It has been one long winter.  It sure looks that it’s over, however in Canada you never know if that is the case.  A few years ago I spoke in Grande Prairie Alberta and one of the natives told me very proudly that sometimes it snows every month of the year here.  Thankfully in southwestern Ontario we don’t have the same climate.  I’m looking forward to beautiful weather ahead all the way into Christmas.

I’m sure that’s the way Michael Ignatieff is feeling too. As all of you know he was made Liberal leader over the weekend in Vancouver.  I thought he must have been thinking about the weather to or at least the surroundings when he commented on the view from Canada Place in Vancouver harbor.  It’s a striking view however when I heard him comment on it I thought he sounded a bit like guy who’s been away for a long time.  Maybe that’s not fair, because Michael Ignatieff seems to be a very decent guy. Needless to say I think the Liberals have a little bit more blue sky ahead of them now that they have Ignatieff as leader.

I’m not sure of all the nuances regarding why the Liberals did what they did in Vancouver.  They were put in a bit of a box when the coalition imploded earlier this year.  Having no contest for Liberal leader will ultimately lead to some type of weakness for the party nationally.  However those are things that political types worry about and not most Canadians.  Most Canadians are just trying to get through this recession with out getting too scraped up.

Having said that Mr. Ignatieff seems to have found an issue with employment insurance or EI, which is finding some resonance with Canadians.  He has said employment insurance is in crisis and in urgent need of reform.  He has called for national eligibility standards of 360 hours over 52 weeks instead of the 54 different regional rates that now apply.  This seems to be kind of a stretch to me but it looks like the Liberals are making that reach to make them more electable across Canada.

It certainly is a lot different than when Michael Ignatieff was in Chatham Kent a few weeks ago.  That’s when he talked about trying to find a way to get back rural seats in order to get a majority government.  Putting something into EI might help but it is not the policy, which will bring back rural Canada into the Liberal fold.  Ignatieff has asked the Harper Conservatives who worked with him with regard to EI but so far the Prime Minister doesn’t seem quite interested.  That might be because of the liberals want to cause election over EI, Mr. Harper might try to rely on one of the other parties in the parliament to support his government.

In many ways the optics of our federal political situation are changing.  Ignatieff is one thing but the NDP and the Bloc are just as important in this pizza parliament has anybody else.  The NDP do not want an election first of all because the last one was only in October and they did pretty well in that.  They always have a problem with any buzz in the Liberal party because typically that draws some of their support away from them.  In my opinion Jack Layton is wonderful and a great asset to the party.

The Bloc Quebecois always has a problem because they never really wanted election.  Key is that the last election was only in October, which I think many people forget especially Liberals. The block did pretty well in October and there is no reason whatsoever that they would do any better having election in 2009.  So they will continue to try and redefine themselves at a time when sovereignty is on the back burner in Québec politics.   What they’ll redefine as is anybody’s guess. My guess is they will just continue to create havoc in Canada’s political system.

For political types all of this is very interesting.  However as I said before I don’t think most Canadians are interested at all.  Regardless of the bounce in the markets lately, we are still in a very deep recession with unemployment rising in this country.  There are so many more things to think about with regard to putting food on the table and lives in order versus wondering who’s going to be around the next political mountain.

So for Iggy, it was a great weekend but keep in mind it might be a long time before there is great political change in this country.  Right now the country is not listening to the political discord.  The last election simply put wasn’t very long ago and nobody wants to go there again very soon.  I say at least till after the Vancouver 2010 Olympics and I wouldn’t be surprised if it is extended much farther out than that.