Robert Gilpin's apposite term, coined in the dark days of the 1980s [before government came to consume 50% of GDP....how dim, how bloody, how awful it must have been...], to describe the extension of State Power, or Statism, was 'Welfare Capitalism'. I like that term. It designates the marriage of socialist welfarism with tepid and state regulated capital formation, profits and investments, fettered trade and managed competition. Mr. Gilpin's Welfare Capitalism is of course market-managed Statism, in which centralized bureaucracies, unelected and unaccountable civil servants and public union workers, in concert with politicians manage the political-economy. It is no surprise that the vested interests which manage society have little in common with those citizens who are managed. Welfare Capitalism is a logical outcome of Statism and socialist philosophy. So too is its bankruptcy.

In the modern political-economy maybe 1/3 of voters are hardcore Marxists and Socialists. These include Green eco-intolerants, former Communists, true-believers in state-power, and the many millions who depend on the state for survival. In actual numbers, the percentage of voting Socialists has actually declined since 1945, a trend which is not widely reported or emphasized. Another 1/3 of voters are 'conservative' or roughly those people who believe in free-trade, market dynamics, the maintenance of high and moral culture, financial probity and thrift; and who might or might not be of the liberal persuasion 'socially'. These people might be irreligious or not of the belief that morality should be interjected into politics. A position I take. Given the left-wing orientation of the modern church, it is simply erroneous and petty-minded to label all church-goers as 'conservative'. Any independent poll of church goers will reveal more socialists and liberals than conservatives. The last 1/3 of voters are the undecided, or the 'they the politicians and parties, are all the same' crowd. It is usually this 1/3 who in the main decide most elections. And if a politician can bribe this group, he will win.

This is certainly true in the modern political-economy. Look at the hopey-dopey agent of change, that magnificent union-funded failure Obama. A raving Marxist who never held a job is designated a deity by the US media and pronounced the second Christ – even though most of his policies and politics have led to the bankruptcy of America [with the Statist GW Bush as a precedent, though I am told by Oprah and Friends that Statist George was a raving out of control libertarian-conservative-cowboy-Christian-dunce].  He did however bribe enough of the 'undecided' voters with his socialist policies to win the election.  Today of course, if you vote against socialism you are a [insert here foul name], anti-humanist, racist, GlobaloneyWarming denying, Mother-earth hating, Homophobic, Islamophobe. That is what passes for cultured and articulate debate from socialists and politicians today. So in the US and Canada the 'independent' or 'centrist' vote is right in the mid-way of Statism and socialism. Most people are not consciously Statists I think, but hopey-dopey, sister-souljah feel your pain socialism, wins elections and sways the too-busy voter. As George Jonas so rightly states, 'socialism wins elections'.

“The NDP may do abysmally in federal elections, but the NDP’s ideas flourish. Canada is governed from the middle, yes, but the middle is on the left. The politicians who form our next government will be statist — socialists in all but name — because there are no other kinds running. Our statists may vary in degree, but not in kind. Since the 1960s, classical liberals or conservatives either haven’t entered the arena or changed their policies afterwards. They wouldn’t have had a chance otherwise.

Here’s the irony, though: If socialists called themselves socialists, they wouldn’t stand a chance either. Canadians are funny that way. They’ll buy nothing but socialist policies and practices, but never from socialists. Calling things what they are isn’t politically polite in Canada.

In the tradition of Orwell’s Newspeak, in Canadian English the word “free” denotes a prohibition, as in “smoke-free environment.” Canadians call laws and institutions that deny people fundamental freedoms of conscience, expression, and association “human rights” laws and commissions. In this eccentric world, going to the polls is like skeet-shooting in a stiff breeze: A vote for Stephen is a vote for Michael.”

People might stop voting for the Statists and their policies if the country goes bankrupt. But maybe not. Harper is privately very conservative. But in a socialist country like Canada a conservative will find no more than 1/3 voting support. To govern from the middle, means governing like a Statist with all the mind-numbingly inane and illiterate rhetoric. It is clear that culture trumps all and when your cultural dynamic is a little to the right of Sweden, then election rhetoric, and post-election outcomes, including post-election higher spending programs, are rather predictable.