Obama vs. Romney: Stephen Harper’s Choice

The American presidential election will hold our attention late into Tuesday night. One person who will surely be watching the results roll in with interest is Stephen Harper. Obviously, the prime minister cannot reveal his preferences, but who would he really want to see win the election?

The answer is quite simple. Conservative both socially and fiscally, Stephen Harper has encouraged, slowly but surely, the Canadian image to lean to the right. Therefore, we could expect him to hope for a victory by Mitt Romney, whose conservative policies almost make Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush look like lefties. Why not? It would seem natural for the leader of the Conservative Party to celebrate the idea of a right-wing win.

When it comes to foreign policy, it is easy to imagine how the prime minister could work peacefully and cooperatively with Mitt Romney, especially in the Middle East — Harper’s Conservatives have become allies with Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli right, just as Mitt Romney has. Finally, we cannot ignore the case of the Keystone XL pipeline. President Obama suspended the project while waiting for the results of environmental assessments, but from his first day on the campaign trail, Romney never hid his intention to give the project a green light.

In spite of all this, there are four good reasons why Stephen Harper could secretly rejoice at the re-election of the man whom the American right has sworn to chase out of office at whatever cost.

Firstly, the Democrats have a tendency to adopt macroeconomic politics that emphasize expanding demand, which can only benefit Canadian exporters and workers, as I have noted in a recent study. It seems obvious to me that Stephen Harper is not at all interested in suffering the effects of American austerity policies between now and the October 2015 election. The Republicans often adopt expansionist policies, but they have a tendency to do so to influence the cash flow of the election year. From Harper’s point of view, it is too late.

Given how slim his majority is — and that it could easily fall if the Ontarian economy suffers the consequences of a decline of internal demand in the United States — it would be surprising if Stephen Harper could accurately predict the consequences of massive cuts in government spending that feature in Romney and Ryan’s economic plan. In addition, the prime minister is a practical man; I would be surprised if he put faith in Republican claims that their fiscal plan will lead to a balanced budget in upcoming years. After all, as was said in the Economist, “Mr. Romney has an economic plan that works only if you don’t believe most of what he says.”

Secondly, the Canadian right’s main resentment against Barack Obama, his decision regarding the Keystone XL pipeline, is not very deeply entrenched. Sure, the president refused to alienate the left by opening the door to the project too quickly despite enormous environmental consequences. In the long term, though, the power of interest groups that support the project and the dire strategic consequences of letting the resource be handed to China means that the president’s resistance will probably only be temporary. Despite candidate Romney’s inflammatory rhetoric on the subject, he is far from certain that, as president, he could eliminate all legal and political obstacles that currently delay the project more quickly than Barack Obama could. Anyway, it is not like Mr. Harper risks losing or gaining many seats in Alberta in 2015.

The third reason is tied to Stephen Harper’s continentalist aims. By working with an American president who has received tremendous Canadian popular support over the last four years, Harper has been able to progress with his plan for solid integration with the United States with minimal local resistance. In fact, certain political acts could be perceived as friendly collaboration if initiated by Obama while being interpreted as a hostile attempt at control if initiated by Mitt Romney.

The fourth reason that would cause Stephen Harper to celebrate an Obama victory is, in my opinion, the most important. Politically, the abrupt shift to the right that would result from a Republican victory would not necessarily be advantageous for Prime Minister Harper and his party.

Stephen Harper knows very well that a good part of his voters do not agree with the extreme conservative ideas that currently prevail within the Republican party, which has, in recent years, veered toward a retrograde social conservatism, radical individualism and an increasingly unequal vision of capitalism. A Republican victory tomorrow would encourage the right wing of the Conservative Party to push for an even more pronounced shift toward the right in Canada — but surely the prime minister in Canada knows that this kind of pressure would cost him votes in urban areas of English Canada and, particularly, in Québec.

When he watches the results unfold Tuesday night, the right-wing ideological side of Stephen Harper would probably applaud the success of Romney’s party. However, there is another side of Stephen Harper — the pragmatic politician, who managed to maintain power through finesse and prudence, and thereby allowed his ideological convictions to make considerable progress. It is this pragmatic politician who will find good reason to celebrate the re-election of Barack Obama.