Harsh Words

Canada just can’t compete when it comes to colourful politicians

Signy Holmes Staff

There’s something wrong with Canadian politics. It’s not the identity crisis, it’s not the allegations of government corruption — it’s something far, far worse.

The truth is that Canadian politics are boring. It lacks a certain je ne sais quoi, and there’s no getting around that fact. Even our scandals, plentiful as they may seem, are dull.

When Belinda Stronach crossed the floor and joined the Liberal party in 2005, Alberta Conservative MP Tony Abbott referred to the defection as “whor[ing] herself out for power,” and Ontario Conservative MP Bob Runciman did her the non-favour of calling her “a dipstick — an attractive one, but still a dipstick.”

These misogynistic insults came under fire from the media, and so did comments made later that year by Liberal MP Scott Reid, in which he criticized the Conservative party’s plan to directly provide families with $1,200 a year for child care. Reid was on CBC News: Sunday when he said that the government shouldn’t “give people 25 bucks a week to blow on beer and popcorn.”

These are only recent examples of the comments that can get MPs into serious trouble. But Canadians are still babes in the woods when it comes to the art of inappropriate comments and political insults. Politicians from around the world have said far worse — or done much better, depending on whether you find these comments offensive or entertaining.

Land down under

Take Australia. With such colourful terms as “budgie smugglers” (a men’s bathing suit) and “brown-eyed mullet” (a turd floating in the ocean, believe it or not) in their vocabulary, we shouldn’t be surprised if Australian politicians sometimes express themselves a little more colourfully than we’re used to here in the Great White North.

Although there are differences, the Australian government is run in a manner similar to the Canadian system. There is a Speaker, referred to as “Mr. Speaker,” naturally, who keeps order. The Members of Parliament are expected to refer to each other as “the leader of the Opposition,” or “the honourable member for Bennelong,” and interjections are frowned upon to keep things from getting too personal.

Or at least that’s the theory.

Despite the apparent similarities, certain Australians seem to have rather unique ideas when it comes to what’s appropriate under these guidelines — a point of view we “polite” Canadians might have difficulty understanding.

Former Australian prime minister Paul Keating, who brought his sharp tongue to Parliament in one capacity or another from 1969 until 1996, was infamous for his acidic commentary.

When referring to current Prime Minister John Howard, then the leader of the Opposition, Keating has pulled out such gems as “a dead carcass, swinging in the breeze,” and “the brain-damaged leader of the Opposition.”

Keating also managed to change the job description for the Speaker of the House from “august politician” to something more along the lines of “kindergarten teacher.” Not only was the Speaker required to chasten Keating and others on a regular basis, he had to deal with tattle-taling of the worst sort.

“Mr. Speaker,” Keating once implored, “can I have some protection from the clowns on the front bench?”

This was after Keating waved off Opposition doubts on the severity of the deficit with the officious remark, “Look, George, you have trouble balancing your own cheque book; don’t talk about the budget.”

You can almost see the pained wincing as their beloved Mr. Speaker pops another migraine pill.

Though at times rude, Keating had a way of getting a point across, as when he discussed the Opposition’s stance on the tax system. He eloquently criticized “coalition members who have always been cheats, cheats, cheats. They will always be cheats, cheats, cheats, and will always defend cheats, cheats, cheats.”

He had a point there, but he hid it well.

Tough but fair, Keating was always willing to hear the other side’s point of view. Even as treasurer in 1985, he was ready to respond, “Oh, don’t be so damned stupid. Of course it will work,” when questioned.

Other Keating gems, lovingly enshrined in Australia’s parliamentary transcripts, include “stuck pigs,” “intellectual hoboes,” ”scumbags,” “irrelevant, useless and immoral,” “motley, dishonest,” “mindless, useless, idealistic, unprincipled,” “gutless spiv,” “political carcass with a coat and tie on,” and his insistence that “the Opposition crowd could not raffle a chook in a pub.”

Not exactly something you’d yell across the street to your worst enemy or follow up with an “Oh . . . SNAP!” — after all, some of those aren’t even words. But once politics descends into petty squabbling, what’s left for the children to believe in?

In the Mother Country

Okay, so maybe we’re that idealistic here in Canada. We’ve had politicians put their foots in their mouths countless times — but when it comes to deliberate, glorious buffoonery of the sort that makes all the parliamentary groupies swoon and sigh “oh, he’s such a rebel,” few could deny that our country is lacking. We still giggle and point at Pierre Trudeau’s pirouette behind the Queen, and we practically went into a national seizure when he was accused of telling Conservative MP John Lundrigan to “fuck off.”

Of course, we couldn’t very well have a national uproar involving the word “fuck.” We Canadian-ed it down to “fuddle duddle.” Trudeau was grilled in a press conference over whether or not he moved his lips, and what he was thinking when he did so. The official Hansard transcript of that parliamentary session records his words as “fuddle duddle,” either because the reporter couldn’t hear what Trudeau said, or his sensibilities were so offended that he chose a more delicate term.

Oh, Canada

Well, to each their own. Australia may take a devil-may-care approach to politics, but we choose to model our government on that staunch noble prototype: England. With origins dating back to 1265, British politicians have a respect for the gravity of their very serious work. Maintaining a stiff upper lip at all times, they carry the weight of history on their responsible shoulders.

What’s that? Winston Churchill you say? Well, there might have been one or two little incidents. Blown way out of proportion. He was prime minister during the Second World War — job descriptions don’t come more serious than that.

Well, Churchill did have his serious side, but that’s not what we’re concerned with here. Where Keating lashed out, Churchill would set you up, then shoot for the kill. Take this lengthy assault from the House of Commons in 1931:

“I remember, when I was a child, being taken to the celebrated Barnum’s circus, which contained an exhibition of freaks and monstrosities, but the exhibit . . . I desired most to see was the one described as “The Boneless Wonder.” My parents judged that the spectacle would be too revolting and demoralising for my youthful eyes, and I have waited 50 years to see the boneless wonder sitting on the Treasury bench.”

Churchill was known for his quick comebacks and clever remarks. Two of the most famous comebacks of all time are attributed to him.

Lady Nancy Astor may have thought she was getting one over Churchill when she remarked, “Winston, if you were my husband, I’d poison your tea.” Churchill wasn’t having any of that, though, and fired back with, “Nancy, if you were my wife, I’d drink it.”

Elizabeth Braddock made a similar mistake when she told him he was drunk. We’ll never know if she recovered from being told “and you, madam, are ugly, but in the morning I shall be sober.”

Just a good ol’ boy

Now there’s the spunk we need to spice up the political scene. Just imagine if, during the most recent election campaign, Martin and Harper had engaged in an elaborate verbal battle where the terms “corporate trollop” and “American lap-monkey” were tossed around just a little more often, and Layton had challenged Duceppe to pistols at dawn. Could have done marvels for voter turnout.

Our neighbours down south had a little pistol incident in 1804, when the third vice-president of the United States shot and killed the nation’s first secretary of the treasury in a duel to the death. Oops.

Then, or so Canadian legend goes, there was the time U.S. president Lyndon Johnson grabbed our beloved little prime minister Lester Pearson by the collar, shook him and yelled, “Dammit, Les, you pissed on my rug!” after Pearson spoke in Philadelphia in support of a negotiated settlement to the Vietnam War.

We love that story, of course. Without any delightfully volatile politicians of our own, we have to live vicariously. This story gives us the advantage of being able to express outrage and indignation without all the awkward feelings of shame mixed with glee at having elected someone utterly mad into office.

As good as it gets

Well Canada, don’t despair. Maybe our politicians haven’t been very witty in their faux pas, maybe our scandals just aren’t as fun as they could be, and yes, maybe politics could use a little spicing up. But there are rays of hope sprinkled through Canada’s history.

After all, not every country’s leader has gone on record as saying fuddle duddle. Heck, prime minister Mackenzie King talked to the spirit of his dog. Odds are, there’s plenty of kookery and eccentricity lurking in those political minds of today, just waiting to be unleashed.

And with a new government, and some bad blood between it and the official Opposition, maybe things will finally come to a head and we’ll get some good old-fashioned fisticuffs in Parliament, just as it should be.

More likely, we’ll just carry on as we always have — a verbal slip-up here and there, quickly crushed by public outcry.