Liberals look at Obama playbook

For a hint of what Liberals are hoping to learn from the U.S. presidential race, check out this article in the current issue of Fast Company.

Every MP and senator who attended today's caucus session received a copy of the article.  Big hint — "Obama has taken what we thought we knew about politics and turned it into a different game for a different generation."

This fits with what Liberal pollster Michael Marzolini has been telling the Grits since last year: The trick for gaining support is to reach out to the whopping 80 per cent or so of Canadians who aren't engaged with politics.

 

Dion showing 'what he's made of' in critics shuffle?

The three new Liberal MPs have been sworn in this morning and assigned their tasks.

No huge surprises here - Bob Rae stays as foreign affairs critic, Martha Hall-Findlay is associate finance critic and Joyce Murray, from Vancouver Quadra, becomes vice-chair of the caucus committee on environmental sustainability.

We still have to wait a couple of hours to see where they'll be seated in the Commons - where rank really does matter and optics are important. 

UPDATE: Rae and Hall-Findlay have both been placed in the Liberals' front row. Here's the updated seating plan (pdf).

Perhaps the most interesting part of the shadow-cabinet shuffle, though, are the other switches of assignment.

* Denis Coderre, the Montreal MP and big Ignatieff booster in the leadership campaign, is out of his defence critic's post and assigned to Canadian Heritage. Coderre may be most remembered in his defence role for his freelance trip to Afghanistan last fall.

But people will be wondering if Coderre's job change comes because his name keeps coming up (vaguely, of course) in relation to Dion's leadership problems in Quebec.

* Bryon Wilfert, perhaps the original member of Dion's caucus-supporter club (and the guy who gave Dion the famous leather knapsack), has been handed the defence job.

* Gerard Kennedy, the former leadership candidate and Ontario education minister - now the only former Dion rival to NOT have a seat in the House - becomes intergovernmental affairs critic. Not a bad idea to have a former member of McGuinty's government on this issue if the Harper government keeps up its attacks on Ontario. Where has Kennedy been, by the way?

* As well, Raymonde Folco is out of the shadow cabinet, with Coderre taking on her duties for official languages and francophone affairs. Does this have something to do with Folco telling reporters last week that it was time for Dion "to show what he's made of"?

FURTHER UPDATES: Apparently, I'm not the only one wondering what's happened to Gerard Kennedy. 

Also, I stand corrected on Raymonde Folco. She was not in the shadow cabinet. It was Mauril Belanger (Ottawa-Vanier) who created the opening for Coderre on official languages and the francophonie. Belanger has apparently stood down from the shadow cabinet for  personal reasons. 

In desperate times, Liberals' thoughts turn to ... Martin?

If you happen to find yourself sitting with a bunch of Liberals these days, and looking for a new way to talk about the mess things are in, try this hypothetical, conversation-provoking question:

In hindsight, was it really such a good idea for Paul Martin to have resigned on election night in 2006?

It was a long-time, well-respected Liberal, not one of Martin's close circle, who first floated that to me this week. As he sees it, the Liberals might well be back in power right now, or on the way back, if Martin hadn't up and walked away when he lost government.

Here's the thinking: when Martin took over in 2003, he talked about staying for 10 years. The party was tired of internal leadership wars, no would-be successors were in the wings, and the Martinites had a stranglehold on the entire organization.

Then, abruptly, Martin was gone and so was the whole infrastructure of the party. The Liberals were not ready, in terms of money, organization or spirit, to conduct a leadership race.

But they had a contest, which further drained the party coffers, created new divisions, and all among a field of too-green candidates - most of whom could have done with a couple more years' seasoning before running to succeed Martin. Bob Rae could have got himself installed in the Commons (that's only going to happen next week), ditto for Gerard Kennedy (still no seat), while Ignatieff could have gained some more experience as an MP and Dion could have improved his English, and so on.

Had Martin stayed and presided over some of this succession planning, he may have been able to revive Liberal fortunes while making a phased, less-abrupt departure. And now, as the economy looms as a major issue, Martin could have dusted off his old credentials as the deficit-slaying finance minister and helped present the Liberals to voters as the best-positioned party to handle an economic downturn.

Of course, this is all 20-20 hindsight and there are numerous flaws in the logic, but it does get one thinking. At the very least, it may show how desperate Liberals are feeling right now.

Miller time? Not yet

Just to put that final nail in the coffin of the rumours about Buzz Hargrove and David Miller running for the Liberals in the next election, it should be noted here that Miller brushed off the idea yesterday with a flat: "It's not true."

In talking to me for another story - about his bid to get handguns banned in Canada - Miller said he remains committed to the idea of being a three-term mayor and he has no plans at present to enter the federal domain. He's only on his second term at present.

He's not ruling out the idea in the long term, though, and he was just about to go into his French lesson as he hung up the phone.

Would he run for the Liberals, though, or the New Democrats? I guess we'll have to wait and see.

The 'Buzz' about Liberal candidates

Last night, CTV's Mike Duffy floated a rumour that the Liberals were recruiting Toronto Mayor David Miller and Buzz Hargrove of the CAW to run in the GTA in the next election. The same rumour is being circulated over at the National Newswatch website.

The official word from the Liberals is this: "If only it were true," a spokesperson from Liberal leader Stephane Dion's circle told us last night.

The rumour seems to have its origins in the final paragraphs of a March 23 column in the Toronto Sun by Angelo Persichilli.

Persichilli, in blue-sky mode, so to speak, is reminding readers how Hargrove enraged his old pals in the NDP during the last couple of elections by urging New Democrat-leaning voters to cast ballots for the Liberals if that's what it took to defeat the Conservatives. And so, he writes:

The NDP leader should be very worried about the erosion of support for his party towards the Liberals. Rae's victory brings the "strategic vote" notion of Buzz Hargrove to a higher level. Now not just votes, but also leaders, are marching from the NDP toward the Liberals. Many New Democrats might be tired of seeing their party being the conscience of Canadians between elections who then send the Liberals or Conservatives into power when the actual election comes.

The only thing missing to close the circle would be an announcement from two former NDP bigwigs that they were running for the Liberals: CAW president Buzz Hargrove in Toronto-Danforth, challenging Layton, and the mayor of Toronto, David Miller, as a Liberal candidate in Trinity-Spadina (against Olivia Chow).

And then, bingo, the takeover of the Liberal Party is a done deal.

So, that's all it takes these days, it seems to start rumours on Parliament Hill: the last couple of paragraphs in a Toronto Sun column. Nonetheless, I'm sure we'll be checking them out more today, just in case, with Hargrove and Miller themselves.

Update: A senior Liberal has also this morning pointed out another flaw in the Persichilli scenario. There is already a nominated Liberal candidate in Trinity-Spadina. His name is Tony Ianno, the man who held that riding from 1993 to 2006 and the former minister of state for families and caregivers.

The adventures of a rookie MP

For those who still have elections on their mind, either the by-elections just passed, or the potential spring election, it's worth checking out the newest issue of Walrus magazine, which has the second instalment in Barry Campbell's series on becoming a politician.

Campbell was the MP for the Toronto riding of St. Paul's - the riding now held by Carolyn Bennett. In the last issue, he told us of what it was like to run for office. Now, in this new issue, he tells the story of what it was like to be a rookie MP with no hopes of getting into cabinet.

The pieces are well written in raw, funny, self-deprecating detail, but with the perspective of 11 years away from this place. Walrus should offer a prize for anyone who can name all the characters that Campbell has only thinly (and tactfully) disguised with anonymity.

A couple of examples:

Describing the wacky makeup of the Liberal caucus, circa 1993, Campbell writes:

"There were single mothers and divorced fathers, and a young woman so unreconciled to modernity that she had fought a running battle with the Catholic Church for the right to say Mass in Latin on her knees (and been arrested for disturbing religious worship)."

And there's this hilarious paragraph, still on the subject of the wacky caucus and the wild variety of communication skills Campbell saw on display:

Some MPs spoke the King’s English. (Indeed, a dashing older gent from British Columbia, a former military man and college professor, looked like he could be the King of England.) Others couldn’t string a sentence together without malapropisms and scrambled syntax.

One MP expressed grave concerns about the lack of “supervision of dirigibles.” Financial derivatives, he meant, I believe.

Another went on and on about government “stewardess-ship.” A Toronto MP (who would become a minister and leadership candidate) was certain that some event “has given a lie to the deception that . . . ”

Another colleague wanted to “suck it to the Opposition,” and another insisted that we be “quick out of the shoe” on something.

When asked why an expected witness had failed to appear, a committee chair said, “I bumped him off.”

I assume the witness was rescheduled, not eliminated.

One MP took me aside to “prick my ear.”

Liberals' Cadman fixation

Some random observations from watching things in the Commons this afternoon, which is the last real chance to see the tension in earnest for the next couple of weeks. Fridays are kind of a fake days in the chamber and tomorrow Stéphane Dion will be in Vancouver. So this was the last chance to get a sense of tone and political dynamics before Parliament goes on a two-week break.

Independent MP Chuck Cadman voted with the Liberals during a budget confidence vote in the Commons on May 19, 2005.

Many of us have been wondering why the Liberals keep hammering away at the Chuck Cadman story every day in the House. That's the story — for those who've been away — that Conservatives allegedly offered the dying, independent MP a $1 million life-insurance policy in exchange for his vote in May, 2005.

It's an important story, to be sure, but there are other issues out there, not the least of which is the whole question of whether the government interfered in the U.S. elections, which even Harper agreed last week was a better story.

I've come up with three reasons for the Liberal fixation:

1. To prove they're not scared of this libel threat. Harper did formally launch the legal case today against the Liberals for alleging he took part in a bribe. He's suing the party for a whopping $2.5 million but he's not pursuing individual cases he threatened against Dion, Deputy Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff and Opposition House leader Ralph Goodale.

Harper said repeatedly that his family has been hurt by all this. Why does that sound strange?

2. Because they think there's something there — I got that from a Liberal official today when I asked. In other words, the simplest explanation is usually the right one.

3. And then, maybe quite significantly, there are the by-elections on Monday. The Liberals aren't worried about the two Toronto by-elections, but the ones in Saskatchewan and Vancouver are worrisome for them. There's a fantastic site, called the Elections Prediction Project, which deems those two by-elections too close to call for Monday.

And where was Cadman from? Yes, Vancouver. And where will Dion be tomorrow? Yes, Vancouver.

McTeague takes defeat in stride

Liberal MP Dan McTeague didn't seem too upset that his private member's bill, making RESP contributions tax-deductible, died in a Ways and Means vote Thursday afternoon.

In fact, there he was, over by the Speaker's chair, talking intensely to Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier. All McTeague will say at this point is that he was talking about Brenda Martin, that Canadian citizen trapped in the Mexico prison — the one who got a visit yesterday from former prime minister Paul Martin.

It's worth noting that Bernier is now on the case and Helena Guergis, the secretary of state for foreign affairs, is off it. From my conversations with Brenda Martin's mother and friends yesterday, that's a welcome development.

Singing their love for the Liberals

The Bible All-Stars sound a bit more like an act you'd hear at a Republican convention, but in fact, this alternative-country band, based in Ottawa, have a soft spot for the Liberals.

In fact, they've written a jaunty tribute to the party and Stephane Dion, with a few digs at Stephen Harper thrown into the mix (here song).

Here are the lyrics, for those who may be working in an office where it isn't politically correct to have this blaring from the computer speakers.

Let' s go,  let ' s go Liberal

You know they have a plan

Let's go let's go Liberal

Get behind Stephane 

Mister Pearson got a Peace Prize

Cos' he put the world at ease

In '66 he gave us health care

And thanks to him the Maple Leaf

Pierre Trudeau shared his vision

And he gave us Charter rights

Jean Chretien said "no" to Iraq

There ain 't no weapons so we won 't fight

With the deficit long defeated

Paul Martin turned to child care

He led the way down in Kelowna

And he almost got us there

[Chorus] 

We cried when Steve came to power

He ain't a friend of mine

Right away he went and killed Kelowna

And Kyoto wasn't far behind

No real child care program

Steve has the poor to blame

If you disagree with Mr. Harper

He'll give y'all some of the same

Stephane Dion is moving forward

For a greener, more stronger land

He stands on the shoulders of giants

Uncle Louie and  Lester B Pearson   ....

[Chorus]

Dion gets an earful on Facebook

Helene Buzzetti of Le Devoir has an interesting little story today - Liberal leader Stephane Dion is facing demands on Facebook to stop propping up Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government.

"With friends like this, who needs enemies?" Buzzetti writes.

Indeed. Here's just a sampling from Dion's "wall" - the place on Facebook where people can write public comments:

"I'm a huge supporter of you, but I think that you're not taking the oppourtunity to slam the Conservatives on their scandal problems. Please call an election after the 4 by-elections," writes high-school student John Zaloznik.

Sarah Mann, a university student in Victoria, is annoyed that Liberals also helped pass the private member's bill re: rights of the unborn. (See blog posting from last week and Antonia's column.) "It is an embarassing week to be a Liberal party supporter and a dismal week for a feminist," Mann writes.

If you want to see Dion's Facebook page for yourself, you can go here.

A warning, though - you may have to sign up as a "supporter" to view it.