Dion's Green Shift

Dion has finally revealed his plans for a Carbon tax, which will be part of the next election platform. I fully endorse this as this will give people strong incentives to cut back on actions that are environmentally harmful, while save people money who choose environmentally friendly ways of doing things. It is a revenue neutral tax, so it will not mean higher taxes for everyone, in fact for many, it will mean lower taxes. Pollution is what we call in economics an externality and in the case of negative externalities such as pollution you tax them, while you subsidize positive externalities (i.e. education). The carbon tax is simply putting a price on pollution and letting the market take care of the rest. It is hardly a socialist or left wing idea, especially consider BC, which has a centre-right government was the first province to introduce it and many centre-right parties in Europe favour such approach. Now I know some will argue that the centre-right parties in Europe are more like the Liberals than Tories, which is true on some issues, although certainly not all. In fact many centre-right parties in Europe are to the right of the Tories on certain issues. My biggest disappointment with Harper is not that he opposes this, but he takes the attitude that we should do nothing about the environment since it might be too hard. The cost of dealing with global warming now is far less than dealing with it later. Never mind, even here in North America, we have some centre-right politicians such as Arnold Schwartznegger, Brian Mulroney, Jean Charest, and Gordon Campbell who all suppport strong environmental action. In fact even McCain supports doing more on the environment than Harper does.

Now in terms of how this will play out, I would argue it is a risky strategy. Now this is not a bad thing in itself since risky can also mean gaining many seats as well as losing many. In many ways it is like buying a risky stock on the stock market as opposed to the a government bond. You are pretty much guaranteed to get the amount promised on a Canada government bond, but you are unlikely to make a lot of money from this investment strategy. On the other hand investing in risky stocks can result in making a lot of money, but also losing a lot. While playing it safe will ensure that the Liberals hold Harper to a minority at the most, it also means the Liberals won't do any better than a weak minority. Taking a bold move such as a carbon tax, may give Harper his much coveted majority, but it also might be what it takes to return the Liberals to their former glory. How well this goes depends a lot on how the plan is sold to the public as well as how Harper reacts. His over the top reaction and inability to bring about an alternative plan may help the Liberals here, but likewise the rising gas prices now could make this a bad time. Either way, I would rather the Liberals stand for something than have no principles other than winning at all cost.

Ireland Rejects Lisbon Treaty

On Friday, Ireland voted against the Lisbon Treaty, which although it does not officially kill the treaty, it will make it very difficult to move forward. Worried the treaty would face the same fate as the European constitution when put to a referendum in France and the Netherlands, most countries choose not to put it to a referendum including the normally Eurosceptic Britain. However, Ireland, is constitutionally required to put all international treaties to a referendum. Normally this is not an issue as Ireland is one of the more pro-EU countries.

I would have voted for the Lisbon Treaty if I could have voted on the issue, however I understand why some may oppose it. It had many positives such as applying co-decision to more issues meaning the European parliament who is directly elected would have to approve the laws not just the Council of Ministers. Although the Council of Ministers represent national governments, coalitions are the norm rather than the exception in Europe and it is quite common for parties that received less than 10% of the popular vote to have cabinet ministers, so this makes it difficult to hold them accountable for making bad decisions. In addition, coalitions are not always along ideological lines either; in fact many European countries have coalitions with parties on both the centre-right and centre-left such as Germany. At least those in the European parliament are directly elected, although unfortunatly each country must use some form of proportional representation rather than first past the post, but that is a whole different story. It would apply the principle of subsidiarity and this means if more than 1/3 of member states felt the EU was interferring in areas they don't have jurisdiction over, they could send it back to the European Commission to ask for an explanation. It would have lifted the limit on 27 member states. As it stands now Norway, Iceland, and Switzerland would not be able to join and likewise further expansion into the Balkans including countries such as Croatia who are ready to join the near future, wouldn't be able to. I believe the EU should be open to all European countries including Turkey and even beyond. It has worked well in promoting peace and prosperity amongst its members, so I am all for expanding it. In addition, the idea of a European superstate was not the intention of the treaty.

That being said, I believe the politicians should respect the results of the referendum and not proceed with ratification of the treaty. I don't believe having another referendum as they did when Denmark rejected the Maastrict Threaty or when Ireland rejected the Nice Treaty is the solution either. No should mean No, not keep on asking the question until one receives a desirable answer. Rather I believe the best solution is to adopt a Two speed Europe as I advocated in an earlier blog. It is not right for a country with less than 1% of the EU's population to scutter a treaty for those who wish to move forward with deeper integration. But neither is it right to force a country to give up more sovereignty than it is comfortable with doing so. When the EU was only a common market and had far fewer members, it was possible to have it operate in tandem, but not with 27 members and is it starts to take on many nation like characteristics. I support deeper European integration as with the United States taking a more unilateral and militaristic approach and China becoming a superpower who has a less than stellar human rights record, I believe it is necessary to have a counter-balance who believes in democracy, freedom, progressive policies, and multilateralism. And none of the EU countries on their own can achieve this, but together they can. I also can say that the EU has been of great benefit for me on a personal level. I work in the financial sector and the fact the EU has a common currency saves me about an hour in work everyday. Likewise when I travelled to Europe last year, I didn't have to switch currencies everytime I crossed national boundaries and when planning my trip time wise, I didn't have to worry about long line-ups at the borders as there are no border controls between EU countries (save Ireland and Britain).

Obama Wins Democrat nomination

As someone who supported Obama right from the beginning, I am quite pleased to see him clinch the nomination. I supported Clinton's right to stay in until the primaries ended, but now is the time to bow out and throw her support behind Obama. The longer the party remains divided, the better the chances are of McCain winning. Now the focus for the Democrats must turn to beating McCain in November, which contrary to what some think, will not be an easy task. McCain is a moderate within the Republicans (although quite right wing by Canadian standards) so unlike Huckabee or Romney, he has a far amount of crossover appeal to moderates. In addition, he voted against Bush on a number of issues so although being a Republican may be a liability, the fact he didn't blindly follow in lock step will be an asset to him. Unlike Canada, where one is expected to tow the party line, senators and congressmen are free to vote against their party without facing party discipline. At the same time McCain does support the war in Iraq and is still more conservative than the average American even though the average American is well to the right of the average Canadian. This has been an interesting race in the sense neither of the frontrunners of either party ended up winning. A year ago, most thought it would be a battle between Guiliani and Hilary Clinton, but instead that will not be the case. Guiliani's campaign fizzled quite early on, while Clinton stayed into the very end, but still could not win the nomination.

As for where from here to go for the Democrats, Obama needs to choose him running mate. Although I would say he should choose Clinton, I don't think it is essential he choose her. Rather he must choose someone who appeals to the demographics he is weak amongst. In particular, he struggled amongst white blue collar voters and this demographic is very important to winning in November. He may be able to pick up states like Iowa and Colorado while hold ones like Wisconsin, however states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio have far more people than the ones mentioned above. Obama cannot afford to lose Michigan or Pennsylvania and likewise will have a difficult time (although not impossible time) becoming president if he cannot win Ohio. These states all have a large blue collar white vote, which is why I think he needs to choose a running mate who can appeal to this group. I don't think the fact he is black will prevent him from becoming president since although some Americans are still racist, they are clearly in the minority. In fact I would argue a black person would have far more difficulty winning in most European countries than the United States despite the fact Europe is generally more liberal than the United States. His biggest liability will be being seen as too liberal. His platfrom is fairly centrist and in fact in relation to Canadian parties, is probably, closest to that of the old Progressive Conservatives, so he needs to highlight the fact he is moderate and not a liberal. As much as some progressives want to see the US move dramatically to the left, they need to be realistic. Trying to move the US as far left as Canada is simply not realistic. Rather the Democrats need to halt America's move to the right and take a more moderate centrist approach than the current administration. That is why I would advise Obama to focus on ending the War in Iraq but still support the use of military force if the US is attacked. Support tax cuts for low and middle income Americans, and make clear that the overall size of government will not get bigger. I have noticed some liberals talk about the US adopting universal health care. As much as a supporter I am of universal health care, bringing in such a program would be political suicide in the US. Instead progressives need to be realistic on what is doable rather than what is not doable. Just because a certain policy sells well in Canada, doesn't mean it will in the US. As Micheal Adams pointed out in his Fire and Ice - Myth of Converging Values, Americans and Canadians have radically different set of values.

In terms of Canada-US relations, I think the Democrats on the whole would be better although I do realize on the issue of free trade the Republicans are probably better, however the Democrats would be at least more understanding on most other issues. Besides, with more than half of Canadians having at least one family member residing outside of Canada, Canadians tend to take a very internationalist approach, so even if McCain is better for strictly relations between Canada and the US, they realize he is not better for relations between the US and the rest of the world.