Paul Martin at a Liberal Party rally.
They may lose elections, they may sign environmental accords and do nothing about them, and they may come up with hair-brained carbon taxes, but if there’s one thing the Liberal’s are good it its pointing fingers.
In his first meeting with the press after the Liberal’s disastrous election showing Stephane Dion blamed Conservative attack ads for ‘cementing in the minds of Canadians’ 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 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.
Today, the National Post reports that Paul Martin is blaming Jean Cretien for his loss. It appears that, much like Dion, Martin doesn’t feel losing was his fault:
Martin accuses Chretien of deliberately leaving the unexploded bomb of the sponsorship scandal behind when he left office, set to blow up in the face of his successor.
“I was mad that people I knew had been involved,” Martin writes, insisting that he had been kept out of the loop. “I was mad at Jean Chretien for having left me this time bomb.
“It drove me crazy that I had to deal with this leftover mess when there were so many more important issues I had come into government to confront.”
I guess its understandable, considering that he was busy being angry at everyone else, that Martin didn’t have time to be angry that Canadian’s tax dollars were being stuffed in Liberal pockets faster than you can say “manilla envelope”.
One of Jean Cretien’s final moves was to impose changes on political contribution rules. On that, the Post reports the following:
Martin accuses Chretien also of leaving the Liberal party a second unexploded time bomb by changing the rules governing political party financing, a change that helped the Conservatives.
“It was Stephane [Dion], I am sad to say, who suffered most from legislation that might reasonably be interpreted as having been aimed to get at me.”
I find this interesting for two reasons.
First, as an average Canadian I find the idea that political parties now have to raise funds from their members rather than from the deep – and obviously out for influence – pockets of large corporate donors a good thing. While Mr. Martin may like the idea of hitting up a few large donors for cash, that’s hardly a good way to keep government honest.
Second, Martin is right that the rules changes hurt the Liberals badly. In fact, the Liberals fundraising numbers since their defeat in 2006 have been pathetic. What everyone seems to overlook is that this is both an inditement of the Liberal’s past practice of trading significant donations from business for ‘consideration’ and of the fact that Liberal grassroots support is virtually non-existent.
The fundraising numbers show the Conservative Party of Canada raised $3.52 million in the second quarter of 2008 compared with the Liberal’s who raised just shy of $980,000.
The Liberals complain that the Conservatives can afford advertising when they can’t.
What they really should be asking themselves is why aren’t regular Canadians willing to donate?
I guess its easier to point fingers.
- Rafael.
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