Brown-John: Slogans are OK in politics, but where’s the policy beef?

By: Lloyd Brown-John

In the 1958 federal election, John Diefenbaker won the largest parliamentary majority in Canadian history. He defeated Nobel Peace Prize winner Lester Pearson.

‘Dief’ tapped into populist discontent and rode to victory on a simple slogan — ‘Follow John.’

Slogans are the bread and margarine of political parties and their promoters.
The word ‘slogan’ may have originated in Gaelic ‘slaugh-ghairm’ — a battle cry.
Former New York Times columnist William Safire defined slogan as “a catch phrase … to thrill, exhort and inspire … (with) the intent of sparking emotions and open the door to persuasion.”

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Pierre Poilievre has been hammering away with his “Axe the Tax” slogan for painfully long. The Conservative leader seems to prefer slogans, including having picked up former Ontario premier Mike Harris’s ‘Common Sense’ theme.

The problem with preaching populist slogans on the path into political office is straightforward. He seems more adept at playing simple critic rather than constructive critic.

Somewhat like hockey. When you are plunked on your butt, munching peanuts with your beer watching a hockey game, it is easy to criticize on-ice player failure. After all, armchair wannabes often presume themselves better players than those on ice.

And so it is in politics as well. Standing in opposition and tossing allegations and slogans is so much easier than actually occupying and managing a government. Returning to Diefenbaker, he was a remarkable critic of the Liberals and Pearson.

Dief’s ability to appear and behave as an outraged citizen was classic theatre. Yet, when he was elected prime minister his performance rhetoric ultimately collapsed.

Of necessity, an aspiring prime minister must understand that theatrical slogans may work in opposition but once in office responsibility demands dramatic change.

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Some may recall a fast food outlet’s commercial of years ago when an elderly lady screamed, “Where’s the beef?” Undogmatic voters may wish to see what plan for Canada’s future would be laid out by Poilievre.

Political parties need a much more substantive outline of what they propose to do if elected. Some term that need a project. What is your post-victory project? So far, Poilievre has been rather indifferent about how his axing the carbon tax would be replaced by any viable policy alternative which might achieve the same or better results in respect to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Poilievre often sounds like a pale echo of a blustery American presidential buffoon, but more subdued and perhaps much less self-infatuated. While his approach to communication with the public may serve him well in opposition, however, it is a perilous strategy for governing.

A political party and leader salivating for power and the mantle of prime minister needs to reach beyond frivolous slogans into policy substance. As Ontarians discovered with Mike Harris’s Common Sense revolution, you really must be cautious about buying a political leader’s half-formed slogan policy promises.

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Like his mentor Stephen Harper, if Poilievre is determined to shift Canada more to the political right he may need to understand that Canadians — concerned about housing, medical care and climate — may still prefer greater government intervention than hard-right Conservatives might otherwise wish.

This is not America, and the political culture which infuses Canada is much less aligned to an inherent libertarianism so often witnessed in American politics. Much of this country’s history has involved government intervention to build railways, highways and social welfare structures that are often anathema to fundamentalists and far-right politicians such as Harper and now, it would appear, Poilievre.

There are serious public policy issues in this country, ranging from immigration to housing to health care and climate change. Poilievre needs to offer Canadians solid public policy alternatives and not slogans or cutesy TV ads of him and his wife wandering through glistening fields of joy.

Axe the Tax is a vacuous slogan. So, Mr. Poilievre, what do you have as a tangible alternative to deal with climate change? Or housing? Or immigration? Health care?

Offering us dry burger buns is one thing — but where’s the beef?

Lloyd Brown-John is a University of Windsor professor emeritus of political science and director of Canterbury ElderCollege. He can be reached at [email protected].

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