The ice sheet was the great equalizer, where it didn't matter whether you were rich or poor, English, French or ethnic, young or old, professional or blue collar, or even talented or not, in garage league the only entrance requirement is showing up.
On the ice, I learned many life lessons about hard work, coöperation, respect and yes, even confrontation.
The most enduring lesson I was taught was the one I received after being manhandled in the corner. I told the offending adversary who had roughed me up and who was now skating away that I'd catch up to him later. To my utter surprise, he screeched to a halt, dropped his gloves and popped me a right hook across the mouth.
As I stared up at him from the ice, bewildered and in shock, I remember his words to this day;
"Don't ever threaten!"
I never forgot that lesson and have heeded his advice all my life...."Don't ever threaten!"
I was reminded of that lesson during the Quebec provincial election when Pauline announced rather injudiciously, on more than one occasion, that a potential PQ government would seek confrontation with Ottawa in an effort to create a 'chicane' which would hopefully serve to enrage Quebecers and perhaps boost support for sovereignty.
It was a singularly stupid statement to make for two reasons, first because it revealed that Quebec would be bargaining in bad faith and second it warned Harper of the potential trap being set.
What Pauline didn't bargain for, was that like the fellow on the ice who slugged me preemptively, Harper wasn't waiting around for the shoe to drop.
After Pauline's victory, we didn't hear anything from Harper except platitudes and a magnanimous affirmation that he'd be happy to work with whatever government was elected in Quebec.
He acted as if he never heard Pauline's threats or perhaps graciously chose to ignore them.
But trust me readers, he did hear the threats and most certainly did not ignore them. Our Prime Minister is not that generous, he's a politician who lives in a Nixonian world of friends who are to be rewarded and enemies to be punished.
No, there would be no verbal riposte to Pauline's nasty invitation to squabble, no argument or complaint, just feigned indifference, and for Pauline, the most self-absorbed, deluded and inept Premier Quebec has ever seen, her interpretation that Stephen hadn't got the message was perhaps the greatest misjudgment of all.
And so Pauline continues to bait Stephen Harper and the Conservative government repeating once more the nonsense of seeking a squabble. Just last week, a Quebec City newspaper reported this;
What our politically-challenged Premier fails to acknowledge or understand is that Harper has already opened the war with Quebec, but on his own terms and that he has been waging the battle long before Pauline was even elected."The Quebec government is preparing to initiate hostilities with the federal government in order to obtain new powers and combat the interference of Ottawa in its areas of jurisdiction.
the Marois government in the coming days will reveal its game plan in relation to sovereignist governance, Le Journal de Québec learned from reliable sources not wishing to be identified.
"The government will not hesitate to force the game and push the limits of its sovereignty on all fronts," We have been entrusted. New powers will be claimed for culture, training and labour on the power of the federal government to spend." Link{fr}
For years Harper tried in vain to seek a majority government through Quebec, at one point dumping almost a billion dollars in the lap of Jean Charest to help bolster the Conservative's image.
We all know how that turned out and the successive wave of Bloc Quebecois members of Parliament sent to Ottawa convinced Harper to pick up his marbles and move on to friendlier environs.
The decision by Quebec voters to snub Harper electorally after the billion dollar gift, may have been smugly self-satisfying, but like calling your professor an idiot in front of the whole class, it ultimately has devastating consequences and as we all know, payback can sometimes be a nasty bitch.
When Jean Charest betrayed Harper a second time, this time with his humiliating, back-stabbing position at a Copenhagen environmental conference, it was as if Charest sealed Quebec's fate.
And so Harper initiated his plan to cut Quebec out of the national conversation, a plan whereby Harper would find his majority outside Quebec, something pundits agreed couldn't be done.
But did it he did, pulling off a stunning political feat in achieving a majority government with no help from Quebec.
To the victor goes the spoils, in this case utter political power without any obligation to cater to Quebec. For Harper it was the sweetest political victory which provided him, in his winners and losers world, the golden opportunity to exact his pound of flesh.
Unlike Pauline, Harper never announced his intentions. His subsequent anti-Quebec policies were enacted slowly and without much fanfare as if he didn't want attention to be called to his machinations.
And so Harper has;
Added thirty seats to Parliament, only three of which are in Quebec, further reducing Quebec's ability to act as kingmaker in a federal election.
While Quebec is making noises about making French the official, official, official language of Quebec, Harper has reminded the province exactly what country they live in and has sent a powerful signal by re-instating the "ROYAL" moniker to the armed forces as well as hoisting the portrait of the Queen in foreign embassies. Let us not forget his plan to share embassy space with the British, a cost saving plan bound to outrage Quebec nationalist.
Then there are those unilingual Parliamentary officers as well as those highly placed employees working in his office with nary a word of French.
But the two most devastating anti-Quebec measures are the continued immigration stampede and the changes to Employment Insurance, both absolutely crushing anti-Quebec measures.
Let us recognize that Canada has the highest immigration level of any important western democracy, double, triple or even four times as high as those in our economic position.
In 2010, for every 100,000 citizens, the United States took in 28 immigrants, while Canada took in a whopping 80, almost three times as much.
Why?
Of the over one million immigrants that come to Canada every four years, less than 8-9% are assimilated into the French side of the linguistic equation.
Nobody in Quebec seems to understand or care that French Canada is being eroded, steadily but surly through immigration and with the continued trend, Francophones will be reduced to under 20% of Canada's population within a few short decades.
Although this massive immigration policy was started by the Liberals, surely it's cumulative effect has been gauged by the present government who's only rationale to continue the stampede is to dilute francophone numbers.
Then there's the latest blast from Harper, the changes to the Employment Insurance program that will devastate the outer reaches of Quebec, where seasonal workers abound and who depend on the largess of the program as an income supplement program.
When a furious and desperate PQ minister Agnes Maltais went to Ottawa, cap in hand to beg for relief, her counterpart, Diane Finley, gave her an eight minute meeting, then politely showed Maltais the door.
On and on it goes, a cruel and vindictive lesson in realpolitik, dished out by the Harper government to a hapless Quebec, which is unable to fight back and unwilling to acknowledge the hurt being put on it for fear of being shown up as powerless.
Pauline's bravado in the face of such a deadly and over-matched assault is sadly reminiscent of a famous Monty Python skit, where the hapless Black knight defends his turf while being ripped apart by a more powerful opponent. As the black knight is hacked to pieces, he continues to bait and challenge the superior force.
It is devastatingly appropos;
Instead of seeking new powers from Ottawa that she will never get, she should perhaps, as they say in French, concentrate on 'saving the furniture,' that is, preserving what little powers Quebec already has.
