Posted on 12/18/2011 8:14:58 AM PST by Clive
Canadas Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his British counterpart David Cameron both stood up for their respective national interests last week and stared down a host of unelected (and unaccountable) bureaucratic rule makers.
In doing so, they confirmed their position in the vanguard of conservative political leadership slowly gathering momentum in the anglophone world. How did they do this? They just said no.
In Harpers case, it was the rent seekers and incorrigible do-gooders behind the Kyoto protocols who were given their comeuppance.
Canadas Environment Minister Peter Kent told Kyoto cheerleaders in Durban that Canada is counting itself out of any further engagement with the flawed treaty.
Kent had long argued that this country would not enter any new agreement until it included binding commitments for all of the worlds largest greenhouse-gas emitters. He specifically called on China and India to agree to cuts. They wouldnt, so Canada walked.
Kyoto was plainly all pomp and no circumstance, an elaborate travelling global talk shop delivering nothing but hot air. Ironic, given its grand pretensions to reduce more of the same for the planet.
While Canada was saying goodbye to Kyoto, Cameron was saying goodbye to closer monetary ties between Great Britain and Europe. It was a popular move with voters.
His rejection of a new European Union treaty saw polls surge in Conservative Party support.
Around 70% of British voters want a referendum on Europe. Half want to leave the EU and mendicant nations like Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain altogether.
Euroskepticism has gone mainstream by the simple expedient of the PM saying no.
Both leaders are playing to the perceived strengths of conservatism. Fiscal management and a retreat from the tax-and-spend mantra so popular with left and centre-left governments are crucial to their ideological makeup.
Harper and Cameron also give the clear impression that the primacy of national sovereignty is something they both heed strongly in their dealings on the international stage.
Neither see progress in the politics of symbolism, be it a dubious climate agreement or monetary union with a host of failing European states.
At the other end of the world are two other leaders of a similar bent, each as committed as the other to advancing the cause of conservative government.
In Australia, the current opposition leader is Tony Abbott. a Rhodes scholar, Oxford Blue in boxing and rugby aficionado (he played competitive rugby every Saturday afternoon in his home town of Sydney until well into his 30s), Abbott is famous for calling anthropogenic climate change b-------.
His conservative Liberal/National coalition holds a clear 10-point lead in voter preference over the stumbling Labor government of PM Julia Gillard.
Abbott, a published author, is keen to engage in the contest of ideas both on the floor of parliament and the wider community.
He is no careerist politician. After leaving his Oxford studies, Abbott entered a Catholic seminary. Deciding against taking Holy Orders, he then embarked on a career in journalism before choosing politics.
If Abbott needs any encouragement in his quest for the prime ministership, he only has to look across the Tasman Sea at New Zealand PM John Key and his centre-right National Party.
Key is a former merchant banker who last month won a sweeping second election victory. This came after a devastating mine disaster and Christchurch earthquake during his first three-year term, events that would test the resolve of any leader. Instead they defined him.
Clearly, New Zealand voters liked what they saw in Keys conservative leadership, a trait they seem to share with growing numbers of voters right across the English speaking world.
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UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. We’re next.
I would rather die. Thats not entirely true. I would rather they die.
You have a problem with conservative governments?
Perhaps, you are on the wrong website ....
Here’s hoping they say no to the stupid incandescent light bulb ban.
What conservative government??? Like the one we have now???
Otherwise,don’t follow you that I may be on the wrong website?
Please,except my apologies mistake mispost.
SOUNDS GREAT.
More power to em and us. May God protect and bless their efforts and persons, houses and property.
Somehow I suspect the oligarchy will find a number of ways to neutralize such efforts with great prejudice.
Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his British counterpart David Cameron both stood up for their respective national interests last week and stared down a host of unelected (and unaccountable) bureaucratic rule makers. In doing so, they confirmed their position in the vanguard of conservative political leadership slowly gathering momentum in the anglophone world. How did they do this? They just said "no." In Harper's case, it was the rent seekers and incorrigible do-gooders behind the Kyoto protocols who were given their comeuppance.
Thanks for the ping! I would love to see Abbott become PM. And as far as Obama... Dear Lord please forgive us and help us change our leadership to protect Israel, in Jesus’ Name, Amen!
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