LP_468x60
on-the-record-468x60-white

As part of his inaugural address on January 20, 1981, newly sworn in President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, repeated his infamous catchphrase,"Government is not the solution to our problem.  Government is the problem."

With those words, Reagan captured the sentiment of much of the United States public.

Trust in government, indeed, in the post-war consensus which had held dominant since 1945, had been eroding for years.  The twin crises of Watergate and the Vietnam War had dealt near fatal blows. 

Yet still, faith in government held.  For a time, it even received a brief wave of rejuvenation, what with Jimmy Carter's 1976 election to the White House.  More than anything, Carter's campaign platform was one of restoring trust and transparency in government. 

Unfortunately, that faith in government didn't last long.

In 1979, the Iranian Revolution occurred, resulting in massive disruptions in the oil industry and a curtailment of production and exportation alike.  Inflation soon reared its ugly head, with gasoline shortages becoming all too common in the United States. 

As if this wasn't challenging enough for the Carter administration, but later that same year, dozens of American diplomatic personnel were kidnapped and held hostage by militant Iranian college students. 

While Carter had his fair share of achievements during his time in office, he nonetheless failed to convey the image of a strong and decisive leader equipped to confront these challenges.

He lost the ensuing election to Reagan, who rode in his victory on a wave of anti-government sentiment.

Within no time at all, Reagan embarked on his neoliberal, anti-government agenda by cutting taxes, largely for the benefit of the very wealthiest in America and to the detriment of federal coffers. 

Similar events took place across the western world.

Margaret Thatcher brought neoliberal, anti-government sentiment into the United Kingdom even earlier, and even more forcefully, than Reagan.  She was able to do so after faith in government was similarly ebbing, again as a result of sky-high inflation as well as increasing labour strife during the 'Winter of Discontent.'  Thatcher's 1979 election victory ushered in an entirely new era of austerity, deregulation and privatization.

In typical Canadian fashion, neoliberalism came later, and more nuanced, once Brian Mulroney came into office in 1984.  While no ruthless slasher of social programs, Mulroney nonetheless had no qualms about privatizing countless crown corporations, all while pursing corporate friendly free trade agreements with the United States and Mexico, at the loss of both Canadian jobs and sovereignty.

Not surprisingly, income and wealth inequality skyrocketed in the decades since.  It is now at levels unseen in almost a century.  Not only this, but middle-class wages have stagnated, while union membership has fallen.

And it has remained much the same to this very day.

Faith in government as a constructive force may yet return, though somewhat unintendedly, what with the onset of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.

With citizens around the world now being strongly advised, even mandated into quarantine to help limit the spread of the virus, economic activity has plummeted.  As a result, household income has fallen while unemployment continues to rise precipitously.  Canada's parliamentary budget watchdog has now even forecasted that the country's unemployment rate could climb up to 15 per cent by the end of the year.

With such dire economic uncertainly rife throughout Canada, and indeed, much of the world, citizens are now more than ever in desperate need of government aid.

To an extent, Canadian governments, both federal and provincial, have altered course to help address this need.  Wage subsidies, extended employment insurance and a moratorium on student loan payments are among several new policies that have been introduced to strengthen Canada's social safety net.

Deficit spending is also no longer the bogeyman long claimed by its hysterical critics, now that the federal government is projected to spend an extra $100 billion or so to counteract the economic consequences of the virus.  Indeed, all governments will similarly find themselves deep in red ink.

It's as it should be.

For forty years, Canadian governments, of all political stripes, have largely shed their responsibility in defending its citizens from economic hardship.

Officials now have an opportunity to restore the role of government as one that prioritizes the health and economic security of all its citizens, and not just for those most wealthy.

Instead of being just a complicit enabler for the super-rich, government can return to its previous role, where it at least retained the semblance of a proactive defender of its citizens.

If there is one positive development to emerge from the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, hopefully it is that every day citizens come to demand more from their elected representatives and their governments, not only during this crisis, but after it as well.

Photo Credit: Jeff Burney, Loonie Politics

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.


This content is restricted to subscribers

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.


Apparently Canada is forging ahead with its pseudo-crucial bid for a United Nations Security Council seat.  And if you think it's an odd thing to be worrying about with the COVID-19 pandemic going on and the economy locked down and the government "injecting" billions of dollars of pretend money into our shriveling wallets, don't look at me.  Look at the Prime Minister.

The National Post reports that our campaign for a non-veto Security Council seat "is full steam ahead."  Both our Foreign Affairs and International Development ministers told the Canadian Press that, guess what?  The latter prated that "The UN Security Council is the body that determines how the world reacts to issues of global security and instability."  Like the slaughter in Syria, say?  Or Russia dismembering Ukraine?  Oh snap.

Still, in the Post's paraphrase, our government believes "Canada's voice on the world's most powerful decision-making body is needed more than ever because of the big decisions that lie ahead in managing the pandemic and its aftermath."  And the first thing that jumps out at the alert reader is that the "big decisions" to be taken in managing "the pandemic" and then "its aftermath", aka the shutting down of most national economies indefinitely on the theory that they weren't contributing much of value anyway, will not be taken by the United Nations at all and certainly not by the Security Council, where three erratic democracies and two rigid tyrannies wield vetos.  They will be taken by national governments.  So the premise is rubbish.

If it weren't, it still would be.  Because the titanic fight Canada is waging for this two-year vanity project is not against disgraceful regimes infamous for their corruption and incompetence who ought to be kept as far as possible from "big decisions" affecting our well-being, if any.  Rather, they are Norway and Ireland.  And no rational person could suppose that whether one of the 10 second-tier votes on the Security Council goes to Canada or to Norway will affect the fate of humanity in the slightest degree.

Besides, our Foreign Minister claimed "once we will be in the post-COVID world (we) will need countries like Canada to be there."  But frankly if you were to list all the countries of the world in terms of how much they were "like Canada", Norway and Ireland would be near the top.  Certainly closer than Iran or North Korea or Burundi or Laos or Peru or… but you get the idea.  Even if a "a seasoned ex-diplomat" with the "Canadian Global Affairs Institute" oozed "The new responsibilities of middle-power status, especially G7 and G20 membership, differentiates us from Norway and Ireland".

Well, yes and no.  Because as the Post noted delicately, both Norway and Ireland "are viewed widely as having an advantage because they spend far more than Canada on international development to poor countries and have far more military personnel deployed on UN peacekeeping missions — two key issues for UN member countries."  Awkward.

The world "needs more Canada", or so we are repeatedly told by vainglorious Canadian politicians and pundits.  Unfortunately, as with Mordecai Richler's mordant "world-famous in Canada," it is a need the world itself somehow seems unaware of no matter how many times we modestly grasp them by the lapels and mention it.  The Foreign Minister even burbled "I think Canada brings something unique to the table.  I think more and more countries want to see their voice amplified through Canada."  But find me one foreign official anywhere who said "I want to see our voice amplified through Canada", even in the loosest imaginable translation.

If we were to adopt the eccentric procedure of judging by deeds not words, it seems the world would need more Norway.  Or Ireland.  And if those sentiments seem fatuous, well, like reading Australians commenting on the need for Australians to take more pride in Australian poetry, it casts a somewhat disquieting light on our own parochial preoccupations.

Parochial?  Perish the thought.  According to Canadian politicians, Canadian politicians are doing a great job.  Including our ministers, who if you're struggling to recall their names just as you're struggling to recall last time we had a Security Council seat and what difference it made to anything or anyone, are currently two people called François-Philippe Champagne and Karina Gould.  And the nameless people who write their talking points told them to say we have secretly become far more respected globally because of our response to the pandemic including $50 million in foreign aid.  At a time when G20 leaders are pledging to "inject" some CAD $7 trillion in liquidity, cynics might note.

Save your cynicism.  Because you're going to need it.  The Post also interviewed "some ex-diplomats" who said what the world needs isn't more Canada, it's more of Canada's money.  As one former NDP leader (and later ambassador to the UN where he accomplished nothing you can remember) told the Canadian Press news agency, we aren't paying enough baksheesh.  We fell down badly on Mali peacekeeping which actually seems to have damaged our standing in the world.  But, he advised, it "can be rectified by giving cash — 'several hundred million' — to the African Union for its peacekeeping operations and increasing its foreign aid contribution to COVID-19" to a minimum of $140 million.

So basically the idea is to buy the seat for, well, a third of a billion dollars.  Which admittedly to a government currently looking at a $130 billion deficit with no plans for raising the money anywhere but outer space is a rounding error.  But still, the principle of the thing ought to grate.

Apparently it doesn't.  Instead another "expert" on international affairs at the University of Waterloo said basically we should buy the Security Council seat.  "If I were an African government expecting COVID-19 to knock on my door any minute now, maybe if you're choosing between Norway and Ireland, I would use that as leverage … If you want me to vote, where's my help?"

OK.  Those famous "experts" who "say" in endless news stories say the idea here is to go find a bunch of governments far less honest, transparent and competent than our rivals in this election, and bribe them with money we don't have to put us on the Security Council where nothing important gets decided so windbags can pat themselves on the back for having exchanged gusts with other bags of wind in return for bags of cash.

Disgraceful in principle.  But exactly what we need in a global and national health and economic crisis according to the people making the "big decisions".  Feel better now?

Photo Credit: Jeff Burney, Loonie Politics

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.