Ottawa Sun
Published: Saturday, May 21, 2005

Wake up blue, go to bed red

Last week I predicted that the government would fall in a 151 to 149 vote. Oh well, as they say, a week in politics is an eternity.

Enough ink, not to mention venom, has been spilled on Belinda's walk across the Parliamentary aisle. Wake up blue, go to bed red, it was all in a day's work for Ms. Stronach. Look for her name to become a verb or an object when discussion turns to betrayal: "You were Belinda-ed" or "That was sneaky, somebody pulled a Belinda on me" could creep into the Canadian political lexicon.

As for House Speaker Peter Milliken's tie-breaking vote in favour of the government, it was cast out of parliamentary convention and not partisan convenience as some have asserted. To be fair to Mr. Milliken, he has done a very good job as Speaker since his election to the post in 2001.

As for the rest of the week that was, CPAC should have sold advertising for Thursday's vote given the viewer interest. And who says Canadian politics is boring? Independent MPs had real clout for a change and every cough, muscle pull, chest pain and ovarian cyst seemed to have the potential to sink or save the government ... never has the health status of our MPs received such attention.

The best line of the week came from Mr. Harper in his post vote concession speech when he pointed out that the only party in Quebec to vote against, in his words, "corruption," was the separatists. Just ponder that for a moment.

Turning to the argument that the Tories are in bed with the separatists, it's malarkey. Even a cursory check of the voting record in the House will show that the Bloc Quebecois has backed Liberal motions as many times as it has backed and supported Tory motions. Ditto for the NDP and their equal support for Grit and Tory motions.

The pressure is off for now, and all attention is quickly shifting to pushing the budget through and wrapping up the present session of the House of Commons and recessing for the summer months. For this Canadians will be collectively grateful; political Ottawa needs to chill out for a few months.

Look for the Tories to regroup and plot their strategy for another confidence or procedural fight this fall. Contrary to some pundits' putrid prognostications, Mr. Harper's leadership is not in immediate or even medium-term jeopardy, he will be there on the ballot next time out. However, the Tory brain trust may wish to dust off one of my columns from a month ago and follow my advice.

Get Mr. Harper out of his jacket and tie and into a golf shirt (but not that gawd-awful gold one please) and slacks and have him hit every barbecue from Oshawa north to Barrie down to Niagara Falls and all points in between. Sure he can stop in Red Deer, but only to grab a coffee -- a quick bathroom stop and then on he goes again.

The Western base, for the most part, is secure, Ontario must be the overwhelming focus of Tory activity this summer combined with a few dollops of Quebec and Atlantic appearances.

As for all those Tory candidates nominated in a hurry, my guess is that at least 25% of them will drop out of contention before the next election rolls around either this fall or next spring so look for another round of nomination fights in select ridings to ramp up in September or October.

Over on the Liberal side of the House, Paul Martin will likely embark on his "Determined as hell" tour to rebuild the badly shattered image of his Liberal Party. Recall that post AG report in 2004 he had the "Mad as hell" tour, then after his televised address earlier this year we had the "Sorry as hell" tour. And should he win the next election in 2005 or 2006, then we'll get the fourth installment which I've tentatively dubbed the "Jubilant as hell" tour.

But before this, the Liberals may wish to nominate candidates in opposition ridings since they all but forgot this rather important part of election preparedness over the last few weeks.