Liberals Pine for Ole Days

Libluvin columnist Larry Martin, speculates the Libs are pining for the "good ole Chretien days." Probably, but the way writes his column, I think he is the one that 's pining.

It’s Jean Chretien’s day today.

The old warrior’s portrait, which is to be hung in the halls of Parliament, will be unveiled in a ceremony hosted by Prime Minister Stephen Harper tonight.

A safe bet is there will be a lot of Liberals in attendance wishing Chretien was still around.

“Ah, the good old days.” That will be the phrase on everyone’s lips as his three straight majority election victories are recalled.

His legacy is getting better with time, particularly on account of what has happened since he stepped down in 2003. The once-proud party has staggered ever since. Paul Martin won a minority and then was defeated. Stéphane Dion took over and the party declined further. Michael Ignatieff replaced him and the party’s latest poll standing is at 25 per cent.

 Yeah right, pine for HRDC  boondoggles, Shawinigate, Adscam, decade of darkness for the military, treat farmers like criminals. and "the culture of entitlement" 

The Chretien good ole days? "Da little guy from Shawinigan" who throttles an innocent protester almost to death.  Yeah right! What a legacy!  Good ole days for Liberanos not for Canada.

More fond rememberance.

 One piece of encouragement Chretien will be able to provide is a reference to his own experience. He served as opposition leader for three years and had a terrible time almost every step of the way...and won.
Another sign of hope is that the party’s major opponent isn’t exactly setting the world on fire

Larry your party isn't exactly exciting the population either. Your leader is a dud.  All your party has to offer is muckraking trying to drum up faux scandals.  And oh, Larry, btw, good ole Chretien faced a very fractured right. 
It's not the '90's anymore. The world has changed. Larry, you're living in the past. Time to get with the times. The population is getting older and more conservative. Apparently Larry hasn't heard what Stephane Dion's wife, Janine Kreiber has said about the state of Libranos.

The Liberal Party is falling apart, and will not recover. Like all liberal parties in Europe, it will become a weakling at the mercy of ephemeral coalitions. By refusing the historic coalition that would have placed it at the helm of the left, it will be punished by history.

Larry Martin might as well face it, the Libranos will not be the powerful force it once was in the forseeable future if a at all anymore. I don't see the Libs getting enough seats to even get a small minority never mind a majority. They would have to gain at least 50 seats. I don't know where they would get those.  Where as the Conservatives only need 10 to 12 more seats for majority. That is very doable.

A coalition with the NDP will form enough seats to govern, they would have to include the Bloc and Canadians will not tolerate that at all.
 So get used to Conservatives in government for the foreseeable future. 

Mr. Ziffy's Trip to Edmonton

Mr. Ziffy was in Edmonton yesterday trying to up his popularity. He was harping about how the oilsands must clean up they're act.

EDMONTON — Alberta's oilsands need to be "cleaned up" and development must be both environmentally and socially sustainable, federal Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff says.
Government must create incentives that will encourage industry to do less damage to the environment while extracting oil in northern Alberta, he said Thursday in Edmonton.
"Our position is very clear: The oilsands have got to be cleaned up ... They've got to be environmentally sustainable and they've also got to be socially sustainable; that is, they've got to be good for aboriginal communities, they've got to be good for the workers," he said

First of all the oilsands are just as clean as the coal fired power plants in Ontario and Hydro in Quebec.
Second leave the industry alone to clean up, they don't need government. They'll do it on their own.
Then this about the deficit and corporate tax cuts.

He told the crowd the federal Conservatives have dug the country into a $56-billion financial hole and now Prime Minister Stephen Harper wants to hand out $6 billion in corporate tax cuts to address the problem.

"All Stephen Harper can offer is a corporate tax cut on your dime. We're borrowing to do that," he said. "Then a 2011 budget ... which will involve savage cuts to the services on which Canadians depend. It's just not good enough."

He said the corporate tax cuts should be suspended until the country gets its financial house in order.

Mr. Ziffy give your head a shake. Uh, yeah, it's because Mr. Ziffy and the coalition of the losers pressuring Harper to come up with a stimulus plan we have that big deficit plus it wasn't enough. They were hounding for more spending. Had the government caved, or had the coalition of the losers were allowed to take over, we'd have a much larger deficit. We could very well be not much better off than Greece.

Corporate tax cuts, yes we need them. It encourages investment and allows business to be competitive and hire more people. That's only good for the economy.

He believes that post-secondary education should be open to all students who have the grades to get in.

I agree a good education is a must these days but how is he going to pay for it? How about students working a part time and get summer jobs to pay for their post secondary education?

Then he goes fishing to poach votes back from the CPC in the immigrant communities.

It was his fourth official visit to Edmonton. He also visited with leaders of the city's Chinese and Muslim communities.

New Canadians have seen with the leadership of PM Harper and Minister Jason Kenney. They have discovered they have more in common with the Conservatives than the Liberals. Most have c-conservative leanings. Liberals had taken advantage of them and have taken them for granted for too many years. Don't think Libs are going to woo them back in the near future.

It looks to me Mr. Ziffy is still out of touch, doesn't know what he's saying, and I think seems to be pandering to the left wing of his party. We have a lefty MP from Edmonton,NDP Linda Duncan only because Jaffer so neglected that constituency. Next time we'll get it back.

Don't think he's going to make in roads in Edmonton or any part of Alberta for that matter. He might as well write Alberta off. He's just not resonating anywhere in Canada either expect maybe, Toronto.

Mr. Ziffy Blames Tories For His Low Poll Numbers

The new poll that came out this morning by the Lib lovin' supporter Frank Graves, Ekos has the Libs tanking again. Mr. Ziffy's personal approval numbers are abysmal as well.
But you know what the latest is?  He's blaming the Conservatives   I mean come on, he can't be serious, can he?

Michael Ignatieff blames his lowly status in the polls on his adversaries, who he says have “done a number on me.” And that was before today’s EKOS results showing the Liberals slipping even farther into the basement of public opinion.

Uh, maybe he should look at himself in the mirror.  He's been leader now for over 16 months and hasn't been able to make inroads with Canadians.  Canadians just don't trust him. Trust needs to be earned. How can he or his party be trusted when they offer no credible policies and continually engage in faux scandals, smears, and a cultural war? Besides, they still need to pay back the $40 million they stole from us.

You can't blame your opponent for all your short comings.  You need to stand up and take personal responsibility  for why you are losing ground.  Didn't a well known Lib politican say to the affect once that "the more mud you throw, the more you lose ground?"  

As long as Mr. Ziffy and the Libs keep up the scandal mongering, the culture war and keep blaming the CPC for their low poll numbers they aren't going to get traction with the voters and their numbers will keep dropping.

Mr. Ziffy Irrelevant?

Kelly McParland has a good piece about on Mr. Ziffy called Michael Who?

The leader of the Liberal party isn't just unpopular. He's also increasingly irrelevant

  You're the leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. You have been leader for well over a year. Your party has just spent the winter portraying the government and Prime Minister as willing -- even eager -- accomplices in the torture of foreign combatants, enemies of women, keepers of a secret agenda that opposes abortion rights and discriminates against impoverished women in developing countries.

 You have argued ceaselessly that the government is obsessed with secrecy, is deliberately hiding critical documents from public scrutiny and is increasingly contemptuous of Parliament. You've hounded the Prime Minister into firing a troublesome minister whose antics raised serious questions about the way business gets done in Ottawa. The country has just gone through one of the most frightening economic periods in a generation, a situation that invariably reflects badly on the government of the day.

Yet an opinion poll finds that, given a choice, voters would pick almost anyone else, including the target of all your party's scorn, as Prime Minister. Far from making inroads against a government faced with any number of challenges, you place dead last when Canadians are asked to identify their favourite leader.

Mr. Ziffy's personal numbers are atrocious.

A Canadian Press/Harris-Decima survey found 52% of those questioned had a negative impression of him, against 26% with a positive impression, leaving him with a net score of minus-26.

 Today also has the CBC's Liberal friendly pollster, Frank Graves, Ekos putting  the Liberals down from their last poll at 25.1, CPC, up to 34.4, NDP, 15.3, Greens, 12.0. 

Wow, those numbers for the Libs are at Dion numbers! He must be somewhere smiling.
Seems like Mr. Ziffy is just not turning the public on.  The culture war, that Graves was advocating (abortion, guns, secrecy, the whole hidden agenda etc.) doesn't seem to be working. Smearing first a former Minister, then the PM and our brave troops in Afghanistan, with the help of the Lame Stream Media hasn't helped either.The more the Libs and their media wage the culture war and demeaning our troops trying to accuse them of "war crimes" the lower the numbers go for Mr. Ziffy and his Libs. It just helps the CPC. 

That old culture war to try and scare people, Canadians aren't buying it anymore.  The CPC has been in office now for four years and everything the Libs said before that the CPC would implement hasn't come to fruition, you know, soldiers in the streets with guns, women would have to go back to the kitchen and they would have to resort backstreet abortions, Harper would make everyone go to church every Sunday, etc.

 Liberals don't know who they are, what they stand for, all they have is faux scandals, smears, and a friendly media who are only too happy to help them along with the smears and faux scandals and cover for them.  Example, Rahim/Guergis vs Pablo   Keep it up Libs and media, it's good for the Conservatives, it just drives more support toward them and away from you!  Could Janie Krieber, Stephane Dion's wife be right?

Ok MPs, You Can Run, But You Cannot Hide

MPs think they can turn the Auditor General down from wanting to audit their expenses to make sure taxpayers are getting value for our money but I think they have another thing a coming. I, like Tasha Kheiriddian think it's absolutely disgraceful that they are resisting Sheila Fraser.
. Don Martin says that if MPs have following their guidebook and the checks they have nothing to fear.

It should be stressed that MPs face 100 pages of bylaws governing what they can pay for hospitality, housing, supplies, staff salaries, and airport lounge fees.
If federal MPs actually follow their guidebook to the letter and the checks on how they spend public money function as intended, MPs would have nothing to fear from the icy blue eyes of the auditor general peering through steel-rimmed spectacles at their detailed budgets.
That’s why she should intensify the come-clean pressure on Parliament. Sooner or later, MPs must accept that Sheila Fraser has made them an audit offer they cannot politically refuse.

They think this is will be forgotten about and will go away. It's NOT going to go away and it shouldn't. It sure did not go away in Britain. MPs resisted over there too and look what happened. Expense were finally exposed and it was revealed that some MPs had spend taxpayers money inappropriately. Are our MPs scared of some similar inappropriate things getting out? Who knows but the optics just does not look good.

The Nova Scotia expense scandal I think is spooking them too. Now the RCMP is investigating.

The funds our MPs are using for their expenses are taxpayers money. We have a right to know if they are being good stewards or not. They tend to forget we are their employers. They work for us. Not the other way around. We should not stand for the blatant refusal and accuses they are giving for not opening their books.

I urge MPs to please stop the stonewalling and allow Sheila Fraser to have a look. If everything is on the up and up, what are they afraid of?

Conservative MPs, you can take the high ground here and voluntarily invite the AG to come and see what you have. Set the example. You talk about openness and transparency, practice what you preach. The public will honor it if you do.

It's up to us, the citizens to put the pressure on and keep it up until they change their tune and allow the AG to conduct that audit. Phone, email, visit your MP and demand they open their expense accounts to scrutiny.

Update: Maybe the AG could start with Mr. Ziffy. h/t wilson

Personalities

Colin Mochrie, Shirley Douglas, Michael Ignatieff, Jill Barber (manicure), Rex Harrington, Sophie Milman, Liane Balaban, Arsinee Khanjian, Joe Flaherty, Sheila McCarthy, David Julian Hirsch, Mark Breslin, Andy Kim, Patrick McKenna, Phil Nimmons, Dan Redican, Isobel Bassett, Paul Gross, Sharon Hampson, Michael Lee-Chin, Daniel Liebskind, Justin Louis, Jeff Seymour, Miriam Toews, Michael Bonacini, Ashley Legatt, Michael Seater, Ralph Benmergui, Jaymz Bee, Larry Green, Danny Marks, Glen Woodcock, Walter Venafro, Heather Bambrick, Rosemary Dunsmore, Tie Domi, Jamie Sale, Shae-Lynn Bourne, Craig Simpson, Ken Daneyko, Stephane Richer