Whatzisname in His Own Words

A Straight Quote:

Some Liberals, still seeking the help of the Chrétien team, ask: Will it ever change, even after Stephen Harper wins the election (because I believe he will)? My answer: I am sorry, but I doubt it. By the time the next leadership race takes place (because, also, I do not believe Dion will retire, and will demand the same second chance John Turner got), almost a decade will have gone by. I do not see Bob Rae or Michael Ignatieff waiting that long, either. If the Liberal Party is ever to win back government, it will be with new people, in caucus and the backrooms. That, I think, is how it should be. It's needed.

In the meantime, the Conservatives will have had the country for nearly a decade. Does that concern me, as a Chrétien Liberal? Yes, it does. Of course it does.

But the opportunity to do something about it is gone, and I don't believe the opportunity will be coming back. That may not be a happy end to the story, but that's how politics is, sometimes. You don't always get the result you want.

And now, a straight request.

If you are a television booker, particularly for Steve Paikin's show, can you make a point of not booking this guy as the token Liberal?

It's pretty clear that he neither expects the Liberals to succeed, not truly cares; that he'd rather see the Flanagan/Harper plan work and his party die rather than work with, or tolerate, the people that called his faction a "has been" or dared to point out his master's flaws. He is still not over events that happened six years ago, and calls himself a "Liberal in exile" when the exile is—from this vantage point, anyway—self imposed. He speaks of events ten years in the future, not acknowledging the obvious truth that, ten years from now, there will probably not be a party for him to return to.

And you know what? He can have these views if he chooses to. I believe in freedom of speech, even if he doesn't. (I also believe in the value of pseudonymity as a necessary component to that, even if he doesn't. I've learned that reflexive self-promoters rarely do.)

But he should not be allowed to represent Liberals or the Liberal Party of Canada, any more than Joe Lieberman should be allowed to represent the Democratic Party of the United States of America when he says similar things. Kos and the rest of the American netroots wouldn't tolerate it; any Liberal netroots shouldn't either.

He has made his choice.