What is the point of this story?

It's not often that I become inspired to write a letter to the editor (ahem)...

But Roy MacGregor's contemptible fluff piece on Scott Brison was too much for me to take. The text of my letter follows.

The problem with Scott Brison is not that he crossed the floor - plenty of politicians have done that, and sometimes for excellent, principled reasons. The problem is that, in the final convention of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, he voted in favour of merging the party with the Canadian Alliance. Then, four days after doing so, he cited this merger as the reason that he had to leave the new party.

He hasn't even been consistent on his reason. Initially, he said that as a gay MP in a conservative party, he would be typecast as a flag bearer for the socially progressive wing when his interests were primarily economic. Now, he seems to be saying that it's because the new Conservative Party was to be hostile to the idea of gay marriage.

(In MacGregor's article, Brison is alleged to have made his decision to cross the floor after meeting with "leader Stephen Harper" - in fact, Harper was not elected leader until several months after Brison left the party.)

How peculiar, especially when we consider that, during the 2003 Progressive Conservative leadership race, Brison joined fellow candidates Peter McKay and David Orchard in opposition to gay marriage (only Jim Prentice supported it).

MacGregor's article was titled "Scott Brison: A different kind of Liberal", but readers who view the defining trait of the Liberal Party as being a lack of commitment to any principle but electoral success would be hard-pressed to spot this difference.