We're passed Labour Day and the signs point to that special time.
The combines are rolling, the leaves are starting to turn and the annual 'Rider-Bomber Labour Day Classic is in the books.
However, this special time comes around not every year, but once every four years. It's pre-election time - that magical time when we can suspend fanciful notions that politicians do things for the greater good of us all and recognize the much more cynical reality that what they do is often about getting themselves re-elected.
In fairness to the Saskatchewan Party government that's truly driving much of the cynicism now, the fact that we know we are having a fall election campaign does mitigate a tiny bit of the cynicism that usually accompanies this season.
For the first 106 years of this province's existence, the surprise of springing a campaign on an unprepared opposition was an effective tool of government. That Premier Brad Wall would voluntarily give up this political tool by legislating set elections days is a welcomed act that shouldn't go unnoticed.
But lest anyone thinks that set election dates meant a complete end to the cynical game playing, think again. Not withstanding a ban on formal government advertising that also starts this week, the Wall government has been busy at the cynical game of pre-election announcements.
And what's irritating about its eagerness to buy our votes with our own money is that this is something the Sask. Party government said it wouldn't do.
Responding to concerns raised by Liberal leader Ryan Bater in 2009 that the Sask. Party might be willing to sacrifice the building of a new Saskatchewan Hospital in North Battleford for the building of a football stadium in Regina, Health Minister Don McMorris was indignant. He vowed his government wouldn't do what the previous NDP government did.
"(A new hospital in) Humboldt was announced seven years in a row, specifically before an election," McMorris told the North Battleford News-Optimist. "That won't be the case under our government."
Well, here we are in cynical election season and it's exactly been the case.
First came the announcement a mere 81 days before the Nov. 7 vote of $8 million towards the planning on a new $110-million psychiatric hospital in North Battleford. (The Battlefords, by the way, was one of the five closest seats in the 2007 election.)
Not only is this what the NDP government did with the Battlefords hospital, but also it's being done with less of a money commitment and much closer to the vote. At least the NDP made its promise 21 months ahead of the eventual 2007 provincial vote and set aside $39 million in the next budget to replace the 100-year-old Saskatchewan hospital by 2010.
But, evidently, the Sask. Party believes in the old adage of "in for a penny, in for a pound" when it comes upping the pre-election cynicism ante. Last week - a mere 69 days before the provincial vote - it announces a replacement for Moose Jaw's Union hospital.
The only thing that needs to be said about the Moose Jaw hospital announcement is that it was even more cynical than the first announcement in that the government is committing a paltry $5 million to planning.
The news release did, however, have a quote from Moose Jaw MLA Warren Michelson on what "a historic day for Moose Jaw and area" it was. Michelson happened to win in 2007 by the slimmest margin of victory in that entire general election. Recently, his re-election task has been made more difficult by the decision of Progressive Conservative party leader Rick Swenson to run in the seat.
It seems that one of the benefits of Wall's set election dates is we can now pinpoint when the season of pre-election cynicism begins.
Murray Mandryk has been covering provincial politics for over 15 years.
