Establishment Man

When exactly did Preston Manning become the Éminence grise of the Canadian Right?

The “good idea” the commission seeks to advance – and that I wholeheartedly support – is that for any economic activity, especially the production of energy, we should identify its negative environmental impacts, devise measures to avoid, mitigate or adapt to those impacts, and include the costs of those measures in the price of the product. It’s the idea behind using carbon pricing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, water pricing to conserve water, garbage pricing to deal with waste, and road pricing to reduce traffic congestion.

If that knife in the shoulder blades didn't sting, now we have word of this:

“The vast majority of Wildrose caucus members look at him with a great deal of affection, as someone who is a statesman, a man of impeccable integrity, and someone we care a great deal about,” he said.

Mr. Manning swayed several MLAs, likely enough to encourage the nine to walk out of their party as a bloc, according to Mr. Anderson (although others in the room remain skeptical of his true impact).

“Even going into that final discussion, many had not made up their minds. If only three or four decided to go, I don’t think it would have happened,” Mr. Anderson said.

Say it ain't so Preston, say it ain't so. 

When Brian Mulroney did stuff like this we would all kind of shrug. He was a man destined for the Establishment the second he escaped from Baie Comeau. Preston too was, in a certain sense, to the political manner born. His father was one of the most successful Premiers in Canadian history. Still he took the path less travelled. Leveraging his family name and matching it up with that old perennial called Western Alienation, Manning forged a political movement. Then he lost control of that movement and the party it spawned to his sharper and more ruthless lieutenant: A certain S. Harper, formerly of Leaside.

Over the past decade he has drifted into Elder Statesmen status. The Great and Good of Toronto, who once mocked his very name, now welcome him warmingly. I remember being mocked in university for speaking of Mr Manning in positive tones. Many of those same people now hail Manning as a Great Canadian Hero. A pioneer. A legend. Paul Martin's squeaky voiced wing man in the fight against the deficit. I've heard CBC reporters speak of him as they would a former Liberal Prime Minister. If not exactly with reverence then with something beyond respect.

Time heals all wounds, except that is political grudges. There are still Leftist dead enders who harbor and deep unabiding hatreds for Brian Mulroney and Ronald Reagan, men whose careers ended decades ago. Preston has been accepted not because so much time has past, or because the Reform Party vision has become acceptable, it is because the former Prairie Giant has made his obeisance to the Great and Good of the Laurentian Establishment.

The so-con stuff has been jettisoned. The usual Greenista platitudes are emitted at regular intervals and with the appropriate level of keenness. The magical rites having been performed Mr Preston Manning has been accepted not as a reformer taking his place at the High Table, but as a tame Western Tory, a house conservative for the Empire Club set. On special occasions he is rolled out to show all and sundry the breath and scope of those who rule the land. Some of their best friends, you see, are Alberta conservatives. 

For those who admired the Reform Party, not simply in the Western vastness but here in the Imperial Capital too, the transformation of Preston had been one of a small and slow betrayal. The whole thing has a kind of camp absurdity about it. Like seeing Joe DiMaggio pitching Mr Coffee. Legends should behave in a certain way. But they so rarely do. 

 

 

Comments

[Will S.]

Manning and Harper betrayed the Reform Party cause when they embraced 'Unite the Right' in the late 90s; and for that matter, Peter McKay's betrayal of David Orchard told me all I needed to know about the Tories with whom the Alliance was merging. I for one refuse to vote Tory. Never, unless they actually become something like what Reform was.

[Cytotoxic]

Manning was the worst thing to ever happen to Reform. He doomed it. He was never a consistent small-government advocate but rather a populist and his bad of populist ideas included the good but also a lot of bad, particularly his passion for 'democratizing' this or that. That includes the EEE senate which would not have improved Canada. Just more voting. It is fitting and goodly that Manning should remove Smith and her fellow malcontents from the WRP. One toxin removes another. Now the WRP is free to do something interesting.

[John Chittick]

Conservatives, including WRP, are content with the status Quo levels of the fatally mixed economy (the legacy of NDP policy adopted by centrists) and falsely believing that they can manage the situation by adding just enough incremental statism to be "electable". In Manning's case, he has been absorbed somewhat by the green theocracy and obviously favours statist growth in that direction. He really has just substituted Pantheism for Christianity for its overwhelming populist appeal.