If you are one of those who enjoys putting down the occasional $2 bet on an interesting horse race, you are hardly going to bet anything on the federal Liberal leadership. Is there even any point in establishing a morning line in such a limited race? You already know who will win.
And you certainly know who the real losers are! While insisting that anyone who wants to comply with the rules, has a right to run for the leadership, this blog has been regularly dismissing those who contribute nothing to the race and act as sandwiches of plain bread to dull the real flavour of the race. Takach and Bertschi were dismissed out of hand after their pathetic showings in Vancouver. Karen McCrimmon fell off the turnip wagon going through Winnipeg. Martin Cauchon had disappointed us to such a degree that he was dismissed after the Mississauga effort and Deborah Coyne had run her course by the time we got to Halifax. We have a present for the person who lets us down in the Montreal event later this month.
The good news in this race is that Justin Trudeau has grown. He has matured throughout the race. He is obviously getting better advice and—unlike his father—following the advice. And that is one thing that people should always remind themselves of: Justin Trudeau is more like his mother than his father. He is better looking than his father, he is more sensitive than his father and he does not have the snobbish intellect of his father. That could add up to being a better Prime Minister of Canada than his father.
Since Justin will win, Marc Garneau will come second and Joyce Murray third. Mind you, Martha Hall Findlay could challenge Joyce Murray’s position but we certainly hope not. Joyce Murray was the only candidate to bring concrete ideas to the race in terms of where the Liberal Party of Canada is heading and how to get there. Where she let us down was in her debating skills. She is not a leader.
In that sense, Marc Garneau showed himself to be much more than a flyer of jet-assisted space objects. More to the right than we like, he proved to be more aggressive and more of a quick thinker than we previously knew. Marc seems to need refreshers on political trends in the 21st Century. He appears to have been stifled by the Quebec version of Liberal politics. He needs to re-examine his stands on some critical issues.
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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry
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