Landlords To A Ghost

One of my favourite authors in earlier years was Lloyd C. Douglas. In his best-selling novel Magnificent Obsession he noted, "If a man harbors any sort of fear, it percolates through all his thinking, damages his personality and makes him a landlord to a ghost." The observation came back to me when I heard what Stephen Harper said to a crowd of about 300 in Brampton, Ontario at the start of this campaign. Read it carefully because it is telling.

"Friends, we are living in a fragile global recovery. Yes, Canada is doing relatively well, but a sea of troubles is lapping at our shores, disaster in the Pacific, chaos in the Middle East, debt problems in Europe and of course very serious challenges south of our border. Canada is the closest thing the world has to an island of security and stability."

It used to be that successful politicians were those like Franklin Roosevelt or Lester Pearson who instilled hope in their populace and openness to the world. Not anymore. Now it's all about what should be scaring you. While other party leaders have been on the hustings speaking about family care or progressive pensions, our PM has spent his opening days attempting to terrify you about the same kind of coalition he attempted to engineer himself a few years ago. Those terrifying opposition parties are out to get you; be careful.His statement in Brampton was classic Conservative thinking. The PM was correct about the fragile global recovery, but when he talks about "a sea of troubles is lapping at our shores," what did he mean? The good people in BC, Newfoundland/Labrador or in the Arctic don't appear preoccupied with anything like that. Yes, disaster has consumed Japan, but they are a heroic people already rising above the ashes of their misery to get a grip on their future - no danger to us there.The Middle East has always been a troubled place, but the springing of democracy and freedom in the region and in North Africa has actually inspired hope in millions of Canadians. A part of the world locked in the cruel embrace of dictators is breaking up and average citizens are finding their voice. Sure there's danger, but this is a moment like the fall of the Soviet Union. The difference is one of emphasis and our PM is more comfortable with the darker shades.Debt problems in Europe? To be sure and they must be monitored. But I don't get his instilling fear in Canadians about the "serious challenges south of the border." Yes, there are economic challenges to be faced in the U.S., but they are still our friends, we are working on shared border issues, and they possess a leader yet capable of inspiring great hope.In Brampton, Stephen Harper just handed us a view of Canada - pulling up the welcome mat, fearing anything that is "without," even our historic neighbour, cringing even before the flowering of Middle East freedom - that is not the Canada you and I know and appreciate. And if we're doing so great, as the PM has stated, why are we cringing in fear?We have pulled up the drawbridge. Sending some fighter jets to Libya to protect its people is a good thing, but being able to sit on the Security Council, lending our voice to the overall approach to that troubled country would have been far better. But we're not really "out there" anymore, we're "in here" and it's getting darker. In Brampton the PM said we are an "island," when in fact we should be out in the world, bold, hopeful, and making a difference.Maybe actress Shirley McLaine was right when she stated, "Fear makes strangers of people who would be friends." We are rapidly becoming a country possessed of solitudes. It's one thing to be fearful of distant enemies, it's another to be afraid of ourselves. We are at the starting blocks of a significant election campaign and the Conservatives begin it with fear - fear of coalitions within and wild things without. We are fast on our way to becoming landlords to ghosts. Is this what we should be considering at a time when we are so much more than this? Maybe that's what high-tech fighter jets and super-prisons are all about - fear. And as long as you buy into it, you can be distracted from declining senior's pensions, the rise of poverty and unemployment, and our deplorable lack of action on climate change. This landlord stuff isn't all it's cracked up to be.