After spending several days sequestered in Stornaway Stephane Dion has come out and seen his shadow.
Rather than step down as the leader of the Liberal Party, as was widely expected by the media, Mr. Dion has announced that he will remain as leader until the leadership convention next year.
I must say, I’m quite surprised that he has managed to hold on to the position what with the number of knives recently plunged into his back by his soon-to-be former caucus. Especially since earlier today the debate seemed to be over whether a Bob Rae or Michael Ignatieff supporter would be named as interim leader.
However, his nearly week-long absence from the public eye can now be explained. Stephane needed to work what connections he has within the party to negotiate his departure. I wouldn’t be surprised if we will also find out that, besides staying on as Liberal Party leader, Dion will have his leadership campaign debt covered by the party.
Dion spent as much time talking about the Green Shift during his departure speech than he did during the last weeks of the campaign. Instead, he blamed the Conservative Party’s advertising for his failure and suggested his main reason to remain leader is to make sure that the “low propaganda” cannot do the same thing to the next leader.
In Dion’s mind election advertising by the Conservatives is the main reason for the Liberal’s loss.
When asked about his own performance Stephane Dion answered,
I consulted a lot about my own performance and I have been told that it has been a very good one. That I have been a good campaigner, I spoke with conviction, we had a good platform. The problem I have been told in all my consultation was that Canadians didn’t know this Stephane Dion. [...] The only moment where I was in their living rooms was in the debates and I’m told I have given a good performance there. The same for the Green Shift [...] This propaganda cemented the mindset of Canadians to the point that its the main reason why we lost.
Talk about delusional.
Robert Fife, on CTV, nailed it when he said Stephane Dion is living in a fantasy land where the Conservative’s are responsible for his failure. Instead, his Green Shift was the anchor around the Liberal’s neck.
In fact, according to Fife its questionable that Dion will be allowed to stay on.
In the next few days Liberals will either sheathe their swords or turn Dion into even more of a pincushion. We’ll have to wait and see…
- Rafael.
Now that Dion is done, it still remains to be seen if Elizabeth May will survive the backlash from her catastrophic deal with Dion.
The Toronto Star is suggesting that May be recruited into the Liberal party. She might as well. She’s already transformed the Green party into a farm club for the Liberal party.
Patrick Ross
October 20th, 2008
That’s quite true. I can’t see how the GPC could possibly leave Elizabeth May at the helm. It was bad enough that she steered the party towards being “Liberal Lite” but her broken promise to not throw her candidates under the bus must have left a lot of people in the Green Party wondering just why she’s the leader.
Of course, what with their touchy-feely nature I’d be surprised to find the Greens even have a mechanism for removing a leader.
Rafael
October 20th, 2008
[...] a negative perception of him that lasted through the election and caused his defeat. In fact, as I mentioned previously, Stephane actually held onto the ill conceived belief that he did well in the election: I consulted [...]
Trapped in Suburbia… » Blog Archive » Paul Martin and the Blame Game.
October 24th, 2008