In naming nine senators to Parliament, Paul Martin played a game of political hardball. The appointments reveal the prime minister has turned his back on Senate reform and the deep desire for greater democracy. The immediate harm will be felt in Alberta, although it impacts all Canadians.

Last fall, Alberta voters elected four so-called senators-in-waiting. It was hardly a perfect process and Liberal and New Democrat candidates stayed away. But Senate reform must begin somewhere - as it did in the United States where senators were originally appointed by state legislatures. That is until the national consensus began to disintegrate in the 1850s, and a reform movement emerged.

Washington largely ignored the desire from citizens to elect senators, but advocates for change pressed on. At the turn of the century, one state, Oregon, acted alone by holding a senatorial election. Nebraska quickly followed, and by 1912 some 29 states were on the road to electing senators. A Constitutional amendment soon passed, and U.S. voters have elected their senators since 1914.

Senate reform in Canada began as an idea championed by a few individuals. It was adopted by Preston Manning's Reform party, remains more-or-less Conservative party policy today, and has the backing of several provinces. Yet after tens of thousands of voters cast ballots for Alberta senators, Mr. Martin vetoed their right to decide who will represent them.

Ending Western alienation will not happen on Mr. Martin's watch. When the Liberals say they want the West to feel like they are part of decision-making in Ottawa they mean to do it by offering pork in the form of more corporate welfare and other government handouts. Instead of making the federal government more responsive - by making it open to dissenting opinion - Mr. Martin hopes a bribe will do instead.

The Liberals say they oppose piecemeal Senate reform without provincial buy in. This guarantees no changes will be made anytime soon, if ever. Mr. Martin could have forced the issue by vowing not to name appointments to the Red Chamber until it was properly reformed. It is absurd that of Canada's 413 federal lawmakers - 105 Senate seats and 308 seats in the House of Commons - fully 25% are appointed, not elected.

The Liberal promise of eliminating the democratic deficit is in tatters. The promise of more free votes died when the Liberal backbench was whipped to support more funding for the gun registry last year. The process to vet Supreme Court judges is a farce as nominees do not appear before MPs or face an up-or-down vote in the Commons. And the government has broken its guarantee to make major appointments to heads of Crown corporations and other agencies subject to parliamentary review.

Most laughable is Mr. Martin's decision to name opposition senators in a party - the Progressive Conservatives - that no longer exists. Incredibly, the government believes it has the gift to choose the people charged with opposing its legislation. If this does not smack of a banana republic mentality, what would In Britain, the government appoints opposition members to its Upper House on the advice of the Opposition leader. It does so for it cannot claim to speak for both sides of the debate. How could it in a democracy

The Red Chamber must be reformed in a manner that gives Canadians, and not politicians, the power to decide who will write and pass laws just as Australia did in 1901 by making its senators elected. If the Martin government lacks the will to do this, it should go the way of New Zealand, which abolished its senate in 1951.

The Senate is not an institution reflecting Canadian values, unless we no longer believe in representative democracy. It is the blight on our principles. And these latest appointments should be held in contempt, for the Liberal leader has signaled we cannot be trusted to elect our lawmakers.