Ignatieff

I'm glad that he has the guts to stand up for the Afghan mission, and of course we would all like Afghanistan to have a stable society as soon as possible, for their sake as well as ours. But to proclaim two years in advance that we're not going to extend the mission if he becomes Prime Minister is a bit presumptuous."Yes, I voted for the renewal of the mission until February 2009," the Liberal leadership front-runner said Thursday. "I see no reason to renew it. We will have done seven years of work for which I have the utmost respect"Obviously he wants to buy a few votes with that comment to ease the fears of those who are on the fence about him as their second choice. But it's going to be tough to get rid of his past staunch pro-war comments that some say put him in line with George Bush on foreign policy.

His delegates are convinced that he's going to revive the party, even though he's proven to be a risk. But can the Liberals, who ran a characteristically anti-American, anti-Bush campaign in their attempt to portray Harper as "George Bush's puppet", accept the possibility of Ignatieff as their leader? Christian Science Monitor has a nice article about how absurd it is that they're considering him. Here's some quotes he's said in the past:"The disagreeable reality ... is that there are some occasions - and Iraq may be one of them - when war is the only real remedy for regimes that live by terror.""To defeat evil, we may have to traffic in evils: indefinite detention of suspects, coercive interrogations, even pre-emptive war.... The question is not whether we should ... but whether we can keep lesser evils under the control of free institutions.""Congress failed to put the ... case for war to adversarial scrutiny and debate. The news media allowed itself to be managed and browbeate

A rather interesting way to put it. I've never heard of opponents being referred to as "little goldfish". I'm sure the multitudes of goldfish lovers in the Liberal party will be shocked by this breach of political correctness.Yesterday, the Dion campaign played down the significance of the defections announced on Thursday. "They are making it sound like it's a big catch, but they are really just little goldfish," said Yves Picard, Mr. Dion's campaign director for Quebec City and eastern Quebec.Well, it depends on what other Quebec delegates do. If it looks like Ignatieff can win back Quebec (despite being the most right-wing on foreign policy), then these defections could be just the beginning of a large scale move away from Dion.

A rather interesting way to put it. I've never heard of opponents being referred to as "little goldfish". I'm sure the multitudes of goldfish lovers in the Liberal party will be shocked by this breach of political correctness.Yesterday, the Dion campaign played down the significance of the defections announced on Thursday. "They are making it sound like it's a big catch, but they are really just little goldfish," said Yves Picard, Mr. Dion's campaign director for Quebec City and eastern Quebec.Well, it depends on what other Quebec delegates do. If it looks like Ignatieff can win back Quebec (despite being the most right-wing on foreign policy), then these defections could be just the beginning of a large scale move away from Dion.

They include a former candidate from the Quebec City region, a top Dion organizer in the provincial capital, and former Lévis MP Christian Jobin."I would say that the majority of Mr. Dion's delegates will be deserting him after the first ballot," said Jobin, who told Dion the bad news on Wednesday.Jobin and the other two — who claim they are bringing a dozen delegates along — said they were attracted by Ignatieff"s positions on two hot-button issues in Quebec: openness to recognizing Quebecers as a nation and a willingness to address the so-called "fiscal imbalance."Of course we can't rule him out just yet, but to have something like this happen a couple weeks before the convention must be disheartening. Interestingly enough, the two issues that attracted these three to Ignatieff are issues that Harper obviously promotes in his attempts to woo Quebec voters.So maybe Ignatieff hasn't lost all momentum, although he would be a more unpredictable choice that Rae. And that's ultima

First the "war crimes" comment about Israel, and now praising China as "one of the greatest civilizations on earth". When does this madness end? As a Chinese person myself, I do realize that there is a rich cultural history associated with China. But China under the current communist regime is appalling to say the least. Doesn't Ignatieff remember the tens of millions killed at the hands of the Chinese communists?China is still a major human rights violator, and will soon overtake the US as the greatest emitter of greenhouse gasses. Religious people are routined persecuted and even killed for their beliefs. They may even have hundreds of spies operating in Canada. China under the current regime is most certainly not "one of the greatest civilizations on earth". Only when true democracy takes over will it be restored to its former cultural and historical prominence.So who is this Ignatieff character anyway? And why does he get caught saying all these absurd things? Can we really afford

As the potential leader of the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC), Michael Ignatieff believes that his willingness to recognize Quebec as a nation will seduce Canadians from coast to coast. You’re wrong, Iggy! The dynamics of Canadian politics has changed, but the meaning of the words didn’t change. Ignatieff, this miserable dumb-ass who spent more than 30 years outside Canada, should know that his decision will not help him to get votes in the other Canadian provinces, because nobody (except the Quebecker separatists) wants to see the same bind in which Canada put itself back in 1987 at the time of the Meech Lake Accord.Michael Ignatieff, one of the 8 candidates in the leadership race of the LPCOnly 42% of Canadian voters (and 44% of the LPC’s supporters) would be "less likely" to vote for the LPC if the leader of this party wanted to recognize Quebec as a "nation". A nation (in English and in French) is a civil community of people (citizens) sharing a common history, culture and lan

Yesterday, the eight candidates for the leadership race of the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC) verbally fought each other in a debate. This fifth and last debate was held in Toronto at the Roy Thompson Hall. Obviously, it gave to the 1500 supporters who were present the occasion to see some candidates showing their heavy rhetoric artillery.From left to right: Bob Rae, Michael Ignatieff and Stéphane Dion during yesterday's debate in Toronto.As time goes by, many people are trying to predict who will be the successor of Paul Martin. At the light of what we heard from this debate, Michael Ignatieff doesn't certainly have what it takes to be a Prime minister. If Ignatieff became not only the successor of Paul Martin, but also the Prime minister of Canada, will he deal softly with Quebec's separatists?We still don't know yet, but his constitutional vision paradoxically elates the separatists, because Ignatieff wants the province of Quebec to be recognized as a nation in the Canadian cons

As an intellectual figure who has an international reputation, Michael Ignatieff, one of the eleven candidates in the leadership race of the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC), definitely has the technique when he wants to say ludicrous things. As a former university teacher, people expect Ignatieff to be very intelligent, but his remarks often illustrate a disconnection with reality. Furthermore, if you're a foreigner, don't wonder why so many Canadians compare him to Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the Prime minister of Canada 1968 to 1979 and from 1980 to 1984.Obviously, as opposed to Michael Ignatieff who didn't have any experience in Canadian politics before the federal election of the 23rd of January 2006, Pierre Elliott Trudeau has been the Minister of Justice in the government of Lester B. Pearson, which means that Trudeau did have some experience before he became at the same time the leader of the LPC and eventually Canada's Prime minister.In this article written in French, it is repor

Michael IgnatieffPhoto Canadian PressWhile Michael Ignatieff, one of the eleven candidates in the leadership race of the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC), is organizing on his web site auctions that allow people to "date" a deputy that is supporting him, we can be sure that the LPC is not really able to take advantage of the contempt that most Canadians have for the Conservative Party. I'm not a hard supporter of the LPC, but in my opinion, one of the problems that the Liberals have is their division that can clearly be seen in the actual leadership race that is taking place in their party.The reason why the Liberals can't really take off in the public opinions can also be explained by the division that tears their party as it was said in the introduction. When Stephen Harper, the Prime minister of Canada and the leader of the Conservative Party, have proposed in the House of Commons to prorogate the mandate of the Canadian troops in Afghanistan, some of the Liberals were against that p