Skip to content
Join our Newsletter

Boomers vs the rest: A Harper government strategy for distraction

Let's be honest for a moment. Not long, just a moment. Won't hurt that much. Without insulting anyone who currently is or has ever been in the military, Canada simply isn't a player, war-wise.
opinion_maxedout1

Let's be honest for a moment. Not long, just a moment. Won't hurt that much.

Without insulting anyone who currently is or has ever been in the military, Canada simply isn't a player, war-wise. Never a leading man, the country has historically embraced supporting roles. Canada's been the good-natured buddy who throws himself on a grenade to save everyone else, or the guy who rushes headlong into certain death because to do otherwise would be dishonourable. Canada doesn't start wars, threaten others with nuclear annihilation, or overthrow unfriendly governments. Canada doesn't have The Bomb, which puts us somewhere well below Pakistan in the Threat to Humanity race.

The thought of this country invading another country or actually starting a war seems as absurd as the idea of Justin Bieber doing a tribute album of Neil Young covers. Okay, maybe not that absurd... but farfetched nonetheless. I mean, heck, simply getting around to buying military hardware has been an angst-ridden exercise for successive Canadian governments.

Perhaps because of that, Canada doesn't really have what you might call an external enemy. We don't fear the terrorist boogieman the way the U.S. or even Britain seems to. We lack the international skullduggery infrastructure to conjure up real threats to our national security. Our internal network of spies bears closer resemblance to the black and white duo who used to grace the pages of Mad magazine than a crack intelligence network. We largely "borrow" threats to appease the paranoid Americans rather than perceive any ourselves.

It's inconceivable we would ever go to war with, say, France over Saint Pierre and Miquelon the way the English did with Argentina over the Falklands three decades ago. It's so... so unCanadian. We worry about the sovereignty of the Arctic but we'll never have a military infrastructure sufficient to "defend" it against frozen interlopers.

Truth be told, our continued existence relies on close ties with our southern neighbour, the rule of international law, good relations with most of the rest of the world, and a global profile resembling a prairie landscape. We are easily overlooked and in the current geopolitical climate, that is a blessing.

Despite the occasional chest beating coming out of Ottawa and the uncomfortable transition of the Canadian Forces from peacekeepers to combat troops, Canada for the most part does everything it can to foster its Mr. Rogers-like good neighbour profile. We welcome immigrants and refugees, albeit forcing them to drive taxi instead of using their medical or engineering degrees. We cling stubbornly, if less proudly, to the tenets of multiculturalism. And our politicians tend not to harp on the shortcomings of other countries, thus depriving the leaders of those countries the reciprocal pleasure of harping on our own.

The problem with all this nicey-nicey complacency is this: It deprives us of an enemy. Enemies are more important than you may think. Aside from the obvious benefits of providing a focal point for worry, fear and hatred, enemies are to politicians what distractions are to magicians. They divert attention to the right hand while the left hand palms the coin. In the case of politicians, it is generally our coin being palmed while we wait for the rabbit to appear.

Thus far, the Harper government hasn't been very good at creating really distracting enemies. Traditional military enemies are simply too expensive and, thankfully, still not very appealing to Canadians. The Con's heavy-handed attempt to cast foreign environmentalists as economic and social terrorists has, by and large, been met with derision. The legerdemain of imaginary crime hasn't really galvanized a population skeptical of spending billions of dollars on an expanded police and prison system.

I don't mean to imply this lack of success has stopped the Harpocrites in their pursuit of these ends. They'll continue to dismantle the environmental review process even though no one believes their cry of wolf over foreign radical environmentalists. After all, there's a lot of money to be made from raping the environment and a lot to be funnelled to powerful friends who will be more than willing to make sure some of it ends up back in Conservative coffers. Same with the war on nonexistent crime.

And I'm sure if Canada had a more robust arms industry — or if the lessons of the Airbus scandal weren't still front-of-mind — the government wouldn't be doing a slow dance to oblivion over the F-35 decision.

Given all of this, it's not surprising Harpo's reached into his Machiavellian bag of tricks to conjure up the ultimate us-versus-them enemy: Baby Boomers.

Brilliant. I mean, who's easier to hate than the Generation of Swine?

After floating a trial balloon in February, while he was with the beautiful people in Davos at the World Economic Forum, Harpo's first majority budget made changes to Old Age Security benefits. For those of you young enough to not really care, OAS pays Canadians roughly $540/month when they reach age 65. To qualify for OAS, you mostly have to be alive; the rest of the rules aren't really very important.

Under the new rules, you'll have to wait until you're 67. If you're already 54 years old, you get to slip in under the new rules. Younger than 54? You have to wait the extra two years.

From a budgetary standpoint, the savings are virtually insignificant. But then, from a budgetary standpoint, Harpo screwed the pooch when he reduced the GST from 7% to 5% when no one except a few dyed-in-the-wool, free market Neocons really gave a rat's ass. That was a simply a dogmatic, macroeconomic disaster of a decision.

But extending the age for OAS eligibility is a cynical, sadistic ploy to pit generation against generation. Unfortunately, it seems to be working. The Gen XYZ and Millennials seem to have taken the bait and are bitching and moaning about how badly they're being screwed while the Boomers continue to suck hard and mightily off the teat of generational debt.

How dreary. How predictable.

If Harpo had been serious about tackling OAS as an economic drain, he could have used his majority to end the charade of universality. Simply put, it makes no sense for Service Canada to pay OAS to people who don't need it just so Revenue Canada can claw it back and make filing taxes more complicated.

Challenging universality would take real stones though and Harpo's more a pull-wings-off-flies kind of guy. I can see his sickening grin as he reads how successfully this move has brought out the worst in people, sparking Canada's version of generational wars... at least wars of words.

But it's created enemies. Everyone younger than 54 hates the Boomers. The Boomers hate having to face their legacy. And Harpo palms the coins.

If we had any sense, we'd know who the real enemy is.