http://www.thehilltimes.ca/html/index.php?display=story&full_path=/2004/february/16/persichilli/Will the federal Liberal Party survive this mess? Not likely
It started with the fight between two people: Paul Martin and Jean ChrŽtien. The question now, however, is not whose reputation is on the line, but how far this fight will go. But one thing is deadly certain, this fight is beyond the personal and nasty dispute between two political titans and now involves the entire political organization and perhaps the entire democratic system upon which our country is based.
The question now is: Will the Liberal Party survive this mess? I'm not optimistic.
Canadians are a very tolerant lot, but also they're focused and pragmatic. They know that democracy works only if you have an honest government and a healthy opposition. For 10 years, we have proven to the world that you can have a democracy even without an opposition. Now we are going to take this experiment to a different high: we are going to show the world that a democracy can exist also without a government.
This is a dangerous game.
If our country is still sound and safe after 10 years of a democratic dictatorship, it's only because Canadian people are responsible and did not take advantage of the vacuum at the top. If Liberals were able to govern for 10 years, it's only because Canadian people parked their confidence in the only spot available, hoping that the other organizations would act responsibly.
What we see today, is a replay of what we saw after Brian Mulroney's government.
The Conservative Party was not destroyed by Canadian people. Yes, it's true, they would have delivered a sound defeat to them, like the one suffered by the Liberals in 1984. But after a couple terms in purgatory, they would have been back in government. In fact, Canadian people started wondering about Liberals already in 1997; definitely they were ready to dump the Liberals in the 2000 elections. It was the litigious, personal revenge, petty politics of the Conservatives that allowed Jean Chretien to be returned to power.
http://www.thehilltimes.ca/html/index.php?display=story&full_path=/2004/february/16/francoli/Sponsorship inquiry to 'rip open the underbelly' of Liberal Party
The new Paul Martin government will live to rue the day it called a judicial public inquiry into the Quebec sponsorship scandal, predicts Jean Chretien's biographer Lawrence Martin.
"It will rip open the underbelly of the party and all its patronage operations. There is a lot of really smelly stuff in there," said Mr. Martin, who is also a columnist for The Globe and Mail.
Mr. Martin completed last fall the best-selling second and final volume of his biography of former prime minister Jean Chretien's life and 40-year political career called, Iron Man: The Defiant Reign of Jean ChrŽtien. The veteran journalist and best-selling author who has written extensively about the scandals that dogged the former prime minister throughout his three Liberal governments, said that Liberals should be especially worried if the inquiry widens the scope of its probe.
The Martin government announced it was striking an independent Commission of Public Inquiry the same day Auditor General Sheila Fraser tabled her damning report into the $250-million sponsorship program on Feb. 10.
http://www.thehilltimes.ca/html/index.php?display=story&full_path=/2004/february/16/rana_2/Federal Grits joining NDP, say NDP MPs, strategists
Disgruntled federal Grits feel shut out by new Paul Martin team, joining federal NDP
Federal Liberals, who feel shut out of the new Paul Martin government, are starting to join the federal NDP, working on some NDP incumbent MPs' campaigns, and sending in rŽsumŽs to work for the left-leaning party, says NDP MPs and strategists in Ottawa.
A top NDP strategist told The Hill Times that the NDP office in Ottawa has received "about 15" resumes from Liberal political staffers who now want to work for the NDP since Paul Martin (LaSalle-ƒmard, Que.) became Prime Minister.
"We are inundated with interest from Liberals because the more people see Paul Martin as Prime Minister, the less they like that party....
unsolicited resumes for no jobs, we just get them. We have received probably about 15 or so since Paul Martin became Prime Minister," said Jamey Heath, director of communications and research for the NDP Caucus.
And last week, Ian Capstick, a former legislative assistant to former minister of Canadian heritage Sheila Copps (Hamilton East, Ont.) joined the NDP as its caucus media officer. Mr. Capstick will start his new job this week.
Mr. Capstick had worked for Ms. Copps since 2003 and prior to working for her, he worked as a summer student for former minister of defence Art Eggleton (York Centre, Ont.). He also volunteered in the 2000 election campaign of Minister of International cooperation Aileen Carroll (Barrie-Simcoe-Bradford, Ont.).