And on the positive side:
- Paul Martin is finally gone. And good riddance to that hack.
- Having been spanked soundly, the Liberals can do a thorough housecleaning and perhaps return politically to somewhere left of centre, geography they seem to visit only on occasion.
- Good For Jack Layton, having picked up 10 seats nationally.
- With only a minority, I'm sure it's just a matter of time before Harper tries to do something unspeakably stupid and his government gets defeated. I'm thinking a September election.
Suddenly, I'm feeling a whole lot better about this.
8 comments:
Gotta disagree on a few things here:
Paul Martin - Best. Finance Minister. Ever. - not a brilliant PM but hardly a hack.
The Liberals are unlikely to swerve left in choosing a new leader. I think they will pick a red tory and shift a little further right.
Layton will not be called on to be a power broker for Harper, the tories will deal with the Bloc as they always have. The gains the NDP have made have come at the expense of the Liberals and the real danger here is that the Libs and NDP will continue to split the non-tory vote allowing Harper to move to the right and win a majority next time.
There won't even be talk of an election for at least 18 months no matter how stupid the Tories get - and they will get pretty stupid. The Liberals won't have a new leader until autumn at the earliest and none of the leaders will want to put the country through another election so soon.
bottom line in this election is the Conservatives won, the conservatives won big, the NDP won big and progressives have suffered a long-term loss overall.
I for one welcome our new fascist pig overlords, and wait with great anticipation for the stupidity to commence......
the rev. wrote:
Paul Martin - Best. Finance Minister. Ever. - not a brilliant PM but hardly a hack.
In my opinion, he was pretty much a failure as a PM. He truly earned the sobriquet of "Mr. Dithers" and if there's one thing I can't abide, it's waffling.
I might disagree profoundly with someone's position, but I'll always at least give them some credit for standing by it. Martin was, personally, the reason I didn't vote Liberal in this election.
The Liberals are unlikely to swerve left in choosing a new leader. I think they will pick a red tory and shift a little further right.
What possible value could that have? Why would anyone vote for a fake conservative when they could vote for a real one?
I was being facetious (somewhat) about the September election, and I'm curious to see how well the Tories and the Bloc play together.
(I'm particularly curious to see how well Duceppe takes it that the Tories made a breakthrough in Quebec, certainly at least partly at the Bloc's expense. I'm pretty sure Duceppe isn't going to be thrilled about that.)
I get the impression that Gilles Duceppe doesn't suffer fools gladly, so I'm not sure he's going to want to climb into bed with one that badly. But, as they say, time will tell.
Get ready for Canadian troops to be sent to Iraq.
Re: troops to Iraq.
Would that require a majority vote? And, if so, wouldn't that require Harper to get the support of the Bloc? Because if it would, that would be just a fine time to let Duceppe put his sovereignty where his mouth is.
Let all of those troops come from Quebec. If Duceppe would vote for sending the military to Iraq, then he can also make sure they come from his province as well.
If Gilles wants sovereignty, he might as well start figuring out what it feels like.
I don't see why the Bloc would jump to support any CPC policies. The idea they're going to rule together as a semi-coalition doesn't make any sense to me at all.
And as a PM and as a party leader, Paul Martin was a hack. The number one priority for the Liberals has to be to find a leader who will unite the party and get past the in-fighting that's hamstrung them for five years.
Find solace wherever you can find it, I guess.
In my opinion, he was pretty much a failure as a PM. He truly earned the sobriquet of "Mr. Dithers" and if there's one thing I can't abide, it's waffling.
It's not waffling - it's a fairly classic style of decision making. Martin's one of those people that pulls in a lot of others when making decisions, and tends to decide based on a combination of information and consensus.
Unfortunately, on the public stage, that style of operation doesn't work so well.
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