Bob Rae should put his money where his mouth is

In the wake of the Governor General’s decision to acquiesce to the request of the Prime Minister to prorogue Parliament, Bob Rae has emerged as the prime champion of the Liberal-NDP coalition that would be propped up by the Bloc Quebecois. Even lame duck Liberal leader, Stéphane Dion has somewhat backed down from the Axis of Idiots, claiming that the Harper government might survive after Parliament returns if the budget is acceptable to his party. As for Rae’s only real competitor in the leadership race, Michael Ignatieff, if he were really gung ho on the idea of a coalition, we would have heard from him during the week before Parliament was prorogued. Jack Layton, assumed to be the driving force of the coalition, now seems to have taken a back seat to the former Ontario NDP premier.

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Bob Rae is currently on a country wide tour to sell the coalition to Canadians. He, like all the other political leaders claims that his way of doing things is in the best interests of Canadians. Certainly since this crisis began over a week ago, leaders and members of all parties have said that they were doing what they were doing because it was in the best interests of the country. There was probably never a time in our history when what was best for Canadians was so subordinated to the greed and the attempt to hold or acquire power by the various leaders. Rae claims that Stephen Harper just has to be stopped; he simply can no longer be allowed to govern. The truth is that it is simply unconscionable to say that the Harper government has to be defeated on either the Throne Speech or the budget when both those are not going to be tabled until seven weeks from now and we have no knowledge about what will be contained in either of them. Bob Rae is doing what he is doing for two reasons. The first is to bolster his attempt to win the Liberal leadership race, either next May or earlier if Dion can be overthrown before them. In fairness to Rae, he is not the only one who wants to see Dion out as soon as possible. By championing the coalition, he is distancing himself from Ignatieff who is obviously uncomfortable with at least getting into bed with the separatists, if not with joining with the NDP. Michael Ignatieff is clearly the front runner in the race and Rae’s only hope for victory is to be able to sell the coalition idea to Liberal Party members. But there is also another reason why Rae is so gung ho to grab power; the sixty year old is worried about his legacy. He is now headed for this history books as being known for his disastrous handling of the recession of the early 1990s when he was Ontario’s first and only socialist premier. Nothing could alter his image more than to lead Canada out of the economic crisis that we are currently in. And Rae uses the perverse logic that because he made so many mistakes in the early 1990s, he is the most able to lead Canada during these bad economic times. Having done a bad job is suddenly a résumé enhancer. He really thinks he is the only one who can save Canada, assuming Canada really needs saving. The reality is that we will be having another election and it will come sooner than later. If an election is not called at the end of January, it is unlikely that either the Harper government or one led by the coalition will last a particularly long time. If Harper is still in power in February he will either be defeated relatively quickly or engineer a defeat if his current high numbers hold. If the coalition should end up in power, they will likely self destruct in fairly short order. If Bob Rae really really believes that the coalition government is the only thing that can save the country, then he should put his money where his mouth is. Rae should announce that he will be talking to Jack Layton about the Liberals and the NDP running as a coalition during the next federal election. Rae should say that his intention, for the benefit of the country you understand, is that the Liberals and the NDP will only run a single candidate in each riding. If this coalition is so important, it should be made formal. An agreement, similar to the one that was made last week with the Bloc could be made again to ensure that if the Liberals-NDP win, they could govern for a reasonable amount of time. Of course this will never happen. That’s because it's not about what’s in the best interests of the country. It’s not even about the coalition. It’s about what’s in the best interests of Bob Rae. It’s that simple.

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