Who needs parliament when you have Davos?

Mr. Harper no longer needs parliament to make grand-standing, vaguely unsettling political statements anymore. At a speech in Davos, Switzerland, he outlined his grand plan to transform Canada. Points on this plan are to aggressively pursue oil and gas exports to Asia, and to overhaul the pension system.

Mind you, it's early, and I haven't read through all of the talking points yet. And it's possible that anything this man could do would unsettle me. The press could announce that, say,  Stephen Harper has nipped out for a loaf of bread and some windex, and I'd find that A Reason To Be Worried.

Having admitted my prejudice here, I still find it oddly inappropriate the location he's chosen to announce it. You mean you couldn't unveil this before parliament, the institution that's supposed to represent us? Instead you're announcing it to a roomful of world leaders and powerful people, who probably don't give a toss, since it's Canada.

"I think he's saying something about Maple Syrup, maybe."

These are some sweeping changes he's mentioning, especially to those on the brink of retirement.  You think that the Canadian people should be addressed first.  I heard on the CBC this morning a reporter saying that the opposition was displeased by the venue he announced this at. One MP - can't remember the name, sorry - said that the proposed pension reform amounted to elder abuse. Since he's got this parliament in the bag, it's stopped being important to him at all - he has enough of a majority to rubber-stamp anything.

Don't despair, though. The conservatives still seem vulnerable to public pressure, if the Gay Marriage fiasco of two weeks ago proves anything. The problem is they now have parliament, and we can expect them to actually put these plans into practise. Which I think is a good Reason To Be Worried.