Stephen Harper becomes the sixth longest-serving PM

A hat-tip to the folks at Sun News for doing the math on this: Stephen Harper is now the 6th longest-serving prime minister in Canadian history.

Harper reached the milestone on Thursday, overtaking Brian Mulroney in terms of number of days in office.

As of Friday, Harper has now served for 3,203 days to Mulroney’s 3,202.

Even Harper’s biggest detractors have to give him credit for this achievement.

While longevity isn’t everything in politics, it certainly matters a lot.

"Length of time in office is a serious measure of effectiveness — I don’t think there’s any doubt of that," historian Jack Granatstein, recently told Postmedia News.

"You have to keep winning elections. You have to keep your party quiet, happy and satisfied. And you have to manage the affairs of the country and its dealings abroad. Anyone who can do that for almost nine years is somebody who is very effective. It doesn’t mean you’re popular — God knows the dislike of Harper is extreme and widespread — but he is effective. He keeps winning elections, and that’s the test."

In Canada, Harper has served longer than any current provincial premier.

And, even in terms of international standards, Harper’s number of days in office is very impressive.

Aside from Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah and Germany’s Angela Merkel Harper has the most seniority of all the leaders at the G-20 summit currently taking place in Australia. He’s also a senior statesman at NATO and the G-7.

Whether Harper can move up on the list remains to be seen. If he wins the next election, he’s almost certain to pass former Liberal prime minister Jean Chretien.

Regardless, when it comes to the discussion about Canada’s most successful and prominent politicians, Stephen Harper now deserves to be in that conversation.

The so-called anti-Harperites may not like it, but you can’t argue with the numbers.

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