It’s all for the good of the Canadian people…
Well, fellow Canadians, it’s time to believe in Santa again. It’s the first week of December and Canada’s Coalition Quintuplets, our new Political Santa Claus arrived early. He comes in the form of Dion, Layton and Duceppe, huddled together with prime ministers-in-waiting Ignatieff and Rae, all touting moral and constitutional legitimacy in what we do.
This political love-in promises nirvana in a week. Leaping from their coalition sleigh they’ll slap that recalcitrant westerner in the saddle of power sending him riding off into the sunset. Their sleigh, jam-packed with political promises, including righteousness and gold nuggets for all, will be laid on the public table.
Wheeling and dealing agreements and resolutions will be unwrapped, and, overnight, solve our complex financial chaos, and our unprecedented economic turmoil. Canadians everywhere will come home from work, arms bulging with presents for their Canadian Christmas tree.
Christmas feasts at food-laden tables will be joyful, while we’re being governed with Canadian political claim-jumping coalition magic, with a choke collar held by the Bloc. Canadians can sleep peacefully through Christmas and step into a New Year filled with dollars and doughnuts, and begin living like mall royalty again.
Only in Canada can tea, and such political fairy tales, be brewed, and come true, you say?
“A quarrel is like buttermilk. Once it’s out of the churn, the more you shake it, the more sour it gets.” (Irish proverb)
There are fairy tales, then there’s reality: Potatoes for Christmas …
“We ate potatoes all that winter. Nothing else. At supper we’d each get a big potato on the plate and mother would cut off one end and say, ‘Now this is your soup, and isn’t that good?’ We’d eat that.
“Then she’d slice off another piece and say, ‘Here’s your meat,’ and another slice and ‘My isn’t that a fine piece of carrot and look at all those nice peas,’ and then she’d pick up the last piece left and she’d say, ‘And here’s your chocolate pudding, and isn’t that nice?’ It got so we’d almost believe her. Yes, children have a tremendous capacity for make-believe.”
The rest of the story is in Barry Broadfoot’s book Ten Lost Years 1929-1939. The book is crammed with people who had lost what we still have — choice! Well, except in political machinations and coalitions.
“Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim.” George Santayana (1863-1952)
(Who could this be?)
Meanwhile on the hustings a century ago in England…
When Thomas Sheridan was a candidate for the representation of a Cornish town he told his father if he succeeded he would place a label with the words “to let” written on it, on his forehead. “I will side with the party that makes the best offer.”
“Right, Tom,” said his father, “don’t forget to add the word ‘unfurnished.’”
Three things cannot long be hidden, the sun, the moon and the truth. (Buddha)
A tip of the hat to the Literary Review of Canada, which tells me fairy tale characters are not burdened by taxes, passports, education and jobs. Ah, but prime ministers are! He knew restricting access to free gold makes gold hustlers meaner than a wolverine in a trap, so he’s on tap for kicking the traces on this one.
Whoever gets through this political chaos, and grabs Canada’s political brass ring, might want to remember to be kind to all those they meet on the way to the top, because they’ll not only be the one’s you’ll meet on the way down; they’ll be the one’s who’ll take you down.
And then suddenly it came, the real answer! They’re being influenced from outer space. A celestial alignment called a planetary conjunction, said Clara Moskowitz in Wired Science.
Planets Aligned in a Frown, she headed her piece, telling us how Mercury, Venus and the moon lined up together, appearing almost as one in the night sky. So, fellow Canadians, we can take some solace we aren’t alone. The planets have joined world investors frowning over Canada this week, and it’ll cost us, not them!