Today in Manitoba

I heard Mr. Astroturf himself, Bob Rae, was going to be in town today. Before I hit the rally at the Legislature, I figured I'd stop in and scope things out since it wasn't too far out of my way.

The Bob for Prime Minster, er I mean Liberal Leader, tour landed in Winnipeg and Manitoba's only Liberal MP rolled out the Red carpet for him. I'm not sure how many people were there for that meeting, since there was also children's gymnstics class going on at the same time. Did this represent the Grassroots of the Party? Consider: Bob himself or the MC (Anita Neville) were identifying most of those from the audience who were asking questions by their names.

The funny thing - when the occasional question was acknowledged from someone that the MC didn't seem to identify by name, the intrepid Mr. Rae was somewhat at a loss for words. One question in particular had him doing a really good Porky Pig impression. Audio will be posted later.

Democracy - coalition style:
A question came up about how the coalition would handle such things as who might be running where and doing what in the next election. Bob's response was that they haven't gotten that far yet. Wonder what else could be going on in the backrooms that we don't know about. Isn't considering having this coalition deciding which ridings will get a candidate from which party a tad undemocratic?

Of Course the Governor General has to approve this - my constitutional experts said so....

On the subject of whether or not Her Excellency would give the go-ahead to this group to govern in the event of a vote of Non-confidence, Mr. Rae asserts that all of the constitutional experts that he'd spoken with didn't see why she shouldn't.

In his universe, the Governor General is obliged to hand power over to them because they have a letter, signed by someone who won't be Liberal leader when Parliament resumes, saying they can guarantee the stability of the house for 18 months? I don't think so. Her Excellency is not obliged to do anything that she deems to be not in the best intests of the stability of the government.

Handing power over to a group of people where:

• the supposed leaders of the pack can't even keep their own party stable,
  
• the actual combined number of active participants (those who put people in cabinet) is actually fewer that the current government (143 to 113)
  
• their survival hinges on the continued good will of a third group whose stated mandate is to promote the break up of the country

Does NOT meet that criteria by any stretch of the imagination. If it did, then she would not have deemed it either necessary or desireable to give consideration to the request for prorogation by the Prime Minister.

Today, I heard Bob Rae make it abundantly clear that the government could put out a budget that matches everything that the oposition says they want and he would still push to defeat them. If anyone had any doubts about his intentions, that should lay them to rest. This is not about the good of Canada, its about Bob Rae's only shot at being Prime Minister.

Your tax dollars at work: The one thing I want to know is why CBC required 2 vans to cover this, while the Freep and CTV only sent one each.