Gerry Flahive is a writer based in Toronto. @gflahive
"I don't speculate, and I particularly don't speculate on my own actions," Prime Minister Stephen Harper told Bloomberg in an interview Wednesday. "Obviously, there is an important decision coming up for Canadians October 19."
Life is full of challenges. But life can be pretty complicated when you don't know what you are going to do next. You might be saying to yourself: Am I going to find another sunken 19th-century shipwreck tonight? Am I going to spontaneously unbutton my suit jacket? Am I going to write unsolicited lyrics for the Guns N' Roses song Sweet Child O' Mine?
Deciding to call a federal election is a pretty big responsibility, and even if the date of that election has been set in stone for quite some time, it's the calling of the election that Canadians really care about. Canadians want to know that their leader can call an election really, really well. Like in an emergency. Or, alternatively, in a non-emergency.
But what if you don't know when you are going to call an election? How can Canadians then know that you know that they know that you don't know when the next election is going to be? It's so hard to know these things.
So, if you are the Prime Minister, here are some of the early warning signs that you might be about to call an election:
- irritability, often experienced for years or decades prior to dropping the writ;
- you really like using the word ‘writ’;
- stiffness in your general demeanour;
- persistent and unexplainable rash promises;
- impatience with the democratic process;
- loss of the ability to define a recession;
- a powerful need to tour factories;
- the distinct taste of victory, and barbecued hamburgers, in your mouth;
- an urge to gerrymander;
- frequent signs – i.e.. there are a lot of Economic Action Plan signs;
- cold stares;
- you repeatedly work late into the night in your office, alone, except for a camera crew;
- you have expressed a desire to debate other party leaders only in a subterranean cavern, from which no television signals can escape;
- you frequently imitate the sound that a paper shredder makes, then glance at your staff;
- your only way of dealing with a chill is to wrap yourself in the Canadian flag;
- self-denial of your ability to appoint senators;
- you are drawn to photographic opportunities;
- you keep slowly cruising past the Governor-General’s residence on your Segway, “just checking that he’s okay”;
- the repeated wearing of cowboy hats;
- your interest in Canada’s forests has recently been reduced to their utility as a source of wood for election lawn signs;
- you feel the need to have something to do until the NHL season starts;
- resistance to change, especially climate change;
- you never have interprovincial relations any more;
- you insist that your security code name be Xenedict Xumberbatch;
- your clothes don’t fit the way they used to not fit;
- a heartbreaking nostalgia for proroguing;
- the repeating of the same words over and over and over and over and over again;
- a loss of front-benchers;
- some people say you are so unilateral;
- an increasing appetite for small talk – and for barbecued hamburgers;
- rolling of the eyes;
- nightly robocalls;
- an uncontrollable contempt for lustrous, wavy hair;
- a recurring nightmare in which Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator travels from the future back in time to stop the Canadian census from being cancelled;
- you tend to push away those close to you – until you realize they are RCMP officers in your security detail;
- paralysis in some of your ridings;
- fear of beard.