Family medicine training is not a cure-all.

Now that the election campaign is finally over, I have been inspired by this blog to vent about a most ridiculous and preposterous element in the NDP platform regarding improvements to the health care system.

Train substantially more health care professionals – including more doctors, nurses, nurse practitioners and midwives – to ease staffing shortages and cut wait times. We will work with the provinces and territories to make it happen:

• We will implement a program designed to increase the number of doctors and nurses trained in Canada by 50%. As part of that program, we will offer to forgive the student loans of health professionals who commit to dedicate the first ten years of their careers to family medicine.

Everything described in that goal, up to the last sentence, seems sensible and doable. But the last point can't be implemented without a significant transformation of the way physicians are currently trained.

In their fourth year as medical students complete their studies, they must choose a specialty and apply to become a resident. This is a de facto requirement for physicians to practice in Canada after they graduate from any Faculty of Medicine.

Family medicine is a specialty and requires a minimum of 2 years in residence. Thus a physician who chooses to become a family doctor will be approaching 40 years of age after completing a commitment to this specialty. The challenge at this moment is that the training program is not currently designed to accommodate physicians who drop one specialty and then apply to become a resident in another. In effect, physicians who commit to family medicine are likely to be stuck in that specialty for the rest of their professional career.

That in itself should not be a deterrent except for the reality that doctors dedicated to this specialty earn 1/2 to 2/3 less than their colleagues who have completed 2-4 years more in residence, in a different specialty. Yet they often work harder, with a greater likelihood of burning out and that is a tremendous loss, given that they provide primary health care.

Here are a few ideas. Provide incentives to nurse practitioners and family doctors to set up offices together. Change the billing system so they are paid a basic salary, based on a minimum and maximum of patients' visits. Change the restrictive family doctor specialty to something more interdisciplinary. In Québec, there is a field of general medicine whose physicians are called 'une omnipraticienne' or 'un omnipraticien'. Encourage Faculties of Medicine to develop residencies and continuing education programs that allow physicians to study and master an additional specialty. Thus, if doctors leave family medicine after a ten year commitment, they will be able to complete the educational and practical requirements of another specialty field of medical science.

Famous blue sweater = pabulum

"... how Harper and the "StealthCons" are like a Big Mac."

This blogpost made me laugh. After weeks of attempting to decode the point of the blue sweater meme the Cons exploited, all is explained here:

The Blue Sweater Vest ads. The Thanksgiving message. I don't think for a moment that they were an attempt to bring people over to vote for him. They were meant to neutralize the acidic taste he leaves in most people's mouths.

Go read the whole post at Blogging if necessary but not necessarily blogging. Brilliant.

Memories of Banana Republic ...

Perhaps the posts were based on incorrectly worded news items. Perhaps we are on the eve of an election result that will compound the divisiveness that the Conservatives have fostered and encouraged in this campaign. Perhaps it is the waxing of the moon.

In any event, some progressive bloggers have let an unsavoury tone creep into their thinly veiled accusations about supposed irregularities that occurred around the control of advance polls by Elections Canada, in a specific riding in Québec.

Three Ballot Boxes From Advance Polls Missing In Quebec - Do we need independent observers?

Since when does Elections Canada ask or allow scrutineers from the competing political parties to take ballot boxes home with them overnight?? ...

We are NOT Zimbabwe ... at least not yet ...

Now, I might make a comment about how gracious it is that the rest of Canada allows Québecois people to vote in this election, if one were to judge by the comments made about this so-called fishy business. But I won't.

But, but .... my mother?

It is always instructive to observe what happens to bullies when the chips are down. Some become more aggressive, some hide behind their mother's skirt, some threaten to remove their stuff and stomp off.

Stephen Harper, when the hot soup started boiling over, resorted to childish petulance. When pushed by a reporter on the matter of Canadians' mortgages, their savings, their pensions, Harper retorted that the current economic situation provided "buying opportunities" for some people. Oh yes, ordinary working Canadians - most of whom are not day traders - surely rushed out to take advantage of Harper's stock market advice.

When he was confronted with the evidence of backlash his comments provoked, Stephen enlisted his mother to help him out. Did anyone keep count of how many times he mentioned his mother's name in his public utterances about pensions? Awwww. Isn't it nice to know that his mom can still come to his rescue, even though Harper clearly liked his Dad best?

And now, it's been hinted that Stephen Harper, if denied the majority government he wants and were he to lose a minority mandate, would withdraw from the leadership of the CPC. To do what? Stomp back to Alberta to join the political movement to separate the western provinces from the rest of Canada? If that were the case, it would not surprise me. I've always suspected that Harper's position on a united Canada was strategic and opportunistic.

Admit to it, Stephen: you cooked your own goose. Enjoy your thanksgiving dinner. Many of us are thankful that your famous blue sweater gimmick flopped and that ordinary Canadians were able to hear your unchecked words and to watch your unscripted actions in all its common, ordinary bullying behaviour.

But, but .... the whales?

Sex, drugs and rock'n'roll.

I think we need to be clear: there was NO sex and NO rock'n'roll at the leaders' shindig last evening.

Sadly so. Those elements would have jazzed up two hours that I found to be stultifyingly bland and boring, in contrast to yesterday's debate which was lively, engaging and dynamic - well, relatively speaking.

Stephen Harper sleepwalked through the event, delivering rote answers to all questions, challenges or criticism in a slow, measured monotone voice. The occasional 'emotional' punctuation to his own pronouncement or to the words of his opponents was a crocodile grin.

All he had to do was show up and not let Mr Furious Berserker escape because Con handlers know those displays do not endear him to viewers. It would seems Harper's lust for a majority government has forced him to concede that point because his sharp edges were blunted. Perhaps he was pulling his punches. Don Martin noticed:

Mr. Harper had obviously spotted danger in a recovering Mr. Dion and went for the jugular within seconds of the debate's opening, no longer the restrained above-the-fray French debate participant mocked in some pundit reviews on Thursday as a valium-drugged. He denounced Mr. Dion as an election rival "panicked" by his trembling poll numbers into a knee-jerk economic policy.

That was the only flash of his characteristic bellicosity and it came off as a rehearsed and tame jab.

Dion took the blow, but it opened the floor to counter attack. Elizabeth May in particular, directed a number of zingers at Harper. He responded with dull rejoinders, many of which were unsubstantiated claims. For example, May offered up the well-documented fact that many young offenders are illiterate and raised the issue that one of the first deep slashes Harper's Conservatives made when they came to power was to youth employment investments ($55.4 million) and adult literacy program ($17.7 million). Harper's flat answer was that the literacy programs did not teach people to read. That must have been a great surprise to the thousands of individuals helped by those programs.

The highlight of the debate may have been May's shot about the Conservatives' absent, non-existent, vacuum of an economic platform (Remember, it was Harper who requested the first hour of the debate be dedicated to the economy) and Jack Layton's quip about whether it was hiding under the PM's blue sweater.

When Harper blankly rattled off a list of environmental 'accomplishments' produced by the Conservatives, including a non sequitur reference to the whales (Are they one of their target demographics? Whales vote Conservative? Whale-lovers vote Conservative? Don't tell Charles McVety.), May conceded good work regarding the national parks was done, paused, then added that all the rest was fraudulous.

Some pundits declared Harper the 'winner' of last evenings debate.... because he didn't unleash his well-documented pugnacious and corrosive fury upon his opponents?

Watching the debate, I formed an opinion that one of the participants in the debate appeared to be medicated, as evident by the slow, slightly slurred speech and flat affect of his demeanour. Who could that be?

Let me answer that question in the style that Stephen Harper demonstrated during the debate.

I believe that judiciously applied doses of physician-prescribed medication can help individuals with personality disorders such as narcissism maintain control over some of the more extreme manifestations of their sociopathic behaviours.

Nuclear family melt down around the oval debate table

This is the second time in as many months that I have watched television. The first time was the subject of this blogpost.

I don't have cable or newspaper subscriptions; I get my news fix from listening to the radio and surfing the internet. I prefer to read articles from a variety of magazines, in French and in English that I mostly buy used or second hand from St Vincent de Paul.

In the last few weeks, I have also read newspapers. There is a federal election happening and I, as a responsible voter, must be watchful and informed.

The problem is, I tend to pay attention to odd things, to focus on the arcane and to draw disparate occurences together in strange mental Venn diagrams. So while I watched the leaders' debate, I felt compelled to take notes, whenever it struck me that I should be taking notes. Here's my perspective on the event that unfolded on Radio-Canada last evening.

The seating plan was peculiar, to say the least. Why were Elizabeth May and Stephen Harper paired off together on one side of the table, across from Jack Layton, Stéphane Dion and Gilles Duceppe? It sent off a weird dysfunctional nuclear family vibe, especially since everybody knew that Daddy and Jack tried to keep Mommy Lizabeth from joining them because it s'posed to be a boys' night but conciliatory Stéphane said she could be there. And so she was, wearing her lucky sculpty choker jewelry.

Bad boys Jack and Gilles held a spontaneous 'Let's dress exactly like Daddy' monochrome mock-in, right down to the diagonally striped blue ties.

An aspiring pundit and back-room politico wannabe, commenting on his own television appearance wrote: "When you are nice, you look like a decent person and it sets the tone for everything else you say." (I won't identify this blogbrat; he's had his 15 minutes of fame already.)

Daddy tried. To be nice. He tried very hard, scrunching up his visage in a semblance of a grin that silently telegraphed: Nonono nono ... not wearing my furious face, nonono nono.

Which was very, very challenging because Mommy and the Boys were very, very angry with Daddy and they didn't have to be so nice.

Round and round and round went the haggling about the economy, with Daddy holding fast to his NOT American fundamentals and the boys spouting all the important economic words like fiscal prudence, pensions, laissez-faire, corporate tax breaks, regulations - except for these. Then Mommy said something about the neighbours who were all talking about Daddy's bad spending habits:

"In the opinion of the economists worldwide and in an OECD report, the conclusions are clear — Mr. Harper's policies are threatening Canada's future with the decisions he's made to favour the oil sector and only the oil sector."

First round winner: Mommy.

Food safety. Daddy said that it wasn't his fault the listeriosis outbreak happened, he blamed those dirty Lib guys who owned the House before he moved in. That's not what the Doctor wrote in his journal, Mommy and the boys yelled. Daddy said the Doctor was a dirty Lib too.

Second Round winner: Not Daddy.

Gilles was the most angry at Daddy, about receiving the wrong declaration about Québec when everyone else got the right one, about the nasty things that Michael 'Teflon' Fortier said regarding the Bloc, about not having a distinct role in UNESCO, about not allowing French as a viable working language for bilingual federal services employees, about lack of recognition for his province's observance of the Kyoto Accord, about deep cuts to programs that fund hard-working artists and about jailing young offenders.

Third Round winner: Gilles

Stéphane wanted to kick Daddy out of the House, and scrub it clean to get rid of all the toxic things Daddy has done that aren't healthy and green and carbon-reducing. Stéphane said the 'P' word, the word that Daddy won't say in the House because even if Daddy is always blaming everyone else for spreading disinformation about Daddy and his friends, that is one excuse that Daddy won't ever ever use or let anyone else use and that is Poverty.

Fourth Round winner: Stéphane

Jack got a couple of good jabs; you just know when no one is looking Jack sits in Daddy's big Lazyboy chair just to feel out what it's like to be Daddy.

Mommy landed a couple of good smacks on Daddy. She sure wasn't afraid to use the words mensonge and fraude to describe Daddy's petulant claims about all he's done for us.

And so it went, for another hour. I kept seeing flashes of old sit-coms: Stephen Harper as Archie Bunker with more hair and a better wardrobe, Elizabeth-Edith May, Jack 'Meathead' Layton and ..... okay, I'm done with this and I need to get to bed.

You want more? Or you want something different? Then read Kady O'Malley on the next leaders' debate later today, en anglais. That's why she gets paid the big bucks.

And now ladies and germs,

... your special Harper appearance scripted for an exclusive audience.

There’s something entertaining about the limited range of Stephen Harper’s performances during the course of this election campaign. As October 14 looms nearer, it becomes quite apparent that a decision was made regarding which particular acts should be punched up in order to reach and reassure ambivalent voters.

Indeed the scripting, staging and styling of Stephen Harper was anticipated well ahead of the moment chosen to call the elections. For example Michelle Muntean has been on board for a while. Requests for information made to disclose who has been paying for her styling skills are deflected. L’idée du jour says she is paid through some undisclosed discretionary slush fund that every elected member of the House of Commons is allowed.

Famous blue sweater. Leading up to the drop of the writ for the elections, Harper was cleverly portrayed in political advertisements and in ‘candid shots’ as a home-spun, piano-playing, kitten-patting warm fuzzy guy. Many agreed with my impression that this incarnation was creepy and phony, yet some took exception to my description of the cringe factor.

The object of lust. In a truly bizarre move, Mashline, the online news/social media website owned by Conservative supporters, paid out a large sum of money to secure the rights to a Canadian version of "I have a crush on Obama". It was a weird marketing ruse for the former Reformers (they count the faux-doctor Charles McVety among their staunch supporters). After all, the girl who crooned this insipid little ditty was definitely not Harper’s wife.

Was it a lame attempt to convince women of Harper’s charms? Unlike brilliant YouTube creations that went viral upon their release – Culture en Péril, even in its 9 minute version got more hits – this gimmick quickly flopped out of sight.

Bad Con, Faux Con. At an overtly scripted event staged for the purpose of announcing the Conservatives' changes to the Young Offenders' Act, Harper appeared in a suit jacket & sweater vest combo. He was posed holding the hand of Theresa McCuaig who clutched a photo of her dead grandson, conveniently killed by young offenders (convenient that is, for the Cons' photo opportunity, not for Sylvain Leduc and those who mourn him).

The veneer of Harper’s smoothly orchestrated public appearances and sound bites cracked last week when he lashed out at the insubordinate and insurgent artists who continue to voice criticism of his policies. The nasty and real Stephen Harper – not the well-crafted façade – held forth about culture and those he labeled rich gala-goers. So unlike the ordinary working people”, he sneered. Not that Harper has anything in common with ordinary working people.

The nasty flip side of ‘Family Man’ emerged. Shortly after Harper exploded with bitter remarks, his generous and hard-working spouse Laureen put an end to her volunteer responsibilities as chair of the National Arts Centre Gala. No doubt her continued participation in the organization of a cultural event of the type held in contempt by her husband would seem to undermine his authority. His children were removed from field trips organized by their schools, since attending theatre or any cultural event would not be congruent with their father’s crude opinion of the arts.

Like any carefully constructed Con game, the purpose is to manipulate the outcome. Any detail that contradicts or detracts from the purposeful image must be removed. Absolute control over the audience is also a key element to the success of this strategy.

Watching the contrived transformations of Stephen Harper into divertissement that draws attention away from the real man behind the masks, but especially from the real issues of this election, is evocative of .... no, not old-style vaudeville or carnival tent shows, though that would be delicious irony. Harper’s calculated displays are similar to those found in old-fashioned National Geographic documentaries – the ones about predatory animals and the various guises they adopt to fool their prey.

Un grand merci to alison - your blogpost provided an important perspective.

Update: Go read Nothing could be further from the truth for an excoriating analysis of the commercial media's complicity in this Con game show.

The tyranny of the majority ....

It's an interesting turn of phrase, is it not? It was said by Conservatives who were chafing and frothing with the injustice, nay, the inhumanity of being subjected to the rules of order of the House of Commons Ethics committee.

Justice Minister Rob Nicholson .... told a rally in Ontario on Sunday that Prime Minister Stephen Harper has already made it clear he would not tolerate any more "obstruction"...

Meanwhile in Québec, former senator and now Conservative candidate Michael 'Teflon' Fortier is the point man for the attack against the Bloc Québecois. It seems that he is travelling across the province with a publicity van. These Conservative campaign advertisements attack not the raison d'être of the BQ party which is legitimate criticism, but the actual validity of casting a vote for Duceppe's party.

A caller to the Radio-Canada noon open-line program, Maisonneuve en direct, said bluntly:

"C'est grossier, ce que prétendent les Conservateurs. C'est comme si on avait pas le droit de voter pour le député ou le parti qu'on a choisi. Et ça vient de Monsieur Fortier, qui a été ministre sans jamais être élu."

Translation: This is crass, what the Conservatives claim. It suggests that a vote for the candidate of our choice is not legitimate. This from Mr Fortier who was a Minister without being elected.

In this opinion piece, the author castigates Fortier as a dangerous right-wing zealot and a promoter of hateful messages attacking the BQ and those who vote for the party. He announces his intention to file a complaint with Elections Canada.

Stephen Harper wants a majority and he will use whatever means necessary to achieve his goal.

Remember, back in August when Harper first tested the notion of calling an election, he claimed that he could no longer govern with the opposition holding the majority of seats? Under his leadership, senior CPC officials called riding workers who were suspicious of the 2006 'In-and-Out' scheme "a bunch of turds". One of those campaign volunteers was a police chief in a small Ontario town who smelled a rat and advised his candidate to turn down the offer.

Harper and his dirty-tricks gang have demonstrated that they can do tyranny very well, albeit on a small scale. All they require is a majority to really unleash their full potential.

A big Merci! to CC who started the thought process with his post. The political cartoon is from the Toronto Star.

How is that working out for you?

Mashline is a new media product. As its name suggests, it mashes "headline news and entertainment" in a range of formats on one website. Genevieve Desjardins, a former deputy director of communications in the Conservative PMO, said:

the site is one-stop shopping for both election news and election rumour. "You have the traditional media and then you click, you have the social media — all the blogs, all the video on YouTube, all the news on CBC, CTV, La Presse — every Canadian outlet is there and updated every minute."

On the Social Media page, this is posted:

Warning - Content posted directly from social media sites may be offensive to some viewers. Viewer discretion is advised.

Indeed. There are 4 columns/areas dedicated to each of the four male leaders of the CPC, LPC, NDP and BQ. No Green Party.

The page is updated every 2 minutes or so. Though I bookmarked the website last week, I only check it perhaps 3 or four times a day. It appears to me that most of the social media that is fed to the PCP column is very critical of Stephen Harper and his Conservatives. Today I followed a link and discovered this clever YouTube:

HARPER IS A CYLON

This one has the potential for going viral, unlike the other Harper themed new media product launched to great fanfare last week.

It seems, from my unbiased perspective, that Mashline, as a medium for displaying glowing testimonials from Conservative bloggers and producers of social media is not working out favourably for them. Perhaps they should allow 'real' people to attend their events, besides the ones they trick for photo opportunities.

Où sont les rhinocéros d’antan?

Indeed, where are the Rhinos when you need them? As I read blogs posted during the Great Debate Debacle, about the pros and cons of including the Green Party, I began to wonder why this event was a catalyst for the outbreak of hissing, spitting and back-biting amongst progressives, (of whom some would say and did say, ‘so-called’).

My epiphany was this: since the Conservatives are ideologues who can only lay claim to cutting, slashing and burning programs as their record of achievement for their two and a half years of governing, they are attempting to co-opt the tactics of the Rhinoceros Party - to sow confusion and chaos.

Unfortunately they forgot the most important element: style. So far their foray in Rhinoceros territory has been sorely lacking in good humour and wit.

Posting a pooping puffin animation on your website is not amusing, it is petty and crude. Luring mothers and their children to a small Ottawa family-centered store to use them for a photo opportunity is not agit-prop; it is prevarication and exploitation. Calling the grief-stricken father of a soldier killed in Afghanistan a partisan hack is not a media coup; it is crass and cruel. Dressing up your leader in garments taken from Peter Gzowski's wardrobe rejects and providing him with a script that makes him muse aloud about tickling piano keys is not a quaint parody of normal; it is a clumsy travesty.

Here are some examples of merry political pranks played by the Rhinoceros Party.

A candidate named Ted 'not so' Sharp ran in Flora MacDonald's riding with the campaign slogan "Fauna, not flora" .... He also took a stand on capital punishment: "If it was good enough for my grandfather, then it's good enough for me." ... Penny Hoar, a safe sex activist, distributed condoms in Toronto while running under the slogan "Politicians screw you — protect yourself."

Platform promises included: instituting English, French and illiteracy as Canada's three official languages, tearing down the Rocky Mountains so that Albertans could see the Pacific sunset, making Montreal the Venice of North America by damming the St. Lawrence River, abolishing the environment because it's too hard to keep clean and it takes up so much space, adopting the British system of driving on the left; this was to be gradually phased in over five years with large trucks and tractors first, then buses, eventually including small cars and bicycles last, declaring war on Belgium because a Belgian cartoon character, Tintin, killed a rhinoceros in one of the books, offering to call off the proposed Belgium-Canada war if Belgium delivered a case of mussels and a case of Belgian beer to Rhinoceros "Hindquarters" in Montréal (the Belgian Embassy in Ottawa did, in fact, do this), Painting Canada's coastal sea limits in watercolour so that Canadian fish would know where they were at all times, building a bridge spanning the country, from Vancouver Island to Newfoundland, making the Trans-Canada Highway one way only.

Now that is clever, sly, and provocative. Where is the Rhinoceros Party when this negative and shallow election campaign so desperately needs it?

As that great French comédienne Simone Signoret said: "La nostalgie n'est plus ce qu'elle était."

The Conservative culture of obscurantism

Though it's likely that few of the CPC faithful would be familiar with the term, it seems that obscurantism is woven deeply into that party's culture.

An article in yesterday's Le Devoir offers up evidence of many instances where the Conservatives' New Government has reined in the release of information and willfully promoted a culture of obscurantism.

A brief look at the succinct entry for obscurantism in Wikipedia takes you from the familiar ("the practice of deliberately preventing the facts or full details of something from becoming known") to the hermetic (Derrida, Lacan et al). Ever pragmatic, Le Devoir provides examples of the Conservatives practices of obscuring information from the public by making it unavailable. Two major scientific studies commissioned by the federal government, the first about global warming and its effect upon public health and the second, a rigorous analysis of the social costs of our current transportation systems, were released in the dead of summer.

The article also mentions that immediately after the Conservatives came to power in 2006, all information and links regarding the Kyoto accord were removed from the Environment Canada website. An allusion to the SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) tactic for silencing critics did not reference the Chuck Cadman affair, but I will.

"Though often associated with religious fundamentalism, obscurantism is a distinct strain of thought: Fundamentalism presupposes a sincere belief in religion, while obscurantism rests on the deliberate manipulation of faith by an enlightened few."

Which segues perfectly to a rather arcane species of obcurantists: Opus Dei members. Thanks to La Presse and its diligent reporters, a Con candidate in a riding south of Montréal has been outed as an adherent of that extremist orthodox sect within the Catholic Church.

Fortunately, black hole production is not yet available to the Cons' overactive web designer geeks otherwise there might be more major 'unsanctioned' obscurantism.

CPC kids - don't play with the anti-matter machine at Conservative Party Headquarters without adult supervision, okay?

Line! Overheard during the 2008 federal election.

Gilles Duceppe is the leader of the Bloc Québecois. While many in the so-called RoC - rest of Canada - wonder what role (or political game) the BQ plays in Ottawa and in federal politics, Duceppe reminded me today how refreshing it can be to hear an outsider's perspective.

The so-called "In-and-Out" accounting practices of the Conservative Party during the last federal election, also known as Adscam, were in the process of being scrutinized by the House of Commons Ethics Committee during August. The behaviour of the Con MPs who attended this committe proceedings were observed and live-blogged by Kady O'Malley, a reporter for MacLean's. This issue is important for the BQ because it may involve high-profile Con candidates that Duceppe's party wants to defeat at the polls on October 14th and so Gilles raised it today, when he spoke in Trois-Rivières.

The 'money quote' (pun intended) was Duceppe's response to the Cons grumbling about keeping their eyes on Elections Canada this time. He likened that tactic to criminals who threaten to watch the police for illegal activity.

Meanwhile, in news that remain relevant to the election campaign even though released before the writ was dropped, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation calculated the cost of pre-election spending announcements made by Stephen Harper’s New™ government. Total amount of promised spending as of September 5, 2008: "$8.8-billion, roughly $94-million a day or about $3.9-million every hour ..."

Updated to add: Oh, I forgot to mention this other important money fact. When byelections are cancelled, all the candidates' expenses not covered by donations have to be reimbursed by Elections Canada. So taxpayers will be stuck with a bill for close to $3.5 million. Additionally this election will cost us about $300 million. Just saying.

Stephen, we hardly know you … and likely never will.

On Sunday morning I watched as the current prime minister of Canada held a televised press conference in Québec city and wondered out loud: Who is this? Absent was the familiarly churlish, arrogant, sneering, hostile, contemptuous man that many Canadians knew from past scrums with reporters. So who, or what was this incarnation of Stephen Harper taking questions from the judiciously assembled media?

Soft-spoken, smiling, polite, charming and almost shy as he gazed away and back to the camera, this seemingly diffident version of Stephen Harper was a performance designed to disarm the eager, possibly aggressive probes from the press corps and to capture the hearts of women watching.

The Conservatives know, from polling results, that their leader has a “female” problem. The majority of Canadian women do not trust Harper to defend their rights. To redress this situation, a cleverly crafted persona was created: a gentle and even sweet Stephen.

This was the Harper on display Sunday morning.

I found his performance riveting. Like most Canadian women, I have experienced in the course of my lifetime at least one intimate relationship that was abusive and based on power imbalance. It matters little who that particular individual was: parent, teacher, friend, coach, lover, boss or spouse.

It is the habitual pattern of behaviour that is significant: an ingratiating phase followed by angry, authoritarian actions that are intended to control. Faced with the loss of a relationship (or control over someone) a bully has to resort to a display of tenderness (recriminations, tears, pleading, cajoling, and charm) to seduce the target of his attentions, to convince her that he deserves a second chance.

Since I’ve never let Stevie even get within view of first base with me, his display was intellectually fascinating but did not strike any of the emotional notes that it was meant to do.

As for the men who were watching, there was nothing in Harper’s demeanour that shrieked out ‘girly man’ or weakness. In fact, if any of the guys caught on to his little charade, they probably chuckled to themselves, in solidarity and self-recognition. It likely reminded them of the time their mom caught them downloading porn from the internet or the moment their wife accidentally opened the envelope with the $300 fine reminder for a speeding ticket and the subsequent grovelling they had to do to set things right.

Surely it’s no secret the CPC had extensive, in-depth surveys done to establish how to spin the announcement of an election that, based upon legislation presented and passed by their New™ government, should have been held in 2010. Focus groups results likely determined that the unfavourable ‘gender gap’ factor vis-à-vis their leader could best be overcome by getting Stephen to wear a different face.

And what a stunning performance piece that was. One does wonder what emotional trigger Harper accessed to provide such a convincing act. Raindrops on roses? Whiskers on kittens? Whoever coached him has a brilliant future in Hollywood.

However it should be interesting to see whether the polls conducted by the Cons immediately after Harper’s performance demonstrated that this display was successful in soothing the concerns of Canadian women. I found Stephen Harper’s act amusing yet ultimately, alarming.

Whatever is concealed inside that blue paper package tied up in string, remain wary and vigilant.