Jean-Marc Fournier, former Quebec provincial cabinet minister, explains (in French, to La Presse) why he was so excited to work for Michael Ignatieff.

The Star’s Susan Delacourt combs the archives:

The executive of the Quebec youth wing of the Liberal Party will ask for the resignation of party leader John Turner at a news conference scheduled for Monday in Montreal.

Time has run out for Mr. Turner, Denis Coderre, the president of the Young Liberals of Quebec , said in a telephone interview yesterday.

Mr. Coderre, once a strong Turner loyalist, co-ordinated the pro-Turner youth movement at the convention that confirmed Mr. Turner’s leadership last November, and was also youth organizer during his 1984 leadership campaign.

Last two sentences of an election bulletin from the B.C. NDP.

The bottom line: want cheaper beer? Don’t vote BC Liberal.

Conventional wisdom in America would have you believe that identifying oneself as liberal is politically risky. After all, when was the last time a serious political contender for the presidency embraced the liberal label? Outside of Teddy Kennedy, Democratic politicians have preferred the term ‘progressive’ to ‘liberal’ for the past three decades. The epic Obama-Clinton battle of last year rarely featured the word ‘liberal.’ President Clinton, a liberal president in a conservative era, preferred the term centrist to identify his brand of politics. He therefore drifted even further from the ‘liberal’ label. Obama seems hesitant to use the word, but when you look at his policies and listen to his rhetoric, you get the distinct impression identifying as a liberal may no longer be a liability for a mainstream politician. In fact, I believe the word ‘liberal’ is on the verge of a resurgence and a comeback. As well it should.

The U.S. political cycle is once again working its magic. After close to three decades of conservative dominance (which was not all bad), Americans seem to be responding to a new brand of liberalism—one in which the government is no longer the problem Ronald Reagan so memorably insisted it was. Government can now offer solutions. The credit for this goes to the financial crisis and the appalling greed of Wall Street for the resurgence. But we should not ignore the role the recent failings of the American conservative movement have played reviving liberalism. Conservatism is in dire need of redefinition, rethinking and purpose. Years of out-of-control deficits, inconclusive and ill-managed wars, mean-spirited and divisive politics, and compassionate conservatives that are neither conservative nor compassionate have harmed the brand.

However, today’s liberals should be careful to avoid getting nostalgic about the FDR years or the 30 years of liberalism that followed. By the end of the sixties, that brand of liberalism had run its course. In fact, liberals then were seen as free-spending, bureaucracy-building elitists with a strong interventionist streak. And eventually, they became associated with a breakdown of law and order, and a widespread sense of permissiveness that led to the rebirth of the conservative movement in the 1970’s. The Vietnam War did not help as it was seen as liberal war.

Liberals today seem to have learned that government must work with market forces and that sensible fiscal policies are fundamental to a sound and effective government. Here, Clinton deserves much credit for modernizing today’s liberalism, as he left the country with balanced budgets and reduced debt. The challenge for the Obama administration will be to harness the traditional liberal values of fairness, justice and opportunity, and mesh them with an approach to government that emphasizes responsibility, that creates the conditions for prosperity, and that acts to redistribute wealth in ways that reduce inequalities within society without punishing success. Obama has already articulated this  ‘progressive’ vision for government. His near-100 days in power reflect this. Now, if he could only start using the word ‘liberal,’ then the comeback will be complete.

Waaaay back in October, when governments were actually elected, smiley Elizabeth May was the first party leader to call for a Liberal-NDP coalition government. Now she might get a senate seat for being so smart.

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED. See below.

Sébastien Caron is a brave fellow. He is the Liberal candidate for Laurier-Sainte-Marie, where he has to contend with two (two!) communist parties vying for precious Liberal votes. Oh, and Caron also happens to be running against Gilles Duceppe, the preternaturally popular leader of the Bloc Québécois, who in the last election garnered over half the votes and beat his nearest competitor––a Liberal, coincidentally or not–by nearly 19,000 votes. [UPDATE: Wrong! It was actually the NDP that took second place, by about 16,000. So much for my narrative.]

It seems Mr. Caron’s plight attracted the attention of an internet vigilante, who has used his powers, such as they are, to ‘help’ Mr. Caron–whether Mr. Caron wants it or not. Threats and means words from Bloc HQ ensued.

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THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED AND CORRECTED.

CBC Radio stalwart Anne Lagacé-Dowson has (temporarily, at least) left the mother ship to run for the NDP in the upcoming by-elections in Westmount. Now, before anyone cracks wise about the NDP’s chances in the place of “11,000 City trees plus a myriad of carefully tended private lawns and gardens” (not my words, I assure you), it’s worth remembering that a hirsute, fire-bellied fella named Thomas Mulcair won a seat for the Knee Dippers in Outremont last year.

Westmount is/was as much a spendy Liberal bastion as Outremont, and is afflicted with a similar bourgeoisie stereotype that masks a sizable middle class reality: south of St Catherine Street for Westmount, and east of, say, de L’Epée for Outremont.

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It’s true. Well, “polling true” anyway, and that sometimes resembles real-life truth: according to today’s big CROP poll, one-quarter of supporters of Mario Dumont’s right-leaning, politically incorrect Action Démocratique party at the provincial level in Quebec would have voted for Jack Layton’s leftie, politically correct NDP at the federal level. Mind you, Continue…