On Sun, Jan 24, 2010 at 9:50 AM, Graydon <o...@uniserve.com> wrote: > On Sun, Jan 24, 2010 at 09:40:33AM -0500, Adam Maas scripsit: >> Duceppe can't add either, he's much more of a Socialist than most of >> the NDP is, being an actual ex-Communist. > > Huge chunks of the US far, far right are ex-trotskyists; now, > admittedly, they can't seem to add either, but there's a fair amount of > evidence the Quebec socialists add pretty well. "Sewer socialists" are > fine; they build infrastructure and are interested in raising the floor, > as it were.
Duceppe was not Trotskyist, more of the 'Moscow Apologist' school. And he spend a couple decades as a Labour Organizer. He's very definitely still in the strong socialist mold, not a Sewer Socialist. > >> An NDP/Bloc coalition with a majority would be a prescription for both >> a disastrous parliament and the fundamental destruction of the NDP as >> a force in National Politics. > > I don't think it would disastrous. I think it would freak a lot of > people out in useful ways, but that's different from being disastrous. IIRC you're out west, where the NDP and the other Socialists are fundamentally pragmatist and do a pretty good job overall of governing. Both the federal NDP and the Bloc are quite dominated by the eastern sort of socialist who's far more interested in doing what's ideologically right than what works. (I should note I was born and raised in BC, but have been in Ontario since Bob Rae was premier). I'd have few issues with either the Saskatchewan or BC NDP parties running the country, but the federal party I have serious reservations about. > >> What I'd like to see is a Conservative/NDP coalition, with a NDP >> leader who wasn't either a professional politician (a la Layton) or an >> Ivory Tower Academic (a la Layton's 2 predecessors). > > That's getting into "and a pony" territory, though; Harper would engage > in such a thing formally only after the Lord God Jehovah with a bucket > of thunderbolts in one hand came down and told him to do it, and maybe > not then. The NDP isn't likely to produce such a leader any time soon, > either. > > -- Graydon Actually, there's strong indications that Harper has tried to set up exactly that sort of coalition, and we functionally had exactly this setup over the summer of 2009. And yes, there's little likelyhood of the Federal NDP getting a leader with the sense and pragmatism of Broadbent anytime soon. A pity, since I prefer having two options in an election (I'll vote Tory or NDP, depending on the local candidate and how functional each party is at a given moment, I won't vote Liberal) -- M. Adam Maas http://www.mawz.ca Explorations of the City Around Us. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
