Dec. 2, 2006: Updated - Liberals breathe easier ...

Update: Greg Weston has written an excellent analysis of what happened, different from mine below. He would understand more clearly what occurred, given his Ottawa background and presence, I assume. He thinks the little people have finally gained some clout, considering that Gerard Kennedy's support and supporters moved to Stephane Dion in the end.

Greg Weston's analysis of what happened at the Liberal leadership convention, Nov. 3, 06, Ottawa Sun

www.ottawasun.com/News/Columnists/
Weston_Greg/2006/12/03/2606555.html


You might want to check this too: Sue-Ann Levy: "A new hope for Toronto" -- re: the formation of the Toronto Party , Dec. 3, 06, Toronto Sun, via newsbeat1

www.torontosun.com/News/Columnists/
Levy_Sue-Ann/2006/12/03/2606175.html

www.thetorontoparty.com

Are the people gittin' uppity? We can only hope.



The Liberal Leadership Convention ... and more

The power brokers have come through and Stephane Dion won. Paul Martin, played his part and emitted bombast and bafflegab with gusto ... as though he meant what he said. Michael Ignatieff looked as though he had been tackled by a 350 pound gorilla--or guerilla ... and he was. Jean Chretien slithered in from China ... just in time to watch his nemesis publicly squirm, having to accept the reality, finally and publicly, of his utter loss, the actual loss having occurred months ago, leading to his public--or media--absence. All are undoubtedly relieved that none of the guilty have gone to gaol.

And Canadian Liberals? They will be led by another Quebecker ... elected not by one member, one vote, but by proxy. Whatever his personal qualifications, and I suspect he has many positive ones, Stephane Dion was not elected by Liberal Party members, but by others voting in their stead. The power brokers have won; no one without a stake in the system as it is had the opportunity to vote for a new leader. What is that aphorism ... with perhaps, an added twist ... The more things change, the more they remain the same ... so democracy loses. In placating the one province that has really counted in Canadian politics for forty years, the rest of Canada can read the message. It cannot be sugar-coated. Nothing has changed; the result was orchestrated by those desirous of power and particularly, taking into account how it would play in that one province with the political clout of the language promoted through Trudeau's Charter, the power brokers who understand the back room dickering, and with the willingness, where necessary, to buy the votes of blocks of voters ... to accomplish their designs ... with promises, we can be certain, using taxpayer money, should they win back power. It has been a cozy little system and you just observed it in action.


A short ancestral memory , Editorial: What have the Grits learned? via newsbeat1

www.torontosun.com/Comment/Commentary
/2006/12/02/2591130-sun.html

Search: to borrow the unforgettable phrase from Western Standard magazine


Chretien's advice: elect a winner
Former PM boasts of his three majorities -- all revealing of his character ... , John Ivison, National Post, December 02, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=
0395776e-9599-41d4-823d-e330c4179b37

Admirable? Read Ivison and decide for yourself.

... Chretien ... like an ageing thespian offered one last chance to creep the boards. For one thing, it allowed him to indulge in one of his favourite past-times -- boasting....

... gave him a chance to put the boots to Martin while he's down. ....

This was the message that the Shawinigan Strangler brought to the convention. .... For Chretien, it's not about taking part, it's all about the winning.

What kind of leader should be elected, he was asked? "A good one." What's a good one? "One who wins elections."

Fair enough, you might say, that's the name of the game. But there is a growing band of Liberals, particularly in the Gerard Kennedy camp, who think this attitude is partly to blame for the predicament the party finds itself in. Much more important than beating Stephen Harper in the next election is putting the party on the right footing financially, organizationally and ideologically.

[....] Chretien .... an unfortunate scheduling problem over a business trip to China for his non-appearance at [Paul] Martin's tribute on Thursday night. .... With the vendetta between Ignatieff and Bob Rae about to get really nasty, that would have been too much intrigue, treachery and fratricide even for the Liberal Party of Canada. [....]

Apropos of nothing ... or everything

Soliloquy, Macbeth, V.v.19-28 -- "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow", Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

www.ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/webstuff/po
etry/Shakespeare-Tomorrow.html

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more; it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

Stop the presses: Liberalism doesn't work -- 'Play it again, Sam', George Jonas, National Post, Dec. 2, 2006

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/editorialsletters/story.html?id=
3f13589d-1a1c-4f0d-8a16-a35944f521af

[....] Big-L Liberalism not being necessarily liberal isn't exactly news either, but the Liberal party's preference not to talk about it qualifies it as a dirty secret. Liberalism's dirty secret is that it has lost virtually all aspects of liberalism during the 20th century. By the end of the Trudeau era in Canada, "liberalism" had become the word for its opposite, state interventionism. One could almost write the equation as Liberalism + 20th Century = Illiberalism. [....]

Search: Westphalian dirigiste with a human face.