The Commons: John Baird exceeds himself

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 6:13 PM - 82 Comments

The Scene. The altogether undramatic sentence, taken from the notes of a Canadian soldier serving in Afghanistan, appeared more than halfway through a story in this morning’s paper. “Local ANP elements were in possession of a PUC detained by CDA troops and subsequently transferred to ANP custody.”

The ANP, in this case, is the Afghan National Police. PUC is apparently short for person under control. And CDA would seem to be a quick way of saying “Canadian” with fewer consonants and vowels. While in the possession of the ANP, having been detained and transferred by the CDAs, it seems that the handcuffed PUC was beaten bloody with shoes. So much so that the CDAs felt it necessary to remove the PUC from the possession of the ANP, the entire incident apparently corroborated by the sorts of soldiers everyone has made clear they support.

This is problematic for a number of reasons. Not the least of which is this government’s repeated reassurances that “there has never been a single, solitary proven allegation of abuse involving a transferred prisoner from Canadian Forces.”

It was on such grounds that Michael Ignatieff rose at the start of Question Period this afternoon to inquire as to precisely what was going on here. And it was here that John Baird, outdoing even his own standards for rebuttal, seemed to imply that Mr. Ignatieff should cease with his inquiries on this file. Continue…

Tehran protests met with violence

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 3:09 PM - 1 Comment

Iranian police are retaliating against thousands of unarmed protestors with tear gas and bullets, according to reports. Despite the authorities’ heavy-handed efforts to shut them down, rallies are ongoing, with protestors using the country’s official Students Day as an opportunity to demonstrate against the government. The mother of Neda Agha-Soltan, the so-called “Angel of Freedom”, who was shot by a pro-government militia in June following Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s controversial re-election, was among a group of grieving mothers who joined the demonstrations. The protest marks the fourth time an official holiday has been used to launch anti-government demonstrations.

Telegraph

P. D. James dishes on detective fiction

By Brian Bethune - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 3:00 PM - 0 Comments

Mention of iconic British mystery writers tends to bring to mind the names of long-dead women—Agatha Christie (naturally), Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh and Margery Allingham prime among them—and one living one. Phyllis Dorothy James, Baroness James of Holland Park in the County of Suffolk—more commonly (in every sense) known as P.D. James, is 89 now. In her by-no-means-finished writing career of 47 years, James has so far produced 21 books, most of them bestsellers as well as critically acclaimed, garnered tributes ranging from her life peerage to seven honorary doctorates and even become the subject of a French Ph.D. thesis, Perversion et perversité dans les romans à énigme de P. D. James.

In her newest book, Talking About Detective Fiction, she examines the enduring human appetite for mystery and murder and how some of its most prominent fictional purveyors (including herself) have gone about satisfying it. When James writes about her craft, she commands attention, both for her accomplishments and as a direct link to the so-called golden age of Christie and the other Queens of Crime. After all, she was there—a Depression-era teenager who would save her pennies to buy the latest Sayers novel.

While James cannot recall a time when she didn’t want to be a writer, she turned to the task with determination only in her mid-30s, when she felt she had little choice. James had met her husband, Connor White, a medical student, while she was working at a theatre in Cambridge. He came back from the Second World War diagnosed with schizophrenia, and spent years in psychiatric hospitals before his death in 1964. Connor was never unhappy there, James once dryly commented, having been well prepared by his education at a minor public school and in the army. “For some time,” she recalled, “he worked in the library but also captained the soccer team. I don’t know whether any games were played away, but those on home ground had their moments of eccentricity. Connor was not pleased when, during one game, the goalkeeper began hearing his voices and stood immobile, eyes raised to heaven, while the ball whizzed past him into goal.”

Continue…

Nobody Would Want To Be a Doll

By Jaime Weinman - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 2:46 PM - 36 Comments

One thing that has occurred to me while watching Dollhouse – and I’ve seen others mention this — is that apart from the show’s confusion about what it wants to be (last Friday’s two episodes mostly fell into the “conspiracy thriller” camp, which I’m not that wild about, though they were good episodes) there’s a serious built-in conceptual problem that the show could never overcome.

The foundational premise of the show is that women (and sometimes men too) have their personalities erased and are programmed to be other people. The heroine becomes a different person every week. The conceptual problem is this: the way they’ve set it up, there is absolutely nothing fun about being a Doll. The Dolls exist to work for others; they personally don’t get pleasure out of being other people, since they’re programmed to forget the whole thing. The overwhelming impression is that it’s really awful to live like this; there is no upside to it.

But without an upside, there is no temptation for us to get drawn into wanting that kind of life for ourselves. We can relate to it in a sort of intellectual way, asking ourselves whether we really know if we are who we think we are, or whether our personalities and memories are in some sense constructed by others. But emotionally, we never think: “gee, that might be cool.” When a story presents a lifestyle that is evil or wrong, it works best by letting us envy it a little; there’s a part of us that wants to be free of conscience like the villain, and we know God should beat the Devil but the Devil needs to be given a chance to make his case. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and many other vampire stories have done exactly this; we don’t want the vampires to win, but we can see what’s tempting about living without responsibility or guilt.

Dollhouse can’t do this, because the premise of the show suggests that whoever is having these experiences, it’s not really Caroline, and she’s not getting much of anything except a lot of headaches out of being all these other people. (Buffy had something vaguely similar baked into the premise; you’ll remember it was established early on that a vampire isn’t really the person he used to be, just a demon inhabiting a dead body. This idea was basically abandoned because it was so much more interesting that a person might want to be a vampire, and enjoy some things about becoming one. But who would want to be a Doll?) That means that the only real temptations and ethical dilemmas are given to people who aren’t Dolls (or think they aren’t).

(Update: I should clarify that when I say “who would want to be a Doll?” I’m not questioning the motivations of the characters within the show, who are given a plausible reason to take this deal. I’m saying that the way they’ve set it up, nobody could enjoy being a Doll.)

Not only does this limit our potential emotional involvement with the show, but it limits the real-world relevance the show can have. Fantasy shows work best when the situations can be related to something that is common in the real world: the idea of a guy hiring Echo in her guise as an expert hostage negotiator, absurd as it is, parallels the way we (in real life) trust “experts” about whom we know nothing except their titles. But the Doll situation has very little relevance to its equivalent situations in the real world, because in the real world, it’s sometimes fun to be other people. We’re all forced into certain roles in life, but sometimes it can be a relief — because we can fall back on pre-set roles instead of trying to find out exactly who we are. And if you compare being a Doll to being an actor, an analogy the show has encouraged, it’s pretty obvious that the parallel doesn’t work at all (actors become other people because they like it). Every real-world counterpart of the show’s premise includes some element of free will, some potential for enjoyment of being other people. So real life is basically more interesting than the show is. That’s not a good thing.

I don’t know how Dollhouse could have solved this problem, short of re-jiggering its premise entirely, and I tend to stay away from suggesting such things (I’m sure I’ve done it on occasion, but I just don’t care for “this show would be better if it were some other show” posts). The problem may just be inherent in the premise of erasing people’s memories; if they can’t remember, they can’t enjoy it, and the show wouldn’t have made any sense if they could remember. But it really is a problem. If evil is never tempting, then we’re free to sit back and disapprove without ever getting involved or questioning our own reactions.

A wee bit of housekeeping

By Martin Patriquin - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 2:18 PM - 1 Comment

1) What is it with French people and U2?

Jamie O’Meara, who is one of two good things to leave London, Ontario (hello, Rachel), writes a hilarious takedown of the Canadiens organization for its continued and egregious use of that friggin’ U2 song whenever the Habs score. James found solace in silence following the recent blanking at the hands of the hated Toronto Maple Leaves. “[T]here is a bright side to every reaming of the buttockle region (isn’t there always?), and that is this: At least we didn’t have to suffer through, not even once, U2′s Vertigo, our absolutely unlistenable, unexplainable, unkillable goal song. For the blissfully, luckily ignorant, the refrain goes like this: ‘Hello, hello, I’m in a place called Vertigo.’ Translation: ‘Where the fuck am I? I feel like I want to fall down and throw up.’”

He isn’t alone. There’s a Facebook page and an online petition to having the thing chucked, yet the song remains. Potential reasons: it’s catchy, it’s a ringtone, it has a head-slappingly simple chorus consisting of ’Woo-hoo/woo-hoo-hoo’ sung by a pint-sized Irishman with whom the French seem to have an enduring affinity. ”Like the Irish, we’ve been conquered and mastered by British bastards,” says this guy.

You see? Everything, especially hockey and even hockey jingles, is political.

2) Give this guy your money. It’s for a good cause. Or so he says.

Fagstein, who despite appearances doesn’t sell discount mattresses or even off-brand flat screen TVs, is a hammy and prolific Montreal blogger. He’s doing a worthy subscription drive on his blog once again this year. His charity of choice is the Welcome Hall Mission. All you have to do is subscribe to his bloggy blog, which you can do from here. “This year… I’ll donate 50 cents for each of [my 1,126] subscribers ($563), and add $1 for each new subscriber between now and a week before Christmas.”

So if you’ve ever wanted to stick it to a broke-ass journalist and donate to a worthy cause all at once, now’s your chance.

3) Public inquiry? What public inquiry?

Everyone and their cat wants the Quebec government to establish a public inquiry charged with looking into the rotten, filthy smell emanating from this province’s construction industry. (I wrote about the Montreal end of things here.) Everyone except FTQ-Construction, which coincidentally or not is implicated in the alleged said smell. Quebec preem Jean Charest, for one reason or another, continues to resist, suggesting the calls for such an inquiry are politically motivated. Funny, Charest wasn’t above a politically motivated commission when it suited his purposes. Remember the (deep breath) Commission de consultation sur les pratiques d’accommodement reliées aux différences culturelles (CCPARDC for, err, short)? Back in the heady days of 2007, when the debate over frosted windows and pork beans somehow threatened his government,  Charest’s government called hearings into reasonable accommodations faster than you can say ‘burka’. But the province’s corrupt construction industry, the endemic fraud of which continues to cost us money and reputation? Bah.

Is Canada shirking its international obligations when it comes to climate change?

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:59 PM - 236 Comments

A proof is a proof (II)

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:44 PM - 6 Comments

A collection of reassurances offered in QP over the last two and a half weeks.

Continue…

A British newspaper wades in on…Canada’s equalization system?

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:34 PM - 10 Comments

Continuing the Guardian’s spate of spirited punditry on the subject of Ottawa’s rotten record in the run-up to the Copenhagen global warming summit, Colin Horgan, a Vancouver-based freelance writer, takes a stab at explaining Canadian regional politics to the paper’s leftish UK and international readership. Actually, Horgan doesn’t do a bad job. You have to admire a guy who tries to interest foreign readers in the equalization system. His conclusion: Stephen Harper can’t afford tough greenhouse gas emissions targets because he needs his MPs from Albertan oil country. “That doesn’t mean that a new Liberal government would shut down the oil sands oil extraction on their first day in office,” Horgan adds, “far from it.”

The Guardian

Life without turn-ons

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:29 PM - 0 Comments

Most cultures are still struggling to come to terms with homosexuality—never mind bisexuality, transgender issues, or the various shades of grey when it comes to defining what turns us on. But if all these identity issues are giving you a headache, there are new studies that examine a much simpler alternative lifestyle: asexuality. The allure of “just say no” for asexuals is not rooted in some kind of abstinence-related morality—although it would be curious to find out how many Catholic priests and nuns, for example, would identify as asexual—but rather a lack of arousal or response to any sexual stimulation. The question now is whether this so-called “fourth orientation” is a genetic disposition, one that’s dictated by environment (sexual abuse survivors, for example), or simply a case-by-case instance of limp libidos.

Toronto Star

Nova Scotia boy found alive

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:22 PM - 3 Comments

After an extensive two-day search involving hundreds of Cape Bretoners, James Delorey has been found alive. The autistic seven-year-old‘s ordeal began on Saturday night when he went outside to play with his dog, Chance, and wandered away from home. He was not wearing any winter clothing, and had to survive a winter storm and frigid temperatures. Delorey had only a faint pulse when he was found, and was rushed to hospital

Canoe.ca

The biggest loser

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:16 PM - 0 Comments

During a 2007 gambling binge at the Caesars Palace and Rio casinos, Terrance Watanabe lost almost $127 million in what is believed to be one of the worst losing streaks in Las Vegas history. The money represented most of Watanabe’s personal fortune, built up over 20 years as part of his family’s party-favour import business based in Nebraska, the Wall Street Journal reports. The casinos’ parent company, Harrah’s Entertainment Inc, got about 5.6 per cent of its Las Vegas gambling revenue that year from Watanabe alone. The 52-year-old has since filed a civil suit, alleging casino staff plied him with liquor and pain medication to keep him gambling. Based on the allegations, Nevada’s Gaming Control has launched a separate investigation into whether Harrah’s violated regulations. Meanwhile, Watanabe was charged in April with four felony counts in district court for intent to defraud and steal $14.7 million from Harrah’s, money the casino says it extended as credit to him, which he then lost. Watanabe has paid nearly $112 million back to the company, but won’t pay the rest.

Wall Street Journal

Bin Laden in Afghanistan?

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 1:00 PM - 3 Comments

A Taliban prisoner claims Osama bin Laden is hiding in Afghanistan—not Pakistan, as U.S. intelligence believes. The detainee, who cannot be named for legal reasons, says in January or February, a “trusted contact” told him he had met the fugitive al-Qaeda leader two weeks earlier in Afghanistan. “He said he had come from meeting Sheikh Osama, and he could arrange for me to meet him,” the prisoner said. “He helps al-Qaeda people coming from other countries to get to the sheikh, so he can advise them on whatever they are planning for Europe or other places.” According to the prisoner, al-Qaeda members are avoiding Pakistan “because a lot of our senior people are being martyred in drone attacks”—a fate bin Laden is anxious to avoid.

BBC News

Greenpeace activists climb atop Parliament Hill

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 12:58 PM - 1 Comment

Nineteen Greenpeace protesters were able to scale buildings on Parliament Hill this morning to unfurl banners mocking Canada’s climate change policies. Fourteen climbed atop West Block, while another five scaled above an entrance to Centre Block. All have since been removed and the RCMP is now investigating how the activists were able to gain such access.

Canadian Press

Obama's Afghan change of heart

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 12:53 PM - 0 Comments

In a decisive about-face, the Obama administration has announced that American military forces might remain in the war-torn country for years to come. The change of heart comes just a week after Obama pledged to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, saying he would begin withdrawing them in July 2011. “There isn’t a deadline,” says Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, and the U.S will not launch a “rush to the exists,” added Gen. David H. Petraeus. The change in tone is likely a response to the public condemnations that followed Obama’s address from critics who claim that a specific pull-out date could compromise the mission in Afghanistan. The White House says the date was meant to send a clear message to the Afghan government: support to the country is not open-ended. The administration now says July 2011 is when more responsibilities will start to be transferred to Afghan forces.

New York Times

Political Yearbook

By Jonathon Gatehouse - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 12:22 PM - 6 Comments

Lookin' for a date?

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 11:56 AM - 0 Comments

Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, the traditionally hardscrabble Montreal East neighbourhood, has been re-christened ‘Ho-Ma’ and is now replete with condos and organic food markets. But someone forgot to tell the prostitutes and their johns, who still frequent neighbourhood streets. So enterprising residents have set up a Facebook page that publishes the photos and licence plate numbers of both. “It’s the oldest profession in the world, but there should be places just for it,” said one member of the online group.

Journal de Montréal
Facebook

What military wives need to know

By Julia McKinnell - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 11:46 AM - 4 Comments

“My best advice? Never, and I mean never, talk about your marriage with another man,” writes the wife of a U.S. marine who fought in Iraq. “You may need to let off steam but it’s best to go to the other wives, your chaplain or your therapist. Men LOVE to make it better for lonely military wives,” writes Mollie Gross in Confessions of a Military Wife, a new tell-all book that’s packed with advice for other military wives, culled from the author’s experience living at Camp Pendleton in California. “Even if you do not have feelings for that man, he will develop feelings for you.”

In a recent phone interview with Maclean’s, Gross describes military life for wives as stepping back into the 1950s—most women don’t work and are full-time housewives, raising kids. “I did notice a lot of the wives drinking on a daily basis. It shocked me. I encourage women to ask themselves, what can I learn while my husband is away?” She suggests learning to sew or learning French or taking a cooking class. When her own husband, Jon, was deployed, Gross honed her skills as a stand-up comedian, which is her current career in Los Angeles now that he’s back.

Continue…

Saved by the bell

By Rachel Mendleson - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 11:36 AM - 244 Comments

Every pump truck in Winnipeg has a cross-trained firefighter-paramedic

“Maisie,” an elderly Toronto woman whose chain smoking often leaves her gasping for air, is so well-known to the firefighters at the nearby station that when her address is announced on the loudspeaker, they all bellow her name. They lumber up the dark stairwell to her squalid apartment as often as three or four times a night. On this particular occasion, they listen to her breathing and give her oxygen. After the paramedics arrive, her colour improves. She signs a waiver, refusing to allow EMS to take her to hospital. On his way out, the fire hall captain empties an ashtray, and places a few dirty dishes in the sink.

While firefighters may be known more for their courage than caregiving, the reality, says Susan Braedley, a post-doctoral fellow at York University’s Institute for Health Research, is “they’re doing more emergency medical care than anything else.” In 2006, 52 per cent of calls to the Toronto Fire Service were medical in nature—a statistic that prompted Braedley to spend 10 months observing the city’s firefighters. Her research, which includes the visit to Maisie’s home, is slated for publication by the McGill Queens University Press next spring in a book entitled Neoliberalism and Everyday Life. According to Braedley, the “accidental assignment of some health care provision” to firefighters has been brought on by several factors: better fire prevention, which has freed up firefighters for other tasks; aging baby boomers; a dearth of family doctors, which has forced marginalized populations to use 911 as a way into the system. It’s a shift that has been subtle and the source of conflict. The result, however, is clear: in municipalities across Canada, what it means to be a firefighter is changing significantly.

Continue…

The whole ‘I’m off wheat’ thing

By Anne Kingston - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 11:35 AM - 17 Comments

Gluten intolerance was a recurring theme this year among high-profile, self-anointed nutritional gurus: on her we-love-to-hate-it website GOOP, Gwyneth Paltrow crowed about her seven-day gluten-free “cleanse” and BabyCakes, the fashionable vegan and gluten-free New York bakery that sells US$30-a-loaf banana bread. The View co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck promoted her book The G Free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide to Middle America. And former Playmate Jenny McCarthy, who claims a gluten- and casein-free diet helped her son recover from autism, showed off the buff bod it gave her on the cover of the May Shape. So when you’re besieged by “I don’t eat gluten” demands this holiday season, know you’re not alone.

Dufflet Rosenberg, the owner of Toronto’s Dufflet Pastries, which offers gluten- and wheat-free desserts, can relate. Customers regularly come into her stores griping, “I’ve got guests who don’t eat wheat,” she says. “As for why, I’ve heard everything under the sun—from asthma to autism, every kind of digestive disorder, lupus. Some people say, ‘gluten makes me sluggish and not eating it makes me feel so much better.’ ” Continue…

It probably shouldn't be this easy to scale the Parliament Buildings

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 11:04 AM - 47 Comments

Greenpeace stages a protest. Twitter reaction from MPs Patrick Brown, Glenn Thibeault, Brent Rathgeber, Michelle Simson, Rod Bruinooge and Olivia Chow. The Ottawa Citizen’s Glen McGregor tweets the scene.

The Dude abides

By Paul Wells - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 8:43 AM - 10 Comments

Alex Ross’s New Yorker profile of LA Philharmonic conducting wunderkind Gustavo Dudamel is up. I’ve seen Dudamel conduct twice, and Ross seems to me to get it just about right: Dudamel is the real thing, but he doesn’t single-handedly render all previous and concurrent attempts to conduct an orchestra obsolete. He will be worth watching, from a distance, while Canadian audiences continue to enjoy the work of Bramwell Tovey, Alain Trudel, Bill Eddins, Edwin Outwater, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Kent Nagano, Bernard Labadie and the rest.

Monday Caption Challenge No. 2

By Scott Feschuk - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 7:16 AM - 41 Comments

UPDATE: In future, I plan to again – and perhaps permanently – resort to democracy to resolve the caption challenge, but this week I am happily siding with the mob and conferring victory upon DanielBlouin. If ever there were an entry that fit the criterion of “funny cuz it’s true,” this is it. Well played, sir. Please flip me an email at scott.feschuk@macleans.rogers.com and I’ll dispatch your prize via the infotainment highway.

And a REMINDER: Queries for the Tuesday Mailbag on Wednesday can be sent to that same email address or placed in the comments below this post. Several questions already this week about relationships and personal matters. I’m like Ann Landers without the moustache.

•

Hey, look – it’s world-famous Liberal MP, and former hockey player of some kind, Ken Dryden. He’s on the ice as part of the Montreal Canadiens’ 100^th anniversary celebrations, which – by my rough estimate – have been going on for the past 40 years (or does it just feel that way?)

Your mission: make with the funny.

* The winner of each week’s caption challenge, as declared by a jury of me (or, on occasion, a guest juror of considerable wit and Internet access), shall receive a prize valued in the tens of dollars. And not just dollars but Canadian dollars (aka the good kind of dollars). You’re welcome.

And the Black Rod is made of chocolate!

By Colby Cosh - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 4:21 AM - 97 Comments

After some hours trying to decipher Angelo Persichilli’s column about the Château Laurier Conspiracy, I think I’ve found the key. One must disconnect Persichilli’s speculation about What It All Means from his actual reporting. It seems likely he overheard or was given access to audio of some genuine conversation, though the whole account is slathered in enough passive-voice sauce to turn anybody’s stomach. Ignore the carefully placed buttresses to the story’s authority and importance, like “This was not an isolated meeting between a few MPs”, and what you’re left with is… an isolated meeting between a few MPs, who bellyache tipsily while Bob Rae listens politely and encourages frank discussion but strongly insists he is not interested in a coup.

This is exactly what you would expect Bob Rae to do if he were a completely loyal lieutenant with no ambitions of his own whatsoever, intent solely on serving as his leader’s eyes and ears. It is also exactly what you would expect Bob Rae to do if he were planning a lightning coup for the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve. Most likely, Bob Rae is just what you think he is: an ambitious fellow forced to play a difficult hand, one who may be happy to profit from a regicide but is fully aware that he who draws the dagger rarely survives to wallow in the glory.

Beyond the facts, the column is full of fairly innocuous propositions disguised as dramatic disclosures. Succession to the leadership is a “dominant theme of discussion” in the Liberal Party? Well, sure, that’s what political parties are: machines for ensuring that aligned political interests stick together if something happens to the leader. I promise you that succession to the Conservative leadership is a pretty frequent subject of table-talk when Conservatives get together. (And, in fact, it’s a strength of the Liberal Party, not a weakness, that it has a lot of semi-credible successors around.)

And Persichilli “wouldn’t be surprised” if Ignatieff retreated to his “beloved academic world” at any moment? So who would be? The Liberals imported that danger/hope as part of the package deal when they dragged Ignatieff back from Harvard. Persichilli, I feel, is merely reminding us of the facts of life in a way that makes his eavesdropping seem fraught with urgency and electricity.

The more I concentrated on what is truly knowable and relevant in Persichilli’s story, the more I felt sorry for Bob Rae. Imagine having to stand there, nodding and smiling and nursing a schnapps, while you pretend to take the strategic judgment of Ruby Dhalla and Carolyn “Body Bags” Bennett oh so seriously. To what Christmas fantasy did his mind drift off while Dhalla, an ISO-certifiable ninny, was waxing obnoxious about the party “not doing enough to nurture the next generation of leaders”? Did he dream of being elected Santa Claus, passing in his crimson finery through the gingerbread doors of the Elf Parliament as the Candy-Cane Peace Tower glimmered in the night sky?

Michael's Gambit

By Andrew Potter - Monday, December 7, 2009 at 12:14 AM - 31 Comments

So Michael Ignatieff woke up to a nasty Sunday morning surprise — our their Kady has the most fun with the story, of course. I also agree with Susan Delacourt — while there is a question of journalistic ethics here, but the Liberals should not make that the focus of their response. I’m also not super interested in the question of who is behind this, since he (or, less likely, she) is merely the agent of a substantial constituency within the party.

The weakness of the support for Michael Ignatieff is a consequence of a number of factors, not all of which are directly related to Ignatieff’s own weaknesses. The Liberals are paying the price — AGAIN — of not having had a proper leadership campaign. It’s like they say about civil wars: they have to be fought until once side is either decimated or capitulates out of exhaustion. Negotiated settlements just leave the antagonistic power structures intact.

Ignatieff didn’t win the leadership, he was installed. So maybe the time has come for him to force the issue: Tell the party to  back him or sack him. You have to think that either outcome would be preferable to the status quo.