Liberal Leadership
You are currently browsing the articles from Jay Currie matching the category Liberal Leadership.
is showing up.
In principle there are 6000 plus delegate slots at the Liberals’ leadership confab. 5000 regulars and 1000 ex officio (in round numbers). But how many are going to show up? Most of the ex-officio delegates - say 900 or so - are party hacks and activists (but I repeat myself) who are more likely to miss their mother’s funeral than a Liberal Party convention.
But the 5000?
Tait Simpson, a Liberal Party flack, told the Hill Times he’s expecting well over 4000. But, as he is a flack lets take it as a nice round 4000. Less the 900 ex-officio which leaves 3100 elected delegates. Who have to pay their own way. $995 for convention fees and whatever it costs to get to Montreal and stay for a few days.
Now, who do you think this favours: Gerald Kennedy with less than 2% support in Quebec? If we take the provinces within driving distance of Montreal there have been roughly 2200 delegates elected. Given that these folks are not faced with quite the same financial challenge as those from Alberta or snowbound BC, how do they break out?
886 Iggy 508 Rae, 405 Kennedy and 300 Dion.
The fact is that the no-show delegates will likely be two things: from the West and rather less well off than the delegates who do show up. The general perception is that, even after the defection of Heather Reisman, Iggy supporters tend to have corner offices in tall towers. Now that it is actually illegal to write a cheque to send a worthy youth delegate from Pouce Coupe or a Women’s Commission member from LeDuc, it is a good bet that the delegates will skew upper middle class or better. There will be very little rabble to be roused.
Will this cut Iggy’s way? It may. Particularly if the costs of the convention ensure there is a truly low turnout. Iggy’s folks are going to show up, the other delegates may not be able to.
Written by jay on November 28th, 2006 with no comments.
Read more articles on Liberal Leadership and Uncategorized.
Mr. Kennedy will release a statement today expressing his opposition to the resolution as the wrong choice for Canada, according to campaign insiders, because he believes it is ill-defined and has raised a variety of interpretations that could lead to greater misunderstanding between Quebec and the rest of Canada. The motion raises expectations of future constitutional change, he believes. globe and mail
I’ve no doubt that Mr. Kennedy acting purely out of principled opposition to the “nation” resolution. But when you are running third and have next to no support in Quebec to lose a bit of pandering to the Trudeau faction of the Liberal Party can’t hurt.
Of course it might not help if he is reminded of his remark in the French language debate back on October 21 when he said,
“Ce n’es pas une question seulement pour la nation ici au Québec, c’est une qustion pour le reste du Canada“. (Gerard Kennedy, Montreal, October 21 leadership debate, 3:10PM Montreal time)
Translation: It isn’t only a question only for here in the Quebec nation, it is a question for the rest of Canada. ALTAVISTAGOOGLE
The Globe reports that Kennedy does not want his opposition to be “a rallying point” for opponents. In fact it is likely to be a rallying point for potential supporters.
Listening to the talk shows over the weekend it is pretty clear that the nation resolution - while perhaps a deft bit of political stickhandling on Prime Minister Harper’s part - is a bit of a pup in the ROC (aka choppedliverstan). Without even trying Warren Kinsella has attracted a couple of hundred signatures to his online petition opposing the resolution. Kinsella writes that this position might just make Kennedy leader of the party a week hence. (And while Kinsella is an asshat he knows Liberal Party politics and, more importantly, his Liberals.)
With nothing else to talk about (as other bloggers here have pointed out the candidates are not insane enough to talk about healthcare, fiscal imbalance or the growing division between rich and poor) there is every chance that the convention may come down to a “vision thing”.
Which vision of Canada? The Iggy/Harper meaningless Quebec word de jour or an appeal to the “One Canada” federalism of Trudeau pere et fils channelled through the unlikely medium of a barely sesquilingual Ontario provincial Cabinet Minister?
The Liberal Party, right, left and center wants a winner and winning issue. Kennedy is giving them one.
Written by jay on November 27th, 2006 with 1 comment.
Read more articles on Liberal Leadership and Liberals and Uncategorized and media.
The Prime Minister is going to table a motion in the House of Commons which answers these two questions:
“The real question is straightforward: Do Quebeckers form a nation within a united Canada? The answer is yes.
Do Quebeckers form an independent nation from Canada? The answer is no and it will always be no!” citynews
No doubt this will cause a certain degree of consternation in BQ ranks as it takes a bit of the wind from the sails of their motion which simply declared Quebec a nation.
Harper has pretty much adopted Liberal leadership candidate Michael Ignatieff’s current position on Quebec’s nationhood: call it a nation and then maintain that this does not actually mean anything. Most of the Quebec Liberals going to the convention are lined up to support a motion which would affirm that “Quebec is a nation within Canada” but begs the question as to what, if any, rights or privileges this confers or which other nations maybe tucked within Canada’s ample bosom.
Justin Trudeau weighed into the debate back in October channeling Pierre,
“Unfortunately, some people these days are wrapped up in this idea of nation for Quebec, which stands against everything my father ever believed,” (ctv via the national post)
As Justin is not actually on the ballot for the leadership his views of his father’s views don’t count but they do open the door for a candidate to question what has now become not only Liberal but also Conservative orthodoxy.
Stephane Dion seems the only Liberal leadership candidate willing to suggest there might be one or two small difficulties in a rush to embrace Quebec’s claim of nationality. (I have cut a little here for clarity…follow the link for the full interview.)
Solomon: So, is Quebec a nation?
Dion: I have no difficulty to find a definition of the word ‘nation’ that may fit Quebec reality. I have no difficulties to find definitions of the word ‘nation’ that will show that there are many nations in Quebec, or only one nation in Canada. It depends on the definition you choose. But, if you want to put that in the constitution then you need to be very, very, very precise….
It’s only one nation? All the Aboriginals are one nation, or 600 nations? The Acadians — I go each year to La Fete Nationale, a national holiday. Are they a nation the same way that Quebeckers are a nation? Anglo-Quebeckers — can they claim to be a nation? Newfoundlanders — they were, some decades ago. Maybe if we ask them now the question they say why are we not to be a nation too? So, second question: what is the significance of these recognitions? Is it purely symbolic or that it means more powers, privileges and public money to the people that are nations? If you compare with people that are less than a nation do we want to go there? If we want to go there, let’s start to have a clear map of what we have to do before we start the debate. evan solomon, cbc
Not exactly a ringing endorsement of “one Canada” nor a direct refutation of the “Quebec is a nation” trope; rather a rather academic, indeed bloodless, response Ignatieff’s proposition.
Now, there is little doubt that Iggy reads the data out of Quebec rather cleverly and the “nation” trope is red meat to soft seperatists and assorted Liberal nationalists. Dion’s academic finger exercises in definition dicing and constitutional logic chopping are not cutting it.
Dion, or any of the other candidates might do a little better if they looked up what Iggy says a political nation is,
“As a political doctrine, nationalism is the belief that the world’s peoples are divided into nations, and that each of these nations has the right of self-determination, either as self-governing units within existing nation states or as nation states of their own” ( Blood and Belonging, 1993)
More than a few Liberal delegates, weaned on Trudeau’s hardcore anti-nationalism, are going to have trouble endorsing “Quebec is a nation”. Especially if, as if in prescient answer to Dion’s questions, Ignatieff’s evocation of the political consequences of nationhood is part of one or more candidate’s campaigns. And Justin may be just the guy to bring it front and center.
Could be an interesting convention.
Written by jay on November 23rd, 2006 with 2 comments.
Read more articles on Liberal Leadership.
Interesting to see Iggy do pretty well, Rae not so well, Dion about as expected and Kennedy brilliantly everywhere but Quebec.
Now, if you were Harper’s brain trust you have to be rooting for Rae if only because he is a proven loser in Ontario. However, Kennedy winning with almost no support in Quebec would be almost as good as Tory growth potential in Quebec is, in theory, greater than in Ontario.
Iggy would be a problem simply because he is at least half again as smart as Harper, speaks better French, is just as tough on foreign policy and has some charisma. However, an Iggy win might well seal the deal for the lefties in the Grits to walk. Bush derrangement mainly; but also the realization that their natural home is in the NDP. This would result in a weaker, albeit more coherent, Liberal Party which could challenge Harper on center ground.
I don’t see Dion gowing much at this point. He failed to take his home province - which is no surprise as he has been willing to tell Quebec some home truths which have not been forgotten or forgiven - and will arrive at the convention with great respect and not quite enough delegates to swing it. Again, not a hell of a lot of room to grow.
We are going to be hearing a lot about the ex officio (read party hacks) delegates. All 1000 of them. Being Liberal hacks by definition they are likely to owe their positions to the entrenched left in the party and, as activists, will tend to veer left rather than center or right. However, being hacks their main loyalty will be to the Liberal Party’s natural right to rule which Mr. Harper has so rudely interupted. While I suspect they will scatter on the first ballot, their essential venality will get the better of them on the second and they can be counted upon to vote for which ever candidate looks as if he has a serious shot at beating Harper. And, being hacks, they will base that assessement on poll results - both public and private.
Were I Iggy’s people I would have a weekly private poll in the field on electability on a head to head with Harper: I would then statistically massage the results of that poll to ensure that my guy did ok but that all the others tanked. About two weeks ahead of the convention I would be leaking that poll to ex officio folks without attribution. That and a few quiet words about jobs in the next Liberal government and Iggy should have the momentum to sew it up.
Written by jay on October 2nd, 2006 with 1 comment.
Read more articles on Liberal Leadership and Liberals.
No older articles
Newer articles »