If I did it...

The title of today's post should illustrate with how much disgust this page reacts to any association with the Liberal Party of Canada, who will be picking a new leader in Montreal this weekend. Liberals like to believe they're progressive while voting against a federal anti-scab law. Liberals touted their commitment to the Kyoto Protocol and did nothing to back it up. Liberals claimed to oppose the Bush administration's misadventures in Iraq, but freed up American troops for deployment in Iraq by having Canadian soldiers take their place in Afghanistan. Liberals claim to support same-sex marriage, yet dozens of their own caucus goosestep in time with Stephen Harper to subvert the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Liberals claim they're the only party who can stand up to a Conservative government, but during the 1990's, gleefully carried on with Free Trade, the Goods and Services Tax, privatization of the CBC, Air Canada, and VIA Rail, while at the same time cutting important federal programs to make Paul Martin look heroic.

Of the four candidates with the best chance to win in Montreal, none of them appear capable or worthy of leading the Liberals to a majority in the next election, which should be early in 2007. If this page did have to choose among the four, my choice would be for the candidate who at least comes the closest to being able to reach that goal, Stephane Dion. Observers have only recently treated Dion as a potential winner, largely due to the fact that he's an abrasive policy wonk with bad English, and his staunch federalism vilifies him in his home province of Quebec. The last time the Liberals had a leader like that, the best he could do was lead the party to three straight majorities.