Scott Tribe points out at Blogs Canada E Group and his blog Scott DiaTribes that Harper used Canada Day to make partisan comments. From the Globe and Mail:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper told party-goers on Parliament Hill that Canada is once again a player on the world stage.

By contributing to the security of Afghanistan and Haiti, and by becoming an energy and resources superpower, he said Canada has resumed its role as a world leader.

Scott Tribe:

Excuse me, Mr. Harper, Canada was never “gone” to begin with, and did not just “get back” from anywhere, notwithstanding your attempts to make it sound like all of this coincided with your election victory last year. Furthermore, Canada was both in Afghanistan and Haiti long before you showed up on the scene, and definitely not under a Conservative Government.

I also caught that snide remark about the “energy and resources superpower”. That’s code word saying to the public “if you go green like those environmentalists and opposition politicians want you to, you lose our superpower capabilities that oil gives us”.

Normally on Canada Day, when a Prime Minister speaks, he gives a speech that is usually the one time in the year where partisanship and politicking aren’t present. But between all of the Conservative blue colours on the stage there this year, and this poorly disguised speech, the Prime Minister and the Conservatives and their strategists showed they couldn’t manage even that small effort.

Comments at both blogs are interesting. People did feel Harper was partisan, and some Canadian commenters expressed their embarrassment. I missed the speech I was out with friends the few clips I caught on TV such as Canada being ‘back’ were transparently wrong headed and, yes, partisan.