The gift that keeps on giving

This is the time of year when columnists who have managed to tire their readers with a proliferation of prognostications and alternating whining and bombast seek a form that allows their sweeter side to emerge. The failsafe has been a list of holiday wishes that we extend to those who have been the object of our critical attention for the year.

I hadn’t planned on taking this angle, but recent public opinion polls indicating a surge in Liberal national support (essentially giving the Liberals a gift from all of us) gave me no choice. In my worry that other’s feelings may be hurt by what appears to be coal in contrast to the Liberals’ present, I decided to offer a few inexpensive gifts: words alone, some cheap advice, as it were, a gesture of my unabiding affection for those who toil in thankless work in the darkened caves of the political.

The polls, of course, have appeared to prove those in the political and chatting classes wrong. Dion’s Liberals are running at 40 per cent in the recent Star/Ekos poll, followed by the Conservatives at 33 per cent, the New Democrats at 10, the Bloc and Greens each at eight.

What’s more, the Liberals are again running second in Quebec and Alberta, with roughly one-quarter of the support in these two polar provinces. While one has to take such polls with a grain of salt, it’s interesting to note that the gender gap is alive and well, with women preferring the Liberals to the Conservatives by a significant margin. These early reads should provide our federal Liberals a serene grin to last the season.

In Atlantic Canada, where we used to be so far behind the curve that we were ahead of the next one, the Liberals enjoy a 52 per cent standing, well ahead of the Conservatives at 32 per cent. With the NDP running at 13 per cent regionally, much concentrated in Nova Scotia, these findings must give our Premier, whose personal popularity is in a downward spin, further cause to shudder.

To Jack, some easy advice: take a couple of days off, eh? Relax. No … really; relax! And if you’re worried about being outplayed on the green front, why not go back to the issues that brought your party to the dance, the life prospects of working men and women and the persistently tragic lives of the poor?

The gap between the rich and the poor is widening, fast. Much is yet to be done and if not you, then who? Working with the Tories is going in the wrong direction. The Nova Scotia NDP continues to shine and your people in the federal office might take a look at why this is.

To my friend Steve, what can I possibly give? I’ve given so much already. Sure it has been a disappointing few months, Steve, but more’s the pity.

Being at 33 per cent isn’t as bad as it has been or could be in light of the drubbing your pal George took. You got away without losing much support in Alberta (and in rural blue Ontario) from your “les Quebecois are a nation� proclamation. You have a Premier of Alberta who won’t step on your toes quite as gleefully as old Ralph did. You even have an issue to deflect criticism from your government’s actual direction by proposing to tinker with the Senate.

So my advice to you, Steve, to the guy who shakes his kids’ hands when he drops them off at school, is just open your heart and your vision; try to control less and listen more. There’s much more to be seen, heard, felt and known than the Calgary School (or the Chicago School) permits. And remember that confidence on the face of some looks to others as misplaced arrogance. We’re already tiring of it and it has been only 12 months.

To Iggy, I offer the following. You’ve probably done enough to divide the Liberal Party. Don’t work now on dividing the country. Yours is not the only, last or best view on Afghanistan, just as it wasn’t on Iraq.

Sometimes those of us in the Ivory Tower need to reflect the insight of the demos, not insist on what we take to be the superiority of our own judgments. The world is more complex than Harvard allows.

In closing, I should say that I’m pretty sure some of my readers have some words of advice to give me as a seasonal gift, too, but these aren’t likely printable in a family newspaper. So don’t worry about anything for me; I’m happy just sharing this space with you.