The peaceable kingdom grabs its mallet!

The Globe and Mails Roy MacGregor has put together a pretty interesting article on the mood of this ornery little country, and to say that Canadians are ready to vent is an understatement. The piece in Saturday’s Globe takes us from East to West and everywhere in between, the general feelings is one of being a tad used, abused and maybe even a bit confused.

There’s a palpable sense that the time has come to take charge of our cynicism and make a stand. Perhaps not a good sign for the incumbent of any riding, a telling quote in the piece sums it all up nicely. Macgregor quotes the owner of an on line executive coaching service, John Atkins, who laughingly points out that “there is something in the Canadian psyche that believes that spanking someone seems more to the point than making a positive investment”, basically he adds, “the greatest country in the world wants to punish its leaders for colouring outside of the lines”

And there is something to that argument; Canadian history is littered with the political corpses of politicians who lived past their best before dates, taking their compatriots to the woodshed with them. Look no further than British Columbia or Ontario, where swings of a political nature are usually of a huge magnitude. Usually removing one government and replacing it with a huge number of the other party, only to have the tide turn within a year or so (In Ontario seemingly within months).

For Paul Martin, trying to salvage his bid to be the new leaf on the Liberal tree, it has to be a bit disconcerting, having spent his last five months trying to implant the belief that he was the change, he now stands on the verge of becoming the changed.

There is no better barometer of Canada’s percolating sense of distaste for the state of our political process than the James Gang with their Whack a PM website. I discovered this little gem in the MacGregor piece and it’s a wonderful bit of participatory satire for us all to play at. Answer a few questions, take a few whacks and hey you’ll be leaving your stamp on the political process. You can also take your score and use it to make decision day that much easier.

As if to emphasize the snarling nature of the voter at the moment, the returns are coming in with great speed. When I last checked it all out, the Prime Minister had been whacked by 1% more of the mallet holding participants than Stephen Harper, Gilles Duceppe finds himself third most likely to be clubbed on the head, while Jack Layton and the Green’s Jim Harris are truly men of peace, trailing the big three.

If Jack Layton truly wants to make a breakthrough in Canadian politics he had best get busy annoying us, with today’s electorate you’re nobody til you’ve been whacked upside the head.