Angry in the Great White North

Everyone remembers the military ad from the 2006 election:

The ad, which was briefly posted on the Liberal website, features an ominous drumbeat underneath a voice-over that says: "Stephen Harper actually announced he wants to increase military presence in our cities. Canadian cities. Soldiers with guns. In our cities. In Canada."

The ad, which was never broadcast, stems from the Conservative platform which calls for 100 regular troops and 400 reservists to be based in major Canadian cities. But, according to that plan, their purpose would be only for humanitarian means or disaster relief efforts.

Martin said the ad was intended to criticize the Conservatives' policy, saying it would spread soldiers too far apart across the country.

But [the CBC's Peter] Mansbridge questioned Martin further about the ad, saying it makes no mention of policy and instead highlights the fact that would be soldiers in Canadian cities with guns.

It will always be remembered as one of the meanest and stupidest moments in modern Canadian political history.

The ad was born of desperation, developed by a Liberal Party that saw its grip on power sliding away, and so willing to tap into the nuttiest levels of leftist mythology -- that Stephen Harper is evil (as are all conservatives), and that he is planning to turn Canada into some sort of Christian fundamentalist police state.

The panic was not limited to low-level party operatives scripting political ads. On camera, the most senior advisors to the Liberal Party lost their minds. When Paul Martin's spokeman John Duffy appeared on CTV's Mike Duffy Live, John Duffy tried to threaten Mike Duffy, to intimidate CTV into not discussing the ad:

Mike Duffy: And something that happened to me last night during the commercial break when I was alone in the TV studio with the studio crew. John Duffy ran in from the make-up room during the commercial break and began hectoring me. I was sitting down and he was standing up. He was putting the fingers in the eyeballs and saying "You will *not* raise this issue!" and blah-blah-blah.

The next thing they're yelling "Twenty seconds!" He runs out and I come back up on the air and try to do my job.

Later on, he comes on with the others and he starts at it again. And so that's why I gave the answer I gave.

That "answer" is one of the most memorable moments of Canadian television:

Why am I bringing all this up? Because in 2006, the Liberals went into the election nervous of course, but generally confident. Then the wheels came off, one at a time. By mid-January, when the military ad was produced causing the fallout it did, the Liberal Party was in a panic.

Today we're not in an election. We don't even know for certain that there will be one. And yet listen to the Liberals:

However, other MPs said they can't envisage bringing down the Harper government this fall.

"I can't see myself showing up for a vote to defeat the government," said a Liberal MP from the East, who asked that his name not be used. "We can't defeat him [Mr. Harper], because if we were to go to the polls right now, you don't know what would happen."

The Liberal MP added that he is receiving no direction from Mr. Dion or the leader's office on the road ahead. A number of MPs are supporting a plan to vocally oppose Mr. Harper's Throne Speech, but abstain in sufficient numbers on voting day to allow it to pass.

We can't defeat Harper.

Notice how Stephen Harper personifies that which the Liberal fear. Even the Throne Speech is not the Conservative Throne Speech, but Mr Harper's Throne Speech.

Imagine starting the campaign at this level of fear. Fearing losing what little power they have left. Fearing that NDP with Thomas Mulcair in their ranks gutting the Liberal's left-wing vote (Mulcair has said that the Liberals passed the Kyoto climate-change accord "as a bloody public relations stunt -- they never had a plan", which is a direct attack on the Liberal Party's oh-so-important environment plank as well an attack on Stephane Dion in particular). Fearing that the "Harper is evil!" mantra is not resonating with the voters.

I wonder, then, if we'll see the Harper is evil message on Day One of an election campaign. Stephane Dion has already set the tone:

Dipping into his thesaurus, Mr. Dion called the Conservative approach to the world "mediocre," "rigid," "simplistic," "incompetent," "amateurish" and "ineffective." He is against buying unwanted military equipment, "insulting" China, selling out on softwood lumber, abandoning mediation.

He reserved his harshest criticism for the war in Afghanistan, where the government's inconsistency has been "appalling" and "inexcusable."

And the reason for all this? Blame "the ideological kinship" between Stephen Harper and George W. Bush, he said. You see, Canada's foreign policy is made in Washington, inspired by "the American right."

Stephen Harper is plotting with George W Bush to drain Canada of its water, according to Stephane Dion:

Dion said he was also concerned about the possibility of negotiations to remove water from Canadian basins, adding that Harper must prevent such an occurrence.

"Neither Harper nor Bush have addressed leaked reports from talks suggesting that the SPP could be used to justify negotiations of bulk removal of Canadian water in order to address potential water shortages in the U.S," he said.

So we'll all die of thirst while soldiers keep us from reaching what little water is left.

Absurd, of course, but then so was the military ad. If Stephen Harper and the Conservatives enter into an election campaign in a position of strength, both in terms of internal party organization and in terms of external factors (a strong economy and such), then the Liberals might have no choice but to go after Harper on a personal level. And that means the "scary" argument which in turn leads to the nutty and paranoid conspiracy theories rooted in classic Liberal Party anti-Americanism.

How long before one of these frightened MPs says something right off the wall that ends up dominating the news cycle for 24 hours?

How long before the craziness comes out of the centre?

If the Liberals are already desperate, the craziness might start much earlier in this campaign compared to 2006. If nothing else, it might be entertaining.