Buckdog

If that is genuinely your view, what was your view about Layton voting against a budget that provided an additional $6.2 billion to unemployed in the January budget and the June ways and means?

great post LD - that was so true

Steve's the Liberal Party?

The EI Bill sucks, now says the NDP.

Now to spend months wrangling over the damn thing, while people get no benefits, and Harper stays in power.

Can the nearly broke NDP can raise enough funds in the meantime to survive an election, unlike now?

The Liberal proposal this summer was much better.

Anyway, you can frame this all you wanted. All of the parties are using this bill to jockey into position.

The lipstick is off this pig of a bill. Still, negotiating hard is what the NDP have been needing to do this week, and they haven't. Hopefully, they will change their tack and get a better bill.

Problem is, Harper, I think, wants an election. He just doesn't want to wear it. So I'm not so sure how far Jack can get with this.

Mark ... the ONLY thing the Lib bloggers are interested in is winning power - mindlessly assuming that somehow you will win even though the polling numbers are bad and getting worse for you. I can attribute this ONLY to the fact that Libs believe that they are the 'natural governing party' and by some kind of political alchemy you will turn the lead of Mr. Iggy into gold for yourselves with electoral success.

What the hell is going on with you guys anyway?

You really don't give a shit about the hundreds of thousands who have lost their jobs from the recession. That is obvious from comments I keep reading on Libesque blogs.

Your Party's hunger for a return to power has clouded your good sense.

I'm not a Liberal blogger. I was only while Dion was leader. I do not support Ignatieff. I will not be voting Liberal. It is more likely I will be voting NDP in my riding, though for my own reasons, which I may yet articulate next election.

I have to say, the purpose of a political party is to get power and to implement policy. If you believe that your party has the right stuff, then that's the best way to serve Canadians' interests. Mucking around in Parliament for months over one lousy bill, keeping a crappy minority government in power is not.

I have believed for a long time that the NDP has lost its way, and ceased being a party seeking power, and more a party fulfilling an activist role in Parliament. This has so tainted the NDP's image, I do not believe they can ever break through to form government. If that doesn't bother you, it should. In my experience, dippers are fine with this, being the so-called 'conscience of Parliament.' It's a mistake.

If you want to get things done, get the power to do so. Be the government.

With the capitalist system utterly failing this past year, why aren't the NDP's numbers cranking though the roof? Why are Canadians instead satisfied (leadership polls say) with a neoclassical economist as our PM? <- things to think about. I don't get it either.

Remember this well: Harper spent the entire summer leading the Liberals on in the EI Working Group with no intention to do anything but use it to give the Liberals bad press. Even with Kevin Page siding with the Liberals, I think they Libs lost that PR war. I think it naive to believe that Harper will not screw around more with this file. Harper wants an election, he's just trying to pin it on someone else.

So keeping Harper in power due to the belief that workers will be helped is not very wise.

You know, in Ontario when Mike Harris pulled the plug on his first 'term' he was behind in the polls. He didn't care because knew that he could lead the polls, that is, use his campaign to shape the numbers, rather than to respond to them. Polls numbers tell you some things, but not everything. They don't tell you how to shape the numbers, they only tell you where you've been. Harris shaped that campaign, and won another majority.

The Liberals have a plan. I don't know if it is a good one, but they clearly believe they can shape opinion given the opportunity. And they believe that being in power is how to best serve Canadians.

So does Harper, by the way. He is quite committed to his mostly private vision of Canada. God (or whomever) help us all if he gets a majority.

Anytime politicians' political expedience trumps popular need, they are writing checks against their good will that, sooner or later, will bounce.

Well said Tom! Our 'Liberal' party of Canada has been particularly out of touch with the Canadian public lately. Good comment!

Thanks Dawg!

I really can't stand the thought of another election. Thank you Jack.

that's all I have to say.