Revolutionary Moderation

Predictions:

You know, people don't give me enough credit for having my finger on the pulse. Perhaps what I need is a Stephen Colbert-style celebration complete with "I called it" graphic once in a while, when I, er, call it. Here I go sticking my neck out once more.

Provincially, I think those who are worried about the Morton revolution should relax - Dinning will take this by default, probably requiring two ballots. Notwithstanding the ousted candidate endorsements, the value of which I think is not what it would be in a single room with twenty minutes between ballots (as Liberals will discover in Montreal), Stelmach has done nothing this week to pull himself out of third place. As I said last night, I suspect that virtually none Stelmach's ballots are going to list Ted Morton as the second choice.

In advance of the speeches tonight at the federal convention, I think it's tough to be certain about much in Montreal, but that never stopped me before. I wish Dion or Kennedy had enough to come up the middle, because I think both of them have proven themselves ardent federalists (Kennedy in the past weeks, Dion over a proud career) but I fear they don't. I think Iggy's carrying way too much baggage to swim far after the first ballot - the Quebec as a Nation debate this country has stupidly involved itself in again is the freshest and heaviest of these albatrosses (albatrossi?) no matter how much he attempts to pretend the resolution early this week was a 'proud' moment. (If he brings it up tonight with almost any emotion except contrition, he's going to be that much worse off. Alternatively, he might try to spin it once more, but where's the evidence that anyone on Ignatief's campaign team understands the fundamentals of spin?)

This leaves Bob Rae, whose baggage comes from a term as Premier of Ontario. I argued then, and continue to argue, that he got stuck with a shrinking economy and serious government financial problems that derailed his early attempts to do anything but stop the bleeding, and by the time he got things back on the rails, the media was having so much fun piling on that the book on Rae's government was already written. I liked Bob - as a moderate NDP who found himself in conflict with his own civil service unions, he never forgot that his first duty was to the people, and to the financial well-being, of the government he led. A left wing government who gives labour the tools to fight on a reasonable footing has done enough - it isn't the government's job to give away the farm to the people who work for it.

I digress, which I tend to do. My point is that Bob Rae will win unless he completely stinks it up tonight, possibly at least in part because he's carrying less trouble with him than Iggy. And if Bob does bomb, it might just open the door for Dion, which would be just fine by me. Despite Iggy's running first right now, I don't know how much growth Ignatief can expect on subsequent ballots against almost any of his seven opponents.