Buzz bomb

To judge by the online coverage, the media appear to believe the "gaffe" in Buzz Hargrove's bizarre tirade today lay in calling Stephen Harper a "separatist." Uh, no. Calling him a separatist may be a ridiculous charge, but it still gets the slander out there, prints it on the public mind, even if you have to retract it later. Paul Martin, as a bonus, gets to "distance" himself from the quote, thus looking statesmanlike and fair-minded (at least by comparison), especially when he says he's never questioned Harper's patriotism, though of course he has. The story today was: a) Hargrove urging Quebecers to vote for the Bloc, a longstanding position which he conspicuously did not include in his semi-retraction, and b) playing the Alberta card, suggesting that Harper, having grown up in being from Alberta, had been imbued with values that were alien to the rest of the country. (There's also the business of calling the National Citizens Coalition a "secret society," which understandably has the NCC in a lather but is frankly just too bananas to treat seriously.) And the other story is that Martin apparently stood by as he did so, and according to some accounts (I have not been able to verify, since no one seems to have the video) applauded. And his disavowal? "I've always said voting for the Bloc will not stop Stephen Harper." That's it. Not: "Voting for the Bloc is voting against Canada, and anyone who would suggest that Quebecers should vote for the Bloc has no place on my team, or in any national party." Not a forceful denunciation of Hargrove's "strategy" in principle. Just an opinion on its efficacy. AFTERTHOUGHT: Or here's a phrase: To urge people to vote for a separatist party, to put narrow partisan concerns ahead of the unity of the country, is "beyond the bounds of reasonable discourse."