The problem with partisan punches

By Jordan Owens - Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 0 Comments

The kerfuffle over Thomas Mulcair’s dual citizenship illustrates one the biggest problems with our political discourse today: too much time taking cheap shots, not enough time focusing on the problems facing Canadians. Or: too much time taking cheap shots, not enough time tending to your own backyard. I’m a partisan hack, so either will do.

You’ll never hear me say that partisan politics is bad. It’s good for people to be reminded of the things that politicians do and say. We should be electing people who represent the best of us, so it’s important that we hold our politicians to a certain standard. Plus, partisan politics has often paid my bills. By all means, keep on keeping on.

Hypocrisy, though, is a different story. Continue…

After the convention: the Liberals’ sweet thereafter

By Adam Goldenberg - Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 4:07 PM - 0 Comments

“The country does not need another opposition party; the country needs another government.” For a political party pinning its hopes on redemption, it is a worthy sentiment, one that might have fit nicely into any of Bob Rae’s many speeches at last weekend’s Liberal convention. Too bad Joe Clark got there first.

The words were Clark’s, just before he won the leadership of the once-mighty Progressive Conservatives in 1998. In the end, Clark was right. His party returned to government, albeit as the junior partner in the right-wing coalition that now governs Canada.

Theirs is a cautionary tale, one that should check the surge of self-confidence that follows any successful partisan powwow. Last weekend’s Liberal convention certainly met that standard. This was not the usual nexus of nostalgia that many of us have come to expect from our party’s get-togethers. We did not sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings. But it’s what happens from now on that counts the most.

For delegates, that means a drowsy trip home and a morning-after spent scouring the papers, delighting in good news stories and cursing any trace of cynical punditry. For journalists, it means hours of agony, trying to figure out some creative new way to rain on the party’s parade.

For Bob Rae, this week brings a “cross-Canada skills and trades tour.” Continue…
Future anonymous Liberal source-watch

By Jordan Owens - Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 2:56 PM - 0 Comments

Photograph by Blair Gable

In the upcoming days, watch for criticism in the media—probably by anonymous Liberal sources (not to be confused with Anonymous Liberal Sources)—of the decision to allow the leader to veto policies. You should also expect criticism of the other major constitutional change to take place this weekend: the process to select the next leader has been opened to include non-member “Liberal supporters,” in addition to card-carrying members.

The objection by these folks will be that membership is now twice-devalued. Members don’t get final say over the party leader, and they don’t get final say over party policies. This is easily summarized and easily stated, so it will be easily repeated by those who agree. And when boiled down to that level of simplicity, it sounds dangerous, which makes it even more headline-grabby. Continue…
Rae, party of one?

By Adam Goldenberg - Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 12:27 PM - 0 Comments

Photograph by Blair Gable

Each morning, the Liberal party’s press office issues a notice to journalists, describing the day’s events. Today’s closing act, it says, is a “Speech by Liberal Leader Bob Rae.”

Among his audience, there are those who think that his job title is missing a word. You won’t find it on the Liberal website, either. “Interim” has been trimmed. But despite his best efforts, when Rae speaks today, those three little syllables will be on every delegate’s mind.

By refusing to confirm or deny his own ambitions, the interim leader has put himself—and his party—in an unenviable position. If he pulls his punches this morning, he’ll disappoint delegates who flew across the country for a partisan pep rally. But if he hits it out of the park, he’ll face renewed calls for clarity about his own intentions: why would he be doing such a good job as interim leader if he didn’t want to keep the job? It’s a ludicrous question, of course, but it’s Rae’s dilemma, distilled: as far as many Liberals are concerned, he’s stuck between a big black block and a leadership race. Continue…
Liberals haven’t ruled out a primary system

By Jordan Owens - Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 8:31 AM - 0 Comments

Update: they have now ruled it out.

After a long floor debate that was slowed by technical difficulties and points of order, Liberals will continue voting this morning on constitutional amendments, including one on establishing staggered regional voting days.

Having voted last night to create a non-member “supporter” category that will be able to participate in the selection of the next leader without becoming a card-carrying Liberal, delegates decided to keep the nomination of local candidates a privilage of leadership.

This morning, keep watch to see whether or not delegates will continue to reform the process by which the next Liberal leader is chosen. Staggered regional voting days—the Canadian equivalent of the US presidential primaries—could be an interesting discussion. Continue…
Leave Peter C. Newman alone!

By Adam Goldenberg - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 11:05 PM - 0 Comments

“There’s a guy out there peddling a book talking about the death of the Liberal Party of Canada,” mused Michael Ignatieff yesterday. “What is he talking about?”

It was another easy standing ovation at Peter C. Newman’s expense. Amid the heady hoopla of this convention, the octogenarian author of When the Gods Changed: The Death of Liberal Canada has been second only to Stephen Harper as an object of derision and ridicule. Don’t pity the man; scorn sells books.

Listening to some of the speeches this weekend, you’d think that this whole Liberal get-together was all an elaborate attempt to rebut Newman’s argument that the party is on its deathbed. If that’s the case, then it’s a waste of time—not because Newman is right, but because this weekend can’t possibly prove him wrong. Continue…
Ghiz: “It’s important to remember that you don’t always win.”

By Jordan Owens - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 4:07 PM - 0 Comments

Anonymous Liberal Sources stole a moment of PEI Premier Robert Ghiz’s time during his visit to the Liberal biennial convention. Here are some highlights:

JO: What’s it feel like to win? There are a lot of Liberals here who don’t remember what it’s like—or have never known what it’s like. Continue…
Justin Trudeau talks leadership

By Adam Goldenberg - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 2:44 PM - 0 Comments

AG: I imagine you’re being asked pretty frequently this weekend about whether or not you’d consider a run for the party leadership.

JT: Only by media, but yeah.

AG: What do you think it says about the Liberal party or the culture of Canadian politics that you keep getting asked that question? Continue…
Michael Ignatieff’s unfinished business

By Adam Goldenberg - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 2:40 PM - 0 Comments

The first thing Michael Ignatieff noticed were my sneakers: black Converse All-Stars. “You’ve got your running shoes on!” he said, ushering us into his Ottawa hotel room. In the dying days of the spring campaign, he had stumped through southwestern Ontario in a bright red pair of the same, sprinting to shore up Liberal votes in ridings the party once took for granted. We lost all but one of them on Election Day.

That was eight months ago. Today, Ignatieff is a recovering politician with unrequited dreams. “I didn’t get there,” he told delegates last night. “God knows I tried. I didn’t leave anything on the table. I gave it everything I had. But I didn’t get there.”

This morning, he spoke with Anonymous Liberal Sources about the journey.

AG: Anyone who watched last night saw you showered with affection and respect. How did that feel? Continue…
A peek behind the curtain

By Jordan Owens - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 2:04 PM - 0 Comments

Liberal party presidential candidate Mike Crawley’s war room is a hub of action; volunteers are assembling swag kits, making stickers, and entering data, all to ensure their candidate becomes the next president of the Liberal party of Canada.

With over 200 volunteers spread out across the country, according campaign spokesperson Nicole DeKort, this is the first opportunity for many to meet in person. Throughout the day, volunteers stop by with information from the floor, so the team can dissect the message and adjust their strategy as needed.

One section of the room is taken up by a screen and projector showing HootSuite, so volunteers can keep track of the conversation on Twitter.

Once voting starts, the purpose of the war room will shift from getting out their message to pulling the vote. The campaign has been collecting contact information for delegates who have pledged their support, and will be making sure every supporter gets to the polls.

Whenever Liberal party politics is at stake, there’s the risk of having temporary battles turn into long-term feuds. According to DeKort, the Crawley campaign is different, because it’s about bringing people together. No matter who wins today’s election—results will be announced tomorrow—Crawley’s team wants to see a united Liberal party turn their focus to the real task at hand: a Federal liberal government in 2015.

Unfortunately, I’ll have to rely on a truly anonymous Liberal source to tell me what goes on in the Sheila Copps campaign war room. At the invitation of friendly volunteers, I waited inside for a communications person, who was then kind enough to remind this former staffer of the First Rule of War Room: no media allowed.

The hallway is just a place for spin.
Ignatieff on Mike Crawley

By Jordan Owens - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 11:30 AM - 0 Comments

This morning, Anonymous Liberal Sources sat down again with Michael Ignatieff. We talked about his view from the stage at last night’s tribute and his thoughts on what comes next for the Liberals. We’ll have a longer piece later, but will leave you with this snippet where he mentions presidential candidate Mike Crawley:

The party’s got to understand—and Mike Crawley said this last night—the party’s got to see itself as being one public service organization in a very competitive field, all of whom are competing for the allegiance and commitment and brains of the next generation. They’ve got to be big enough to reach out to those groups and say “come on in.” We have no monopoly on public service, we have no monopoly on virtue, and no monopoly on wisdom.
God save the queen

By Jordan Owens - Saturday, January 14, 2012 at 7:51 AM - 0 Comments

The Young Liberals of Canada have managed to garner attention with a priority policy resolution calling for the abolition of the monarchy. The reason for doing so? To make the country more democratic. Yet the means by which this resolution will arrive on the convention floor was apparently anything but.

The monarchy resolution had to pass several hurdles before becoming the Young Liberals’ priority resolution. Young Liberal policies originate from clubs, and are then submitted to their local Young Liberals of Canada (YLC) Provincial and Territorial Associations (PTAs). YLC PTAs then vote on the resolutions they receive; those that pass are then to be considered by the YLC’s National Policy Committee, composed of members of the YLC National Executive. The YLC Policy Committee takes the resolutions it is given by the PTAs and decides which one of these is to be given priority status. Continue…
Here come the Ignatieff Scholars

By Adam Goldenberg - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 7:46 PM - 0 Comments

After his speech tonight, Michael Ignatieff will get a nice surprise:

In recognition of his contributions to public life and his vision for a united Canada built on a promise of equality of opportunity, friends and colleagues of Michael Ignatieff have established this fund to help aspiring young Canadians pursue post-secondary education and support their efforts to build a united, progressive Canada for all.

The Michael Ignatieff Scholarships will be open to all Canadian students enrolled in an undergraduate program at a Canadian university, CEGEP or college. Award recipients will be selected taking into account financial need and academic achievement, as well as evidence of involvement with the Liberal Party of Canada or other contributions to the principles of Liberalism, equality of all persons, national unity, and political engagement.
Michael Ignatieff says thank you

By Adam Goldenberg - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 6:47 PM - 0 Comments

The last time Michael Ignatieff addressed a Liberal convention, he had just won the party leadership. I was backstage, watching his speech scroll by on the teleprompter.

“Friends,” he said that day, “I am confident that if we offer our fellow citizens a message of hope, they will ask us to form their next government.”

In the end, our fellow citizens weren’t quite on the same page. But Michael Ignatieff is still hopeful. Continue…
Note to Liberals: please stop talking about marijuana

By Adam Goldenberg - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 6:12 PM - 0 Comments

One says he’s “a proven advocate for members.” Another says he’ll remove “obstacles to grassroots engagement.” A third wants the policy process to be “an effective tool for grassroots members.”

The people running to be the Liberal party’s next National Policy Chair are all preaching to the choir. Their fate is in the hands of Liberal delegates who took a day or two off work to fly to Ottawa to debate Liberal policy resolutions with other Liberals who took a day or two off work to fly to Ottawa to debate Liberal policy resolutions. Continue…
And now, some words from Michael Ignatieff

By Jordan Owens - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 4:27 PM - 0 Comments

Earlier today, Adam and I sat down with our old boss, Michael Ignatieff. We’ll have more for you shortly, but here’s some of what he had to say about the Canadian political landscape.

AG: What is it like to watch the Conservative majority unfold from your vantage point?

MI: Painful. The Prime Minister is saying that we’re now a conservative country. Who does he think he is? What does he think Canada is? It’s as arrogant as when we said it’s a Liberal country. It’s neither a Conservative country nor a Liberal country. It’s just the country, and it’s bigger than all of us. The Canadians that I know are practical, moderate, non-ideological, middle of the road, fiscally conservative, socially progressive, by and large. It doesn’t make them Liberal, doesn’t make them Conservative. I don’t think they’ve moved an iota actually. So when he says the country’s gone conservative, it’s just the kind of arrogance that will ultimately bring these guys down. Just the same way we were brought down by thinking the country was Liberal. There’s a message for us and a message for them.
Keeping it ‘En Famille’?

By Jordan Owens - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 1:45 PM - 0 Comments

Following along with my previous post, the policy process has also taken a digital twist. At previous policy conventions, a floor vote would be held to select resolutions with enough support to be debated at plenary sessions. Instead of holding two in-person votes, the Party has used Liberal.ca to open first round voting to the entire membership. With the first round of voting moved online, priority resolutions will only be voted on by in-person convention-goers once, at a plenary session early Sunday morning.

I’m not sure what this means for En Famille, the Liberal members-only online forum designed for policy discussions—and championed by presidential candidate Ron Hartling. En Famille has largely served as a sandbox where those so inclined could discuss policy amongst themselves—and no one else. If you’re not familiar with En Famille, it’s comparable to the closed Facebook group “Liberals Rebuilding the Liberal Party” in terms of the kinds of issues discussed. Continue…
The ghosts of Liberal backrooms past

By Adam Goldenberg - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 12:42 PM - 0 Comments

To Canadian political journalists, Liberal fratricide is mother’s milk. Trudeau-Turner begat Turner-Chrétien begat Chrétien-Martin, and Dion-Ignatieff begat Ignatieff-Rae. Liberals only stand behind their leaders, it is said, to stab them in the back.

What rubbish. Sure, there are divisions in the Liberal party. There are divisions in every party. Take an old-time Newfoundland Tory for a pint, and ask him what he thinks of the Reform Party. In the months before the last election, I met at least one New Democrat MP who couldn’t stand Jack Layton—and don’t even get him started on Tom Mulcair.

Political people are, well, political, and that’s both a vice and a virtue. What makes the Liberals different is that internecine warfare is part of the party’s modern mythology, perpetuated by a persistent minority of aging backroom boys who’ve never met a dead horse they don’t want to beat. Continue…
The revolution might be digitized

By Jordan Owens - Friday, January 13, 2012 at 12:37 PM - 0 Comments

It’s too bad for the Liberals that 2011 wasn’t the year of the social media election. Despite killing it in online metrics, Liberal efforts to cash retweets in at the ballot box were largely unsuccessful. Unfortunately for us humble bloggers, social media remains largely dominated by members of the mainstream media, “web 2.0 experts,” people making slanderous allegations about Julian Fantino, Beliebers, people who aren’t Mike Duffy, and an increasingly large group of folks determined to give me an Ikea gift card.

But do not fear, pyjama-clad fans of weekend-long policy conference webcasts, the Liberal Party of Canada knows the Internet is more than a series of tubes. Continue…
An important party for the weekend

By Adam Goldenberg - Thursday, January 12, 2012 at 11:24 PM - 0 Comments

Let’s make one thing clear: the Liberal party is not meeting in Ottawa this weekend.

Yes, there is Liberal convention taking place in our nation’s capital, and yes, many Liberals will be there. But the vast majority of party members—to say nothing of the nearly three million people who voted Liberal in May’s federal election—will be staying home.

Many don’t know it’s happening. Some weren’t interested. Most weren’t invited. But for the next few days, a few thousand delegates will cast votes on their behalf that could change the face of Canadian politics forever. Or so we’re told.

I’m not sold. Continue…
Hey Liberals, where do we go from here?

By Jordan Owens - Thursday, January 12, 2012 at 3:48 PM - 0 Comments

When did the wheels fall off the Big Red Machine? Ottawa’s chattering classes are obsessed, trying to pinpoint the exact moment when things went wrong for the Liberal Party of Canada. Do we blame Michael Ignatieff’s leadership, the feuds of the Turner-Chretien-Martin years, or Trudeau’s alienation of the West? Is there some other demon lurking in the shadows; was he waiting for us to be distracted by the Conservative foible of the day before snatching electoral victory from our collective, centrist grasp? Welcome, dear readers, to the Liberal Biennial Convention: Blame Game Edition.

I don’t expect discussion this weekend will stray too far from this narrative. This exercise will be as much about moving forward as it will be about diagnosing our institutional ailments. It will be as much about these two issues combined as it will be about hospitality suites. Such is the futility of Ottawa.

Settling the question of what went wrong matters, if only because it will determine how we rebuild. Continue…
Celebrating anonymous Liberal sources

By Jordan Owens - Thursday, January 12, 2012 at 3:24 PM - 0 Comments

Recently, anonymous Liberal sources have commented on the following issues:
As a former communications staffer in Michael Ignatieff’s OLO, I’m as big a fan of the well-placed source as the next gal. But it’s a privilege to influence the national dialogue and that’s the best anonymous Liberals can do?

Allow me: Continue…