"Progressives" and the "civil society movement"?

It looks like Maude Barlow and friends are circling the wagons in advance of basically declaring war on the new Prime Minister. Her hit list is pretty lengthy:

Harper will not have an easy time of it now. His caucus includes former Mike Harris cabinet members Jim Flaherty and Tony Clement, architects of the infamously unpopular "Common Sense Revolution" who will want to replicate that draconian plan at the national level. It includes radical social conservatives such as Cheryl Gallant and evangelical conservatives such as David Sweet and Stockwell Day. Harper is in debt to social conservative and Christian groups who expect a free vote on abortion and same sex marriage. He is welcomed by the American right wing and the Bush Administration who anticipate a new and closer relationship and expect a reversal of Canada's position on Ballistic Missile Defence. He will face provinces who will not be happy to lose the billions promised for new day care spaces and a First Nations community unhappy with promises to break the accord on housing and education signed merely weeks ago. With a majority government, Harper could have ploughed ahead on some or all of these fronts. But where will he turn for support to implement an agenda Canadians don't really want?

We're likely to find ourselves back to the polls in the next 18 months. Much can happen in that time. We in the civil society movement will be watching closely at any attempts to dismantle vital social programs such as public health care; rip up environmental treaties such as the Kyoto accord; cut funding and support to the arts and the CBC; sell off Canada's fresh water (as promised by BC Conservative member James Lunney); enter the weaponization of space by buying into Bush's Ballistic Missile Defence plan; and moves to become even closer to Bush's military and security agenda and his war on terror.

What I take issue with is this word "progressive". What is "progressive" about returning to an over-regulated economy like we had in the 1970s when inflation, unemployment and interest rates were all at least 10%? What is "progressive" about quashing the entrepreneurial spirit through punitive taxation? What is "progressive" about throwing up tariff barriers that would increase the average family's grocery bill by at least 25%? These are the historic demands of Barlow and her friends in the "civil society" movement (as if only they, the anointed ones, can "civilize" society through bigger, confiscatory, redistributive and more inefficient government as directed by administrative fiat.)

Society is by nature "progressive" because we are always moving in a forward direction. And "civil society" refers to those stakeholders and actors which are outside of government - yet still in the political system - like research institutes, advocacy organizations, and citizen's and community forums. Not to creating a nice, sunny and happy Utopian planet Earth. (What's so progressive and civil about bossing people around, anyways?) As for suggesting that duly-elected yet church-going representatives have no right to their opinions on issues relating to morality, how about arguing them on the issues rather than saying that they aren't legitimate voices in the debate because they derive their political philosophy, in part or in whole, from the Bible? I don't share their perspectives on a lot of things but they certainly have a right to express their opinions in Parliament.

And while I'm defending the rights of Christians not named Bill Blaikie to participate in the national discussion, I'm going to add another term that I think is a complete misnomer, and that's "a woman's right to choose". Don't people of both genders have the right to choose whether or not they're going to a) have sex and b) use proper and adequate birth control? It's not as though North American women are held at gunpoint and forced into committing sexual acts against their will. It seems to me that there's a lot of choosing going on before pregnancy even takes place.

These are three examples that come to mind of how some people like Maude Barlow use misleading language and terms to fit their own political agenda.