Ugh… more proof how un-Canadian Ignatieff is. A true Canadian male in 1994 would have proudly worn a mullet. Business in the front, party in the back. His flowing, unkempt Euro-locks make me sick… even 17 years later.

Holy crap, he looks like Matt "The Eleventh Doctor" Smith! I didn't think that type of hair grew outside of captivity!

There's an enormous difference when you look at the way Ignatieff spoke prior to his entry in politics, and compare it to what we hear from political-Ignatieff. Pre-politics he's intelligent, articulate, willing to discuss complex issues with the seriousness that their complexity deserves. Now, he's much more bland, more inclined to talking points, and far less interesting and engaging to listen to.

I don't always agree with him – the section on Quebec in Blood and Belonging thoroughly turned me against him, he wrote as if he didn't care whether Canada survived or not, and wouldn't lay odd on Quebec staying – but I'm well aware that my deep hostility to separatism, and to prospective Prime Ministers who show little interest in their country until they see a chance for political advantage, is exactly the emotional-nationalist attitude Ignatieff opposes rather than the reasoned position of an intellectual. His perspective may be preferable to mine when it comes to governing – but he always appears to me as a man with many theories about good governance and policy-making who selected Canadians as convenient guinea pigs for his public policy ideas because the PM position looked open. I think he expected to be PM by several years ago.

Still, there's something truly wrong with the way we conduct politics when a man is forced to become (or at least present himself as) less intelligent, less deep, and less thoughtful as soon as he enters politics.