Bring on the Farce

While you were wrestling with the idea that had Belinda not dropped out of the Liberal leadership race, Tie Domi could have ended up serving cucumber sandwiches at 24 Sussex drive as the first-spouse, the campaign fell even further into the realm of farce.

As Jumpin' Joe Volpe was about to enter a news conference to defend his ethics-challenged campaign, he was chased down the street by two "ghosts," wearing white sheets and signs reading, "Volpe Has Spirits." This spectacle at least got Joe some national TV. And it's good to see that David Herle has found a work again.

Both Volpe and Igantieff have been accused of bringing out the dead - and signing them up for Liberal Party cards. Now I know what I'm doing for Halloween.

And then there's Eddie Goldenberg. He's packin'. Yeah, you know what we mean. He's packin' a mean grudge against the Martinites and let's er rip with his new tell-all. We say: buy the book.

Finally, there is Hedy Fry, a candidate who was not chosen as first, second or third choice for leader by any of the 1,000 respondents to an EKOS Research poll. "She literally got zero. I have never seen that in over 20 years of polling," said EKOS's Frank Graves. But Rae welcomed her to the lefty fold.

Are you kidding me??

Bob Rae donated money to NDP candidates this year.

And this guy thinks he should lead the Liberal Party.

People, are we losing our minds? Stop the insanity. Can someone please get the Anyone But Rae movement going.

Is Iggy Fading?

A new poll from the Globe and Mail shows the Liberal leadership battle is a tighter race than many expected. Although anointed early as the heir to the throne, a gaffe prone Michael Ignatieff has not walked away with the race.

Now the Globe poll puts Iggy only 2 points ahead of Bob Rae and 6 points ahead of Stephane Dion. The second tier candidates are Kennedy and Dryden, both with 9% support among Liberal Party members who will vote to select delegates. The remaining candidates each have less than 3% support.

While the poll is useful, it doesn't reflect the GOTV machine that Iggy and the other candidates have assembled and which may make the difference on a riding by riding basis.

But with conventional wisdom dictating that Ignatieff has little room for growth on second and third ballots, this must be troubling news for the Iggy camp. And it must be great news for Rae and his fellow travelers.

But the dark horse remains Stephane Dion. He's the only candidate who has exceeded expectations in a disappointing and lacklustre race.

SHOCKER! Bennett is Out

So apparently Carolyn Bennett was running for the Liberal leadership.

Did you hear about this? Anyway, she's dropped out and endorsed Bob Rae. Some of her immediate family members have followed suit while her other supporters left the phone booth they occupied to join Stephane Dion's campaign.

She made the decision after the surprising realization that she had no chance to win. Good-bye Dr. Bennett, we hardly knew ya.

Ignatieff no longer in love with George W. Bush.

Brison's tax policies make sense.

The surprisingly effective Martha Hall Findlay gets the Globe profile treatment. Do you believe in miracles? Well, neither do we but she has set herself up as someone to watch. Rock on Martha.

Iggy at 30% Support?

Will leadership candidate Michael Ignatieff pull off a convincing win on "Super Weekend"?

Ignatieff has far and away the most caucus support with 35 MPs and seven Senators onside. But has his sometimes faltering campaign truly connected with Liberals at the constituency level? Some pundits say yes, Iggy has the support of 30% of Liberals.

We'll find out the Sept. 29 weekend when close to 5,000 delegates will be elected. If Ignatieff does well on the Super Weekend, we are sure to see some of the second tier candidates make a move. But to who?

Bob Rae differs with his former friends in the NDP. Despite some weasel words about "re-evaluating the mission", Rae says we should stick to our guns in Afghanistan.

"But we can't just snap our fingers and say this week that we lost too many troops and we have to come home," Rae said.

He said he opposes arbitrary deadlines for either curtailing or extending the mission and called the New Democratic Party position that Canada should pull out now "incoherent."

Iggy's Relaunch

Michael Ignatieff relaunched his floundering campaign last night by unveiling his Agenda for Nation Building: Liberal Leadership for the 21st Century. More policy documents are expected in the run up to the convention. This is an attempt to shore up Iggy's policy credentials and remove the focus from his recent gaffes.

Of course, sucking up to soft nationalists in Quebec by saying Quebec should be called a "nation" won't help on that front. He says he won't offer new powers to Quebec but thinks cheap semantic tricks like this should resolve that pesky separatist problem.

Ignatieff remains steadfast in his support for Canada's role in Afghanistan. At least he's not being spooked by the Great Appeaser with a Mustache, Jack Layton, who wants to sing Kumbaya with the Taliban. While Layton has always been despicable, he's now clearly a coward too.

Speaking of New Democrats, Bob Rae wants to raise taxes and hire more bureaucrats! OK, maybe not. He actually said something about healthcare.

The Globe and Mail continues their profiles of the candidates. Today Roy MacGregor takes a look at Scott Brison. While written like an overwrought "after school special" it does highlight the positive fact that an openly gay MP from rural Nova Scotia is a credible candidate to lead the Liberal Party.

Dryden Goes Big

Liberal leadership candidate Ken Dryden unveiled his policy platform yesterday, calling for a "Big Canada" defined by peace, love and oooh baby baby...

Dryden is in favour of education, fairness and the environment, in addition to some other bold policy initiatives. Or so we are told, we dozed off part way through the newser. But check it out for yourself. Dryden is a thoughtful guy.

We've said it before and we'll say it again: how can a man so qualified to be leader be so lacking in charisma? Sure, it works for Harper but c'mon...

The Ignatieff bashing continues full bore. The jazz man Paul Wells tackles Iggy's pronoun problem.