Apparently, people do read this thing.

This page has noticed some interesting comment traffic with respect to an earlier post this week concerning CAW President Buzz Hargrove. Someone claiming to be one of Hargrove's children takes exception to my comments, and attributes them to a 'blatent' lack of excitement in this page's life.

First of all, Jaime - thanks for dropping by and sticking up for the old man. This page does at times go overboard with the rhetoric, but I've often been left with the impression that it's part of the appeal for a lot of regular readers. I have been throwing around epithets like 'egocentric idiot manchild' for so long they've practically lost all meaning, and nobody has taken a strong enough exception to write in until now.

However, your Dad was acting like an egocentric idiot manchild when he went out of his way to endorse the Liberals while remaining a member of the NDP. In my neck of the woods in East Vancouver, people are still p*ssed about what's happened with David Emerson: one doesn't swear allegiance to one party then start making overtures to another. The 'strategic voting' argument is in mathematical reality, a total crock: every party on the ballot has as much chance of winning as any other if it gathers enough support during a campaign. The Ontario NDP were well within their rights to suspend his membership, and it wasn't a vicious attack on him or the members of the CAW. Being CAW President doesn't put you above the constitution of the party that you formally signed on with.

I don't know what your politics are, or for that matter, what your Dad's are anymore: they seem to have changed quite a bit from when I met him in Calgary six years ago. However, there's a right way to change, and a wrong way to change, and the wrong way is trying to pretend that you're still the same. It's not about engulfing oneself in someone else's life or looking at them like they were a shoe, it's about being p*ssed off that someone couldn't make a choice between keeping his word or quitting honourably.

As for my life not being exciting or constructive, that's all relative. Now, if this page were to say that David Emerson showed at least more dignity than Buzz Hargrove by tearing up his Liberal membership to sit in Stephen Harper's cabinet rather than have the Liberal party tear it up for him, I'm sure Jaime's response would certainly be exciting....