JOHN CHUCKMAN

COMMENT POSTED TO THE NATIONAL POST TO A CCOLUMN BY REX MURPHY

What is Mr. Murphy on, medical  marijuana?

An excellent speaker? Harper? The guy who addresses us as “friends” much in the manner of a tent preacher?

Harper is only comfortable either giving a set speech on a topic with which he is comfortable or in delivering a cheap, fast put-down in Question Period.

Hardly the skill range of a good speaker.

Add to that his basic dislike of people and the kind of stiff arrogance we saw in Ignatieff, and you do not have a winning combination.

Really great speakers always possess a kind of honesty in wanting to communicate something – even if its selective in nature – and Harper is likely the most dishonest personality ever to hold office in Canada.

Harper is driven by negatives.

He doesn’t like Canada and its traditional way of doing things. He said so himself.

He hates the Liberal Party and would love to destroy it. Again he said so himself.

He admires the way things are done in the United States, a country which today approaches no longer even being a democracy.

This is a man full of resentments with not a lot positive to contribute.

I almost suspect he was bullied as a kid in Toronto and has never forgiven his tormentors. He works hard to get back, possessing a genuinely destructive personality.

He has little popular appeal, naturally enough, and I think it fair to say his career is largely one of circumstances, of having lucked out with the Liberals so divided.

His lack of genuine feeling – except for a warm feeling about power – comes right through. He can’t hide it.

I believe the Conservative Party associates who have left before the election have done so for a generally unobserved reason: they are tired of his private tyranny and relentless suppression of individuality. They’ve put up with it long enough, likely believing he should have retired as leader and given someone else a chance, but, no, his negative personality listens to no one and his love of power has reached badly corrupt levels. Most of them will return after he is defeated.

And he is going to lose and lose big, no matter what polls may say.

 

 

 

 

 

 

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE TORONTO STAR

Nice to know that the PMO spends time and resources on rubbish like sending out compilations of photostats about Justin Trudeau’s past, paid speaking engagements for charities to local newspapers in hopes of generating some bad press.

I genuinely believe Harper is the worst bully we have ever had in high office -indeed, he’s the only one, truly in a class by himself.

Harper’s repeated low-life attack ads didn’t work against the attractive Trudeau, so he tried another avenue of attack, that of sending out press kits to local newspapers about a matter which doesn’t even qualify as a tempest in a teapot.

It is perfectly normal for people with big names to speak for fees – it happens thousands of times a year. Tony Blair and his wife have cleared millions that way. So has Bill Clinton.

And did anyone notice Harper’s shabby bullying behavior at the G-8? All but calling Putin, the only real statesman in the bunch, names? That’s what bullies do when they don’t get their way.

I suggest our public schools put together a new curriculum on bullying, one that features Stephan Harper as an example of how not to behave.

 

 

 

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY LAWRENCE MARTIN IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

First, a great deal of time has passed with considerable change of circumstances since Pierre Trudeau was prime minister, changes which might well render Pierre himself not electable in the contemporary world.

But regardless of what Pierre’s political standing would be today, Justin is not Pierre, not even close.

Justin is a handsome and charming young man, but he received more of his mother’s genes than his father’s.

The steely will and fierce intelligence are simply not there.

I would say Thomas Mulcair more closely resembles some of what we saw in Pierre Trudeau, but that is not good news for the Liberal Party.

I suppose it’s worth a try, running Justin, but it would be a desperate measure for a desperate party whose fall is only the responsibility of its own coterie of insiders and in-fighters.
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“Those in Hog Town and kebec will love it though

“A great way to divide a country”

He was voted as the greatest Prime Minister in a public poll.

He did have qualities of toughness most people admire in a leader regardless of some policies with which you might disagree.

He also had a strong ethical bent we see utterly missing today.

Your “kebec” is stupid speech and plays to the trailer park crowd.

Talk about dividing the country, stupid speech will do it every time.
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“This is an informercial by a Grit hack.”

No, it’s a genuine matter of interest to millions.

Justin is a very popular figure.

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY ADAM GOLDENBERG IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

I do not even understand why Adam Goldenberg has written this hatchet-job piece.

And I do not understand his qualification to do so, since having been a chief speechwriter to Michael ignatieff is pretty much an overblown claim to nothing.

Ignatieff plainly is the most terribly failed politician of our time, and his poor judgment and lack of skills have given us a legacy of a national government bent on copying the right wing of the Republican Party down to almost every detail.

Many of us knew that it would be so: Ignatieff is by nature a standoffish man and his spoken words have always been considerably less than dazzling. Mr Goldenberg’s efforts appear to have no spice to a dull dish.

Of course, there was Ignatieff’s past service to the worst war crime of this generation, the invasion of Iraq, an event in which a million or so perished. his claims to being a genuine liberal (small “l”) were always tenuous.

He proved himself a much overrated person in a dozen more ways when he took on the Liberal leadership.

He made a dumb speech at the convention attacking his own party which then became useful attack-material for the Harperites.

He accepted being parachuted into a riding, and then arrogantly chose not to live there, after having promised he would.

He accepted being parachuted into the leadership, an act which starkly cast doubt on Ignatieff’s democratic values.

Ignatieff went on that ludicrous Ma and Pa Kettle Cross Country Bus Trip when it became obvious to Party leaders he had no ability to communicate and empathize with people.

Since when does a bus trip change one’s character? It only made him look ridiculous on top of all his other shortcomings.

He always raged and blubbered against a coalition when it was clear to many – given the Liberal Party’s weakened status – that that was the only way to wrest power from Harper’s minority.

And Ignatieff chose when to call an election – he didn’t have to do so, but he did – and it was the most destructive election call in my lifetime.

Compared to Ignatieff’s fumbling, preachiness, lackluster speechmaking, poorly chosen issues, lack of organizational skills, and just plain boring personality, Bob Rae still looks remarkably good.

“Then he ran and lost, then ran again…”

That is subtly but definitely dishonest. There was no second-time race. Ignatieff was handed the leadership by a small group of Liberal Party insiders.

I and many others believe Bob Rae could have beaten Ignatieff, Rae being one of the most eloquent politicians of our generation, rising to levels of clever observation and well-chosen words Mr ignatieff could only dream of.

Of course, the genuine question is not why the talented Bob Rae ran and is running but why the inept Michael Ignatieff ever thought he had something to offer, other than some kind of legacy claim to crown his family’s achievements. Pure arrogance.
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“Liberals are now in third place and electing a man with a track record of failing to run provinces well during a recession (which is exactly the situation we are in now) will do nothing to fix that.”

You have it precisely wrong: he ran it well under the circumstances.

There were hard choices to make, and he made them.

“Rae Days” were a thoughtful and decent option to large dismissals.

Union leaders and cheap columnists have never forgiven him.

And that doesn’t say a lot for their speaking in an informed manner or displaying effective intelligence.

For completely different reasons however I think Bob Rae’s day may have passed. I do not see the Liberal Party regaining its position any time soon.

Harper’s potential for growth is exhausted, 39.6% certainly being his high-water mark, a number interestingly which is close to the highest number achieved by the National Socialists when they ran as a democratic party in the early 1930s.

There is a dazzling new star on the political scene, and his name is Thomas Mulcair.

I do believe he has a serious chance of making the NDP Canada’s other major party and of rising above the old sort-of Boy Scout image from which the Party long has suffered.

I don’t see anyone else in the Liberals remotely up to the challenge. Talk of Justin Trudeau is pathetic. He has more of his mother’s genes than his father’s.

Dalton McGuinty is sickening and tiresome to almost everyone in Ontario, and it is only the PC’s stupid moves that have kept him going – first, John Tory’s insistence on committing political suicide and then the Party’s electing the current nasty gnome, Hudak, as leader.

Dominic LeBlanc is an intelligent and attractive candidate, but he never seems to have caught fire in the Party.

While intelligence is important, politics is far from a rational process, many emotional and lucky factors playing roles.

The Liberals cannot succeed without Quebec, and they are now far out-shown there by Mr Mulcair.

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY JEFFREY SIMPSON IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

Parties, like great families or national empires, do have a limited life.

A great family like the Eatons rose to being a household word and then declined to nothingness in several decades. Except for the name on the Eaton Centre, no ordinary young person of the next generation will even know who they were.

It is possible, but I don’t absolutely think so, that Canada’s Liberals have begun just that same descent along the arc of power.

To explain this phenomenon of declining power, it is not necessary to assert notions like being spoiled by success.

After all, the set of problems facing a nation changes over time, so much so that in periods of say fifty years, the old problems are forgotten or unrecognized by a different generation.

There have been countless examples of this in my lifetime, the greatest surely being America’s barbarous war in Vietnam.

Today, I’m sure if you asked most young adults about that ghastly effort, killing three million people in ten years of terror, many would not know where Vietnam is located and many would have no idea of when the war occurred.

That inevitable process of fading mass memory over the generations is part of why parties fade away.

But also, leadership always plays a key role. We’ve all seen in great family dynasties the way the iron-willed founders are succeeded often by less capable sons and grandsons.

Just look at Trudeau, one of our great leaders – whether you like his policies or not, he was a great leader. His son Justin, a handsome and intelligent young man, clearly does not possess the same talents and ruthless drive for success. One can almost feel the difference in temperament and attitude and drive.

And the Liberal Party has made some bad choices in its leadership recently.

Then there is the inevitable role of luck and fortune in the rise and fall of parties and families.

Old man Kennedy in the United States made his serious money through work with the Mob during Prohibition. Take away the historical mistake of American Prohibition and likely the Kennedy family would never have risen to such heights.

The bad luck of the Liberals has been two-fold, at least.

First, Quebec having been taken out of play in national politics. Second, the appearance of an opponent more dark and ruthless in his application and abuse of power, Stephen Harper, than they have ever faced.

Harper is simply a new phenomenon in Canada – a man who is perfectly comfortable with the Republican Right types like a Dick Cheney or a Tom Delay or Newt Gingrich – ugly, bad-tempered, ruthless men all.

The Liberals have never faced such a man before. Moreover they do it not with a Trudeau or a Chretien but an Ignatieff, a man of no political experience and little political talent.
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From another reader:

“Shouldn’t Bob Rae be front and centre reminding us what an NDP Government can do to You !!!”

Bob Rae was a responsible and capable premier.

Those were dangerous days economically, and Rae got us through.

He tried the path of the least hurt to people. If it had been someone of Harper’s ilk, I guarantee thousands would have lost their jobs, permanently.

Just wait, if Harper gets his majority, the budget will be balanced on tens of thousands losing their jobs as whole departments and programs are abolished.

To say anything else is just ignorance.

The people still whining about Rae Days make themselves sound like pathetic big babies.