No, the differences here are of ideology, on all sides. Parallel thinking. When I taught sociology in university, I used to give my students an issue and ask them to argue from the point of view of the three main paradigms. They were always amazed at how different the points of view are. Liberals like to think they don’t have an ideology, a specific world view, but obviously they do.

But, anyone who would say the fact that this current government being minority makes no difference, is completely wrong no matter what the partisan position taken.

So, it’s unfortunately time for me to turn the comments off on this post because, as I said previously, you are using this post to trash Mr. Harper instead of what this post is all about — the situation in Iran. It is a shame you chose to change the channel given such a dire situation.

In fact, when commenters do that deliberately, they are usually called trolls. I won’t go that far, but something is fishy that is for sure.

As to the UN, it is not the problem. It is not the UN that is stifling the development of a more mature discourse on international affairs here in Canada. It is our own leadership. Again, Harper promised a very different approach in the run-up to the last election. Sadly, as on so many issues, Harper’s record is one of wasted promise. Only in Canada, where we have long suffered from a poverty of leadership, would such a PM be regarded as a real leader.

As for international affairs, for as long as the UN exists in its present form its bureaucrats will continue to suck all of the oxygen out from the world stage. Why hasn’t the UN ever insisted on open, transparent and monitored elections for Iran, or for any member nation for that matter? The UN has no problem at all providing a soapbox for Iran’s mad mullahs to air their grievances through their evil sock puppet Ahmadinnerjacket, but the UN has never held any such place at the table for anyone as insignificant to its backroom dealings as the Iranian people. Iran believes that it needs a nuclear weapon to become a player on the world stage, but Canada has chosen not to arm itself in such a way despite having had the components and technology for almost as long as the US has, and therefore if we have remained irrelevant it is largely by choice.

In any case, I don’t think Harper is any better than the previous Liberal PMs and certainly no better than Dion would have been. But, there is a key difference. Harper promised to be different. As soon as he got in, however, he showed he would not be. He allowed himself to be captured by the senior bureaucrats, most of whom are strongly pro-Liberal and want to keep things the way they have been for much of the past half-century. Harper allowed this to happen because he is more interested in retaining power than anything else. Lord Acton would seem to be correct.

We have serious national security problems to confront and sadly PMSH is not the man to deal with them. If you think I am wrong, what would you say to a PM who appoints as his National Security Advisor a woman with absolutely no experience in national security affairs? Well, Harper did just that only last year. What about a chief of Border Services with no background in policing, but by all accounts a very good accountant? Why are such individuals being elevated into such positions? The answers lie in the nature of the Canadian bureaucracy and the fact that PMSH doesn’t care about such matters. And so, foreign policy becomes hostage to his domestic political concerns — and that’s not a whole lot different from the Libs who used immigration policies to build core ethnic groups of supporters.

As to what is going on in Iran — well, its history unfolding. The regime is behaving in a bloody-minded way. That is hardly surprising – it is after all a hardline theocratic tyranny. The leading defeated candidate is also no Western moderate, but a hardline Islamist who helped establish the current jihadist regime. All I can think is that the more the violence continues in Tehran, and preoccupies the attention of the Iranian regime, the less time it has to advance its malevolent goals abroad. But, at the same time, I am not sure that I want the demonstrators to win either. Perhaps we could somehow support both sides against each other.

Harper’s condemnation of the Iranian violence — about which I am largely unmoved — is purely self-serving. If he cared so much about human rights, he would not cozy up to the Chinese government whose record is about as bad as Iran’s. That’s the Iran, by the way, that your friends helped create by supporting a revolution that erected an Islamist/jihadist state. (Unlike other recolutions – e.g., Russia’s — the people actually asked for a Sharia-based society — astonishing. So, in that sense the violence is a consequence of that support for what is truly a barbaric regime.)

In any event, most of what Harper says about foreign policy is all about domestic political positioning. It’s pathetic, I agree, and quite embarrassing that a G8 country should be so politically immature that it cannot voice a grand strategy, but there you have it.

I have never said anything negative about Obama. In fact, I have written on CoTM about his goals for education which are laudable — assuming he can get the teachers’ unions to agree.

And, sorry, but I do care about the Iranian people. I went to university in the early to mid 1970’s with two Iranians, who eventually fought in the first revolution (on the side of the Islamic Revolution), even though they both came from affluent families. In any event, they became very close friends.

I don’t know what happened to them, but this situation is very real to me — because it is possible it is their grandchildren who are protesting.

And, I don’t think it is right to simply lump all conservatives as fanatics. But, then again, you are a self-described “cynic.”

Lucky for Jack, Joanne and I, you are not so inclined when it comes to managing our websites!

But, one last point if I may: Let me remind you, this post is NOT about Mr. Harper. It is about Neda and the people of Iran — particularly the young. That is far more important than haggling over who said what about our PM.

As others have said as well, the U.S and foreign media love to have him on as a guest.

Also, in this particular instance, let’s be clear — Harper was not the first to condemn what is happening in Iran. French president Sarkozy took a hard-line position over a week ago. Now, compared with Obama, it is true that Harper was out in front. But that is not a man I would want to be compared with. Foreign policy for Harper is all about domestic politics — nothing else matters to him. He knows elections in Canada are never won or lost as a result of foreign policy, unless it is looking tough (real easy when no one abroad cares) and standing up to the US (and appealing to the Libs’ pot of Canadian nationalists).

Harper is no better or worse than Chretien or Turner or Trudeau or Mulroney: they are all examples of self-serving leaders who like to cloak self-interest in appeals to high-sounding phrases in the hope of gaining the support of the easily duped or unaware. Conservatives really need to use their critical faculties when listening to the guy. He is not the Messiah.