is also disappointed. I think these early responses are a bit too cynical, and I include myself in that. Harper is a strategic, long-term thinker. He doesn't do things for quick hits. Yes, this move will be politically helpful in the short-term. But I think this hints at Harper's desire to settle the Québec question once and for all, perharps in a second term. Harper knows that the conservative movement can never achieve its full potential until the constitutional issue is sidelined.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 5:54 PM
