Liberals New Green Politics

A follow up on the Dion/May alliance announced today. Just how far are the Liberals willing to go with their new found principle of strategic voting?

Will the Liberals back down from running a candidate in Edmonton Strathcona, considering their poor showing last time, and the fact that the NDP candidate Linda Duncan is an environmentalist.

Will they also not run a candidate in Wild Rose where the Green Party ran second.

After all that would follow Cherniak's dictum; "This is about the Liberal Party doing what is right for a truly progressive Canada. The symbolism of running a candidate in every riding is somewhat meaningless in comparison."

Dion is not running a Liberal against the Green Party Leader in exchange the Greens won't run against Dion. Oh be still my beating heart like they stood a chance in his riding. Being so principled will he offer the same deal to Layton and Duceppe?


And the cynical could see this whole affair as a hastily constructed way of distracting from yesterdays Liberal bad news story on Belinda Stronach.




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Canada's New Progressive Right

With this announcement it is clear that Liberals have taken Gerry Nicoll's advise and moved to the progressive right. May and Dion the new Red Green Tories. A match made in Antigonish.


Globe and MailGreen leader to get free ride from Liberals
Globe and Mail, Canada - 2 hours ago
At the time of Ms. May's announcement it was rumoured that she already had a deal with the Liberals -- the party wouldn't run a candidate against her and ...
Liberals staying out of May vs. MacKay ChronicleHerald.ca
Liberals agree not to run candidate against Green leader CBC Nova Scotia
Green leader gets helping hand from the LiberalsThe Daily News


See:

Elizabeth May and Red Tories

May Day For MacKay

Shameless

Corporatism

Elizabeth May Catholic Grrl

PC=Liberals

No Room for Red Tories

You Tell 'em Danny Boy

Happy Canada Day/Jour heureux du Canada

Green Party

Elizabeth May

Peter MacKay

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Chrysler Inc. vs. Liberal Inc.

Better to take over a failing Big Three Auto company than to play in the back benches of a failing political party.

Onex, Magna eyeing joint Chrysler bid: report

Belinda Stronach leaving politics for Magna

Belinda Stronach to return to Magna as it grapples with Big Three auto woes

Belinda Stronach, the former Canadian cabinet minister who made national headlines for both her political and personal life, has decided not to stand for re-election and will rejoin the ranks of Magna International Inc. (MGa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research) as the auto parts company's executive vice-chair.

The Liberal politician, the daughter of Magna founder and Chairman Frank Stronach, said on Wednesday that encouragement from the company's leaders played a part in her decision.

"My father is looking to the future, the company is facing important strategic decisions, and the Canadian and global auto sector and economy are in a period of great challenge," Stronach said in a statement.

"So I am stepping aside from elected politics for the time being and will now take part in public life in a different way."

While in the Liberal party the best she could do around globalization was focus on mosquito netting.

Belinda Stronach focuses on global projects

Now she can focus on the real impact of globalization and how Daddies company exploits workers world wide.

Magna International's workforce dropped by about 1,150 net jobs in Canada last year as tough industry conditions dented the auto-parts colossus.

It marks the first time in more than a decade that annual employment at the country's largest industrial employer declined.

Magna's annual information form shows employment fell about 5 per cent to 21,050 from a peak of 22,200 in Canada during 2005.

Magna's information form also reveals that while employment decreased here, the company's overall workforce in 23 countries climbed marginally by 450 jobs to a record 83,250 in 2006 from 2005. Every other region in the Magna empire posted job gains.

Senior Magna executives have said in recent years that the company can stay competitive only by producing parts in lower-cost regions and near where auto makers build new assembly plants around the world.

It has led to strong increases in Magna's workforce in Mexico and Asia in recent years.

Although auto makers have expanded some operations here during the past decade, they have added only one assembly plant.

Three other assembly operations have also closed.

This shows that the good ship Liberal is leaking from all seams after electing Dion to be Captain. He relegated Belinda to the back bench, a big mistake.

And clearly internal party communications are not good, since the Liberals would not have appointed their favorite pet feminist Martha Hall Finlay to a safe seat in Toronto if they knew Belinda was quiting. Since she was the candidate in Newmarket kicked out for Belinda.

Of course with the woof and wiff of capitalist deal making over Chrysler during the past two months on could say this was a unexpected momentary decision. But clearly since she decided not to contest the leadership for the party, the writing was on the wall.

The selection of Dion as leader and his lack luster performance since then can only have hastened her decision. Whose your daddy? Well Belinda knows. Better to work for a Strong Daddy than a weak Dion.

As I have said many times Dion is the safe man, the safe choice, the third way, all which makes him a lame duck. Belinda leaving is a sure fire indictment of all the Liberals failures to change, despite Gerard Kennedy's assertions otherwise, and Dion's failure as Leader.

See:

Chrysler Made In Canada?

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Real Leadership

With these poll numbers Jack Layton can say that he would make a better PM than Stephane Dion. Since he got more support in Quebec and in the West than Dion and his support is competitive with the "Official Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition".

While Dion has been on another of his invisible tours of Canada, his third since the beginning of the year, Jack's visibility has been in the house thanks to the deal making the NDP is willing to do in order to keep parliament functioning. Jack has been an effective opposition leader, Dion has not.

Thus if it quacks like a lame duck, and walks like a lame duck, it's name must be Dion.

Keep those poll numbers coming in, they just make Liberals quack up.

H/T to Wundrick



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Liberals The New PC's

So suggests Gerry Nicolls who recently was fired from the National Citizens Coalition. It seems he is uber disappointed in the new Authoritarian Government of Harper the autarch. As result of his criticism of the Harpocrites, the invisible hand of the government reached out and touched the NCC which in return gave Gerry the boot.

Now Nicolls is suggesting a revival of the old Progressive Conservatives under the New Liberal Party of Dion. This of course has upset some Liberal bloggers, but frankly considering Dion's flip flops on issues like the war in Afghanistan and the Anti-Scab legislation, well if it walks like a PC and quacks like a PC it probably is a PC.

And think of it, if the Liberals became the new PC party Elizabeth May would join in a heartbeat and dissolve the Green Party into a new Progressive coalition with the Liberals.

The Progressive Conservative Party was cannibalized by the Alliance Party. The loss of the adjective “progressive” was more than grammatical. The heart was torn out of Canadian politics. The loss of the traditional, principled Progressive Conservative counter-weight to the ethically flexible Liberals has cost this country dearly.

After all the Progressives who came out of the PC's are now going Green.

See:

Elizabeth May and Red Tories

May Day For MacKay

Green Party

Elizabeth May

Peter MacKay


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Liberals Defeat Anti-Scab Law

Whether in government or as the Official Opposition the Liberals have once again shown their true colours. They defeated the Bill C-257 the Anti-Scab law.

Not the Conservative government, the Liberals. Who flip flopped, having promised to support the private members bill, Dion in the last two weeks changed his mind and said the party would not support the law.

Again the boys from Bay Street pull the strings of the Liberal party.

Progressives should remember this.

Since the Liberals have defeated Anti-Scab bills every time they have come before the house over the past 14 years.

For a breakdown on how they voted see Uncorrected Proofs.

Interesting side note that there is no press coverage of this at Google Canada Top Stories.

See;

Anti-Scab

Dion

Buzz

Gomperism

Liberals

Unions


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Taliban Dion

Well the pejorative "Taliban Jack", used by Blogging Tories against the NDP leader for the principled opposition he and the party has to the war in Afghanistan is now being used by Harper against Dion and the Liberals.

Right Hon. Stephen Harper (Prime Minister, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of National Defence has provided a clear explanation to the House of Commons. As the member knows, this government was at the time operating under an agreement signed by the previous government. We have since entered into a new arrangement with the Independent Afghan Human Rights Commission.

I can understand the passion that the Leader of the Opposition and members of his party feel for Taliban prisoners. I just wish occasionally they would show the same passion for Canadian soldiers.

Of course truth is the first victim of war. In this case the principle of innocent until proven guilty is also abandoned. How does the government know these prisoners are Taliban, since they are Pashtun villagers arrested in the war zone?

Nor do they have any information about them since they handed them over to the Afghanistan government with no proper follow up procedures.

Top military officers off base on detainee file

Which was the whole point of the oppositions demand that the lying, incompetent Defense Minister resign.

And predictably the Blogging Tories are all cheering the PM's slander. The progressive blogosphere is all a buzz about the latest over the top comment from the PM. Why the surprise he is an autarch not a statesman.

See

O'Connor

Afghanistan






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Bye Joe, will Wappel Go?

Well Dion turfed Joe Commuzi out of caucus for simply announcing he is supporting the Conservative Budget. No great loss, he also stepped down as a Cabinet Minister when Paul Martin whipped the cabinet for the Same Sex Marriage vote. He is a member of the conservative rump of the Liberals.

Now what are the Liberals going to do about their other conservative backbencher Tom Wappel? He who voted with the government on Same Sex Marriage and more recently on the Anti-Terrorism Act;

In late February, Ontario MP Tom Wappel broke ranks and voted with the Conservative government on extending two clauses in the Anti-Terrorism Act. However, the Liberals never announced any punishment for Wappel. Dion called it an internal caucus matter.

Dion's weakness as a Leader is showing. Both these votes, the Budget and Anti-Terrorism Act were whipped votes. And he turfed Commuzi even before he actually voted whereas he did nothing after Wappel did vote with the government.

Wappel unrepentant for defying Dion on vote

Renegade Liberal will face unspecified “consequences” for defying Dion

But it seems that Dion only applies discipline to those who are not intending to run again, like Commuzi.

Of course consistency is the bugaboo of the Dion regime.


See

Dion

Liberals


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Jack Ain't Smiling

NDP launches ‘Leadership and Fairness’ campaign

And Jack ain't smiling in any of these TV ads. He gives the viewer the stiff upper lip. Serious stuff. Do I smell spring election in the air?

	Jack Layton on environmental leadership » View Ad
	Jack Layton on better health care » View Ad
	Jack Layton on the prosperity gap » View A

Timing is everything, and since the Liberals don't have TV ads, and are moving towards the Conservative position on issues, well this should help the NDP in the polls.

Meanwhile the Liberals hit the road with Dion No-Show, that is he makes a hit in the national media but not with the local folks where he visits.

Liberal leader Stephane Dion was on the offensive as he spoke to about 200 Liberal supporters in Vancouver Sunday night.

Meanwhile the Liberals having spent over a year reviewing policy in preparation for an election have come up with....nada, nothing, zip.

So we are left with Dion issuing press releases where he flip flops again, while whining that the Conservatives stole the Liberals platform.

Like their support for the Made In Alberta plan for environmental intensity targets.

In 2005, the former Liberal government proposed regulations that would require companies to reduce the "intensity" of their greenhouse gas emissions. Dion was environment minister at the time. But in recent weeks, several Liberals have hinted they are revising their plan.

There is again the perennial pre election talk about the need for a merger of the Left, but which left is that? There is no coherent left in the Liberals, many being more Red Tories like Brison and Stronach than social democrats.

As I said before the NDP needs to attack the Liberals on their weakness; their failures to develop a national day care program, their support for the war in Afghanistan, their support for increasing police powers against civil liberties, their failure to support anti-scab laws, their flip flop on the environment.

These are of course the same positions the Conservatives embrace. By defining themselves in opposition to the Conservative program, the NDP does something the Liberals cannot and will not do.






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Economist Trashes Made In Alberta Green Plan

Ouch!

Jeffrey Rubin, chief economist with CIBC World Markets, said Tuesday that governments in Ottawa and Alberta are pursuing a minimalist policy that will actually lead to significantly higher greenhouse gas emissions. Eventually, he said, Canada will have to get tougher, prodded by a growing movement in the United States to combat global warming.

Of course he is a Bay Street Banker part of the Kyoto Conspiracy.

See:

Environment

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Harpers Alberta Green Plan

Polluters could pay into fund rather than cut emissions under Tory plan

While this article focuses on how Harpers Green plan is really just the Liberals Green Plan with a new cover, the reality is that even that plan was a Made In Alberta Plan, a sop to the Oil Industry.

It is polluter pays and intensity based. Just what the Big Oil Boys in Calgary ordered.

And like the Liberal Plan intensity based regulations will simply see our Greenhouse gas emissions increase, like they did under the Liberals.

Proving Harpers point that Canada cannot and will not meet it's Kyoto obligations. Because Big Oil won't let us.

What the Liberals could not do in thirteen years, the Conservatives have not done in 13 months. And will not be able to do with their Made In Alberta Hot Air plan.

Alberta is the only province in the country with legislation to reduce greenhouse gases, but it is based on intensity -- not absolute reduction targets.

The province is still negotiating with industry over its greenhouse gas emissions intensity targets, but a spokesman for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers has said industry is looking at a target that would cut emissions intensity by 12%.

Stelmach said his government is pushing for more.

CAPP says few companies could meet the 12% target, but the proposal is "affordable" as long as the penalty is in the range of $15 per tonne of emissions.

A 1000 mw coal-fired power plant produces about six million tons of carbon dioxide annually.

Stelmach said he wants targets in place by July 1.

"I know industry wants to do its part and will do its part," Stelmach said. "If they don't come to the table, we'll make sure it happens. We will get it done."

He said he's confident Alberta and Ottawa are on the same page on emissions intensity targets, but stressed there needs to be a single regulator of the protocols

However, the premier maintained Alberta has invested heavily in emissions-cutting technology.

"This approach has already produced ... a 16 per cent reduction in emissions intensity from 1992 levels," said Stelmach.

Calgary-Northwest MLA Greg Melchin, who served as energy minister from 2004 to 2006, said Alberta imposes some of the tightest environmental standards among the world's major energy producers.

NDP environment critic Nathan Cullen was less generous toward Stelnach's complaints. "He's doing an apples and oranges comparison that's not going to pass muster," he told Macleans.ca. "Alberta's emissions have gone up 39% since 1990, the most of any province. He can claim whatever intensity-based games he likes; that's a business as usual scenario.

Premier Ed Stelmach is defending Alberta's record on greenhouse gas emissions, saying the province has reduced emissions intensity, a measure that takes economic growth into account.

The 16 per cent drop in emissions intensity since 1990 shows progress on the environment file that has not hurt the economy, particularly the energy sector, Stelmach said Wednesday.

Emissions intensity is based on a formula that takes economic growth into consideration. The overall production of greenhouse gases in Alberta has steadily climbed and shows no signs of levelling off.

Total greenhouse gas emissions in Alberta have increased by 39.4 per cent from 168.17 megatons in 1990 to 234.51 megatons in 2004, according to Environment Canada.

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The Only Poll That Counts

The latest poll shows that the Harper attack ads and attacks on Dion and the Liberals has had an impact in the ROC. But the real poll is what their impact has been in Quebec, because Quebec is the key to any Liberal or Conservative victory. And their impact has been a big fat Zero.


Decima's poll, provided to the Canadian Press, showed the separatist Bloc Quebecois, which runs candidates only in Quebec, stood at 35 percent in the province, with the Liberals at 23 percent and the Conservatives at 15 percent.

And for those who think we are going to have a spring election sprung on us, think again...not with these numbers we ain't.

In an average of the last three weekly polls, the Conservatives have 33 per cent, the Liberals 30 per cent, the NDP 14 per cent, the Bloc nine per cent and the Greens 11 per cent.


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Liberals Scab

Liberals are not the party of workers in Canada.

When in power provincially Liberals oppose a living wage.

Now the Federal Liberals under Dion have flip flopped on anti-scab legislation Bill C-257.

A private members bill from the BQ supported by the NDP and until today, supported by the Liberals.

And like the flip flop on the Anti-Terrorism Act, Mr. Dion does it again. But will he whip the vote? Probably not. Without the Liberals support the bill will die on third reading. When they were the government the Liberal majority voted against previous private member anti-scab bills.

My what a friend business has in Mr. Dion. I guess two controversial votes in a week would be a bit much for Mr. Dion's fragile leadership. The infighting in caucus would be even more virulent than it was over the Anti-Terrorism Act. After all the Liberals are the party of Bay Street as much as the Conservatives are.

By flip flopping on this bill, which has been placed before parliament five times now, the Liberals prove they are not just pro-business but pro-scab. Which means anti-union. I hope they don't plan on trying to solicit funds from their old friends in the General Workers Union in Toronto.

Progressives? In name only.

Green? Sure thats the colour of money.

Friends of Buzz Hargrove? Only during elections.

Labour has a political party and it is the NDP. All others are pretenders and fair weather friends.

See

Dion

Buzz

Gomperism

Liberals

Unions


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Dion Sucked

Celine Dion not Stephane Dion.

At the Academy Awards.

Doing a pathetic souless song dedicated to the great composer Ennio Morricone.

10:52: I'm not the biggest fan of movie scores, but I have to say, Ennio Morricone elevates the genre. Take notes, please, John Williams. Celine Dion opens her mouth, my cue to get up and stretch my legs.

In fact it was so bad that while she looked like she was lip-syncing the words were actually coming out of her mouth. With lip-syncing there is at least some power, some force, some emotion because it is pre recorded. This was live.

You had to lean forward to hear her sing, and as the camera focused on her mouth I was given to think of a Kissing Gourami as she painfully formed each word with her lips as she sang. High notes ferget it. Deep contralto ferget it. It was white toast, nah make that Melba toast.

Luckily it was the Academy Awards and not American Idol, or she would never have made the cut. But then again Best Supporting Actress awards are given to those who don't make it on Idol.


Dion's performance was a flat as the other Dion's has been in Question period.

That's what happens when unilingual Francophone's try to express themselves in English by reading from a script or a teleprompter.





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Reading Entrails

The other reason Harper acted as he did yesterday, in pushing the Liberals buttons, is that he has read the entrails; the polls.

He is laying the groundwork to piss off the opposition enough that they get sucked into a confrontation that will lead to an election. Clever that.

He will wait till after March 26 to really begin pushing their red election buttons.




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Canada's Two Opposition Leaders

Canada does not have a PM it has an Opposition Leader running a Minority Government.

That is what was revealed by Stephen Harpers actions in the House during Question Period today.

He attempted a personal slander against a Liberal MP but was shouted down by the Official Opposition Liberals before he could finish quoting this from the Vancouver Sun;

A young Liberal MP who delivered Stephane Dion 250 leadership votes is the son-in-law of a man police have interviewed in connection with the Air India bombing case. Navdeep Singh Bains, MP for Mississauga-Brampton South, shot on to the national stage after the December 2006 convention in which he delivered huge support to Gerard Kennedy and later to Dion, who won the Liberal leadership by 437 votes.

The Vancouver Sun reporter is on a campaign to link the Federal Liberals directly to the Air India disaster. And it is a conspiracy theory worthy of a tinfoil hat. Her apparent political biases are gleefully pointed out by at least one sympathetic conservative blogger at the National Pest. She goes way back to show that the whole Air India disaster was Liberal bungling, or worse, conspiracy with nationalist militants in the Sikh community.

The number of questions surrounding why the Liberal party has suddenly done an about face on extending important provisions of the Anti-Terrorism Act, provisions needed to continue the investigation of the Air India bombing, continues to grow.

Reporter Kim Bolan at the Vancouver Sun revealed that former prime minister Paul Martin sought the support of a terrorist group, the International Sikh Youth Federation, during his 1990 bid for the Liberal leadership.

Mr. Martin, flanked by other notable Liberals (Albina Guarnieri and Maurizio Bevilacqua) appeared at an ISYK convention asking delegates for their support as he sought the leadership of the party.

Here is the critical line in Ms. Bolan's report: "The Martin speech came two years after then Conservative external affairs minister Joe Clark warned Canadian politicians to steer clear of the federation, the Babbar Khalsa and the World Sikh Organization because of terrorist links."

Harper used the pretext of the Air India Inquiry and his attempt to renew the Liberals Anti-Terrorism Act to personally vilify and call into question the integrity of a sitting MP and his family. He was so eager he almost jumped out of his ill fitting suit.

Like the blogger at the National Pest, Harper is attempting to opportunistically use the Air India disaster and its 'about to fail public inquiry' to throw heat on the Liberals.

The Conservatives in opposition have long held that there was something nefarious and untoward in the Liberals working with their traditional base; immigrants and new Canadians. The Vancouver Sun reporter continues her articles in the same vein. The swipe by both the Vancouver Sun and the Conservatives is that the Liberals are guilty of associating with terrorists because of their support and fund raising in the Sikh and Tamil communities. A broad brush is used condemning whole communities, and the terrorist smear is one of convenience for the Conservatives. After all they have skeletons in their own closet.

What Harper attempted to do today was something that was NOT Prime Ministerial. Being the autocrat and autarch he is, he could not resist.

But PM's being statesmen and parliamentarians do not do such things. They leave the bullying and bully boy tactics to underlings, to cabinet ministers, to right hand men and women, whom they trust. To be able to sit back serenely in knowing you ordered the hit but not taking the pleasure or abuse that comes from delivering it.

But pompous megalomaniac he is Harper could not resist, nor could he trust anyone else to deliver his hit on Dion and the Liberals.And so he showed himself to be what he really is, an Opposition Leader. Not a Prime Minister.

And what he was today was an Opposition Leader, a strong one, one who is gaining in the polls. And thus one doomed by his limitations of office, and personality, to act like an Opposition Leader rather than as a PM. Holding on to power with a minority, but acting like you are majority has won Harper the polling support of some Canadians.

But in reality what the recent polls have shown is that he is far better as Leader of the Opposition than Dion is.

And that is what he confirmed today. He does not have the stuff to be PM. He is no statesman, and no parliamentarian.

He spoke of being the Executive branch of the government, and he is one who wants Executive power and prestige that the office of President has to the south.

And as such he will always be a pretender not a PM in the Canadian system of parliamentary politics.

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Glass Half Full

CTV / Globe and Mail focused their reporting about their latest poll on Mr. Dion vs Mr. Harper, as usual.

That's a glass half empty.

On the other hand the glass is half full.

As their polling also shows that at this point it is just as likely to be Mr. Layton vs. Mr. Harper.

Meanwhile, when asked which party leader had the clearest vision of where he wants to take the country, Harper showed a significant lead over his rivals (percentage-point change from a Dec. 3-4 poll in brackets):

• Stephen Harper: 50 per cent (+ 18)
• Stephane Dion: 22 per cent (- 16 from when Paul Martin was leader)
• Jack Layton: 20 per cent (+ 1)
• Gilles Duceppe: 8 per cent (- 4)

More than half of respondents also felt that Harper is the most decisive of the party leaders.

• Harper: 53 per cent
• Dion: 19 per cent
• Layton: 20 per cent
• Duceppe: 8 per cent

Dion also lost out on charisma, which he himself defended shortly after becoming leader of his party.

"I would not have been able to win this race if I had not been able to connect with Canadians ... I have a capacity to communicate with passion and with reason," he said last December.

But respondents seem to have felt otherwise in the poll. Here are the results when voters were asked who was the most charismatic (percentage-point change from a Dec. 3-4 poll in brackets):

• Harper: 35 per cent (+ 18)
• Dion: 20 per cent (- 9 from when Martin was leader)
• Layton: 36 per cent (- 2)
• Duceppe: 10 per cent (- 4)

Lack of charisma, indecisive, and a whiner.....Dion slams Tory attack ads; wants Harper to withdraw them as matter of honour

Yep, it's as much a race between the NDP and Conservatives as it is the Liberals and Conservatives. Between Layton and Harper as much as it is Dion versus Harper.

And it's a dead heat on the environment. So much for the greening of the Liberals under Dion.

If there is a party in Canada facing a failure in leadership this poll shows only one; The Liberals.

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Liberals Weakness

The environment will NOT be the key issue in the next election. It will have an impact but not what Dion and the Greens hope for.

Harper has made it clear that the next election will be about Law and Order and Afghanistan. And this is where the Liberals are weak, a house divided.

And this is where the NDP is strongest in holding principled positions directly opposed to the Harpocrites. Sure their positions are at odds with pundits and pollsters but in the end a clear stark line of demarcation between the NDP and the Harpocrites leaves the Liberals out on a limb. As centrists they have failed to appeal to either the right or the left, and all Dion has done is paint himself green.

Meanwhile on issues of Law and Order and Afghanistan they suffer from the political baggage they carry from having been the government in power that introduced Anti-Terrorism laws and troops in Afghanistan.

Thus the Dion Liberals skate all over the ice trying to coordinate their right wing and left wing. And like the Oilers, they are not scoring goals.

Challenged this week on his judicial agenda, Harper opted for a schoolboy counterattack. Without much connection to anything relevant, the Prime Minister accused Liberals of not liking the police. That tactic echoes this government's response to skepticism about Afghanistan: To doubt its purpose or progress is to undermine troop morale

Despite growing opposition within Liberal ranks, party Leader Stephane Dion says Grits will "absolutely not" revisit their decision to oppose an extension of two controversial provisions of the Anti-Terrorism Act on civil liberties grounds. Dion's spokesman Andre Fortin made the statement Friday as a potential mutiny appeared to be shaping up among Liberal MPs, some of whom argue that one of the measures, investigative hearings, are vital to an RCMP probe into the 1985 Air India bombing. Among Liberal MPs citing the Air India case are justice critic Marlene Jennings, Stephen Owen, Keith Martin and Don Bell.

While the party may have put its bickering behind it, the NDP said yesterday Mr. Dion has yet to make clear his position, refusing to back a withdrawal of troops but also opposing the extension of the mission to 2009. "If Mr. Dion is looking to blame someone for the current state of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan, he might want to start with his own caucus," the NDP said, noting that several key Liberals did not turn up for a vote on extending the mission.

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Tweedle Dee Tweedle Dum Green Poll

Too bad they didn't include all the party leaders in this poll. The results would have been interesting.

However when it comes to whose more Green, Dion is ahead of Harper. Despite Harpers recent conversion.

No surprise since Dion has made the politics of the environment his hobby horse and he is a one trick pony.

Luckily the majority of Canadians don't trust either of them when it comes to who is really green.


(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The two major party leaders have not convinced many Canadians about their commitment to the environment, according to a poll by Angus Reid Strategies. In the survey, 31 per cent of respondents believe Liberal leader Stéphane Dion cares the most about the issue, while 13 per cent select Conservative leader and prime minister Stephen Harper. However, 28 per cent of respondents pick neither politician, and 27 per cent are not sure.

Polling Data

In your view, which of these individuals cares the most about the environment and global warming?

	All	Men	Women	Age 18-34	Age 35-54	Age 55+
Stéphane Dion (Lib.)	31%	37%	26%	33%	28%	34%
Stephen Harper (Con.)	13%	16%	10%	9%	12%	20%
Neither	28%	25%	32%	30%	30%	25%
Not sure	27%	23%	32%	28%	31%	21%

Source: Angus Reid Strategies
Methodology: Online interviews with 1,122 Canadian adults, conducted on Feb. 6 and Feb. 7, 2007. Margin of error is 3.1 per cent.

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