Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Post Mortem
Literally, post mortem means after death and that is a somewhat accurate description today. There are few bright spots today for Liberals. I can only think of four pick-ups if you don't count seats reclaimed after floor-crossing. We are in the wilderness folks. To add insult to injury, Jack Layton is still my member of parliament. Stéphane Dion ran a disastrous campaign. He placed a bad policy as the central plank of our platform. It was the wrong policy at the wrong time. That said, I beg my fellow Liberals to spare us the fratricidal (and sororicidal) bloodletting of a third leadership race in six years.
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5 comments:
There was nothing "bad" about a carbon tax shift plan that over 230 economists endorsed and all environmental groups. The problem was it didn't get sold properly; it was attacked mercilessly without us properly responding to it. The plan was not complicated or complex.. but the media presented it as such and our folks failed to counter that.
I agree with you on no desire to have a leadership race.. though the backroom boys are already trying to get Dion to quit. They are either heedless of Harper and Tom Flanagan wanting them to do exactly this measure.. or they don't care.
Yeah, sure, Scott...nothing complicated about completely rewritting the Canadian tax code with an environmental plan that has nothing to do with the environment.
Give it up leftard, you guys lost. Wait til the next election in about 18 months when your thieving party is even more broke from a leadership convention they can ill afford...it will make this 20 seat loss look like a win.
Destruction of the LPC is a hand! Oh happy day!
I disagree it was bad policy; it was good policy. But it was bad politics. Harper was a policy wonk when he was first elected leader. Reality taught him the lessons of politics. Dion deserves a second chance, if he can prove he's learned his lesson. Once he's PM he can let loose a little with the policy. Until then, it's 3/4 politics, 1/4 policy.
What would be great to hear, and what I hope we will hear, are some of your thoughts about the way ahead for the Liberals. What is your party's raison d'être, supposing that it isn't likely to continue to be the Green Shift or other radical environmental prescriptions?
Dear Aaron,
I am a supporter of the Liberal Party of Canada and of Stéphane Dion. I was very inspired by the classy, substantive campaign that Mr. Dion ran during the election. Although our party did poorly I feel this was not so much a reflection on Mr. Dion as on a number of other factors (lack of election preparation due to snap election; internal dissension within the LPC, collusion between Stephen Harper and Jack Layton against Dion, negative advertising, the politics of fear, etc.)
Now that the election is over and loyal Liberal volunteers are exhausted and inattentive, certain "un-named senior liberals" aided by a hostile right-wing media are trying to force Mr. Dion out of his leadership position without even giving a chance for ordinary Liberal members to consider whether this is in the interests of our party or Canadian democracy. They present this as a fait accompli. They say that Mr. Dion is isolated and finished politically. What they do not realize though is that Mr. Dion is NOT isolated. Grassroots Liberals were energized and inspired by his campaign, by the Green Shift, by his refusal to play politics as usual. We do not believe that engaging in another self-destructive round of LPC leadership politics will serve our party or the country well. What we need to do now is to serve Canadians by concentrating on our role of official Opposition. We need to think seriously as a party about why we lost this election and how we can better organize ourselves to win the support of Canadian voters next time. We will not let this leadership coup succeed without being heard from.
Go here to learn more about what we are doing and to join the revolt: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=40161095228&ref=mf
Best regards,
Jean Proulx
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