Ed Broadbent's Campaign For Ottawa Centre

[maplesyrup]

A couple of weeks ago, Ed Broadbent's Liberal opponent in Ottawa Centre, PM Martin buddy, Richard Mahoney, came out publically in support of a public inquiry for Maher Arar.

Ed Broadbent and the NDP had been clammering for a public inquiry for quite awhile. All of a sudden Mahoney goes public demading one as well. Sure enough, within a couple of days, the Liberals launched a public inquiry. It was quite obvious that it was a set up, and that Mahoney already had already been told a public inquiry was imminent when he went public with his request.

Now today, I ran across the following article today by Paul Wells of Mcleans. I highly doubt PM Martin is cutting his buddy Mahoney loose, so what is really going on here?

Huh?

http://www.macleans.ca/paulwells

One hopes news editors in Ottawa didn't miss an extraordinary moment during today's Question Period. It would have been easy to miss. But it was absolutely the damnedest thing. Bear with me while I walk you through it.

Marcel Proulx, the Liberal MP for Hull-Aylmer, asked Hélène Scherrer, the new Heritage Minister, what she thought of the controversy surrounding Marcel Beaudry, who runs the National Capital Commission in a manner that reminds many Ottawa citizens of the kind of authoritarianism that made Singapore what it is today.

Scherrer gets up and says, in effect: The NCC board backs Beaudry; this government backs the board. He's not going anywhere.

Now here's the thing: Richard Mahoney, the Liberals' star candidate in Ottawa Centre — the guy facing Ed Broadbent at the next election — is campaigning, more or less fulltime, to have Beaudry dumped. Here's the relevant section on his website (which carries the horribly depressing slogan "The Future Starts Here." Yes, Rick, that's the funny thing about the future. No matter where you are, no matter when, that damned future keeps starting. That's kind of how the future works. But I digress).

So we have here the specatacle of Paul Martin's minister standing in Parliament, which is physically located in Rick Mahoney's riding, and cutting Paul Martin's candidate off at the knees.

Which leads to two questions:

(1) Why?

(2) Is that really what happened? Or is the whole thing Kabuki theatre: has Mahoney staked out a "maverick" position while the PMO and the Ottawa-region caucus help him out by skating him offside, so he can look like he's Brave Enough to Stand Up to the PMO?

My colleague John Geddes called Proulx, the MP who lobbed the lob in question, to ask what the little QP tableau was all about. He said that last week, when the Liberals' National Capital Region caucus decided to publicly back Beaudry, they also decided one of them should put the question to Scherrer. So she had advance notice.

Isn't it a bit odd to have the capital-region Grits and the PM's minister lining up against the party's handpicked candidate in a vital electoral battleground? Well, Proulx told Geddes he suspects Mahoney is folding his hand. "I don't think Mr. Mahoney is as strongly calling for [beaudry's resignation] at this time. I think maybe Mr. Mahoney has realized that he was directing his energies in the wrong place."

Hmm.

[Pellaken]

I see a pattern from the liberals that leaves me totally befuttled

step 1:

kick ourselvs in the butt in such a way to help the NDP

step 2:

repeat step 1

step 3:

repeat step 2

step 4:

a throne speach to feign to the left

step 5:

repreat steps 1, 2, 3, then 1 again...

why are the liberals leaving themselvs open to attack from the NDP? This is kinda like the head cheerleader asking out the top nerd...

something's up.

[maplesyrup]

why are the liberals leaving themselvs open to attack from the NDP? This is kinda like the head cheerleader asking out the top nerd...

something's up.

Two reasons:

1 - it's just natural for PM Martin. Martin's real world is with the corporate elite (right wing). Having Bono, Kofi Annan, etc. around is strictly for show. (It is just more feign lefts, to make sure not too many left Liberals go wandering off to the NDP.)

2 - PM Martin's biggest threat is from the right, the CPC if they ever get their act together.

Once the election is over, with another Liberal majority government, the Martin Liberals will bring in so many right wing policies it will make your head spin.