Liberals put party before the people (Canada: obvious headline - great article!)

Toronto Sun (Canada) ^ | Sat, December 3, 2005 | PETER WORTHINGTON

[GMMAC]

TORONTO SUN
Sat, December 3, 2005

Liberals put party before the people
Ignatieff nomination demonstates Grit flaws

By PETER WORTHINGTON

You wanna know what's wrong with Canadian democracy, the way it's practiced by the federal Liberal party?

Look no further than Michael Ignatieff and his nomination as the Liberal candidate for Etobicoke-Lakeshore.

Here's a guy who was born in Toronto but who has mostly lived and worked in other countries.

He teaches at Harvard, but returns to U of T in January as a "visiting professor," for heaven's sake. Ignatieff writes critically acclaimed books that only the elite read, and is widely touted to be a future prime minister in the mould of Pierre Trudeau.

Okay, now he's got the nomination in Etobicoke-Lakeshore, but it's not as if the voters of that riding chose him.

FOISTED ON THE VOTERS

Rather, he was foisted on them -- chosen by "acclamation," which means no one voted for him.

He's the choice of the party, not the people.

Not only that, two other candidates for the Liberal nomination were prevented from challenging his.

Sound familiar? Like a dictatorship, eh?

Riding members -- especially Ukrainian-Canadians (traditionally among Canada's most loyal citizens) -- are upset that they were denied free choice, and claim Ignatieff mocked Ukrainians in one of his books (which he did). And what's Ignatieff's reaction to all this?

"A great evening ... this is politics," he said.

Does he insist, as a human rights scholar, that rivals be allowed to contest his acclamation?

Nope. He's "not going to second-guess the party."

Hmmm. One of Stalin's old Bolsheviks couldn't have said it better.

Before beating a hasty retreat from his acclamation this week -- out the back door after answering a couple of questions -- Ignatieff declared that of all the honours and awards that have come to him over the years "the greatest honour of my life has just occurred tonight when I was put up for nomination by a great Canadian, Jean Augustine."

What balderdash!

From all accounts, the loyal Augustine was told to make way for the golden boy (age 58), and she'll be suitably rewarded by some government post after the election, either by the Paul Martin gang in Ottawa, or the Dalton McGuinty gang in Ontario.

What this unseemly scenario in Etobicoke-Lakeshore represents is just another example of democracy defiled by the Liberal party -- not unusual these days, but still disgusting.

From his record, Michael Ignatieff seems an attractive guy and pretty sensible, even though if he's elected (not a sure thing) he'll have to button his lip about supporting George Bush or approving of the war in Iraq.

Meanwhile, up in Newmarket-Aurora, we have the lovely Belinda Stronach asking workers who helped get her elected as a Conservative, to switch like she did and come and help get her re-elected as a Liberal.

No shortage of chutzpah in Newmarket!

This election campaign is in its early stages, but already it's clear that we've got to get rid of the cabal that runs the country from Ottawa.

The Sun calls it a "Do the Right Thing" election, and it's pretty hard to challenge that.

WE CAN BLAME OURSELVES

If we, the voters, don't do the right thing, and if we re-elect the same guys who've so abused propriety, decency and honest democracy, then we've no one to blame but ourselves for the arrogance and corruption that has been so rife in government.

In just the two ridings mentioned above there are sound alternatives to the Liberal establishment.

John Capobianco in Etobicoke-Lakeshore, and Lois Brown in Newmarket-Aurora (who almost toppled Belinda when she was a pretend Conservative).

Belinda doesn't deserve re-election, and Ignatieff by suppressing whatever democratic instincts he may have in order to follow party orders deserves neither acclamation - nor voter support.

Stick to academia, buster.

[GMMAC]

Also see: The candidates who fell to Earth (Canada: Liberal 'stars' crash & burn!)

[GMMAC]

Librano$ PING!

[ncountylee]

This guy is left of Stalin.

[fanfan]

Worthington nails it again!

[GMMAC]

If other local Liberals end up as collateral damage - which I'm obviously hoping for and working toward - it will be gravy!
Mainly it's a great anti-Liberal issue which my posts on Ignatieff over the past week illustrate and which so far has only kept getting bigger.
Plus it's one they now most certainly can't win since it more than makes the case for virtually every criticism Harper & the CPC have raised insofar as their arrogance and sense of electoral entitlement are concerned

BTW, Michael's father, George Ignatieff, was a son of Russian immigrants who rose to be a very prominent Canadian diplomat under PM's King, St. Laurent and Pearson.
(interestingly, for anyone who's read Ann Coulter's 'Treason', old George was quite involved in the founding of the UN and a very close associate of Alger Hiss et al - from which you can draw your own conclusions.)
Anyway, Michael had a very privileged up-bringing (Upper Canada College, etc) and comes across as someone determined to out-WASP the WASP's and with the same sort of condescending 'nobles oblige' arrogance and elite disdain for the views of anyone beyond the ivory towers of academia as Stephen Lewis and Trudeau combined. He's a professional academic who no doubt feels he could teach even John Kerry a thing or two about intellectual nuance and who has written scholarly pieces over the years, among numerous other ones, which are blatantly pro-Russian and anti-Ukrainian to the point of open racism.

However all this is secondary to his candidacy being so revealing as to how the Librano$ operate and the contempt they have for the electorate.

[GMMAC]

Hey backhoe,
Found the image below quite by accident.
While very similar, it seems a tad better than the one you're now using:

[fanfan]

I have a version of that on the wall in my office.
I cut it out of the Ottawa Sun the day after it was taken in the Byward Market downtown.

[backhoe]

Thanks- I'll save that.

[rasblue]

You should know that the Ignatieff's are a blue blooded family. His grandfather, or his great-grandfather served in the court of the Czar's of the Romanoff family.
I'm not sure how it goes but lets just say if they are doing genetic testing to see who is related to QEII I'm sure Ignatieff would be a relation of some kind.

[GMMAC]

Is this meant as FYI info or offered in support of a certain poster's bizarre 'High Tory' theories which many view as merely a thinly veiled hate campaign against Canada and ALL Canadians?

In any case, it would seemingly be the Liberal anointed one's great-grandparent since he apparently bleated on about same being 'buried in Ukrainian soil' at his Party's de facto 'imposition meeting'.

[fanfan]

I don't care if his blood is green with purple stripes.

He has still received his nomination in a nefarious, underhanded, non democratic way.

BTW, George W. Bush is related to the Queen as well.

[GMMAC]

Beyond that, virtually all U.S. Presidents are somehow distantly related to each other as well as to sundry European Royal Houses.

It's that ol' 'six degrees of separation' thing. Genealogists pored over their family trees because they're famous historical figures. If there were any good reason the do this sort of thorough research on ours, doubtless similar finding would be made for the same reason M'Lady Fanfan - LOL!

[fanfan]

It's that ol' 'six degrees of separation' thing.

Isn't that fascinating ?

We humans think the world is so big. lol.

[GMMAC]

"We humans think the world is so big.'

... but still small enough that it could stand a lot less liberals, Marxists, Islamofascists and assorted other riff-raff.

[Grig]

Get a load of this:

[Grig]

Get a load of this:

[GMMAC]

Love it!

Say, is that Don Alphonso in the background just behind Martin's right arm .... or just some other Liberal gangster?

[NavVet]

Liberals put party before the people. Why should Canadian Liberals be any different from American Liberals.

[GMMAC]

The only difference I've ever noticed is that ours are a bit more inclined to blurt out moronic things that yours likely only think about saying out loud.

Howard Dean, however, is one of yours who'd fit right in up our way - LOL!