The right thing for the wrong reason.

Doing the right thing for the wrong reason is not as good as doing the right thing for the right reason, but it sure beats doing the wrong thing for the wrong reason. And since the Liberals have been getting things double-wrong pretty consistently since the election, it is heartening to see the party do the right thing for the wrong reason.

I suppose a determined optimist might say that constitutes good news.

This is all about leadership. Going into the election campaign, Liberals weren't at all certain their leader had any. Exiting the campaign, they were certain he didn't.

Stéphane Dion announced he would resign after the party chose a new leader in 2009 but would stick around until then. He was the lamest of ducks. Not only were his days in power formally numbered, he had neither the affection of Liberals nor the respect of the public. And his party was broke.

Stephen Harper may well have meant all the nice things he said about civility and co-operation in the weeks leading up to the return of Parliament but there's only so much temptation a nasty, ravenous partisan can take. This was blood in the water. Like the shark who struggles to leave behind his carnivorous ways in Finding Nemo, the prime minister got the scent and went into a frenzy.

I will not recap what happened next. Children might be reading.

What's important for present purposes is that Stéphane Dion led his party into an unprecedented and dangerous course of action without the slightest mandate. It was manifestly absurd that this man who had led the Liberal party to its worst result in modern history, who had announced his resignation, who had no significant base of support in the party or the public, would suddenly become prime minister and make decisions that would decide the fate of Canada and the Liberal party for years to come.
[Top]

And yet the Liberal caucus responded to this absurdity by, quite literally, signing on the dotted line.

Only when polls showed the public had turned decisively against Dion's Liberal-NDP coalition did Liberals permit some back-room grumbling. And only when John Manley condemned Dion's leadership did Liberals screw up their courage and ask him to please be merciful and quit now.

This crisis has demonstrated more clearly than ever that parliamentarians do not think and act as elected officials independently exercising their best judgment on behalf of their constituents.

They think and act like sled dogs: The guy at the back shouts "mush!" and they pull.

This obedient mentality has developed for many reasons but one of the most important is how parties choose their leaders.

ontrary to what many Canadians seem to think, we elect members of Parliament, not a prime minister. Members of Parliament decide who will form government. The prime minister is merely the member who commands the confidence of a majority of his fellows.

Traditionally, this meant the caucus of the governing party could remove the prime minister and install another at any time. All it took was a show of hands. Seven out of 18 British prime ministers in the 20th century lost power this way, Margaret Thatcher being the most famous.

Needless to say, MPs with the power to remove a prime minister do not think and act like sled dogs. And prime ministers don't treat them like dogs, either.

Of course the knock against this is that it's undemocratic. And in a sense, it is. The leader's name may not be on ballots but it's certainly a big factor in the minds of voters. Who are MPs to decide for them?
[Top]

But those MPs are always concerned with winning the next election and, unlike prime ministers, they don't live in a bubble. They are excruciatingly sensitive to popular feeling and they would not oust a prime minister unless they were sure the public was with them. And as in the case of Margaret Thatcher, they are usually right.

But all this has changed because parties have embraced "more democratic" means of choosing leaders. The worst of these is the most popular: "One member, one vote" typically delivers victory to whichever candidate is best able to round up herds of instant members, leading inevitably to sleazy tactics and the development of ethnic fiefdoms.

Happily, the Liberals announced Monday that, given the urgent situation, the caucus would choose an interim leader, with a leadership convention to follow. Right thing, wrong reason.

After Bob Rae and others complained, the party announced the decision would be opened to hundreds of party members. Wrong thing, wrong reason.

Tuesday, Bob Rae announced he was dropping out of the leadership race. Michael Ignatieff will now be acclaimed leader, presumably by the caucus.

And so we're back to the right thing for the wrong reason.

Unfortunately, this isn't much of a precedent for caucus control of the leadership, which means Liberal MPs will soon resume the usual role of lining up and waiting for the guy at the back to shout "mush!"

And that's just plain wrong.

You can contact Dan Gardner at the Ottawa Citizen.
E-mail: dgardner@thecitizen.canwest.com

Back to Columns

Home

Copyright © 2005  Dan Gardner
Website Design & Management by:  GRA Web Site Design Ottawa