There is no individualist "I" in team, specially sports teams. Its a, 'gasp', collective effort. No one 'star' can win the game, unless it's tennis. Suddenly Harper has mellowed, he believes that the cooperation and collectivism of sports "builds character".
Gone is the rabid individualist ideology of the past. No longer the anti-state liberaltarian, he is calling for more money from the State to go to parents to pay for user fees; which is just another form of taxation. Tories promise tax credit for kids' sports fees
My how the New Harper has changed from the Old Harper.
On being ‘libertarian’
“But I'm very libertarian in the sense that I believe in small government and, as a general rule, I don't believe in imposing values upon people.” (National Post, March 6, 2004)
Gee and wouldn't character building and team work be considered 'values'?
Economic conservatism, Harper says during an interview in his Calgary office, is libertarian in nature, emphasizing markets and choice. Libertarian conservatives work to dismantle the remaining elements of the interventionist state and move towards “a market society for the 21st century.” (Toronto Star, April 6, 1997)
Paying for user fees is the state intervening in the marketplace isn't it?
Paying for user fees is the state intervening in the marketplace isn't it?
ReplyDeleteThat's absolutely correct. The following quote from the CATV piece seems particularly inconsistent.
"Government needs to give working families a break," Harper said at a hockey rink in Buckingham, Que. on Monday morning. "We need to help families so that cost is not a barrier to help keeping children active."
Apparently he doesn't feel those same working families "deserve a break" if they don't share his own seeming fondness for sports -- which doesn't seem like a particularly sincere or principled position at all.