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“NATO but neutral”? What could that possibly mean? Surely the first thing a country would do if it wanted to be in any sense neutral would be withdraw from any and all military alliances. But of course, Canada has never been “neutral” in any way, shape or form.

Having slapped us about the face with that lede, Fisk levels all the standard-issue complaints against the Harper record both at home and abroad, with the novel addition of nativist tactics that have turned up during this election campaign. David Suzuki turns up to call Harper a “dictator,” apropos of nothing. But what has any of this to do with “Canada’s democracy”? There are certainly charges one could level against Harper in that regard: his disdain for Parliament, most notably. But there isn’t a single accusation in this entire piece that supports the notion of a weakened democracy.

Dreadful.

At Esquire, Chales Piercerambles on aimlessly about Harper aspiring to be “a Christian oil-sheikh, just as Jesus intended,” but concludes on a somewhat positive note by observing that “unlike (in the United States), the condition of the Native peoples of Canada is a subject of serious consideration in the national election.” You sure could have fooled us.

Heather MallickHeather Mallicks all over the October edition of Harper’s: The Liberals were altogether splendid people, she explains, while “Harper’s obedient, dark-suited, rural, punitive, women-despising MPs likewise do as they’re told,” etc. etc. zzzzz. (That’s another great sentence, incidentally: “Harper’s obedient MPs … do as they’re told.” You don’t say.) It’s nothing Mallick hasn’t said before two dozen times in the Toronto Star, only it’s aimed at an intellectual American audience in what we used to think was a serious magazine — and with a helpful through-line comparison to Richard Nixon to help the Yankee audience along.