October 2000
by Barry Stagg
Idolatry is the excessive worship of supreme things, Godlike or not. Hollow idols proliferate through literature and history as people worship images and ideas that promise much and deliver little or, worse yet, deliver evil in lieu of the expected good.
I have been browsing through a few books and articles lately that brought a focus upon the role worship of corporate organization has played in the stifling of Newfoundland progress. For instance, John Crosbie's piece in the Globe on September 1 called for a battlefield repulsion of the Canadian Alliance Party by loyal Tories, all in the name of preserving the name and political bloodline of a party that now represents out-Liberaling the Liberals as its only claim to legitimacy. Corporate loyalty or brand name loyalty are sailed forth by Mr. Crosbie in the face of the obvious need to merge these two factions of the Tory tradition.
The week before, the Globe's Report On Business had chronicled the frustrations of Argentia people trying to plan for an economic boom that never came because of the heavy handed statist- corporate fighting over Voisey's Bay. Back-stabbing and rank greed were familiar themes but Premier Tobin's glib quip about dealing daily with companies that could buy or sell Inco in the blink of a corporate eyelash smacked of establishment smugness. Tobin in the company of great corporate power seemed to be the end for this premier, an end and an achievement disassociated from the agony and disruption of mere Argentia livyers.
As background to these current pieces was the 1999 book 'The Big Score', by Jacquie McNish, telling of the mega-millions made, if not earned, by Robert Friedland and his assorted Diamond Fields cohorts in the sale of the Voisey's Bay nickel deposits to Inco. They made money out of a speculative frenzy and still remain the only ones to have profited significantly from this great reserve of minerals. It is as if the whole serious process of finding and developing Newfoundland's wealth is reduced to a cursed and immensely rich bingo game for foreign gamblers.
Finally there was a look at Michael Harris' book 'Lament For An Ocean' about the grisly destruction of the Newfoundland fishery. Smug state and corporate management put boardroom wealth and paper thin efficiencies ahead of common sense or even self-preservation.
With the word 'self-preservation', it hit me that really the preservation of self is confined in these high social altitudes to the advancement of government and business managers, both in and out of political office, coupled in an unholy union with big money gamblers. In short, people, and more precisely, citizens of Newfoundland mattered not a darn when the decisions were worked out to promote the paper and bank account success of the relevant gentry. As long as big government ( Tobin and fellow travellers) were able to deal with big business ( FPI, National Sea and assorted European entities ) and with big time bingo players ( Friedland and the like) then the actual mass of people and resources could and were ignored, to either perish in the case of codfish or languish in the frozen ground as regards Voisey's Bay nickel.
Brian Tobin and John Crosbie are simply sitting at the same table these days, literally and figuratively. The establishment call to man the barricades to preserve an elitist status quo is not hitting a chord with the regular folk. That is why the Canadian Alliance is attracting the independent voter. That party is a vessel for promotion of old-fashioned and desirable self- reliance and freedom from government's warm wet paw. Offering chilling ghost stories about intolerance will not deter the ordinary person from looking favourably upon a political party that advocates that government get out of the way when it is not needed or wanted. What is that old tale, from a venerable book, about chasing the money-changers out of the temple?
Worshipping the false god of government nannying, whether whelped by Tobin or Crosbie, is no longer accepted. It is time that the two wings of the Tory party stopped grousing and unite for the good of politics and the citizens of a nannyed-out country. The disagreements between John Crosbie and Stockwell Day are the sorts of things worked out in conventions and caucus meetings like Mr. Crosbie did in reconciling with Brian Mulroney after losing the 1983 Conservative leadership race. The point of poltical fratricide in the face of complacent and easily identified Liberal arrogance is lost on me.