Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his government are known to be calculated tacticians. They do not go charging down any blind alleys and they leave nothing to chance. So there's no question they are aware of who wins and who loses when they introduce a bill that would prohibit Elections Canada from taking on any initiative that encourages voter turnout.
That's just what they did this week when they introduced the ironically titled Fair Elections Act.
The data is pretty consistent. Voter turnout is getting lower and lower, and the young, the struggling poor and otherwise disenfranchised - people not part of the Conservative base - have the lowest turnout numbers of all.
Those same groups are targeted by more stringent rules on presenting ID when you show up to the polls. The same voter disenfranchisement method is currently popular in southern United States.
The bill also ups the amount allowed for personal campaign donations and takes the power away from Elections Canada to investigate and prosecute cases of wrongdoing.
This is the same party whose MPs have been booted from caucus for breaking election finance rules and whose operatives stand accused of using robocalls to deliberately mislead voters away from the polls.
The Tories are usually quick to invoke Canada's veterans and those that sacrificed their lives in the First and Second World War so we could have the right to vote. That makes it particularly offensive that the same party would use its power in government to discourage Canadians from exercising that right for their own self-serving goals.
