Dear Helena Guergis: Don’t quit!

I know I’ll be swimming against the tide here, but if I had one piece of advice for Helena Guergis it would be this: don’t quit!

Certainty, the Liberal Party isn’t offering that same advice. They just moved a press release succinctly titled: Minister Guergis must step down. I agree with all of the reasons cited in the release, from her staff letter writing club to her airport meltdown and, well, her just plain general incompetence for the job. She shouldn’t be a cabinet minister in the Government of Canada. She is plainly just not up to the job.

Why, then, do I not want her to resign? Because of all the grief and abuse she has been taking from her own party leadership who, instead of backing her up, have cut her adrift, and have taken to giving comments on background to every reporter on Parliament Hill bad-mouthing her, insulting her personally, and expressing their strident wish that they be free of this meddlesome woman.

When her male cabinet colleague, Jean-Pierre Blackburn, was in an airport incident of his own involving a now infamous bottle of tequila, what did a senior government official tell CTV? "He remained polite. He didn't pull a Helena apparently." Classy, throwing your own minister under a bus like that. The Conservative punditry such as former Harper communications guy Kory Teneycke, usually tightly scripted by the Harper PMO, have been unleashed to attack Guergis and demand she quit.

They’ve also certainly been feeding Bob Fife lots of anti-Guergis vitrol. This piece he filed today is a doozy, where he reports Conservative officials have told him Guergis has a revolving door of staff, has made no friends in caucus, PMO officials want her to resign to end the misery (they’re praying before a Buddha, apparently), no one in caucus or the party is defending her, she’s not very popular, no one really likes her in caucus, and so on. They also reportedly won't let her join in any reindeer games.

If you believe that we wouldn’t be hearing all this negativity on Guergis from official Conservative circles without Harper’s say-so, then I have a bridge in New York to sell you. It is obvious that the Harper Conservatives have launched a campaign to make Guergis as unwelcome as possible in the hopes that she will just take the hint, do them a favour, and just go away already.

A Guergis resignation would solve all their problems. They’d be free of the dead-weight, and could say how they’re so sorry to see her go, they’ll miss her, what a shame, etc. If they boot her out involuntarily, it’s more of a reflection on Harper: how could he have appointed someone so obviously unqualified in the first place, and why didn’t he cut her loose sooner?

What’s happening now is all about the optics and framing of her inevitable departure, whether it’s now, or later in the next shuffle. It’s also all in the very spirit of constructive dismissal (not legally, of course, since ministers serve at pleasure).

So that’s why I make this plea to Helena Guergis: don’t resign. No matter how many dirty stares they give you in the hallway, or nasty things Conservative surrogates say about you on Power and Politics, don’t give in. Don’t let them win, and give them the satisfaction of seeing you slink away. Just keep enjoying the ministerial limo and the business-class travel (just get to the airport on time, please) until the Harper crew finds some stones.

Don’t quit, Helena.

If they really want rid of you, make them fire you.

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Blackburn’s tequila tempest: Exposing the contradictions of airport security regulations

In Conservative Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn’s altercation with airport security staff in Ottawa, when told airport security regulations on liquids prevented him from bringing his bottle of tequila onboard, he reportedly demanded the bottle be poured-out on his presence. I guess he feared the CATSA staff would be having a little fiesta at his expense. The request was refused, which likely incensed him further. (Although he himself helped bring us these rules.)

Blackburn’s request was rightly refused, though, and it was his second attempted skirting of our country’s asinine airport security rules. And it exposes just how stupid, and useless, those rules are.

We’re not allowed to bring liquids onboard because of the fear liquid explosives could be disguised as, say, a bottle of tequila, and used to bring down a plane. So we’re restricted to a small amount, containers of 100ml, confined to a one quart zip-lock bag. This is supposed to make us feel safer. It ignores, of course, the scenario of two or more people each bringing in their own bags, then meeting and combining them post-security. It’s bureaucracy masquerading as security, and we’re supposed to just ignore the fact it’s all a sham.

In the name of making us “feel” safer though, no bottles of water, juice, or tequila. Here’s the thing though. Blackburn wanted his tequila poured-out in his presence; no fiestas on his dime. That couldn’t happen though because, in theory, that tequila, or your Evian or my Coke Zero, is a possible liquid explosive.

Now, if you follow the illogic that I can’t bring my cola on because it might be an explosive, then every confiscated bottle should be treated as a possible explosive: carted off in a bomb-proof container and destroyed safely. Does that happen though? Of course not. It would be prohibitively expensive and cumbersome and, besides, we all really know your Evian is just water and Blackburn’s tequila is just booze. His fear they’d take his bottle home and have a party likely isn’t unfounded. I recall reading many confiscated contraband is also donated.

It’s all a farce. It’s a farce that regular Canadians have to deal with every day. While the both handled it very, very poorly, Blackburn and Helena Guergis simply saw front-hand the mess that successive governments have made of air travel in this country.

Unlike you or I though, they’re both in a position to reform the rules and bring a degree of sanity to our airports. Perhaps their experiences will spur them to act.

In the meantime, leave the tequila at home.

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Move over, Helena Guergis: Another Conservative minister has an airport meltdown. With tequila!

You know how they say truth is stranger than fiction? Well, if you told me that, after Hurricane Helena Guergis' airport meltdown in PEI, where she berated airport security staff, threw her boots, tried to break through a security door and called the province a hell hole, that we'd have another Conservative minister would have an airport blow-up, I wouldn't believe you.

And if you told me it would involve a bottle of tequila, I'd say you're smoking something that Stephen Harper would definitely not approve of.

Yet tonight on CTV, Bob Fife reported that just such an incident happened involving Conservative veterans affairs minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, just four days after Hurricane Helena ravaged Charlottetown:

Veterans Affairs Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn caused a fuss when airport security stopped him from carrying a bottle of tequila onto a plane in Ottawa, just fours days after Helena Guergis berated airport employees in P.E.I., CTV News has learned.

Blackburn wanted to bypass a rule that all Canadians must follow: You cannot pack containers filled with more than 100 millilitres of liquid.

When security at the Ottawa airport told Blackburn he would have to give up his bottle of tequila, sources say he asked that the bottle be kept for him. When security refused, he demanded that they empty the bottle in his presence.

Sources told CTV News the argument became so heated, security almost called the police.

Apparently, Blackburn never apologized and never told the PMO, who I'm sure were thrilled to hear about it.

Here's a "senior government official" doing some sort of damage-controlling spin:

"The minister wasn't pleased by the fact he had to leave the bottle of alcohol behind. He was upset that they wouldn't destroy it in front of him," the official said, on condition of anonymity. "He remained polite. He didn't pull a Helena apparently."

Yes, that is apparently a real quote, apparently from a real senior Conservative official, presumably in the PMO. I'm sorry, Helena. Some people claim that there's a woman to blame. But I know ... it's his own damned fault.

And here's my favourite line from the story:

The PMO says Prime Minister Stephen Harper will issue an edict to his ministers, reminding them that they're not above the law.

Yes, the PMO really said Harper would remind his ministers they have to follow the law. And not just the big ones, but all the stupid little ones too, just like the regular Tim Horton's folks. They are, however, entitled to their entitlements.

Let them eat apple fritters!

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Conservative minister wants a spring election

Conservative revenue minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn has been in the Quebec media pleading with the BQ to not bring down his Harper Conservatives this fall, saying an election right now isn't right for Quebecers. Fair enough. But what's interesting is Blackburn has suggested a desired window for the next election: he'd like one in the spring:

(Via Google Translate:)

"The interest of Quebec, it is precisely that there are no elections in the fall. The right window is in a budget and the budget will be next spring," he added.

Most of the piece was same 'ol, but I did find it interesting mentioned spring as the time for an election. I haven't seem the Conservatives giving a prefered timeline in the English media. And I'm sure they could have a different story come spring, should it come to that. Odd though that Blackburn is boxing them into a date, and that the message seems to be Quebec-only.

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We need a little Clarity on Quebec

After Conservative intergovernmental affairs labour minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn’s pronouncement that a Conservative majority government would re-open the constitution to address “Quebec’s historical demands” the backtracking quickly began.

Out to quickly distance the Conservative government from Blackburn’s comments was intergovernmental affairs transport minister Lawrence Cannon, emphasizing Blackburn was expressing his own views, not the government’s:

"There is absolutely no appetite to open the constitution and to have any amendments to the constitution. We practice a federalism of openness in Quebec as well as with the rest of the provinces."

Still, after Cannon’s rebuke Blackburn left the door open, saying the time will come:

"As a Quebecer I think we can all wish to one day see all of these measures form part of the Canadian constitution. Now, to do that, there has to be a will on the part of the provinces. The circumstances have to lend themselves to being able to proceed in that path - I think everybody recognizes that the fruit is not ripe at this stage and we will continue with our agenda."

It will ultimately be up, said Blackburn, to Stephen Harper, who has conveniently been out of the country during all this nonsense. Here’s what he said to La Presse though in December (via Danielle and Paul):

“Stephen Harper souhaite que la résolution qui reconnaît les Québécois comme une nation soit incluse dans la Constitution canadienne”

Or, badly translated:

"Stephen Harper wish that the resolution which recognizes the Inhabitants of Quebec as a nation is included in the Canadian Constitution"

Which of course differs from what Jason Kenney was telling the English media last year:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has no plans to take up Mario Dumont's offer to re-open the Constitution, one of his top lieutenants said Monday.

"Our focus is on concrete, tangible deliverables, not abstractions,'' Jason Kenney, secretary of state for multiculturalism and Canadian identity, said in an interview.

So, if I’m following all this correctly, the Conservatives are saying we totally want to get the Quebec as a nation thing into the constitution so give us a majority and hey maybe the time will be right, but hey English Canada the time isn’t right at the moment so totally don’t worry about it.

It all seems purposely confusing and misleading. The Conservatives want to have their cake (hey Quebec, we’re going to take care of you) and eat it too (don’t worry rest of Canada, not gonna happen). National unity shouldn’t be used as partisan ploy for political gain. The consequences can be serious.

A guy who knows a little about national unity and what not, Stephane Dion, is calling BS on the Harper government:

Dion, a former minister in charge of the unity file and a constitutional academic before he came into politics, said the Prime Minister wants Quebecers to believe he'd recognize their nationhood within the Constitution, but in fact, has no plans to do so.

Dion said that Harper has been deliberately vague with Quebecers about how he intends to handle nationalistic aspirations in that province – dating all the way back to his campaign speeches in that province in the last election campaign.

"The Prime Minister should say, very clearly, which federal powers he wants to transfer to provinces, and to the province of Quebec in a special deal maybe. He must clarify that," Dion said yesterday.

What Stephane didn’t say, but what he could (and should) have, is that we need a little clarity here, if you will.

I found this interesting:

Senior Liberals said they suspected the Constitution was thrown out for public debate merely to make mischief for Dion, who is dealing with internal party strife and huge dips in party support in Quebec.

History has shown that debates over Quebec's place in the federation can prove hugely divisive in the Liberal party and can pit Quebec Liberals against those in the rest of Canada. The fact that this information was leaked to an English-language newspaper seemed to feed that suspicion.

Maybe, maybe. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the Conservative strategy here. I also think Blackburn went off script. But a few things:

a) The purposely vague, say one thing in English and another in French actions of the Conservatives can easily be exploited by pointing-out the discrepancies and calling for clarifications, as Dion has done here.

b) This is an opportunity to stake out clear and defined policy ground for the Liberal Party. Articulate an alternative policy, a federalist alternative. The BQ and Conservatives are both fighting over the same soft-nationalist ground. Who is speaking for federalist, pro-Canada Quebecers?

c) I recognize such a position may alienate the establishment members running the LPC(Q) (into the ground). Well, it’s not like they’re helping much right now anyway. C'est la vie.

d) A strong federalist push would play to Dion’s strengths, and his base, and the Liberal base. The Conservatives want to give Dion a chance to play Captain Canada again? Fine with me.

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Harper’s Quebec constitutional foray, and where’s Rona?

I find it interesting that this…

The Harper government is telling Quebec that if the Conservatives win a majority in the next election, they will look to reopen the Constitution and give more meaning to their recognition of Quebeckers as a nation.

Emphasizing the Conservative receptiveness to “Quebec's historical demands,” Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn raised the possibility of winning 30 to 40 seats in the province, up from the current 11.

“The recognition of the Quebec nation within Canada allows us to think that we can put some meat around it, and that a majority government is more able to do a number of things, while being respectful of all of the provinces,” Mr. Blackburn said in an interview.

…comes just a few days after this:

Mr. Dion also appointed Gerard Kennedy, who will run in a Toronto riding in the next election, as intergovernmental affairs critic. It is a potentially contentious move because Mr. Kennedy, who threw his delegate support behind Mr. Dion in the December, 2006, leadership contest, had not backed the idea of the Québécois as a nation within Canada.

I suppose the timing could be coincidental, but I suspect it’s not. It will be interesting to hear Gerard’s first public comments on this. And speaking of intergovernmental affairs, interesting that the Conservative minister, Rona Ambrose, is no where to be heard from in this story. Instead it’s a senior Quebec minister, Jean-Pierre Blackburn, making the comments.

I wonder if Blackburn gave Ambrose a courtesy phone call? Hopefully Rona keeps her mouth shut; we all remember what happened to her predecessor when Harper first brought-up this Quebec as nation nonsense:

The federal Parliament formally recognized Quebecers as a "nation united within Canada" Monday night, but it came with a high cost for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who suffered his first resignation from cabinet over the divisive move.

Michael Chong, the minister of intergovernmental affairs and sport, prefaced his resignation by telling reporters he continued to have faith in the government, the Conservative party and the prime minister. But he charged Harper's recognition of Quebecers as a "nation united within Canada" smacked of what he called "ethnic nationalism."

"The reason why I got involved in politics is my belief in this nation we call Canada. I believe in this great country of ours and I believe in one nation, undivided," he said. "This is a fundamental principle for me, not something on which I can or will compromise. Not now, not ever."

While Michael made a move of principle, opting to resign when he was cut-out of a matter squarely within his ministerial responsibilities and asked to defend a position he disagreed with, I suspect Rona will want to keep the car and driver instead. And it’s not like she hasn’t been busy.

Why, look at these media releases for 2008:



Well, maybe 2007 was a busier year:


OK, well, maybe not. It’s probable telling though whose picture is on the front page of the ministry Web site, and whose is not:


Maybe some enterprising member of the parliamentary press gallery will track down Michael Chong down in the hallways and ask him for his thoughts on Blackburn's promise. Anyone?

Anyway, back to the Conservatives; constitutional musings , which have generated quite a bit of blogsphere reaction. I thought the nation motion in 2006 was supposed to be the end of it, was that not what Harper told us? I think the only person that wanted to re-open the constitution for this, at least back then, was Michael Ignatieff.

Anyway, even if I favoured putting this in the constitution, and I don’t, it would never work. You couldn’t do just this one thing. You need to get the other provinces to support it. You can ask them to give this to Quebec and ignore the Senate inequality concerns of the West, the seat distribution concerns of Ontario, and other issues. We’d quickly get bogged down again in the constitutional moray and that’s not the priority of Canadians.

This is all just politics, of course: the Conservatives sense Liberal weakness in Quebec, and they’re looking to gain ground. It’s a continuation of their fighting with the BQ for the soft nationalist vote. It’s akin to Russian roulette though, because every vote Harper gains in Quebec by pandering to soft-nationalists is going to cost him one in the West. And that’s if he can convince Quebecers he’s serious. The BQ and PQ are going to constantly be moving the goalposts, and will use any failure to meet them as a betrayal of Quebecers, stoking the separatist fires.

And whatever Harper does, they’ll just raise the stakes higher. We saw that in 2006 with the nation motion. Duceppe was pleased as punch with how it played out, and his next demand was ok great, now let’s constitutionalize it. Now that Harper is doing that, I wonder what the next demand will be?

To square the circle, frankly I’m glad Gerard Kennedy, with his lack of support for the nation motion, is now our intergovernmental affairs guy. I think he’s actually the right person for us on this file.

We can’t compete with the BQ and the PQ for the soft-nationalist vote in Quebec. But there is an opening in Quebec, and in the rest of Canada, to be the strong federalist champion. It has been a traditional Liberal role, but it’s one we’ve gotten away from since the aborted Paul Martin era began. Let’s pick that federalist mantle up again.

If we do we’re appealing to a segment of Quebec the other parties are ignoring, and a segment that actually thinks positively of Stephane Dion. We need to get those voters back; if we do we’ll hold our own there. And we’ll gain ground across the rest of Canada as well.

We’ll have to wait and see what play gets called though. It's not without risk, but as Warren says it could galvanize the party. So for god's sake, don't wuss-out yet again.

Anyway, I leave you with these comments from Stephane Dion the leadership candidate on this issue back in 2006:

"People are all mixed up about this." Dion says. "It’s a very interesting discussion at a seminar of political science, but the moment you talk about putting that in the Constitution and you blame the other candidates for being afraid to raise the issue, then legitimate questions come: If you are a nation, what am I, mashed potato?"
--
"Now all of a sudden, the burden of proof is back on our shoulders. We need to deliver this mysterious constitutional change that will change Canada into a Federation of Nirvana through a magic word that everybody would agree upon. It will not work. Keep the burden of proof on the separatists."

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