unimaginative2
Senior Member
NDP serves only to give victories to Tories
JOHN BARBER
The Globe and Mail
September 10, 2008
Now is the time for all progressive men and women to bury the New Democratic Party. The effort is overdue, postponed by sentiment and stasis, but party leader Jack Layton's latest move calls the question.
Is it any wonder that Mr. Layton and Conservative Leader Stephen Harper joined together to exclude Green Party Leader Elizabeth May from next month's televised debate, offering the same reason (claiming she is a Liberal) and backing it with the same puerile threat?
The only difference between those two is that Mr. Layton's threat to withdraw was a weak bluff. The man is in no position to give up his privilege, and the debate would work just fine without him. Maybe better, considering that his main function at such events as currently constituted is to elect Conservatives.
NDP perversity revealed itself nakedly in the last election, which brought an enormous tranche of Tories to power as a result of ruinous left-wing vote splits. People wonder why Ontarians, after rejecting the Mike Harris legacy so vehemently, brought half his cabinet back to life in the Harper government. Just look at the numbers.
Health Minister Tony Clement won Parry Sound-Muskoka by fewer than 30 votes - 18,513 versus Liberal Andy Mitchell's 18,485. But what put him in power were the 5,472 sheep who wasted their votes on a no-hope NDP candidate.
Will Ontarians continue to elect a finance minister, Jim Flaherty, who treats them with undisguised contempt? That's Mr. Layton's call: As long as his latest no-hope candidate in Whitby-Oshawa can rustle up a few thousand votes, Mr. Flaherty will likely squeak into power once again.
Let's not forget Environment Minister John Baird in Ottawa West-Nepean, another Common Sense holdover whose political fate likewise hangs by an unaccountably resilient thread of NDP futility.
No fewer than 20 of the 40 Conservative MPs elected in Ontario in 2006 owed their victories to the same arithmetic, winning with bare pluralities in ridings dominated by progressive voters - mostly Liberals.
NDP perversity is grounded in a founding mythology predicting the Liberal Party would wither away as Canadian politics polarized on ideological lines. More than 40 years later, with the NDP stuck on the fringe, resorting to desperate measures to repress upstarts while viable parties crowd the centre, the true believers cling to the delusion. While they struggle to elect their own members, they hand riding after riding to the Conservatives.
Tellingly, it was Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion's inspired non-aggression agreement with Ms. May that most provoked NDP diehards. By agreeing not to run a Liberal candidate against the Green Leader in Central Nova, Mr. Dion created new hope for his tattered big tent - welcoming fellow travellers without requiring them to vote Liberal. With her participation, Ms. May proved her worth as a welcome new face with fresh ideas.
Both figures know that the future of progressive politics lies in similar non-partisan alignments. Mr. Harper knows that his future lies in preventing them. Mr. Layton, meanwhile, has shown that his party has no place in that future.
Ms. May embraced the deal because she is focused on social change and has no ambition to play a Ralph Nader role in Canadian politics. For that alone she deserves the gratitude of every Canadian. Now she has exposed the bankruptcy of the old-line socialists - another distinguished service to the fractured body politic.
Go Green!
JOHN BARBER
The Globe and Mail
September 10, 2008
Now is the time for all progressive men and women to bury the New Democratic Party. The effort is overdue, postponed by sentiment and stasis, but party leader Jack Layton's latest move calls the question.
Is it any wonder that Mr. Layton and Conservative Leader Stephen Harper joined together to exclude Green Party Leader Elizabeth May from next month's televised debate, offering the same reason (claiming she is a Liberal) and backing it with the same puerile threat?
The only difference between those two is that Mr. Layton's threat to withdraw was a weak bluff. The man is in no position to give up his privilege, and the debate would work just fine without him. Maybe better, considering that his main function at such events as currently constituted is to elect Conservatives.
NDP perversity revealed itself nakedly in the last election, which brought an enormous tranche of Tories to power as a result of ruinous left-wing vote splits. People wonder why Ontarians, after rejecting the Mike Harris legacy so vehemently, brought half his cabinet back to life in the Harper government. Just look at the numbers.
Health Minister Tony Clement won Parry Sound-Muskoka by fewer than 30 votes - 18,513 versus Liberal Andy Mitchell's 18,485. But what put him in power were the 5,472 sheep who wasted their votes on a no-hope NDP candidate.
Will Ontarians continue to elect a finance minister, Jim Flaherty, who treats them with undisguised contempt? That's Mr. Layton's call: As long as his latest no-hope candidate in Whitby-Oshawa can rustle up a few thousand votes, Mr. Flaherty will likely squeak into power once again.
Let's not forget Environment Minister John Baird in Ottawa West-Nepean, another Common Sense holdover whose political fate likewise hangs by an unaccountably resilient thread of NDP futility.
No fewer than 20 of the 40 Conservative MPs elected in Ontario in 2006 owed their victories to the same arithmetic, winning with bare pluralities in ridings dominated by progressive voters - mostly Liberals.
NDP perversity is grounded in a founding mythology predicting the Liberal Party would wither away as Canadian politics polarized on ideological lines. More than 40 years later, with the NDP stuck on the fringe, resorting to desperate measures to repress upstarts while viable parties crowd the centre, the true believers cling to the delusion. While they struggle to elect their own members, they hand riding after riding to the Conservatives.
Tellingly, it was Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion's inspired non-aggression agreement with Ms. May that most provoked NDP diehards. By agreeing not to run a Liberal candidate against the Green Leader in Central Nova, Mr. Dion created new hope for his tattered big tent - welcoming fellow travellers without requiring them to vote Liberal. With her participation, Ms. May proved her worth as a welcome new face with fresh ideas.
Both figures know that the future of progressive politics lies in similar non-partisan alignments. Mr. Harper knows that his future lies in preventing them. Mr. Layton, meanwhile, has shown that his party has no place in that future.
Ms. May embraced the deal because she is focused on social change and has no ambition to play a Ralph Nader role in Canadian politics. For that alone she deserves the gratitude of every Canadian. Now she has exposed the bankruptcy of the old-line socialists - another distinguished service to the fractured body politic.
Go Green!
