The race is on and already the Reform/Conservative (Ref/Con), are on the defensive. The "trickmaster" Harper is caught in his own web. He started the campaign by warning(fear-mongering), about a Liberal/NDP/ Bloc plot to form a coalition government....the Libs in bed with the "socialists" and "separatists, when he, himself in 2004 had signed a letter with the NDP's Layton and the Bloc's Duceppe and sent it to the then Gov.General Clarkson, proposing to form a coalition govt. Harper has used deception time and again in his five years as Prime Minister. He is very comfortable playing this game but now it has come back to bite him.
     Harper has been accused of being manipulative, secretive, autocratic, controlling and undemocratic. He tried to limit access to information and directed his MPs not to spesk to the media, unless it was approved by the PMO. He has refused to divulge important information to parliamentary committees and even refused to allow Ministers and MPs to appear before these committees. His government has been accused of contempt of parloiament and his government was deafeated on a motion of contempt, the first time in Canada's history. He and his Ref/Con ministers have tried to frustrate parliament, especially when questions of ethical behaviour were being investigated....raising money, election-rules violation, lying to parliament, influence-peddling etc.     
     Harper has started the campaign as the front-runner, 143 seats and leading in the first polls. He will want to be cautious and his first blunder has not helped. He will try to campaign in a bubble,, appearing at controlled settings/party events, but risks being portrayed as afraid of facing voters and reinforcing his image of being controlling having little to offer on such problems as unemployment, health and child care, seniors'benefits and pensions, the war in Afghanistan and Libya and the economy.
     Ignatieff has to take chances. He has to win more seats in Quiebec and the Toronto/ 905 area. He has to get rid of his image of being aloof, too academic....lots of babies and dogs /cats to kiss, more contact with the "great unwashed"( Bob Stanfield tried this in 1974, even having a beer with his daughter in a tavern, but it did not work) . He has so far failed to strike a chord with the voters. He has to sell his ideas, he has to make them resonate and it cannot be stilted or forced.
     Layton is not well and the campaign may take a toll. He has to pick up seats in B.C. Sasketchewan and Manitoba, hold on to those in Ontario and the one in Montreal. He will be caught in the middle between the Ref/Con and the Liberals as has happened before. He will target the Liberals, because they pose the biggest threat but he has to make a case against the government he helped defeat, especially out West/ BC and Ontario or he will have trouble holding on to his 36 seats.     
      Duceppe is off and running, accusing Harper of lying and of his refusal to fund a hockey arena in Quebec City. He has a very good chance of increasing his seats from 47 to at least 50. He is the most experieced campaigner...no more hair-nets.
     We are in for some interesting times in the next 39 days. What will the voter turnout be? It has been dropping in recent years. It is too earl to predict, except that Harper is vulnerable....integrity, ethics, contempt, a government that did little except build prisons and trying to pas more punitive laws and got us in a another war. Let's see whether the other parties can energise the electorate. 

     He came into office, full of idealism and hope for a more peaceful and better world. He gave a rousing speech in Cairo, which the Muslim world took as a new day for American foreign policy. The hope and idealism have been relpaced by calculating and cynical decisions, no different from past prsidents. In the case of Bush, you can say that he was overwhelmed and out of depth, putty in the hands of Chaney and Rumsfeld, with the unctuous Blair whispering in his ears. Obama voted against the Iraq war and campaigned for change...respect for international law and no nation-building. How things have changed.
     Truth is elastic in diplomact/politics,and it has been stretched and convoluted to suit policy. Sometimes,however you can be caught in the web you spin, as Obama was, when he said in Chile that the UN res.1973 will be respected i.e. it does nat call for the removal of Gadhafi, but, in the next breath he revealed his true position, "Gadhafi must go".
     What is happening in Libya is a travesty. Yes, Gadhafi is a brutal autocrat, and so he is targeted. Will Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Bahrain, and others be similiarly treated. No, No,.....Saudi Arabia will keep the pumping, Yemen is an ally fighting al Qaeda and Bahrain is the base for the US Fifth Fleet. They can help each other kill and repress their citizens ( Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar have sent troops to help the ruler of Bahrain). No democracy for them, because they jeopardise American interests. What hypocrisy. But let's not be naive. This how things are done...Countries do not have freinds, they only have interests. 
     So what now? Libya will be a problem for years (the "no-fly zone in Iraq lasted for 12 years). It will be split between the East/Benghazi ad the West/Tripoli and the civil war will allow al Qaeda to be more firmly implanted in the East, where it gas been a presence for a while. Yemen already is a "failed state" with wars in the North and the South and a strong al qaeda presence . The Shia populations  in all these places will more and more turn to Iran. Saudi Arabia will continue to pump oil and export Wahabism. In the end Iran will emerge as the only winner, if it can be called that
     Obama will more and more do wht is necessary ti win the next election. More drone attacks in Pakistan/Afghanistan. More willingness to use the military option and more "soothing" rhetoric about "hope and change". To quote Zeno of Elea..."Politicians are niot born, they are excreted"    
          

     Demonatrate in Libya and you get comfort and suport from theWest. Do the same in Bahrain and you get invaded by the Saudis and the West "complains" while people are beaten, gassed, denied hospital treatment and killed. Libya has Ghadafi and oil, Bahrain is the Central Command of the American Fifth Fleet, and  a Sunni "royal" family ruling a Shia majority. , repressed, exploited  and dicriminated against. In comes the Sunni/ Wahabi Saudis, builders of mosques and madrassahs, exporter of oil and religious extremism, but close friend and ally of the USA and the West. They "fear" Persian/ Shia Iran,  the supporter of Hizballah and Hamas and sworn enemy of Israel. Thus, they intervene in the internl affairs of another country, albeit a neighbor to stop the aspirations of the Shias, all under the guise stopping the "Iranian threat".
   
    The "no-fly zone" and the taking "of all necessary measures"against Libya,, while the Saudis are "tut-tutted" is not only duplicitous but dangerous. It sends a contradictory and confusing message to the people who dream of throwing off the shackles of the autocrats, from the Saudi to the Bahrani, to the Jordanian, to the Kuwaiti and other ruling families. The hatred will deepen, the frustrations will grow and the recruiters of al Qaeda and other extremist groups will have many volunteers.
     The ignorance and the arrogance of th West, their self-interested and misguided mnd-set , will set back the development of democracy, drive away/discourage the moderates and embolden the autocrats and the religious fanatics. There will be a heavy priceto pay for "our" inconsitency and duplicity.     

     Japan will rise from the earthquake/tsunami/ nuclear disasters. It will take some time and a lot of money, but the strength/resilience of the Japanese people will prevail in the long run. They did it before. Devastated by the second world war and two atomic(erican)
 ombs that laid waste to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they rallied and rebuilt and became an economic superpower. 
     Surviving and progressing is endemic/ingrained in them. They have already started, with the infusion of over $220 billion. They will also receive help in all forms from the wider world, because failure is not an option. 
     The rebuilding will be long and hard, but we are dealing with a people that are very literate, hardworking and culturally strong.
     They were prepared for the earthquake, but the tsunami was the killer. The nuclear problem will also send a message to the rest of the world that there are great risks involved in the building and use of nuclear power. Lessons can be learnt and the best minds will be put to work to make improvements....there will not be total safety, but as was the case after Three Mile Island ans Chernobyl better and more protected plants can be built. Older plants will have to be closed or refurbished, but there is no going back. Too many countries.... USA (20%), Germany, France among them, are too heavily reliant on them for their energy.
      
   
    

     People are easily bored/distracted. Too many bullet-riddled buildings and bomb-blasted sand dunes and we want new distractions, and so while the fighting and dying goes on in Libya, we are more enthused/enthralled with the horrors in Japan, brought on by the huge earthquake and the devastating tsunami. Now with the threat of a nuclear reactor meltdopwn, the media,( especially the 24 hours cable news) are hyperventilating, trying to "feed" us the rolling cars and boats, the crushed buildings, the fast-moving/ unrelentingly destructive wall of water and from time to time some heroic incidents.
     There is a lesson to be learnt here, if you are a long-serving autocrat, faced with a revolt. Wait, play for time , call out your security/armed forces and pulverize the "rebels", while the rest of the world wring its hands in despair, caught between their vaunted democratic values and their connections ( past and present), to these same autocrats. Listen to their confused ramblings, watch them race each other to condemn and fulminate and then watch the hopelessness creep into the heroic people who dared to dream of a better day, who took up arms to usher in those better days and who hoped and prayed that their pleas for help will be answered by those who encouraged them and who boasted about the great promise that is "democracy". Watch their hopes die and watch them, as they turn away and embrace their only comfort, their religion.
     We will rue these lost opportunities and we will be punished. Once again the feckless politicians have been true to their nature and we are the worse for it.   

     It is very hard to break a long and bad habit, stuck with a mind-set, mired in contradictions. Supporting tyrants and their coterie, for oil and "security", but mouthing platitudes about democracy and human rights. It is a new world, peopled by the young and the informed, educated, connected and aware, with memories of the past dealings between their corrupt and autocratic governments, financed and propped up by the USA and the West , who also championed, financed, protected, armed and defended the Israelis against the displaced, savaged and desperate Palestinians and also waged war against the Arab/Muslims.
     Prestige and influence have been lost and the USA and the West are irrelevant, drifting and clueless. Speaking for democracy and human rights in Libya but not Bahrain (home ofthe Fifth Fleet), hesitant in the case of Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria, confused about Yemen( with which it has an alliance to fight al Qaeda), fearful of angering the Saudis with their oil abundance, but quite adamant about Iran.
     Coherence and consistency are replaced by confusion and flip-flops, and it all becomes meaningless. In the meantime history marches on in the Middle East. From Algeria to Libya to Yemen, a people's revolution inflames, and they want no outside help, other than humanitarian aid and the evacuation of foreigners. It is their revolution and they do not want it to be contaminated, do not want to be beholden to the "corrupt and rapacious West".
     Israel shudders and China  (with no history in the area) awaits. It will be the biggest winner.     

     Tens of thousands of migrant workers , forgotten by USA, Europe who are more interested in saber-rattling, are the real casualties of the turmoil in Libya and eleswhere. Desperate, hungry and poor, they clamour for assistance, but other than non-governmental agencies are left to fend for themselves.
     This is a disgrace, Enough of the "war talk", and instead send help to these forlorn and helpless. They mostly come from poorer countries who do not have the means to re-settle them. Also, these countries will suffer economically, now that these migrants will not be able to send money home, which has been a boon to their families and their countries.
     USA, Britain, Canada and the other countries who are so quick to send warships, chockful of weapons, should instaed send humanitarian "ships" full of food, water and medicine, but that is so unglamourous. Tough talk ( Cameron in his "Thatcher/ Argentina-like"moment sees votes) Hil/Bama are in a quandary (they fear that the Republicans will see them as weak...not good for votes), Merkel has to deflect from her "plagiarised Defence minister" and the shellacking from the last regional voting and the very unpopular Sarkozy is all "shook up" from the 5 million North Africans in his "quartiers". War for these inept and fading "leaders" is the remedy....."Create external dangers......as Arsitotle advised, and the people will rally around you, and forget the dire problems at home. Temporary relief but no solutions.
     

     Gadhafi has run the gamut of relationship....enemy, terrorist funder, friend and back to enemy......
     Condi Rice went to Libya to welcome him back. Blair followed suit for oil$$$, the British Gov't freed convicted terrorist to curry favor, Hillary met his son, Europe filled his coffers with petro dollars and Berlusconi was an avid suitor. Now he is the plague. 
    Contradiction has become policy and there is war in the air. The USA cannot afford another war. It has already lost in Iraq....all it got for its tens of billions and thousands of lives is an Iraq in turmoil. Europe bombed Serbia and got tens of thousands of refugees clamoring to get in and unleashed "white-slavery" and international criminals. It also gets most of its oil from Libya. Now Russia will be their supplier and they will have to cosy up to Putin. China will be given a free pass when it clamps down, because of its veto in the Security Council. Iran will be condemned but it will ring hollow, because a blind eye will be turned on Saudi Arabia, because it will pump more oil  and the Generals in Burma and Mugabe wiil sail along merrily with their repressions. " Oh what a web we weave........"