This commentary is old however it deals with issues that remain relevant to the political discussion today.
The Liberal party that claims to be a force for good and the glue that unites this nation, this week showed their true colours again as Master practitioner in the Arts of Identity Politics. This week a Liberal candidate in Calgary on the popular social media site Twitter , claimed that the Calgary cops were racists. Normally, this would be water off a ducks back, and merely chocked up as, a rogue candidate going way off the deep end in a riding that probably could only be won if Hell probably froze over first. Sadly the Liberals have an illustrious history of playing Identity Politics by pitting one region or group against each other in the broad Canadian debate.
In 2001 then Minister Hedy Fry tried to marginalize the Canadian alliance as a political force by alluding that certain areas of British Columbia had crosses burning on their yards. A not so veiled reference to the Ku Klux Klan and their illegal and immoral activities of that organization in the United States.
If an individual cast their gaze back even further to the time of Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, he himself had a mixed record when it came to the mastering of the Faustian Fine Art of Identity Politics. Famously in his first meeting with Adolf Hitler. he thought that Hitler was a fine fellow and would be a great leader for Germany. “My sizing up of the man as I sat and talked with him was that he is really one who truly loves his fellow-men, and his country, and would make any sacrifice for their good. ” I’m not comparing King’s initial support for Hitler’s efforts in 1937 as it applies to the Liberals broad brush approach to Identity Politics.
The fact that King probably did not see the forest from the trees and assumed that Hitler was some type of fellow traveler on the wave of progressivism sweeping the world.
Smacks of a mere massive misreading or naïveté.
However, something that cannot be excused is the blatant pass that the Liberals have been given on the issue of Identity Politics up to now.
From the established historians to the halls of academia and the mainstream media have not traditionally held the Liberals feet to the fire on their lack of consistency when it comes to the issue of Identity Politics.They are a party that are for everything and everybody when it suits them but when they see a political advantage can be gained they will instantly marginalize and demean the broad pageantry of the Canadian mosaic as a political tool to gain power.
The Liberal party has been for one thing and one thing only the fastest and easiest route back into the government’s good graces.
People should be judged for what they do not who they are. the Liberals have clearly forgotten that and are comfortable treating people as just an appendage of a broader political base. This is the fundamental flaw in the modern Liberal party of Canada and Liberal ideology.
