In the latest twist to Harper's coalition with 'Separatists' and 'Socialists', the Conservatives are now running attack ads against Michael Ignatieff during a baseball game ... get this .... suggesting that the Liberal leader will form a coalition with 'Separatists' and 'Socialists' if Harper doesn't get a majority.
What is wrong with this man? Is there a rubber room in his future or is he really that stupid????!!! I know that Harper is a lying sack of dog doo doo, but this is insane. He's definitely a danger to himself and others.
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: MICHAEL IGNATIEFF
Leader's gut reaction to ads: Don't treat Liberals like fools
Toronto Star
September 19, 2009, after the party voted against the Tories.
Susan Delacourt Ottawa Bureau
OTTAWA–Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff was watching a baseball game on TV Thursday night when he received a vivid confirmation of his party's decision to vote no confidence in Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government.
Three ads flashed on his TV screen – the first was a taxpayer-financed spot, boasting of the government's economic plan. The next two were the nasty Conservative ads, accusing Ignatieff of wanting to form a coalition with "separatists" and "socialists," and accusing the Liberal leader of just being in politics for himself.
Ignatieff said he was immediately struck by the political irony – there were the Harper Conservatives, lashing out at the New Democrats and the Bloc Québécois, on the eve of needing their support in yesterday's confidence vote in the Commons.
And the Liberal leader realized, once again, that this is what happens to parties who support the Conservatives in this fragile minority Parliament.
"While you're propping the government up, they're running ads saying, `He's just in it for himself.' How stupid do they think I am?" Ignatieff said in an interview with the Star yesterday, immediately after the Liberals, for the first time in nearly four years, voted against the government in a confidence vote.
"If you want to make Parliament work, you can make Parliament work if you're the prime minister of Canada. It's that simple. So now, he can do it. But don't treat the Liberal Party of Canada like fools. Because we're not."
The Liberal party is in the midst of preparing its own round of ads to follow the flurry of TV spots they've been releasing over the past couple of weeks. While the first wave was mostly positive – some say too positive, featuring Ignatieff talking in a forest glade – the next series of ads are expected to have more bite.
But Ignatieff said yesterday he's setting strict limits on how low they can go in attack mode.
"I've got a bar," he said. "I make no apologies for attacking his policies; I've been attacking his policies vigorously and will continue to do so. But I've not attacked his patriotism, I've not attacked his family, I've not attacked his commitment to Canada."
Ignatieff will, however, attack the way Harper does politics – and the ads are a big part of it.
"What he says in private is not what he says in public," says Ignatieff, a reference to a video that emerged over the past couple of weeks, showing Harper delivering a speech to staunch Conservative supporters – a speech in which he mocked social-justice advocates as "left-wing fringe groups" and talked about a need for a majority to deliver "a lesson" to the opposition parties and their supporters.
Though Liberals are not saying what's in the next round of TV ads, there's some speculation that this video will play a part in them.
"What he says in private is contemptuous of Canadians and treats all Canadians who disagree with him as enemies," Ignatieff said. "The other disagreement I have is that when he attacks his opponents, he engages in falsehoods and the politics of personal destruction.
And when that guy's time in politics is finished and people ask what was his legacy, what was his contribution to the public life of Canada, it'll be those attack ads. And let it be on his head. I'm tired of it. And Canadians are tired of it."
Ignatieff said he laments that in the current hyper-partisan climate of Canadian politics, a party can suffer for voting in support of the government, as the NDP and Bloc did yesterday.
Is Ignatieff sorry now that the Liberals did help keep the Conservatives in power?
"No," is his answer. He's even not sorry he made a compromise deal last June to try to work out an employment insurance reform package with the Conservatives and avert an election.
Since then, Ignatieff has been criticized for caving in to Harper, the party has sunk in the polls, and some Liberals believe they lost a prime opportunity to take power away from the Tories.
"All I can say is that we tried in good faith to work with Stephen Harper," Ignatieff said. "The EI thing in the summer wasn't a game to me. ... But it was absolutely impossible to work with (Conservative MP) Pierre Poilievre and (Human Resources) Minister (Diane) Finley."
So when does he expect to see an election now?
"I'm one party leader among four. Decisions about elections involve everybody. "I've taken my responsibility, which is I've said I can't support this government any longer. It's up to the other parties to decide what they're going to do. End of story."
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