The Written Word
for September 8, 1999

Watching Joe Clark and Preston Manning is like watching two tall people on a teeter totter in a low ceilinged room – one is either down or hitting his head on the ceiling.

The United Alternative idea has turned out to be a horrible one for Manning who is clearly just trying to re-invent himself as the head of a national party not just top dog of a regional one. Joe Clark, on the other hand, has the trappings of a national party with the reality being it’s an Ontario one with a sprinkling of Maritimers thrown in. The teeter-totter is there, so they have to play, but it’s just a useless ride with lots of periodic pain.

Preston Manning’s problems are obvious. He is losing ground fast where ever he has strength and he needs a helping hand. His party, supposed to be a grassroots organization has found that this formula doesn’t work in parliament where the structures have been in place for centuries. He must, on the one hand, give off the appearance of a liassez-faire approach to dissent in his party while in fact maintaining ironclad discipline.

Joe Clark’s problem is that his message can only appeal to Central Canada. He will appease Quebec ‘til the cows come home and in fact has mused aloud that perhaps assymetrical federalism might be a good idea – that is unequal provinces. This idea isn’t especially saleable in Ontario but they don’t ask as many awkward questions there as they do in the Far West, the area of the Tories traditional support. In fact, with Clark the ancient schism in Tory ranks is there for all to see. The Tories always represented protest in the Western Provinces and reactionaries in the east. Diefenbaker papered over that crack as did Mulroney. Clark couldn’t do it in 1979 which is why he is an asterisk prime minister only. Now the crack is very visible again.

The benefactors of all this are the Liberals. While it’s difficult to say what things will look like in a couple of years, right now the Liberals are looking pretty good. They will lose some ground to the Tories in Ontario but they’ll pick up a few Quebec seats and perhaps enough in Alberta and British Columbia to take up the slack.

What can Mr Clark and Mr Manning do about their troubles?

Probably very little now that matters have gone as far as they have. Mr Manning would probably be best advised to go back to his constituency, the Far West, and forget about gaining national power except by way of a share of it under a coalition. That his party has never lost its sharp edge also hurts him.

The Conservatives cannot back out of their Quebec appeasement mode if only because Joe Clark still believes that appeasement works.

If nothing else, the Liberals are very good at exploiting enemy weakness. They have won campaigns when that’s all they’ve had going for them. They’re like the big guy in the one man lifeboat – they just have to keep rapping the fingers of those trying to climb aboard to keep it all to themselves. The BQ is slipping, the NDP is brain dead and the right is squabbling amongst themselves.

A classic situation for the Liberals and you can bet that they’ll take advantage of it.