Stephen Taylor

The latest rumours and indications do show that the Liberal party is gearing-up for a late-spring election. I believe that the writ will be dropped on May 9th as Paul Martin returns for a week of extensive coverage after his visit with US President George W Bush this Wednesday (update: actually this Friday). Canadians have placed Canadian-American relations high on the concerns list and whatever Mr. Martin accomplishes in Washington (not Crawford) will be translated into an instant boost into the polls.

Two international also take place in the 36 days between May 9th and an election on June 14th. Paul Martin will visit Normandy (not Norway) on June 6th and the G8 summit in Georgia from June 8th through June 10th. These two events should keep Mr. Martin in the news for international (look I’m doing my job) type of events.

So, Mr. Martin, in his short time in office, has/will become the Prime Minister visible on the international scene while he will be seen as dismal on domestic policies.

Let’s just remember why Canadian-American relations are at a recent all-time low, remember why Canadians were able to liberate France 60 years ago, and contemplate whether the Liberals are setting, or being led by, the trend of globalization.

The Conservative Party of Canada released television ads yesterday. The spots feature a casual-looking Stephen Harper leaning against his desk. Harper mentions that it’s time for accountability in Ottawa and doesn’t mention the sponsorship scandal directly. The ads run will run after the liberal party advertising campaign, which occurred a few weeks ago and featured an adlib Martin talking about how there needs to be accountability in Ottawa. Accountability is a good concept, however, I’ll vote for the party that takes it on as a policy issue and not as an afterthought.

Here are the ads:

Accountable Government 1

Accountable Government 2

Accountable Government 3 (French)

Svend Robinson will step down from his parliamentary duties and take a leave of absence. Today in a press conference, the NDP member from Barnaby-Douglas told the media that the reason was due to a lapse in judgement. He “pocketed a piece of expensive jewelry” and blamed the incident on “severe stress and emotional pain”.

Mr. Robinson is a senior parliamentarian from British Colombia as he was originally elected to the House of Commons in 1979. He has been re-elected seven times since. While it was an extremely childish and foolish thing for Mr. Robinson to do, I find it upsetting to see a career potentially end in such a way. This is not so much a political failure for the NDP as it is a personal failure for Robinson.

I do not subscribe to the principles of the New Democratic Party of Canada and I would not be saddened to see their influence in the House of Commons make way for the votes of the Conservative Party of Canada. However, Mr. Robinson’s seat is still an NDP seat and thus an NDP vote. The personal destruction of Svend Robinson does not benefit the political agenda of any party; his seat may just be filled by another NDP nominee in the next election.

Some may laud this turn of events as a win in the us vs. them realm of partisan politics. Let’s not celebrate the demise of a man’s career. We can criticize a parliamentarian’s personality if it seems to reflect party policy (such as Mr. Robinson’s ill conceived trip to meet with Yassir Arafat), however, the personal misjudgement of Svend Robinson does not reflect his party and therefore I would find it petty to dance on the grave of a man’s career.