The increasing irrelevance of the NDP

Politics is all about power. While there may be an occasional politician who seeks elective office for what they perceive to be the public good, these men and women are few and far between. In federal politics, there are some MPs whose primary interest is the well being of their constituents. They never make it into cabinet, keep getting re-elected no matter what happens in the rest of the country and are usually unknown to everyone outside of their ridings and their immediate families.

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People can be funny some times. They want leaders to be strong and powerful but usually reject those who are obvious about seeking power for power’s sake. All of which brings us to NDP leader, Jack Layton.           Barring the discovery of a fountain of youth that will provide immorality to everyone, the NDP will never gain power federally in Layton’s lifetime. Yet, with the desperation of the opposition parties to rid the country of the newly re-elected Conservative government, a coalition was formed that would have seen Jack and his party with seats at the cabinet table and the ability to force the weak Stéphane Dion to do the NDP’s bidding. This power was so close that Layton could taste it.           The coalition benefited the NDP and the Bloc by giving them power and was a boon to Dion who had a chance to become the Right Honourable Prime Minister of Canada after he had his backpack on and was half way out the door. But the coalition certainly did not benefit the Liberal Party of Canada or its new leader, Michael Ignatieff who would have gone down in history as the Liberal leader who could only become prime minister with the help of the NDP. When the coalition died, Jack became very very angry. And it showed.

Layton made it clear that he cares only about power

          The budget that was introduced by the Conservative government last week was an attempt by the government to throw money at the current recession in the hopes that it would stimulate the economy. It was nothing different than other countries, especially the United States, are doing. If anything it was a coalition budget. The jury is still out on whether these stimulus packages will do what it is intended that they do but Layton and his N Dippers decided to vote against the budget even before the document was tabled. The Liberals agreed to support the budget provided that an amendment be passed that forces the government to provide reports on how the stimulus package is working; a request that the Harper government willingly acceded to. Layton’s response to all of this was to accuse Ignatieff of forming a coalition with the government. Of course there is no Liberal/Conservative alliance; this is just Jack’s way of moaning the fact that he and his boys and girls were deprived of the chance to hold power. Boo hoo. Layton made it clear that he cares only about power; the fact that both the Conservatives and the Liberals seem to think that this is the way to bring the economy around and create jobs is obviously not a concern to him. The only important thing is that he was deprived of the power that he not only desperately sought but came so close to attaining. The Conservatives are still in power but Layton directed his party’s opposition to the Liberals for committing the most grievous sin of all; depriving him of power. What is the most humourous in all of this is that it happened right after the anti-American Layton got a brand new hero, Barack Obama. He is forever quoting Obama in the House. Of course Obama is all in favour of throwing incalculable sums of money at the problem but when Harper, with Ignatieff’s support, essentially does the same thing; it’s bad. While Obama seeks bipartisanship by having the Republicans join the Democrats in their policies, Layton sees conspiracies with our “bipartisan” budget. Layton and the NDP aren’t even bothering to hide the fact that for all their whining about the most vulnerable people in society, all they really care about is power. In so doing they are becoming more and more marginalized and less and less relevant as an influence on the federal scene. At least Jack’s antics provide some entertainment in these gloomy economic times.

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