Smells Like Team Spirit

ORIGINALLY POSTED Saturday, December 9, 2006

It seems like a good time to talk about concepts we heard repeated during the election. They are fresh in our minds and there never was enough time in any of the venues to debate ideas. Even the mayoralty candidates, who had more time than all others put together, didn't deal much with ideas. Tim Jones did but he had no takers.

The value of team spirit and co-operation was floated as a virtuous aspiration. I don't buy that.

Well, think about it.

Consider the structure of an NHL team: captain, coach, players, owners, game officials and fans. The goal--pardon the pun, is to win and create wealth for everyone connected with the team. One cannot live in Canada without having an awareness for what it takes to win in hockey.

Discipline is huge. Every player knowing and doing what he does best. Knowing what his opposite number does best. Doing his best to foil the other fellow's best. Everyone doing their best to get the puck into the other team's net pow pow pow! The optimum best in this context does not equate with nice, polite, kind, fair or scrupulous adherence to the rules.

What? Are you kidding me?

Every player knows he is only as good as his last game. Any time fan/coach/owner satisfaction falls, there is the chance of a trade....and off he flies into netherland.

Now we have established similarities between a blood sport and politics. It is clear they have little to do with any concept of virtue as espoused by candidates touting the value of "team spirit" without having a full understanding of how it plays in the political arena.

Unlike hockey, politics is a game without any written rules.

There are no manuals for newly elected councillors. Skill is acquired through practice on the ice. Principles are not necessarily shared. Even procedural rules are not always observed. When the campaign ends, the work of council is supposed to begin. It doesn't always. Sometimes the campaign never ends and the town's business is completely subjugated .

The common principle the community is entitled to expect is that every member intends to do what each believes to be in the community's best interest. That does not imply a shared vision .

Therein lies the kernel of democracy. The point of an election. The difference between a team and a council.

When every councillor's views have been expressed and hopefully heard respectfully when each debate ends when the vote is taken, the only remaining criteria is that the majority rules.

There is no team, no captain, no coach, no owners, no referees, no penalties, no game forfeits.

There are no winners when the game is played in bad faith.

Politics are frequently cloaked in layers of unctuous righteousness. But "All the perfumes of Arabia" are not enough to make it smell like team spirit.