My initial comments on the outcome of the Canadian elections can be found in today’s National Post, it’s not online so you have to get a hard copy at the newsstand. Kudos to Adam Daifallah at the Post for giving bloggers the opportunity to reach a wider audience and for getting me to blog again.

And talking about the return, I have already violated my intention to make it a “tentative return”, it’s pretty much back to normal here. That in no small part is a result of the warm welcome extended to me by the following blogs:

Chris Lawrence
One Hand Clapping
Being American in T.O.
Small Dead Animals
Colby Cosh
Instapundit
Who Knew?
Fringeblog
Blackfive
Alisa in Wonderland
Terrataco
Trudeaupia
Blogfonte
Simon World
Dean Esmay
David Janes
Gin and Tonic

Let me know if I missed anyone. Thanks again, there’s nothing like traffic generating links.

One more thought on the Canadian election, and as a fan of the cross-border aspect I am going to bring the Americans into it and our American in Toronto has some thoughts. She points to the effects of the interference by Michael Moore and that other experienced election spoiler, Ralph Nader.

Coming on the heels of his movie release Moore probably had some impact as I suggested earlier. Someone floated the likely outrage that would occur if Rush Limbaugh would dispense some electoral advice to Canadians, but even wheeling in some moderate American conservatives (Schwarzenegger, Giuliani, McCain to name a few) to prop up Harper would have caused a nationwide outrage, with the CBC no doubt stirring up the flames of fury. Whatever comes out the US must be bad for Canadians is the dogma, but here’s what struck me. Is the leftist sentiment in this country not to a large extent an American import product? How many disgruntled, socialist, environmentalist, pacifist or otherwise disenchanted Americans over the years have made Canada their home, adopted citizenship and are now practicing a political agenda for which there was little appetite back home? I don’t have to look very far to identify a significant number of them and there are actually some figures for this phenomenon:

During the Vietnam War, U.S. emigration to Canada surged as thousands of young men, often accompanied by wives or girlfriends, moved to avoid the draft. But every year since 1977, more Canadians have emigrated to the United States than vice versa - the 2001 figures were 5,894 Americans moving north, 30,203 Canadians moving south.

So for every six potential Conservative voters Canada loses it gets one Liberal back. That must have had an impact last night.

My hopes were dashed the moment I switched on the TV last night as the politics of fear have done their work, Canadians have chosen to return the Liberals to power with the scary caveat that they will have to form a coalition with the left-wing New Democrats. At least the Liberals will now be held accountable but that is about the only positive thing that emerged from last night’s tally of the votes.

As a foreign observant I am still mystified what the underlying reason is for the inability to turn this country even slighly to the right. True, the country never had a Reagan or Thatcher but then you would think that someday, sooner or later, Canadians would follow in the footsteps of their Anglo-Saxon brethren and opt for small government and low taxes. Especially given the geographical similarities with its southern neighbour it’s not unthinkable that entrepreneurial regionalism would somehow support a steady course away from statist adventures. Regional dependency is more like it.

Canada is different in two ways. It hasn’t suffered a deep national trauma that would align the electorate behind a national savior, nor does it have a dynamic and vibrant economy that engages its participants to an extent that they are able to rid themselves of reliance on state nurtured sustainability. Make no mistake, there is a strong conservative undercurrent and Stephen Harper did very well by uniting the Conservatives on their journey to eventual power, but Canada needs a major screw up by last night’s winners to raise hopes that he will ever be Prime-Minister.

So, what to expect in the weeks ahead? Hard to say but you can bet that a lot of it will center around bickering over domestic economic and social policy, the New Democrats will want their piece of the pie and eat it. Foreign policy, defense and national security will take a definite backseat setting Canada on a further track to the margins of international influence. Peacekeeping, if that, instead of peacemaking. Still, I can’t see Paul Martin pissing away his track record of balanced budgets and debt repayment and that’s where the weakness of yesterday’s outcome is. Here’s hoping.

UPDATE I: Mark Steyn:

“ we're looking at a Liberal minority government governing well to the left of M Chretien's three ministries. So it's corruption plus socialism. That's great news, isn't it?”

UPDATE II: Trudeaupia:

The other horrible thing is this will be the most screaming leftist government we've seen in the country since Trudeau. Welcome to Trudeaupian idiocy on steroids.

UPDATE III: Belinda, the pan-Conservative babe, is in by the narrowest of margins. At least something positive and she'll be instrumental in the next campaign.

THOUGHT: At 11:24 Pacific Time it looks like the Liberals and New Democrats together can't get to the required number of seats (now together at 154, precisely 50% of the seats avaialbe) to form a majority, so the Bloc Quebecois is in play. This is going to be a messy affair.

FINAL UPDATE: In my riding Conservative John Reynolds squeaked in, you will be pleased to know that in British Columbia's Orange County the Marxist-Leninist Party still managed to get a decent 118 votes.

This is it. Return to regular blogging tomorrow.

A struggling incumbent, a separatist, a socialist demagogue and a somewhat boring but ambitious conservative are the front-runners in today’s Canadian federal election. I expressed my discontent over the lack of a real debate and the inability of any of the four key contestants to present a persuasive vision of Canada’s future earlier. Conservatives moving left, Liberals throwing mud, separatists with a Quebec-first attitude and of course the union bullies with their pre-1980s attitude who lost their environmentalist compatriots to an emerging green party, it was all in all a forgettable spectacle. And we may be at it again soon if no party is able to claim a majority. Looking at the projections there are no real winners, but there’s little doubt that the Liberals will be the clear losers and that is a very good sign. Canadians want change but they still have not figured out what exactly they want and none of the politicians has been able to help them find out. Only one of the leaders has made an attempt and positioned himself as a credible leader, and Trudeaupia gives credit where it is due to conservative leader Stephen Harper:

He has at the very least survived the coordinated Liberal/media smear campaign and has an excellent chance of being elected on Monday. Honestly, I didn’t think the Conservatives could dare to have such hopes until at least the 2008 election, if then. For the foreseeable future the Liberal hegemony over us is finished. Done. And for that we owe Stephen Harper, Peter MacKay and the team many thanks and our votes on Monday.

Let’s hope it works out that way but a real political transformation in a country dominated by political correctness, rabid anti-Americanism and fear of change will take more than one election, or hopefully at some point, a visionary leader. It is not morning in Canada, yet.

Update I: Similar sentiments can be found over at Innocents Abroad.

Update II: David Frum runs some numbers that Canadians should look at before they cast their vote.

UPDATE III: Colby Cosh makes it clear why he thinks Harper and the Conservatives should win:

Harper is different. He does not believe it would be his job, as Prime Minister, to lash Canadians onward to a New Jerusalem of state childcare, equal incomes, fit bodies, and pure thoughts.

Exactly. Let's hope it all works out today.

At a dinner party this weekend the topic of the Canadian elections came up and someone sitting next to me piped up and commented that her vote was in doubt after seeing Fahrenheit 9/11. She was not your typical lefty; a professional working for a top law firm and she had just returned from a business trip and shopping spree in Florida, because as she said, there’s so much more to buy in the US than in Canada.

Anyway, I tried to figure out what prompted her apparent departure from a conservative vote and she pointed to Moore as he had advised Canadians to do so. She had initially not really taken note of that but having seen his movie (which according to her got a standing ovation in the theatre …) Moore had somehow gained a form of moral authority that allowed her to take his advice seriously. I tried various approaches, first debunking the Moore phenomenon which didn’t work. Then I posed the question: why does the content of this movie relate to domestic politics in Canada? Our discussion then moved into the wider territory of politics and economics and I introduced the Florida shopping trip: if it’s so bad down south, how come they have much more goods on offer in their stores? The response was centered around the phenomenal poverty in America so you can see, I was going absolutely nowhere: Michael had done his work. And judging from the numbers across North America last weekend probably many more have accepted his status as an opinion defining expert. And as my dining encounter underlined, he’s getting serious traction in the political middle ground. His views are no longer considered extremist or borderline, Michael Moore is mainstream. Again, brace yourselves for the months ahead.

And while we are at the strange interaction of American and Canadian politics, here’s some reader mail following the report that 40% of Canadian youths see the US as an evil force:

Canadians should realize that their anti-Americanism no longer occurs beyond the notice or care of Americans. Many Americans, including myself, are beginning to realize that Canada is as much an enemy as France.

Perhaps a strong quote, but still. After the endless America bashing abated following the decision of Canada not to participate in the war in Iraq it has now re-emerged as three of the four major political parties have repurposed anti-Americanism for electoral gains. Apart from the dubious tactic of singling out one particular group or nation for attack and the wisdom of clobbering your major trading partner, I really challenge, going back to my dinner companion, the assumption that everything American is so despicable. On the contrary.

But more importantly the crux is that Canadian politicians, the Prime Minister no less, fail to present a compelling vision for their nation to their electorate. They fall back into a poisonous mode of electoral rhetoric that not only directly affects bi-lateral relations, it creates an atmosphere where young people and the easily influenced take their recommendations at face value which in turn can have a very damaging and negative impact in long-term relations between the US and Canada. And that is clearly in no one's interest.

North American audiences it seems are becoming more receptive to soccer, which is great as it allows me to throw in some random updates on Euro 2004. The Dutch overcame their fear of penalty shoot-outs yesterday against the Swedes and are now on track to reclaim the title as they are the last major soccer nation left in the tournament. Yet they have to beat Portuguese home side in the semi-finals on Wednesday to do that.

Samizdata picks up on the phenomenon of the conservative yet socially liberal Belinda Stronach, one of the new faces in Canadian politics who will claim her seat in parliament after the election tomorrow. If you look at her pedigree and politics it was an obvious choice to brand her as Canada’s Schwarzenegger, which I did back in January. She’s will be a phenomenal asset for Canada’s conservatives and I wonder why we didn’t see more of her in the national campaign, side-by-side with Stephen Harper. She is the perfect conservative to capture the middle ground and deliver a clear conservative majority, which as of today is still pretty much in doubt.

Just saw Jeff Jarvis on CNN’s Aaron Brown to talk about Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, together with Jeff Greenfield. I haven’t seen the movie and my initial reaction is: I probably won’t as I would get very irritated having to sit through the extreme and inflammatory misrepresentation of facts that Moore is serving up this time. But the anger wouldn’t be directed so much at Moore, it would be directed at the stupidity and ignorance of the many people who I know will buy into Moore’s rhetoric, accept it and treat it as the gospel, and then propagate it. Greenfield, Jarvis and Brown seemed to agree that a movie like this primarily has a big impact on youngsters and when a movie that juxtaposes Saddam/al-Qaeda and the USA points to America as the bad guys, you know we are in for some challenging times ahead. It’s a subscriber link but the Vancouver Sun reported today that more than 40% of Canadian youth in the age group 14 to 18 see “the U.S. as an evil global force”. Numbers like this render me speechless but you can bet that with Moore being in the limelight in the months ahead these numbers are not going to come down.

But it’s not the restive adolescent group only. There are many mature adults who after Bowling for Columbine (which I discuss here) fell for the flawed logic presented by Moore. There’s a huge chunk of the well-educated middle classes that will see Moore’s latest movie as the validation of what they had been thinking for a long, long time. Remember, Reagan proved them wrong, socialism and communism collapsed, but here's a new cause that the chattering classes can rally behind with renewed vigor. Not long after 9/11 a group of academics I occasionally had a beer with were grateful to see ”evidence” online that the plans to build a pipeline into Afghanistan really were the source of a conflict between the Bush and bin-Laden families and that 9/11 and the removal of the Taliban were all directly related to developing and exploiting oil resources in the Middle East. Again, well-educated people in North America and Europe will once more point the finger to a democratically elected leader and say: ”you’re evil, you’re the bad guy”. Our enemies are having a field day and that is what makes me livid, in the face of suicide attacks, bombs on trains and beheadings we fail to close ranks and I wonder if Michael Moore in his quest to unseat Bush realizes the real damage that he is inflicting on our free society.

But Moore has a right to his opinion; the style and tone however contribute to a polarization that is scary. It’s a sad week for a democratic open debate where a former Vice President sees it fit to call bloggers “digital brownshirts” and the current VP, not someone beyond controversy either, uses the f-word against a senator. It’s only June so imagine where the vocabulary will be in November. Iraq is no Vietnam, but the debate over the war on terror at large is becoming poisoned and since the threat of terror is of a far greater magnitude than anything, as we know now, that endangered us in the Cold War era we can only hope it will not lead to a fatal divide.

By the way, I do not think that Al Gore lost his mind, he’s always been like this although now all the constraints of protocol have fallen away: Gore unleashed. Even as VP he was known for using extreme oratory to make a point. And sometimes he had a point, anyone remember this?

If you haven't already, read Edmund Morris' reflections on the Gipper, a lengthy piece with some remarkable forays into Reagan's life and personality from his official biographer. I can lift out a few parts that struck me but having read it, combined with what I know about Reagan, it leaves me with only one real train of thought. It's amazing that Reagan, given the time he grew up in, the environment in which he shaped his political career as well as some of the setbacks he encountered in life, was so confident and thoroughly at ease with himself. It was something unique, a centerpiece of his psyche, that not only extinguished any self-doubt, it also fueled his decisive optimism. This was likely the key to his success, I think, and Morris highlights an important feature of that ability:

Reagan was not introverted, yet from infancy he had the same kind of "happy" self-centeredness that Bradbury speaks of, the same need to inhabit an imaginative construct in which outside reality was refracted, or reordered, to his liking.

It structured the world for him into a navigable chart where anything was possible. I know that for a fact, because I recognize it. Although there’s some naivety in there we should not judge it as a negative, if you are able to shape the facts of the world around you into a construct that enables you to realize your dream or vision, then it’s a huge positive. Think about it, if you have all the cold hard facts available, wouldn't it be a truly sobering event, preventing you from taking a bold, risky course? Combine that self-shaped map of the world with unrelenting optimism and you have a pretty good chance at success. Reagan had it in spades, which is why we’re still talking about him.

Megan asks the question, will violence increase, decrease or stay at the same level in Iraq following the June 30 handover? Her guess is a decrease, and I commend her for her optimism but I am not quite sure I would agree. The increased violence of the past few weeks and today is no doubt related to the impending sovereignty change but after that, what really changes? Coalition forces will remain present for a long time and power will fall into the hands of an administration that is viewed with suspicion as its power is rooted in the very presence of those coalition forces. Also, it seems, the availability of weaponry in the country continues unabated. There’s an election scheduled and in a country where power right up to this moment has come from the barrel of a gun there’s a strong likelihood that many will attempt to use the gun rather than the ballot box to effect change.

The basic question though is: what do the various insurgent groups and terrorists intend to accomplish, what are their real objectives? A stable and democratic Iraq that enjoys a strong relationship with the international community is probably the last thing on their list of objectives. In fact it’s the opposite of what they want. As long as their objectives are not achieved violence will continue, and the harder we strive for a democratic Iraq, the harder they will fight back.

Canada’s elections? Still a dead heat and with no clear majority emerging Colby Cosh has started thinking about a Liberal-Conservative alliance. With proportional representation on the books in most Western European countries this form of coalition government has been a workable solution for years in the old continent. In my native Holland the Christian-Democrats have been in power for more than 100 years (except the period from 1994 to 2002) in one form or the other, a track record not dissimilar to that of the Liberals. To monopolize power in that fashion takes a while but once you have it is relatively easy to maintain: when the wind is blowing from the left you move left and when the wind is blowing from the right... In addition you have the incredible benefit of ensuring that you can become institutionalized: you get to appoint judges, top bureaucrats, diplomats and other officials, so in the end your power base is phenomenal and you can help shape elections. In Canada some judges and notably the CBC are more than happy to pitch in during a campaign to ensure that the Conservatives can not implement their Americanized vision of Canada.

The Dutch Christian-Democrats have, without ever presenting a bold vision for the nation, alternatively teamed up with the Free Market Right or with Labor, whichever formula worked best at the time. Of course, this sometimes resulted in some internal party conflicts, but the last time that got out of hand was in the 1980s when two pacifist radicals were booted out of the party when the Dutch signed up for cruise missile deployment on their soil. The same happens here by the way, Sheila Copps was just too far to the left to continue to be part of the Martin Liberal team. So in essence, I can’t see why this type of coalition building would not work in Canada other than a lack of experience with this highly pragmatic approach.

Damian Penny notes that a hurdle to this might be Stephen Harper’s role. Would he be willing to serve in a government under Paul Martin? It may be hard for Canadians to visualize this, but again my experience leads me to believe that it would not be out of the ordinary for him to sign-up for the role of Deputy Prime-Minister and Minister of Finance if we follow the European template. Thinking out loud, he would be given day-to-day control over budgetary matters and in return offer the Liberals a few things on their wish list. Note that conservative Christian-Democrat Lubbers in the late 1980s offered the finance portfolio in Holland to Labor leader and former union chief Wim Kok, ensuring that this socialist would forever change his views about fiscal policy, which he eventually did. There's a risk for Harper, becoming a taxing and spending quasi-Liberal just because Martin puts you in that position may be too dangerous an option. So the other route open to Harper would be to remain in Parliament and not join cabinet and control policy at a distance as political leader of the Conservatives where he would have the ability to pull the plug on the coalition if it would drift too far to the left. Again this approach has been tested in European settings with some success, it would certainly allow Harper to remain ideologically pure. Definitely a major gamble for him personally, but then with today’s electoral projections on the table it is time to start thinking outside the box.

Unthinkable stuff for Canadians, maybe. But is has been a successful formula in countries after which the Canadians would like to model themselves so much: European social democracies.

We all knew that there were issues with Michael Jackson and there are few people left that don’t know about the duplicitous ways of Bill Clinton, but we sometimes need a British TV personality to provide further evidence of such notions. After Martin Bashir unveiled the real Jackson for us, now David Dimbleby has done the same with Bill Clinton when probing the aftermath of the Lewinsky affair:

When the broadcaster persists with the question of whether the politician was truly penitent, Clinton directs his anger towards Dimbleby. The atmosphere, which was initially warm, then turns decidedly chilly.

No kidding. My question really is why we have to go through this Clinton-song-and-dance once more. The answer is probably very simple: there’s a lot of money to be made by the various media that recycle Clintonian artifacts.

While the Ken Starr crusade against Bill Clinton was a complete over-the-top waste of public time and money it did prove one thing beyond a reasonable doubt: Clinton’s dishonest nature and thoroughly unsound moral compass. Like Nixon, Clinton has now set himself on a mission to cement his reputation as that of an elder statesman and I have to say I will probably listen to Clinton if he ventures into areas of political importance such as moving the Democrats to the center in order to make them electable in the aftermath of the Reagan revolution. What is however disturbing, and which in turn destroys every tiny bit of authority he has been able to reclaim, are the endless deceitful attempts to set the record straight over Lewinsky and some other issues that transpired during his years in the White House. Not only are we asked to put up with patent nonsense (“sleeping on the couch”) we are also once again asked again to join Clinton on the slippery slope of rewriting history with the help of borderline constructions of his own mind. To blame the affair on self-destructive behaviour that finds its origins in his upbringing is a brazen attempt to exculpate himself from any responsibility. Yet, that’s the hallmark of Clinton's reign, and here’s the ultimate legal gem that underlined that philosophy when the former President reached a deal with the independent counsel shortly before he left the White House in 2001:

"I tried to walk a fine line between acting lawfully and testifying falsely. But I recognize that I did not fully accomplish that goal”

OK, so whenever you are close to committing a crime, just blame it on your inability to accomplish walking that fine line, it may just get you off the hook. The pervasive dishonesty makes shelling out 35 bucks for Clinton’s book a tenuous proposal. Apart from some useful political lessons, Clinton’s legacy of avoiding responsibility, lying, shamelessness and hiding behind questionable legalese constructs has become an integral and accepted part of political life of the new century. Thanks Bill.

It’s been quite a while since I penned my argument as to why peace arrangements between democracies and terrorist groups are inherently flawed. Today David Frum, while honestly admitting that he was caught up in the enthusiasm for such deals in the 1990s, looks at this issue with a particular focus on what happened in Northern Ireland.

Bush gets a major boost from McCain? Who would have thought that? Well I did. At the end of the day John McCain is a Republican and for all the daydreaming about a Kerry/McCain ticket and the hope that someday McCain will take the reins of the Republican Party to steer it away from the direction that George W. Bush has given it, what we need above all is a reality check. Make no mistake, I have always been a strong proponent of the Arizona Senator but when he lost out in the 2000 primaries he must have realized that the only way forward was to join the ranks of the party and to support the new leader. The straight-talking express was great while it lasted but if McCain had continued to ride his bus after 2000 he would have been on a road to political irrelevance, rejected by the Republicans, viewed with suspicion by the Democrats. If you want to effect change, desire to direct your party away from its present course, better to stay in your party to help and shape that direction.

And so it is with Andrew Sullivan. Bush’s intention to find a way to outlaw gay marriage appears to have been the final straw for Andrew who has now stated he can no longer support Bush. Whether or not Sullivan was ever inside the Republican tent is not relevant, one of the strongest Bush supporters in the blogosphere has thrown the towel in the ring and decided to migrate to political no-man’s land as supporting Kerry would, judging from Andrew’s site, be unthinkable. My sense is that Andrew has overreacted and failed to take a route that in the long run would have yielded much better results and that is to stay under the Republican umbrella as a constructive long-term contributor. Ronald Reagan became President of the US at age sixty-nine, and one of the reasons for that late ascendancy to power was that he had first relegated himself to the political wilderness after he left the Democratic Party and then it took him close to fifteen years to change the course of the Republican Party. Change takes time and if you really believe in the conservative underpinnings of the Republican Party you do not achieve that much by slamming the door and declaring you no longer are supporting its nominee for the White House. But then Andrew is a very popular journalist and blogger, so he can probably take a few liberties but I don’t think Republican strategists are keen to sound out our Daily Disher in the near future.

That however doesn’t change my view about Andrew. He was the first blogger I discovered and he’s still the first port of call during morning coffee. I agree with him on most issues and share the intelligent comments of this blogger on the abuse that has been hurled at Andrew. But let’s face it, Bush’s first term has been marked by many ups and downs and it is the right of every Bush supporter, wherever he or she is, to criticize his record and come up with solutions because for many of us, and I certainly speak Andrew’s language here, we believe in the conservative dream that the Republican visionary Reagan laid out in the 1980s. Running up huge deficits by erroneously comparing 2004 to 1982 deserves criticism, launching a successful justifiable pre-emptive strike against Iraq only to see it tarnished by poor execution raises questions and going after one particular minority in an anachronistic way deserves disapproval. But that doesn’t mean the support for Bush should end abruptly. It means that Bush should listen to these critics, both in and outside his party, and recalibrate some of his policies in order to cement the achievements of his first term.

Barring any disaster Bush will probably have a fairly uncomplicated journey to re-election; Kerry is just not credible presidential material. That in turn means that Bush will have to start thinking about his legacy and about giving true meaning to his uniter-not-a-divider mantra. To me there’s only one real option open to him and that is to act on some of the criticisms and think about a reshuffle of his team as there are some clear deficiencies in the group that currently executes the President’s wishes. By having stayed inside his party John McCain can play a role in that process and exert some influence, I still am enough of a dreamer to see him take over the Pentagon, who knows. Sullivan has in a way disqualified himself for a while to exercise influence in conservative circles. Given his well-thought out ideas, views and abilities that’s a pity, but then to help bring about change in the Republican camp may take a very long time and Sullivan is surely young enough to reconsider some of his rash decisions.

It’s Father’s Day and my request could have been to spend the rest of the day in front of this screen, but it is way too sunny and hot today. Coffee in the garden and a visit to the beach are probably the priorities today. The blogroll has been updated and I am thinking about a longer piece about Sullivan, Bush and the Republicans. That will very likely be posted sometime tomorrow.

With a week to go the Canadian election is still too close too call with Conservatives and Liberals in a dead heat. It’s interesting, the Conservatives have announced radical cuts in corporate subsidies and support programs which of course is something that is wholeheartedly supported here at Peaktalk, but many of my clients, entrepreneurs no less, are starting to squirm. Come on guys, the market place ultimately offers far greater rewards than anything corporate welfare offers, but then the only way to prove that beyond a reasonable doubt is to see that particular mechanic at work. Canadians should abandon their tendency to look south of the border with a mixture of jealousy and disgust, they now have a better chance than ever to allow an ambitious group of politicians to define a new brand of conservatism of which Canadian can be proud and which could potentially yield a dividend that is equal to or larger than what Americans currently enjoy. That is if they ignore the advice from this well-kown American.

James Joyner is on top of things Saudi, but I have to qualify one of his statements where he argues that the terror threat does not come from the poor and educated, but from the well-trained sons of the affluent. The latter is certainly true but these well educated guys have a far better chance of succeeding and getting on the ground support in a country where a rapidly growing segment of frustrated, poor and uneducated youth is looking for a way out of their dismal lives. It takes a certain type of intellectual to achieve this, which is why the Russian Revolution and Nazism succeeded and why for instance equally radical groups such as Baader-Meinhof and the IRA failed: a prosperous, employed, freedom enjoying middle-class is probably the last group of people to be mobilized behind a radical ideology that seeks to overthrow the current order. Given that and the incompetent and divided leadership that currently rules Saudi Arabia (think about the analogies with the Weimar Republic and the last Czar) Saudi Arabia is poised to be the defining battleground in struggle with Islamist terror.

Great piece yesterday by John Hawkins on the potential for bloggers going forward and why the arrival of established journalists like Michelle Malkin (who by the way has a great new blog, another superb Sekimori design job) is actually good news for the blogosphere. Hawkins is right, blogs are still in their infancy and only this week, a number of years after the phenomenon started, Time Magazine finally devoted a feature article to it. The public at large is still pretty much unaware of the incredible source of news and commentary that is provided by weblogs and for well-known names to jump into this game, there is a good chance that their efforts and brand appeal will rub off on smaller bloggers. The party has only just begun.

And I have to admit, that is also one of the reasons why I ended my 4-month sojourn, I had invested too much time and effort into something that I not only really like, it has some real future potential. With today’s Instalanche everything is back to normal here at Peaktalk. Thanks Glenn.

An Anglo-Franco/German spat is brewing over the appointment of a new EU President. Chris Patten, former Hong Kong Governor and now EU Commissioner for external relations appears to be well positioned to become the new EU leader. Well, I have met the man a few times and written about him in the past. He seems to have strayed from his conservative roots, but he will still be a phenomenal man to lead the EU and certainly be able to function as a counterweight to the Franco-German axis.

We can scrutinize Dick Cheney’s now historic statement that Reagan showed us that deficits don’t matter on a regular basis as more and more studies point to the fact that while Reagan created deficits, they went hand in hand with significant spending cuts as this study from the American Enterprise Institute shows. The Vice-President did not make a great call in comparing the Bush deficits to the Reagan deficits but it seems that not only conservatives in America are prepared to accept deficit spending, Canadian Conservatives have presented a platform that critics claim will lead to a very questionable state of Canada’s finances going forward. Andrew Coyne was kind enough to run the numbers and it appears that the implementation of the Conservative platform may not drive the country into deep deficits, but it seems to me that the problem is more philosophical. In order to realize their objectives conservatives in both the US and Canada are accepting deficits as a legitimate tool to do business. Bush is prepared to avoid a repeat of his father’s one term in office at any cost and gambles that aggressive tax cuts and unrelenting spending will buy voters and keep the economy humming at a pace that will avoid it being an issue in November. In Canada, the Conservatives under Harper have come to realize that their message will only get traction in a country dependent on public services if they are prepared to pour money into it. Again, the numbers may not bear this out as of today but cutting taxes and increasing spending across the board can be a dicey proposition especially if the Conservatives have to form a minority government where they would have to rely on possibly the Bloc Quebecois, a party representing a region that lives on a federal government doling cash out to them in almost every form imaginable. Pork, welfare, whatever you call it Americans and Canadians alike rely on it to a large extent.

Being a conservative with financial roots I even find having a mortgage evidence of abject fiscal failure and I am prone to reject deficits on purely ideological grounds. But having said that there can be an argument for significant tax cuts, increased spending in some areas while at the same rolling back expenditure in a number of areas to ensure that the gap that is being created remains manageable and is restricted to only one or maximum two budget cycles. Bush’s approach and the outlook for Harper are not Reaganite; they are Nixonian and may have a fairly devastating impact on the North American economy going forward. Political ambition needs to be tempered with fiscal realism, let’s hope someone listens.

Looking at the Google searches that drive traffic to this site I am surprised to see how many people are still googling for information about the Baltic Exchange bombing in London in 1992 by the IRA which I wrote about in detail here. Not only that, the events at Entebbe and the death of Dora Bloch at the hands of Idi Amin’s henchmen also generate a lot of queries and traffic. It is clear that acts of terror, irrespective of the number of deaths and the year in which they took place, linger in our collective minds and various events can trigger a thirst for more information, encourage attempts to re-evaluate what happened and write history, renew the search for the terrorists that got away or just simply to remember the fallen. Blackfive yesterday marked the anniversary of the TWA hijacking in which a one US servicemen was executed and others beaten and tortured. These acts of terror and their innocent victims should never be buried away in files or archives, they should be kept alive and it’s encouraging to see that weblogs increasingly play a very important part in that process. Peaktalk has a pretty good memory and will continue to do that.

Mark Steyn discusses the reign of Dutch Queen Juliana who passed away earlier this year and contrasts her folksy reign with that of the Windsors. As usual any Steyn piece offers some gems and as a Dutchman this one struck me as something that was quite on the mark:

But perhaps the quirks of Dutch Royalty will not be a problem much longer. Along with the relaxed attitude to monarchy and marijuana, the Dutch seem to be relaxing themselves right out of business. Indeed, until recently the entire country was showing signs of mass euthanasia. Just over a year ago, I had a conversation with a senior Dutch government minister apropos demographic trends in the kingdom – Mohammed is the most popular name for newborn boys in Amsterdam, etc. In the wake of 9/11 he and his colleagues realized that something had gone wrong, that today’s young Dutch Muslims are less assimilated than their grandparents, and, aware that I was Canadian, he told me the government wished to counter this with a citizenship ceremony modeled on my own country’s, in which new Canadians take an oath of allegiance to Queen Elizabeth. But he worried that the concept of an oath to the Queen might be a bit too overtly nationalistic for the Dutch. I suggested to him, as politely as I could, that, when Canadian nationalism is too strong meat for you, you know you’ve got a problem.

Yes. Go read Steyn’s piece in its entirety if you’re interested in royalty and in the various ways and shapes it comes.

Here’s a tidbit from the stack of newspaper clippings I get on a regular basis from my dad, and this recent one really is too good to be true:

“The extent of Reagan’s influence was evident last week when the Green Left party proposed to apply targeted tax cuts to stimulate the Dutch labor market – Reaganomics from the former Communists!”

Lenin is turning in his grave.

That is I think the way to describe the elections for the EU Parliament. Trying to read deeper things into the results is a pointless exercise, echoes of Iraq or a protest vote against a centralized European nation state may play a part for some, but with less than half of the eligible voters bothering to turn up we can’t really attach any meaningful explanations to this result. Michael Totten points to the anti-incumbency outcome which is probably the best explanation for the results overall when you break them down per individual country, with the exception of Britain where anti-European sentiments run deep and impacted the outcome. If that’s the case then it appears that the EU election in essence is driven largely by national issues and politics.

The apathy of the European voter in itself is evidence that many don’t recognize the EU as a decision making supranational body (the EU increasingly is, its parliament isn’t) but merely as a multilateral organization of nation states that has some pros and cons regardless of the way one votes. The fact that voter turn out in the new member states (many of them ex-Communist nations) is around 29% is telling, wouldn’t these be the people that are dying to participate in a democratic process? Are they already so far up the learning curve that they know it doesn’t matter which way they vote or vote at all? In fact their poor turnout has contributed to the 45% turn-out rate overall for the EU compared to 50% at the last election.

There’s one interesting case in The Netherlands where a former EU employee who was fired after he disclosed fraud and incompetence within the European Commission launched his own party, Transparent Europe. This brave whistleblower got a surprising 7% of the Dutch vote, and in Britain a new anti-European group claimed close to 15% of the vote. Still, these are exceptions and in general Europeans are reluctant to really engage themselves in a pan-European debate. In national elections some anti-European groups on both the left and right usually get a bit of traction but they remain fringe groups. The only country where Euroskeptics are part of the political establishment is Britain and it is there that we may see an interesting battle ahead that could even spawn some form of a Euro-crisis, but then we already knew that. The election and its results should leave us in pretty much the same state as the voters: indifferent.

A few months back Andrew Sullivan raised the alarm over the fact that the laws of the Canadian province of Ontario allowed certain civil disputes to be settled under shari’a. Conrad reacted succinctly, arguing Sullivan to calm down since this was nothing more than allowing parties that entered into a civil contract to adopt arbitrage of their choice, an entirely normal and accepted practice in most of the developed world. I was on my blogging break and keen to dash to the keyboard and write a post arguing that a realistic position on this particular issue could be found somewhere in the middle. Well, Sari Stein has effectively done that last week making the point that applying shari’a is all well, as long as all parties voluntarily agree and if it doesn’t contravene secular law. The moment these two tests are no longer being met we are in trouble and there can be very little doubt that is where we are heading if it means that shari’a will be applied to marriage, divorce and other related family matters. If that is allowed to happen, and it probably already is happening, we will have a parallel ‘legal’ system that will violate the basic rights of those subjected to it, no doubt creating many victims in the process.

There always has been a parallel Muslim universe, notably in Europe, but is seems that efforts to promote integration have only pushed certain muslim groups underground, enabling them to promote radical Islamism, recruit for jihad and apply shari’a regardless of whether local law allows it or not. For instance many mosques have cooled their rhetoric and repackaged their message for underground delivery and the ‘moderate imam’ may be nothing more than window dressing according to a recent report from the Dutch intelligence services. In the report they outline that the apparent reduction in radical rhetoric from mosques in The Netherlands may be a reaction to the impact of moderate Muslim groups as well as trying to avoid the scrutiny from an intelligence community that has woken up from a long, end-of-Cold-War induced sleep. It shouldn’t come as surprise that groups that have appeared on the radar screens of western law enforcement and intelligence agencies on the one hand, and reduced funding from the Saudi motherland on the other, have to find alternative ways to operate. By going underground the task of monitoring them and disrupting their recruitment efforts have become that much harder and the development underlines that gathering intelligence is becoming increasingly the single most important component of the war against proliferating Islamic fundamentalism. Any efforts to allow muslim communities to integrate into western society seem to achieve the opposite: they accelerate the creation of a freely operating sub-culture that controls its subjects from the mosques to the courts.

UPDATE: The ParaPundit is equally interested in the muslim sub-culture that is disconnected from the mainstream, noting that during the recent elections in the UK muslim community leaders forced eligible voters in their community to give up their mail-in ballots.

Regular visitors at Peaktalk will know that basic economic freedoms feature high on the agenda here. The continued omnipresence of radical left-wing unions in Canada, protected by hopelessly out-of-date legislation (but then Canada never had a Reagan or Thatcher), has contributed in no small part to the country’s inability to really tap into the unlimited potential gains of free markets. In particular in British Columbia the situation is dire.

Only a few months ago health support workers launched an illegal strike that severely disrupted the delivery of medical services and shut down numerous hospitals. This practice goes hand in hand with influencing as well as outright intimidation of other unionized workers who have been “convinced” to show solidarity with their partners on strike. A general strike loomed but the provincial government managed to get the strike declared illegal by another anachronism, the Labour Relations board, a quasi governmental body whose rulings tend to be skewed in favor of unions. Had simple logic been applied to this situation (note: it was support staff that was on strike) the government should have fired anyone staying off the job after the strike was declared illegal. But no, the law apparently allows food workers and dishwashers to cripple hospitals and care facilities causing an estimated 6 million dollars in damage and, worse, a build-up of waiting lists that only recently had been reduced to manageable levels. Luckily, with the ruling of the Labour Relations board in hand the government had a case and went to court where a judge fined the Hospital Employees Union, by historical comparisons, a hefty $150,000. Compared to the actual damage caused, the union got off lightly to say the least. In fact it is absurd that a union can force its members into an illegal strike, cause damage and the walk away with a slap on the wrist. However with no political will to seriously take on the anachronistic labor relations in Canada I continue to take a very dim view of the prospects of bringing them in line with the rest of the western world.

Sunday mornings are for reading and coffee drinking, I worked my way through a pile of Dutch magazines Irene brought back from her trip to the motherland. In it a lot of interesting stuff that will somehow work its way into my posts in the weeks ahead. Here’s a very interesting excerpt from an interview with Antony Burgmans, co-Chairman of Anglo-Dutch food conglomerate Unilever after being asked if he had any concerns over Europe’s future:

“Yes. In the past fifty years in Europe a contract has emerged between political elites and the citizen. The political elites have committed to take care of its citizens and in return for that they extract 44% of gross domestic product from society. That leaves very little money for innovation. And as government feels it has a natural right to interfere in everything there are simply too many rules. That leaves very little incentive to be entrepreneurial. Research has indicated it is the greatest ambition of 60% of Europeans to make it to retirement. Isn’t that horrifying?”

Right, there’s Europe for you in a nutshell: the mission is to make it to retirement and the government should pick up the tab. The human qualities of imagination, risk taking and entrepreneurialism have long migrated across the ocean to the new world which by consequence has a far better future.

UPDATE: Glenn points us to this interesting fact:

The US and Canada added more millionaires last year than Europe, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East, combined.

Simple isn't it? Taking a risk is likely to be more rewarding than waiting for the goverment to take care of you and hoping that some sort of pension plan will kick in at 65. It doesn't mean everyone in North America will become a millionaire of course, but it means you can have a realistic shot at it and you are probably going to have more fun doing that than just trying to make it to retirement ...

Bagpipes always accompany movement and last night in Simi Valley the lone piper’s rendition of Amazing Grace accompanied Ronald Reagan to his final resting place. It was the conclusion of a memorable and emotional week with a number of deeply touching ceremonies and that’s why I decided not to update the blog but leave you with my farewell to Reagan below.

It was of course also the week of Nancy Reagan and when she broke down last night it was also the moment that Irene and felt tears welling up in our eyes, it was really a heartbreaking moment. In a way it is telling that only now, after ten years of braveness and hard work for someone suffering from Alzheimer’s and before that decades of support and partnership, that the media are giving Nancy the recognition she deserves. From harridan to heroine, apparently you need to be old, frail and suffering from a deep loss before the media is able to extend the sympathy and recognition you deserve. Needless to say the positive influence, importance and character of Nancy were long recognized in the Dorsman household. There’s no successful career that is not shaped by strong spousal support, it’s always a team effort, and Nancy’s strength and intellect not only helped navigate Reagan through the most difficult patches of his presidency, they were also instrumental in Reagan’s greatest successes. And by the way, we were also deeply impressed with her escort Maj. Gen. Galen Jackman, what a moving display of support. He was the pillar of this emotional week.

With that I will leave the Reagan week behind me and regular blogging will resume tomorrow.

Yesterday President Ronald Reagan passed away. In the weeks ahead we will all discuss his legacy and the impact he has had on our lives. The effect he’s had on my life is indelible. Here’s why.

In the Beginning
When Ronald Reagan became President of the United States I was a teenager, had heard about him, but he did not really ring a bell, other than that he was an older guy with a background in Hollywood. Within a few years after Reagan taking office, I embarked on my journey in life, left the elderly home to go to university and discover the world. My journey took place against the backdrop of a western world that was stuck in recession, overtaxed, overregulated, uncompetitive and facing many social ills that at the time seemed beyond resolution as a left-of-center political correct atmosphere had stifled real debate. At the same time many people in Europe rallied the streets on a regular basis to demonstrate against deploying American cruise missiles on European soil as a counterweight to the Soviet missile build-up. Many of my friends joined in these protests, unwilling to see the rationale of the “peace through strength” philosophy that was coming out of Washington. It was in those days that I mentally departed from Europe and saw the deeper values underpinning “Go out there and win one for the Gipper” and “the Shining City on a Hill”, sentences that drew ridicule in Europe. Yet they represented and appealed to profound human emotions, crossed boundaries and inspired many around the world, not least of all myself. So my journey that turned out to be driven by optimism, a strong need for self fulfillment and a deep belief in the ability of the individual to shape his or her own destiny coincided with a period in which the White House was occupied by an inspirational, visionary, wise, and charming man who very effectively communicated the same values to the rest of the world. That man’s term in office spanned my departure from home, college; graduation and my departure from my native grounds. Ronald Reagan helped me shape my destiny.

The Vision
The ideology supporting Reagan’s political ascent was simple, but was lost in years where the makeability of society by government had become accepted wisdom. And for many of the post-war years it seemed that on both sides of the Atlantic an active government that taxed and redistributed worked. By the late 1970s however it had become evident that it could wreck dynamic societies and that a return to a deregulated, low tax environment where the economic freedom of the individual has precedence over collective arrangements would be the best way to revive a broken economy. That a free-market system had serious shortcomings was not lost on Reagan, but as he would eloquently put it, mankind had not come up with anything better so far. The tenet of individual freedom also infused Reagan’s foreign policy and it established the notion that taking a principal ideological stand vis-à-vis the Soviet Union would be the only way to deal with that adversary. Appeasement was not part of the Reagan dictionary. It turned out Reagan was right and with that he not only ended the Cold War, he gave a new generation a handbook of how to deal with international conflict. The current war on terror will to a large extent be defined by Reagan’s view of the world.

The Man
But there was more to Reagan than just his vision. There was the person, the man Ronald, and it has often been said that he was aloof and remote, to the point that he had strained relationships with his children. The gregarious Bushies never connected with what seemed like a distant man, a claim that his critics often used to point out that it was impossible to write a credible biography about Reagan. There was in their view no way of getting close to him and understand what he was about. The reality was that most of Reagan’s emotional and inter-human needs were fulfilled by only one person, Nancy. Ronald and Nancy were the embodiment of an almost perfect relationship that includes love, friendship and a very strong professional partnership. As odd as it may sound, they did not need anyone. But that doesn’t mean Reagan was distant or aloof, he was just harder to read for the outside world as he didn’t embody the standard social traits that many expect of others. Reagan: A life in Letters reveals what an extremely nice and amicable man he was. Concerned, engaged, almost humble. If you combine that with his engaging humor, the twinkle in his eyes and the trademark Reagan gait you can not come to any other conclusion than that he was an incredibly cordial and loving man. A nice man, a good man but not everyone was always willing to see that.

The Secret
But a great vision and a good