Monday, October 16, 2006
Obligatory Post Debate Commentary
That was mildly entertaining, but in no way decisive. Any Liberal who had his/her mind appreciable changed by what happened in Toronto yesterday probably wasn't paying much attention to begin with. Overall, the best performers were the four who have no chance of winning, which isn't hard now that they're released from the pressure of, you know, *really* running for the leadership. Ken Dryden was excellent. Scott Brison, though still a shithead, was excellent (but how come nobody, especially Volpe, pointed out that Brison was a former opponent of gay marriage?). Martha Hall Findlay was pretty good. Joe Volpe was as good as he could have been given that he is absolutely without credibility at this point - I mean, he almost made me feel like a big meanie for kicking him around so much.
As for the front-runners, maybe it's just my continued inability to understand why anybody supports him, but I thought Gerard Kennedy performed the worst. The challenge he faced was to demonstrate that he wasn't some vacuous twit who loves sound bytes so much that he wants to have sex with them right there on stage, and I don't think he did it. His closing statement was reasonably good but he was the most invisible of the front-runners in the debate portions. The one place he did shine was in the "debate" on same-sex marriage, though he only did so by completely misrepresenting the issue and Charter's role in it (so did Brison and Volpe).
The other three each had their strengths and weaknesses. Bob Rae got good lines in against Ignatieff (especially the oft-quoted "this from a guy who's changed his mind three times over the last week," which is sort of unfair since Ignatieff hasn't changed his mind at all). His defense against Stéphane Dion's attack against his economic record as Premier of Ontario was solid (and, uncharacteristically, I found myself siding with Bob fucking Rae over Dion on the question). On the other hand, it's still extremely difficult to tell what Rae would do as Prime Minister - he's good at criticizing other candidates' positions and defending his own record, but not much for giving anybody a compelling reason to vote for him. Likely because no such compelling reason exists.
Michael Ignatieff, as has been repeated over and over, did what he had to do - he rose above the fray and basically refrained from attacking anybody else. He seemed like one of the smartest guys on stage, which he was, and advocated his positions well. He and Dion engaged in the closest thing to a substantive policy discussion on the need for new legislation on the environment. In my opinion, Ignatieff looked like a guy who was ready to be Prime Minister, while Rae looked like a guy who was ready to be opposition leader. Gerard Kennedy looked like a guy who'd be in over his head as Ontario's education minister.
And Dion? I have mixed feelings here. He attacked well, and looked like a guy who was better-versed on the issues than anybody else (which he probably was). His attack on Rae's economic record bothered me - for a guy who wants to see fewer resources consumed, her sure seems big on economic growth - and his claim that he was around when the tough fiscal decisions had to be made is a little disingenuous, since he missed the toughest three years of deficit cutting. Besides that, his constant defense of the Chrétien-Martin years wore on me, since I'm not particularily a fan of those years, but would likely play better to the partisan crowd he was addressing. On the upside, he did a better job than either Rae or Kennedy at portraying himself as the guy who could take on Ignatieff (not that I buy into the existence of this alleged "anybody-but-Iggy" movement - I see very little reason that a supporter of Dion would be more inclined to back Rae than Ignatieff on a final ballot).
Insofar as Ignatieff is the front-runner, the failure by all other candidates to gain appreciable ground against him made Ignatieff the winner and his three closest challengers all losers. Insofar as the challenge for each of these three was to position himself as the best last-ballot opponent for Ignatieff (though I suspect there will be three left on the final ballot, barring early quitters), Dion won and Kennedy lost.
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That was mildly entertaining, but in no way decisive. Any Liberal who had his/her mind appreciable changed by what happened in Toronto yesterday probably wasn't paying much attention to begin with. Overall, the best performers were the four who have no chance of winning, which isn't hard now that they're released from the pressure of, you know, *really* running for the leadership. Ken Dryden was excellent. Scott Brison, though still a shithead, was excellent (but how come nobody, especially Volpe, pointed out that Brison was a former opponent of gay marriage?). Martha Hall Findlay was pretty good. Joe Volpe was as good as he could have been given that he is absolutely without credibility at this point - I mean, he almost made me feel like a big meanie for kicking him around so much.
As for the front-runners, maybe it's just my continued inability to understand why anybody supports him, but I thought Gerard Kennedy performed the worst. The challenge he faced was to demonstrate that he wasn't some vacuous twit who loves sound bytes so much that he wants to have sex with them right there on stage, and I don't think he did it. His closing statement was reasonably good but he was the most invisible of the front-runners in the debate portions. The one place he did shine was in the "debate" on same-sex marriage, though he only did so by completely misrepresenting the issue and Charter's role in it (so did Brison and Volpe).
The other three each had their strengths and weaknesses. Bob Rae got good lines in against Ignatieff (especially the oft-quoted "this from a guy who's changed his mind three times over the last week," which is sort of unfair since Ignatieff hasn't changed his mind at all). His defense against Stéphane Dion's attack against his economic record as Premier of Ontario was solid (and, uncharacteristically, I found myself siding with Bob fucking Rae over Dion on the question). On the other hand, it's still extremely difficult to tell what Rae would do as Prime Minister - he's good at criticizing other candidates' positions and defending his own record, but not much for giving anybody a compelling reason to vote for him. Likely because no such compelling reason exists.
Michael Ignatieff, as has been repeated over and over, did what he had to do - he rose above the fray and basically refrained from attacking anybody else. He seemed like one of the smartest guys on stage, which he was, and advocated his positions well. He and Dion engaged in the closest thing to a substantive policy discussion on the need for new legislation on the environment. In my opinion, Ignatieff looked like a guy who was ready to be Prime Minister, while Rae looked like a guy who was ready to be opposition leader. Gerard Kennedy looked like a guy who'd be in over his head as Ontario's education minister.
And Dion? I have mixed feelings here. He attacked well, and looked like a guy who was better-versed on the issues than anybody else (which he probably was). His attack on Rae's economic record bothered me - for a guy who wants to see fewer resources consumed, her sure seems big on economic growth - and his claim that he was around when the tough fiscal decisions had to be made is a little disingenuous, since he missed the toughest three years of deficit cutting. Besides that, his constant defense of the Chrétien-Martin years wore on me, since I'm not particularily a fan of those years, but would likely play better to the partisan crowd he was addressing. On the upside, he did a better job than either Rae or Kennedy at portraying himself as the guy who could take on Ignatieff (not that I buy into the existence of this alleged "anybody-but-Iggy" movement - I see very little reason that a supporter of Dion would be more inclined to back Rae than Ignatieff on a final ballot).
Insofar as Ignatieff is the front-runner, the failure by all other candidates to gain appreciable ground against him made Ignatieff the winner and his three closest challengers all losers. Insofar as the challenge for each of these three was to position himself as the best last-ballot opponent for Ignatieff (though I suspect there will be three left on the final ballot, barring early quitters), Dion won and Kennedy lost.
