Inkless Wells

Paul Wells on all the latest out of Ottawa—along with the occasional post about jazz. Follow Paul on Twitter: @InklessPW
He also offers his thoughtful perspective of Stephen Harper’s last 10 years in his recent eBook, The Harper Decade.

Categories: Inkless Wells

You think it's easy making rebel alliances?

by Paul Wells on Sunday, November 30, 2008 10:19pm - 55 Comments

A note of caution regarding reports that this evil devil’s pact among separatists, socialists and compromisers is a done deal. I am given to understand, from plural anonymous sources, that Dominic Leblanc, Michael Ignatieff and Bob Rae are meeting at this very instant in Toronto, at Rae’s behest. The tiny perfect ex-Premier is urging his colleagues to “get behind this deal and get behind Stéphane Dion.” You can assume the main target of this pitch is Michael Ignatieff, who — here the picture gets fuzzy — is said to be (a) leery on the idea of Dion leading this thing; or (b) leery on the whole idea of an evil devil’s pact; or (c) floating in a stew of mixed messages and conflicted helpers. Or (d) artfully seeming to be floating in a stew of mixed messages and etc., etc., the better to catch the weak off guard.

“If it falls apart, that’s where it will happen,” one of my nameless informants said about the Toronto meeting among the Liberal hopefuls.

Rae’s pitch is that the Liberals have a process for selecting a leader and that until that process reaches its conclusion at the May Vancouver convention, Stéphane Dion is the leader and should enjoy the prerogatives of leadership, such as presiding over evil devil’s pacts, should any arise.

By tomorrow you’ll know how it all ended, but I just wanted to say that some confusion remains as of this hour.

Tags: confusion thy name is, Harpergeddon, Michael Ignatieff

More by Paul Wells

de

Paul cannot go on assignment during what will prove to be the most interesting period in Canadian politics in his lifetime. He’ll be kicking himself.

Inviting a couple of Tories to sit in the Cabinet is too smart for the Libs or the NDP.

If Parliament were really about democracy there should be a couple of Bloc members in that “Coaltion” Cabinet. That they alledge to advocate for Quebec independence is demonstrably not a true representation of their intent by virtue of their very presence in the House. Everybody should just grow up and accept they advocate Lower Canada interests. They couldn’t separate from their underpants. Alberta and Newfoundland are more realistic threats to leave.

The other thing that should be made plain is that this coalition is about an emergency transfer of wealth from Western Canada to Central Canada. No one dares say so.
Haweater

I didn’t believe that Stephen Harper could be so stupid and so arrogant. Oh yes, I did think he could be very arrogant but to combine the two qualities at the same time was unexpected. The economic statement was intended to irritate all the opposition parties but why? If had left out all of those extraneous measures, party financing, civil servant freezes and pay equity nonsense and concentrated on what the statement was intended to do, he would have been fine. He could have said that he was meeting with the automobile industry (he is) and that the government was following what the U. S. was doing and would provide a stimulus in line with the Americans but instead he irritates all three of the opposition parties. Harper’s new spirit of cooperation didn’t last long. I believe we will see a new spirit of cooperation amongst the three opposition parties and the Conservatives will continue to play games. Gilles Duceppe is not scary as the Conservatives would have us all believe. He sounded more statesmanlike in the pre-election debates than all the other leaders.
madeyoulook

I’m surprised Rae stayed at that meeting despite the fact that it wasn’t to be held in public, with media present.
bud

This has to be done now! Separating the Liberal Party from the public purse for this long is just cruel and unusual punishment! Party first!
GPoliquin

Remember people, Wells’s Rule number 1 of Canadian politics: “For any given situation, Canadian politics will tend toward the least exciting possible outcome.” That means Harper will get his time-out. Parliament will resume in January, heads will have cooled. Harper will backtrack and evil devil’s pact will be a thing of the past. . .