[LINK] "Anti-intellectualism: Political venom moves North"

[rfmcdonald]

Oh, joy. The Globe and Mail's veteran columnist Lawrence Martin has identified a trend towards populist conservatism, or Conservatism, in Canada at least partly influenced by the Tea Party's issues.

Remember two years ago when the liberal Obama tides were sweeping the U.S.? Many of us thought there would be a wash-over effect into Canada, an infusion of liberal idealism of the type of a John F. Kennedy or a Franklin Roosevelt. Barack Obama would stir the Canadian political imagination. Younger generations would be politically awakened. Old conservatism would fade into Bushian disrepute.

To the surprise and disillusionment of northern liberals, there has been no such reverberation. Remarkably enough, something closer to the opposite is in play. Mr. Obama appears to be helping Canadian conservatives. Some of the populist anger he has stirred south of the border is channelling north. The success of Toronto mayoralty candidate Rob Ford is an example, as is the furor over the HST in British Columbia. The tenor of the Harper Conservatives’ pitch on the gun registry, on law and order, on census-taking, on science is in keeping.

It’s a play to bumper-sticker populism, to an anti-intellectual spirit that crashes against the Obama promise of enlightened governance, civility, global perspective. A few months ago, Ekos pollster Frank Graves was talking about a culture war. Given the ugly nature of the political polarization here, who can doubt it? It’s a smaller version of America’s. But it shows signs of growth.

Partly. Thankfully, certain issues aside--the census, the long gun registry, et cetera--the content of Canada's Conservative Party, and of the actions and backgrounds of its membership, remains quite different. Thank the legacies of British-derived evolutionary conservatism, I suppose.

Mr. Harper is a lot of things but no visitor to this galaxy in recent years would declare him a populist. The input of conservative rank and file into policy-making in Ottawa is infinitesimal. Policy conventions of the old Reform Party sort have disappeared. The PM runs one of the most top-down governments in history, which is hardly in the spirit of the tea baggers. Moreover, he has expanded the size of government, a cardinal sin in their play books.

Last week, Mr. Harper’s House Leader, John Baird, a limousine Conservative, tried to nail the Liberals with the elitist charge but was laughed out of one of his chi-chi bars for being a hypocrite with a cap H. Intellectually, Mr. Baird is no fool which, given the down-with-erudition approach of his party, presents problems for him as well, not to mention Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, who has to cope with the burden of having a degree from Princeton.