After announcing he is not running against fellow Liberal candidates but “against Stephen Harper and the Conservative government,” [Michael Ignatieff] charged them with dishonesty, incompetence and something close to bigotry and racism.
“We do not want a Canada where the colour of your skin, the language that you speak, the country you originated from determines how well you survive this economic downturn,” Mr. Ignatieff declared. Liberals, he added, “are going to fight for all Canadians to get the same shot at the economic dream.”
[…]
It’s a desperate-seeming strategy, even if certain tired elements within the Liberal party — ageing spin doctors seeking to recapture their glory days of smearing Stockwell Day — haven’t gotten tired of it. Why, one wonders, is Mr. Ignatieff taking tactical cues from the Adscam-era demagogues who gave his party such a bad name in the first place?
Indeed. For his opening move, the demagogue mentions an Ignatieff NYT piece from 2004 – without linking it.
Ignatieff initially supported the [Iraq] war – as had the Clintons, and as had most of the Democratic Party establishment.By March 2004 – long before he became an MP, let alone a Liberal leadership contestant – he was writing in the New York Times that he had been wrong. That impressed me.
And for good reason. Oops! Here’s what Ignatieff actually wrote about his support for bombing Iraq (a country chock full of brown people!);
The discovery that Hussein didn’t have weapons after all surprises me, but it doesn’t change my view of the essential issue. I never thought the key question was what weapons he actually possessed but rather what intentions he had.
Ignatieff concludes the op-ed by arguing (rightly, in my opinion) that having intervened, the US was duty bound to pursue the Iraq war to a successful outcome;
If the United States falters now, civil war is entirely possible. If it falters, it will betray everyone who has died for something better.
Interventions amount to a promise: we promise that we will leave the country better than we found it; we promise that those who died to get there did not die in vain.
It wasn’t until he decided to run for political office – in a country he hadn’t lived in since 1978 – that Ignatieff had a “change of heart”.
But that’s just predictable spin on an issue that died earlier this year when the tides in Iraq turned in George Bush’s favour. It’s this passage, from the second paragraph, that caught my eye;
As usual we were talking about ourselves: what America is and how to use its frightening power in the world.
In 2004, Michael Ignatieff not only continued to support the prosecution of the Iraq war, he publicly self-identified as American to a New York Times audience.
Again, it wasn’t until he decided to run for political office – in a country he hadn’t lived in since 1978 – that he had a “change of heart”.
And he has his shiny new spin-doctor to thank for pointing it out.
I was for it before I was against it, yada yada, blah blah, eevil Conservatives, discrimination, we all deserve a chance at the “dream”. One could assume that “the dream” is a Lieberano victory, sounds more like a nightmare to me.
Cheers Bubba
“The discovery that Hussein didn’t have weapons after all surprises me, but it doesn’t change my view of the essential issue. I never thought the key question was what weapons he actually possessed but rather what intentions he had.”
My sentiments exactly – and I expect it was of most people – ask Kuwait, Israel,Saudi Arabia etc.etc.
Nice to see that the National Post has now taken to publishing articles without identifying who wrote them. Just the type of source I would expect you to rely on.
Why so scared of Iggy? Hitting a little close to home?
I had a longer comment, but my opinion of this man (sic) can be summed up a great deal more succinctly:
What a spineless c**ksucker!
Funny how the usual suspects forget about the uranium from Iraq that ended up in Canada.
maxwell; Have you not been listening to the lieberals telling about the American influence on Harper? If you say Ignatieff isnt American,well anyone that has lived and worked in a foreign country longer than he lived in Canada should have taken that citizenship.Lots of other Canadians did but they were honorable people.First a leader from France,now an American.
Ray/Iggy and Jack present: 30 years of Conservative minority government.
Devin, your Simpsonian “stop pretending you’re not scared of me” has gotten real old.
What a laugh to hear Liberals playing the progressive card, as they pit regions against each other, steal taxpayers blind and fearmonger over the latest financial crisis.
Get it straight, we’re not scared, we hold this caricature of a party in contempt, as do most Canadians.
Only Liberals think Ignatieff is a savior, to Conservatives he is an empty suit, lecturing his students, like the last leader. This is no dream team, this is a dream on team. How could anyone be scared of someone who lost a leadership contest to Stephane Dion?
Devin, keep on living the delusion, and good luck with that.
I Posted this earlier at Blue Like You (Joanne):
The racist card is to sand bag their last three bastions: Immigrant filled Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver who are all slowly turning Conservative from the results of many close races in the last election. It’s panic. If they loose these cities, they are toast. Game over. Asta la vista.
Plus, playing to the Obamamania does not hurt. It’s almost a subliminal tactic but seeing how the North American population has become so vacuous and apathetical towards their responsabilities towards a taken for granted democracy, it might have some traction.
Remember, the youth vote was high in the States for Obama. The younger the voter, the most likely he/she will choose pie in the sky. It’s not their fault. They are already indoctrinated by the education system and pop culture.
So, if Iggy accuses the Conservatives to be racist and it’s in the news it must be true. “How dare Harper be racist when Obama won the hearts and hope of the world!”
That’s what the left does best. The MSM keeps the uninterested to begin with masses ignorant, the education system indoctrinates and the lefty Liberals/Democrats exploits it.
Shamrock, that was very nicely ‘framed’.
Iggy = the left wing of the Liberal Party falling into the Dipper Ocean.
With the economy the main issue for Canadians, I like the way Harper compares to Iggy. Iggy is a foreign policy guru…the only problem is that he basically agrees with Harper on said topic. I don’t see how the Liberals win with him?
Iggy’s an idiot. I don’t like him one bit. He’s been out of this country for way too long. He should fail. He may succeed, but that shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. This guy may genuinely get some conservative votes. There are many wannabe Americans on SDA who had the misfortune of being on the wrong side of the border and they may see in him an epitome of their dreams – an American leading Canada.
I see him as an American. Through and through. Which isn’t a bad thing at all. I would just prefer it if we could have a Canadian running Canada. More in touch with how the system works, and how it screws us over.
Harper is the new Chretien. He has done nothing of significance and I don’t see that changing. I recently noticed that the Fed government still requires functional bilingualism to get most bureaucrat jobs. Quebec overrepresentation in government continues. I thought Harper would change this. Apparently not. Do all government servants need to speak French? One language really should be enough.
Well, thats what you would expect from a Conservative anyway. Harper is just walking an uneasy path down the center, and achieving precious little.
Please someone give Dim a memory pill…He forgot we still only got another minority.
Dim, repeat after me:
Right wing increments. Slow but steady. The gazelles frighten easy. The msm hyenas are always roaming around their Lieberal savannah.
Shorter Lying Jackal: if you hire me, I’ll like you again.
Wake up people!
Can’t you see where this is going? Can’t you see how they will frame the next culture war in this country?
Section 13.1 folks.
Conservatives want to remove it so they can continue to discriminate against minorities. This is the next “big” issue and it will be blown out of proportion along with a willing media.
Why do you think Iggy has approached the Nazi Hunter?
Keep your powder dry folks, this is going to get even uglier than the SSM issue.
Even if he does get the Liberal leadership, he still has to win over Canadians. Unlike Obama, Iggy is an old white guy with an extensive list of quotes, speeches and interviews that will be used against him. I suppose, given his age, this is really his last chance to become PM.
Beyond that, isn’t he supposed to be notoriously arrogant and obnoxious? Another in the long line of Liberals who will presume to tell us Canadians what we want and expect us to unquestioningly bow to their superior intellect. These personal characteristics combined with having to follow Dion the out-of-touch professor and disastrous “beer and popcorn” type statements of the past will only reinforce the Liberal’s elitist reputation. Therefore, I sincerely wish him the best of luck on becoming the new Liberal Leader.
Most of the editorial boards are already on the record as opposing 13.1, as are a number of groups on both right and left across the spectrum.
Indeed, about the only ones who defend the HRC’s these days are whiny hasbeens who have a record of internet sock-puppetry and vile online commentary.
How far does anyone really think they’d get with that tactic?
I guess I can understand disappointment with Mr. Harper,not being right enough for some.But to compare him with Chretien is emotional,not factual.
If the Liberals really wanted to make some serious electoral inroads, they would make an attempt at reaching out to one demographic that they have contemptuously ignored for over thirty years: Western Canadians. Instead, they’re quite content to cling to their vision of Westerners, and especially Albertans, as mouth-breathing knuckle-draggers.
Judging by his statements, it appears that Iggy is no different from the rest of his fellow-travelers. He never mentions the issue of Western alienation, much less proposes to do anything about it (Here’s a hint: drop the Liberals’ slavish devotion to the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly). The Liberals’ vision of “inclusiveness” still has no room for those of us in the Western part of this nation.
Another quote from the NY Times in March, 2003. An odd choice of modifiers, “the president”, Sounds like an American talking.
“I still think the President is right when he says that Iraq and the world will be better off with Saddam disarmed, even, if necessary, through force.” – Michael Ignatieff, New York Times, March 31, 2003
but the spinning started in 2005.
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/bbing/stories/s1354582.htm
The takeaway from Iraq is show me the money, show me imminence, show me threat, and also be much clearer, this would be a self-criticism, me, is notorious that I supported the war. Part of my reason for doing so was I thought the question of whether, of how much bad stuff he had was going to be unclear. But I thought there was absolutely zero doubt about the malignity of his intentions. Zero doubt about his strategic intention. It wasn’t clear that he had weapons of mass destruction, it seemed indubitable, based on his track record, and I looked at the inspectors’ reports from ’91 onwards with some care. It seemed indubitable from that series of facts, and they were pretty good facts, that he had the strategic intentions to acquire weapons of mass destruction, and therefore the factual question of what he had at any given moment might be unclear, but the strategic intentions were clear and when you paired that to the fact that this man had made war on, twice in a short span of time, that is he was a danger to his neighbours and he was also a genocidal dictator towards his own people, and I’ve been up in northern Iraq and I’ve seen that and it wasn’t ideology to me, I’d spinned at Halajba, I’d talked to the widows of people who’d been killed by him. So I did due diligence in terms of what the facts were. And the facts about him on human rights grounds were as bad as people say. There was no spin in the Bush camp on that regard, there was huge spin on the weapons of mass destruction and threat side
Back to the drawing board – if this is your line it ain’t going to work. He supported Iraq – so did the vast majority of the Con government, including the PM. Issue neutralized.
He’s too American – get with the program, we’re in the post-Obama era. It’s ok to be pro-American now.
Iggy and WK. Now there’s a dream team. I would apply Teach’s comparison x 2.
When you have lived the majority of your life outside the country, when you self identify yourself as an Americam, when you know more about the real estate market in London than Toronto, you apparently are a perfect partner for over the hill, has-been buffoons like Warnout.
He’ll dive deep into his bag of cheap insults, “sly & witty” innuendos & smears, but he hasn’t realized the world has moved on from his ilk, from the era of his hero Cruton’s “so what if a couple of million dollars was stolen, it was for a good cause, from I’ll mock Christians but not Mulsims, from having a pet rock to a pet fish.
Kantsellit anymore, over the hill, past tense.
It will be amusing to watch him lose battle after battle with Kate. Again. Same as last time.
Kate, go easy on him. At his age the mind starts to slip a bit and the heart isn’t as strong. The shock of being ass kick and bitch slapped by a “girl” might be too much for his Liberal constitution.
The Nat’l Post quote is todays editorial, Devlin should know they generally are not attributed to a particular scribe but to a board.
As to Obama, Jack Granastein in todays Ottawa Citizen predicts by mid 2009 Obama will be held in a similar view as Geo W. Bush by the anti American Canadians (Libs, NDP, Bloc, and raging Grannies) and the U.S. will have seen the dream come crashing down.
“Jack Granastein in todays Ottawa Citizen predicts by mid 2009 Obama will be held in a similar view as Geo W. Bush by the anti American Canadians”
Yup, let the protectionism begin!
devin maxwell – a newspaper doesn’t always publish the names of its authors. That’s hardly unusual.
As for ‘we conservatives’ being afraid of Ignatieff, I doubt that; a criticism of someone’s speeches and behaviour is hardly an act of fear.
I think that Ignatieff is going after the immigrant population, who have long been a major source of votes for the Liberals. The Liberals effectively bought their votes, using a number of strategies. First, was their overly generous immigration policies of (no need to show you can work, no need to show you accept our values, no need to not rely on welfare). Then their policies of isolationist multiculturalism which rejected integration and learning Canadian values and instead, isolated the immigrants into frozen replicas of their old ways. AND, since the Liberals were in power, they used taxpayer money to fund, generously, these immigrant blocs, in their isolation – in return for their votes.
Harper’s strategy is different. He’s not isolating them but working to encourage them to move into small businesses, to learn Canadian values, to move out of isolation. He’s turning them from dependents to independents. The Liberals are trying to get them back as ‘enslaved voters’.
The problem with the Liberals is that they remain trapped within an elitist ideology, one that sets up an autocratic centralist elite in Ottawa-Montreal and views the population as peasants to be ‘ruled’.
dim- I don’t see much difference between Americans and Canadians. Could you enlighten me?
I have a strong feeling that you don’t know anything that Harper has accomplished. Nothing. I suggest you take a look at ‘Crux of the Matter’ for a list of some of his accomplishments.
Equally, you don’t seem to understand that bilingualism – much as I also strongly reject it – is a constitutional reality. Bilingualism is the major component of Trudeau’s Charter of Rights. To change this, and I’d love to see it changed, but to change this, Harper has to change the constitution! He can’t do that without provincial approval, and he can’t even get near that without a majority.
So, much as many of us would like to see this disastrous rule thrown out, it’s in the Constitution.
Amazing how a guy like Warren-I’m-Back-Kinsella thinks pure politics is so important to other Canadians – just because. Just because WK thinks it is so almighty important. Winning for the sake of winning and all that.
Has Warren ever mentioned any good governance policies ? Doesn’t have a clue. Guess that’s why the title of his book was ‘kicking ass’. Kicking ass for the sake of kicking ass – after all, that’s what punks do.
Maxwell
It’s an editorial, to which The National Post simply follows a long standing tradition of not assigning authorship.
The Post can be faulted for not making it clear on their web page that it is an editorial, although it seems obvious from the tenor of the piece that it is just that.
Iggy didn’t even make it on the short list to be the president of UBC, not even considered, (inside source). If he is not seen as a leadership quality for one of our top universities in Canada, what makes the Lib’s think he is fit to run Canada?
Kate, I have been reading WK’s blog on and off for a couple of years now and I have come to the conclusion that WK is potentially a very violent person. A check into Wk’s past would probably reveal more than one suspended sentence and/or conditional discharge. It would be interesting to look into WK’s relationship history with women, also. The rage that is in this character is usually vented on the weak and defenseless that WK claims to want to protect.
The anti-racism crusade makes me think of the multiple homicide convict trying to preach the gospel.
Beware of WK.
Dim: Harper is not Chretien. He is Mulroney.
————-
“Conservative Convention: Well, it really is Stephen Harper’s party
Paul Wells
Kady fills us in on why attending the Conservative convention in Winnipeg would have been a stunning waste of time. Fun fact: 21 years ago, Stephen Harper attended the founding Reform Party convention in…Winnipeg, because he’d grown tired of an autocratic ruling Conservative elite that was disdainful and ashamed of its base.
Some time later, he decided he wanted one of those for himself.”
But keep sending him your hard earned dough. You’ll get lots of kool-aid crystals to mix for yourself (Harper doesn’t deign to even mix it for you anymore).
If Warren K ever cared about the good governance of Canada, he would have not supported PMJC for as long as he did.
That Iggy is willing to take advise from WK shows a real lack of concern for Canada’s national well being from Iggy.
Hey, we Yanks just elected our first Communist President. Now you have the opportunity for your first American PM. (You’re welcome! 😉
“It would be interesting to look into WK’s relationship history with women”
No question there is a subcurrent of mysogeny there. Likely the consequence of being raised by a weak father.
Granatstein likely isn’t far off of the mark. I wonder how long it will take R-Calf/Obama toadies Dorgan and Daschle to engineer another BSE “crisis” and slam the border shut to Canadian beef.
ET,
“I don’t see much difference between Americans and Canadians. Could you enlighten me?”
In a nutshell, higher government involvement is more acceptable to Canadians than it is to Americans. Harper, even if he had a majority, wouldn’t try to privatise universal healthcare. Semantics here notwithstanding, popular opinion tends to support.
Not so in America. Financial regulation offers a more glaring example – Americans would be (and, indeed, are) aghast at the Canadian approach, the same one that has seen us ride out this little financial crisis. We expect the government to be cautious – Americans expect the government to keep shut. And, occassionally, react. Huge difference right there.
The Conservative victory in Canada does not say “privatize healthcare” or “cut regulation of the financial sector”. It says people are fed up with corrupt liberals.
Like I said, it wasn’t a slur at Americans. It was simply noting the fact that the two have a very different approach to government.
“I have a strong feeling that you don’t know anything that Harper has accomplished. Nothing. I suggest you take a look at ‘Crux of the Matter’ for a list of some of his accomplishments.”
So they say. Anything major? Nope. The only thing thats visibly changed since 1996 is the foreign policy. Government spending remains the same.
“Equally, you don’t seem to understand that bilingualism – much as I also strongly reject it – is a constitutional reality.”
Sure its in the constitution. But does that mean that every bureaucrat has to be fluent in BOTH languages? Being fluent in one should be sufficient, but it often isn’t especially for the career oriented jobs. It is automatically biased towards those who are schooled in Montreal, over those who are schooled in Alberta. Speaking one language should be quite sufficient.
Wow
That is why, for so many reasons, I wish for Iggy and the Toronto Party of Canada a cold, long journey into the political wilderness for years to come…
“Liberals are going to fight for all Canadians to get the same shot at the economic dream.” – Iggy
Do we take that as a big Liberal promise to vote to get rid of the 1943 War Measures Act institution called the Canadian Wheat Board that denies liberty and the right to pursuit of happiness to Western grain farmers?
Or is it just more election Lieberal BS?
Is he willfully ignorant or does he not understand the Liberal Party is all about racism, bigotry and hatred. Separating groups into race, gender, religion in order to better isolate them and make them beholden to Liberal handouts. Does he not realise Liberals are all about ensuring only their selected groups thrive; gays, minorities, politically correct advocates etc. Does he not realise Liberals hate the basic concept of democracy – where people, not hand picked judges or HRCs, decide how they want their country to function. This is a man who turned his back on all his values and beliefs in order to fit into the narrow minded, hateful limits of the Liberal Party. When he was a free thinking acedemic, he spoke on various issues and ideas, based on information and evidence. Today, he spouts garbage designed to appease the perpetual victims of the left wing and cater to the mindless drones of the “gimme” groups. It is sad to see such an intellect discard thought and considered reason in order to gain power – he is deffinitely a Liberal. How sad.
Actually, ted, no, Harper isn’t Mulroney. He’s himself. He’s into smaller government and a decentralized government. Mulroney was the opposite; Mulroney was just a Liberal.
Liberals, as noted, are all about centralist governance, focused around Ontario-Quebec. They view the West, the North, etc as irrelevant and filled with ‘beer and popcorn’ peasants.
Liberals are elitists, viewing the electorate as a people to be manipulated, whether as isolated immigrants or as uninformed voters.
After a full generation and more of Liberal propaganda, via our schools and MSM, most Canadians are ‘centrists’ and quite ready to allow government to do all the thinking and all the work. That’s a reality that has to change. Why?
Because our economy can’t continue to function if it lacks the ability to provide its own ‘engine of growth’ via its own long-term investors. We can’t rely on the US to be our ‘engine of growth’ and do all the innovation, investment and research. Equally, our economy can’t continue to function unless we move into a competitive role in the world market, rather than the Liberal setup which relied only on one consumer market, the US.
Canadians have to become more capable of taking risks, of being entrepreneurs. A generation of being moulded as passive peacekeepers, as operaters of secondary franchises rather than entrepreneurs has kept us safe, but fragile and dependent.
Harper is both decentralizing, returning power to the local governance and is focusing on empowering the middle class – something that the Liberals rejected – and developing more small and medium buxiness entrepreneurships.
So, nice try, ted, but Harper isn’t a Liberal, whether you call such a red tory or whatever.
Regarding the assertion that the youth vote increased greatly in the american election.According to a break down of the US election results,it actually showed a miserly 1% increase to 18% from 17% in 2004.Check Hugh Hewitt blog for very good analysis of the numbers underlying the US election,including the very under reported fact that Obama barely got 1 million more votes then Bush got in 2004. Basically the difference this time was the conservative base stayed home and did not support McCain.
What’s all this you say, a cynical opportunist in politics?
Imagine my surprise.
The comparison to Mulroney, ET, was his disregard for the grassroots of the party, as demonstrated by (1) his policies and actions since getting power by rejecting traditional Reform/conservative ideology with record spending, record increases in the size of government, more than doubling the spending on polling, introducing his own sponsorship program, gaming the electoral financing system, and lack of accountability and tranparency as well as his recognition of Quebecois as a nation, etc. etc. etc. (2) his spokesperson telling Conservative Party members that they are “just another stakeholder group” and not to expect much input into government policies, and (3) culminating in Harper announcing yesterday that conservative ideology isn’t working and for the economy to work conservative ideology must be rejected in favour of pragmatism and whatever he says the party needs.
He’s come a long long way from a grassroots leader to a grassroots squasher.
It’s interesting how this competition is for the Liberal leader of Toronto.
I’m guessing Toronto will be the last beach head of the Glibs and that the pragmatic Stephen Harper continues to define the post-Mulroney Conservative party as Canada’s Natural Governing Party.
Get real guys! Iggy will be tough to beat! If “we the people” want Stephen Harper to win the next election, we need to get to work pronto! Keep your back to the wall, and your sword well honed–this is NOT Stephane Dion. He will go whatever direction it takes to win–trust me.
I suppose we cant expect Carolyn Parrish to be an Iggy supporter.
“damn americans, I hate those bastards”
ted – again, you are deliberately (?) misinterpreting Harper.
He didn’t say that ‘Conservative ideology isn’t working’. He said that this economic period is not a time for ideology but for pragmatics. You don’t seem to understand the difference between ideology and pragmatics.
And why you insist that he said that ‘Conservative ideology isn’t working’ when he didn’t say this – well, that’s your bias.
Ideology, which deals with the abstract, can be mulled around when you have plenty of time to get into the abstract beliefs. But when you have an actual fire in front of you, you don’t mull over whether you ought to yell ‘Fire’ in French first, and then English, and then not ignore the ‘minorities’ and try for translators..and..
You simply yell and call 911 and get to work etc..
Harper hasn’t abandoned the grassroots. I don’t think you know what this means. The grassroots isn’t only the Reformers but people who have become Conservative are from a variety of opinions. Your insistence that Conservatives are all and only Reformers is your own bias.
set you free – yes, it’s interesting that both Rae and Ignatieff are from Toronto. But they are both part of the Ottawa-Montreal bloc of Liberal Power, the old focus on Ontario-Quebec as the centre of the Canadian universe, the elitist view that the rest of the country is irrelevant, and that the electorate are beer and popcorn peasants to be manipulated at election time and forgotten the rest of the time.
The NP has an interesting article that the Liberals, who are hand in glove with PowerCorp, Chretien’s friends and relatives, have an agenda that Rae, who is a member of the PowerCorp Set, is being set up to be the winner.
Ignatieff is fighting back by trying to get the ethnic vote; the Liberal strategy of dealing with immigrants is to isolate them into ghettoes and fund them to remain frozen in time – as long as they vote Liberal.
That’s what the Dominion needs, yet another 40 years of debasement of fundamental liberties.
I’m not for a one party state, but can’t these Liberals go back to being classically democratic instead of socialist.
Until they do with a cognizant platform, they should run a homeless shelter just to see where there brand of liberalism ends up with the programs they have so forcebly impressed upon on hard working Canuks.
He was an academic, wrote some interesting books and now he’s just another racebaiting political hustler.
Does anybody survive contact with the liberal party?