Stories behind the stories

 Patrick Gossage's  op-ed column in today's Star  has inflamed some Liberals, if my email inbox is any indication. Gossage has traced the Liberals' problems back to the infighting of the Martin-Chretien years and pinpointed Martin's battle against Sheila Copps as one of the  moments when things started to go badly. 

After covering the Liberal party for most of the past  23  years or so and writing a book or two about Liberals, I think it's fair to call this a distinguishing feature of the party -- every  development  can be traced back to a moment when someone's feelings were hurt.  Long before Copps' feelings were hurt, Martin supporters were feeling rejected by Chretien, and before that, Chretien's gang was offended by its treatment under John Turner. And on and on it goes, winding its way back into history, perhaps as far as the Paleozoic era, as far as I know. (By the way, Gossage knows this history well, and in my view, his choice of the Copps' exclusion is kind of an arbitrary spot to pick for backdating the Liberals' troubles. Jane Taber and I were just discussing all the nastiness we witnessed when we started reporting on the Liberals back in the 1980s.)

After I mentioned this business of old grudges to one Liberal on email last night, I started to wonder whether this is something particular to politics generally -- and whether it helps explain what turns people off this world all together.

You can't really understand Stephen Harper and his Conservatives either, for instance,  unless you know what's hurt their feelings in the past. Harper became put out with Mulroney's Conservatives in the 1980s, then he had a falling out with Reform Party leader  Preston Manning, then he became the official Opposition  leader and nursed grudges over how he was being treated by Liberals and the media, and so on and so on. And this explains a lot,  if you have to work in this world every day, as we do.

I'd imagine it's difficult for anyone  outside this world, however, to understand all this angst without a guidebook. And many people may well say: hey, I'm supposed to get over my grudges and hurt feelings when I go to work, why can't these folk?

Of course it proves the point that all politics is personal, but it also may prove that it's ALL personal -- in the absence of serious discussions over policy, vision and values, we are left with only stories of grudges and feuds.

As I write this, the Liberals are in the midst of a caucus meeting where they're choosing their new, interim leader. I don't know whose feelings are going to be hurt in this process (Garneau and Rae have gone to some lengths to say it isn't a contest, just a "choice.") But it being a Liberal gathering, chances are that some old divisions will have to be revisited. That's just how it goes.

 

Comments

[cam]

Gossage may have also left out that Trudeau had basically moved the Party operation into PMO, leaving the Party with outdated technology, fundraising lists etc in 1984. I don't mean that as a slam against Trudeau, but if he's going to start pointing fingers there are a few in his hand pointing right back at him.

[Catherine]

Forwarding grudges. All political parties do it. For the 'shiny' ones with power, it is just a matter of time.

[Pierre Béchard]

Ms. Delacourt, in this piece, when you write "I'd imagine it's difficult for anyone outside this world, however, to understand all this angst without a guidebook". I imagine that by "this world", you meant the political world, especially the Liberal Party of Canada. If that's the case, I wonder on which planet you were? Do you really think that grudges only exist in politics? Did you ever take a good look at big corporations, including the media? Come on Susan, politicians are simply a reflection of what we are as human beings. I know, it's a depressing thought, especially after the last federal election, but that's what it is. Without grudges, have a nice day, PB

[Alex Hoyos]

Finally someone makes some sense of this political mess.

Politics have become personal specially because voters have make it personal. Platforms do not count anymore.

2 years of derogatory adds against Iggy killed his message. People bought into it.

The over financed conservative machine has won. About 67% of all ads ran last election were conservative ads. People didn't look beyond them and made it personal.

[Robert A. McDougall]

Whatever the causes or the scope of grudges and other failings -- and whether or not Garneau and Rae are secretly at each other's throats -- I certainly hope that LPC is able to renew itself as a significant political entity on the Canadian political scene.

I am not necessarily a died-in-the-wool "Liberal", but I see the current situation as an opportunity for the party to establish itself, once-and-for-all, as a "non-Left" and a "non-Right" party -- and, indeed, as a "non-Centrist" party. Rather, I would hope to see the LPC become the "Rational Pragmatist" party of Canada, wherein policy decisions were made on "the facts", not "ideology": some decisions could be "leftist", some could seem "right-wing" and some could appear "centrist" -- but all of them would strive to achieve a near optimal approach to implementing a well-defined set of LPC-determined national goals for Canada.

Indeed, without rejuvinating "Da Vision 'Ting" in a much more meaningful form, our Canada will not likely be able to compete against the emerging "third-world economies": and our way of life could well sink into a left-or-right ideologically-driven nothingness!

Hey, folks! There is still room for a third party that has objectivity, drive, and inspiration! That could even be The Liberal Party of Canada; re-vamped, of course!