Don’t act surprised

To realists — not cynics, realists — the likeliest outcome of the Liberals’ electoral reform consultations was always obvious: a lack of electoral reform.

The precedent for holding a referendum was too strong; the arguments against holding one were too laughably weak (it’ ll be like Brexit! Somehow!); the potential for blowback from a population that is mostly OK with the status quo was too intense; and the explicit promise to “ensur(e) that 2015 will be the last federal election held under (first past the post)” was far too odd to take seriously. We were supposed to believe a party that had thrived for 140 years under FPTP had suddenly concluded it was the worst system imaginable, but held no particular opinions on the myriad possible replacement systems, and that it was mere coincidence all this vagueness might attract proportional representation supporters who would otherwise vote NDP?

Please. There’s giving people the benefit of the doubt, and then there’s being a chump.

Still, if the Liberals’ escape strategy proceeds as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau suggested it might this week, it will be pretty special to watch. Any change will require lots of support, Trudeau told Le Devoir; the bigger the change, the more support. “What’s a big change? What’s a small change?” he asked, rhetoric- ally. “All these questions are why we must have rigorous conversations with intelligent Canadians.”

Okey dokey. But what of the promise? Well, Trudeau had an answer for that.

“Under Stephen Harper, there were so many people fied with and the motivation to change the electoral system is less compelling.”

Talk about projection. It wasn’t “people” who promised an end to FPTP. The votes-to-seats ratio of the current government is almost exactly what it was for the previous one. If scads of people were outraged then but sanguine now, that’s depressing. But I don’t see any evidence it’s true, and it’s a