OTTAWA (CP) - It's already proven a pivotal Conservative campaign moment: Stephen Harper behind the cash register at an electronics outlet in the heart of suburban Ontario, promising to trim the GST by nearly 30 per cent.
In a province known for being both tactically vital and politically fickle, it might have touched off a strong shiver of deja vu.
It's only been 10 years since another frank-talking, where-did-this-guy-come-from Conservative leader, Mike Harris, seduced Ontario's middle-class suburbs with simple, direct pledges to cut taxes by 30 per cent, shrink spending and tackle welfare fraud.
The Common Sense Revolution platform, a neo-con manifesto that resonated with voters, plucked the Tories from the political wilderness and ushered in an era of social upheaval that left an indelible impact on Ontario's political landscape.
So, as the federal Conservatives chip away at Ontario's reluctance to embrace Harper in their current election campaign, it stands to reason that their tactics - simple, consumer-friendly visuals and cash-on-the-barrelhead promises like cutting the GST - would at least pay homage to Harris.
"It's a simple promise that's easy to explain, and the other similarity is that some people are skeptical about it," said Tony Clement, a longtime veteran of the Ontario legislature and one of the early architects of the so-called CSR.
Voters in Ontario had an appetite for change in 1995, fuelled by nearly five years of recession and a spendthrift New Democrat government, but they had their doubts about an upstart Tory campaign that sounded too good to be true.
"They were skeptical about our tax cuts in 1995, before we actually did them," said Clement, a former contender for the Conservative leadership who's running under the Tory banner in the cottage-country riding of Parry Sound-Muskoka.
"Once we get into power (and) if we actually follow through with the GST cut, then it could snowball in terms of popularity for the governing Conservatives: 'Holy cow, they actually did it, they did cut the GST."'
Other Harper promises, such as a $1,200 annual child-care allowance and a tax break on youth sports fees worth $80 a year per child, borrow the tried-true Harris tactic of putting money in the pockets of the typical middle-class suburban family.
"In essence, the child-care plan and the youth sports plan, they're all the same thing, which is basically just relieving tax on Canadians," said Paul Nesbitt-Larking, a politics professor at Huron University College in London, Ont.
"The packaging of them has been done in such a way as to appeal to young people with families, people with teenage children and so on."
Tory insiders promise more Ontario-friendly federal policy pledges in the new year, including a "crime and justice" measure - always a popular wedge issue with the Harris Conservatives - that they hope will resonate the way Harris's welfare-fraud crackdown did in 1995.
Home to 106 of Parliament's 308 seats, Harper desperately needs to punch Ontario's dance card in the Jan. 23 vote. Problem is, the province has proven a cruel mistress for the Conservatives, delivering only 24 seats in 2004 to the Liberals' 75.
Harper needs at least 10 or 15 more to have a chance of forming a government after the Jan. 23 federal vote, Nesbitt-Larking said. Many of those may come from southwestern Ontario's farm ridings, as well as the vote-rich suburbs of the so-called 905 belt that rings Toronto.
Clement said he believes voters are less apprehensive about Harper than they were during last year's federal election campaign.
"There's a comfort level there that wasn't there before."
Still, while Ontario voters may be hungry for change, they're not starving for tax relief and economic growth they way they were in 1995, said Decima Research pollster Bruce Anderson.
What's more, tax relief is less important to Ontario's coveted urban female voter, who still doesn't see Harper as particularly appetizing, Anderson said.
"They're probably the last group in Ontario society that will lose that sense of stigma around the Harris agenda, because their preoccupation is more likely to be with what were the impacts on health, education and other social services."
Indeed, conjuring memories of Harris is a risky proposition in Ontario, which was polarized by his plan to slash welfare rolls, cut civil service jobs and impose dramatic changes in education that touched off massive labour unrest.
After Harris was re-elected in 1999, the tainted-water crisis the following spring in Walkerton, Ont., killed seven people and sickened thousands more, becoming a touchstone for critics who blamed it on Tory spending cuts.
There are already signs the Liberals plan to draw parallels between Harris and Harper: campaign "issue cards" have been made available to candidates that warn voters about the "damage Mike Harris did to Ontario."
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Politic...1368931-cp.html Well there you go, the cons are already giving waffling over whether or not they will cut the GST.
If they think that using a campaign which pays homage to Mike Harrass is going to get them any votes here in Ontario, they're sadly mistaken.
I hope they keep it up though, it'll only make their inevitable defeat that much sweeter.
Clement had his ass handed to him when he ran in the Brampton area last time around so I guess that's why he's running in Parry Sound this time.
You have to love the age of information eh? 
CKA Uber 
Who's next? I bet blogs all over are getting deleted right about now. Maybe we will even see some bad con one's. 
