There are a bunch reasons that I'm not running around making Book of Revelations-type noises about the possibility of a Liberal-NDP "coalition" government in the event of a Conservative minority being reelected on May 2. First and foremost, I don't see it as being much worse that the "Conservative" government we've had for the last five years. If anything, the Harper Government has made the idea more palatable to fiscal conservatives, since they've already done the maddening work of spending all the money.
As a matter of fact, Harper is crossing the country right now promising to make a giant mess of both the tax code and government revenues by giving tax credits to everyone for virtually everything. Getting fat? Well, the Tories want to subsidize your gym membership! Not only is that brutally irresponsible, given their record-breaking deficits, it's also using the tax code for social engineering. Yes, a Liberal-NDP coalition would do that too, but at least they'd be honest about it.
About those deficits. Well, the Right Honourable Prime Minister is promising to eliminate them in less than three years, which is nothing short of a fantasy. More importantly, he hasn't said how he intends to do it, other than relying on economic growth. And no serious person is believes that's going to happen, particularly when you're dive bombing the economy with tax credits, which will tend to increase the existing deficit.
There's no way that Michael Ignatieff's proposed corporate tax increases will pay for his massive budget giveaway, but at least it's something revenue-related. There's a nugget of reality in the Liberal platform, however tiny and likely dishonest. Harper isn't even content to stay with white lies. He's going with the Full Monty.
I will not vote for any of the potential coalition parties, but it doesn't really make a difference to me if they assume office. The Harper Conservatives, instead of trying to hide their allergy to money, are actually proud of it and they're promising more of the same. And I have no intention of rewarding that.
My other reason for not caring at about a "coalition" very much is that it's completely constitutional. There is nothing in our Constitution that says that the government has to win the popular vote. It does, however, have to enjoy the confidence of the House of Commons. You might not like the Constitution, but that doesn't change the fact that it means exactly what it says. Also, for conservatives to argue that George W. Bush was entitled to establish residence in the White House, but a coalition should be precluded from taking power in Parliament would be intellectually fascinating.
Furthermore, Canada has already had one formal coalition government before, and that was formed by the Conservatives. Feel free to look it up.
Third, I don't think there actually will be a coalition. Micheal Ignatieff has already forsworn the idea of a "coalition" and I don't think that he has the balls to renege on something that blatant that soon. This isn't a guy with the confidence or political skills of Jean Chretien, who could lie with an easiness and transparency that would take your breath away.
Ignatieff, being Ignatieff, made his denial of a coalition with such precise and legalistic language that it allowed the Tories and their toadies to come back with the idea that he must be plotting a secret "accord," not unlike the federal one in 1972 or the Ontario Peterson-Rae deal in 1985.
And that could happen ... if Jack Layton is a lot dumber than I think he is. '72 and '85 had two things in common. In neither instance did the NDP actually share power in the form of Cabinet seats, they just supported the governing Liberals in return for a few of their policies being enacted. In both cases, the NDP were nearly wiped out in the subsequent election. The Trudeau and Peterson governments were not only able to take credit for their own records, they also managed to steal the NDP's more popular proposals, as well. The junior partner of such an arrangement never does well politically in its aftermath.
An accord would also require that the NDP compete for influence with the Bloc Quebecois, which will almost certainly have more seats in Parliament than they will. Layton will get very little credit for the successes of such an arrangement, but will take a huge chunk of the blame for its failure. The NDP's chances of ever winning anything again in Quebec will be destroyed and they'll face doom almost everywhere else.
Given that he's been in politics longer than any of the other federal leaders, I have to assume that Layton knows that history as well as I do and would very much like to prevent it from repeating itself. And the only way to do that is a full coalition government, with the NDP as equal partners. If I was Layton, I'd demand to be made deputy prime minister and/or House leader, and have Thomas Muclair named minister of finance.
Ignatieff feels that he has to be prime minister and Layton knows that he can't be. Why then would he give Iggy everything and get virtually nothing in return? After all, Jack has been able to wring concessions out of the already quite liberal Harper Tories when he wants to, and there's nothing to indicate that he won't be able to again. Stephen Harper has proven again and again that he'd give up the store rather than lose power and I don't expect that to change. I can't think of a single realistic reason why Layton would put the Liberals in power and relegate himself to being nothing more than Gilles Ducceppe's golf buddy in the process.
I don't know that Michael Ignatieff is bright enough to take that deal, and I don't think that he could control his caucus if he was. I'm convinced that unless he breaks 100 seats in three weeks - which there's little chance of - he's finished as leader, which is why I think he forced the election in the first place. In my opinion, he just wants to get it over with and flee the country as quickly as he can. I also think the caucus went into this election preferring a Harper majority while they get a new leader to being in a coalition with Ignatieff leading it.
If you're the NDP, your first and last strategic objective is to see the Liberals annihilated forever. That obviously doesn't happen if you give Michael Ignatieff (or whoever eventually replaces him) the keys to 24 Sussex Drive.
But keeping them as the official Opposition in a minority government goes a long way in furthering that goal. Win, lose or draw, the Grits are going to be broke again on May 3. So not only are they going to have to pay down their debts, they'll also have to raise enough money to maintain a constant state of election readiness. More likely than not, the Liberals will have yet another leadership race underway, which will exacerbate their thirty-five year old civil war. And all the while, they'll be supporting the Conservatives in the House about 95% of the time, further alienating their own base and dividing the caucus.
I could be wrong, and "Canada's Natural Governing Party" can survive another three to five years of that, but I don't see how. If you can tell me how a bunch of broke people that hate one other and have no prospect of winning power on their own manages to survive that long, I'd be more than interested in hearing it.
Despite my thinking that everything they believe is insane, I actually believe that the NDP are the most honest and principled of the federal parties. But they are professional politicians, and I can't think of a single sane reason why they'd want to keep their main ideological rivals - who they hate far more than the Tories - on life support.
A possible coalition government, however unlikely I think it is, doesn't bother me nearly as much as it should. But that's due to the almost monumental failure of the Conservative Party to do much of anything that's actually conservative. Stephen Harper made the conscious decision to both campaign and govern as the Liberals did, so there's virtually no difference between the two.
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