The time has come for the federal New Democratic Party to loosen up and let its rookie-rich Quebec caucus learn how to be good Members of Parliament right out there in public.

Yeah, there are risks in such a course of action. But there are risks in trying to control the caucus with an iron grip worthy of Prime Minister Stephen Harper as well, as the last few weeks of chatter about an NDP in "disarray," culminating in the Jan. 9 defection of Lise St. Denis to the faltering Liberals, have revealed.

Ryan Leef
Member of Parliament, Yukon
Open Letter #9
January 2012

Dear Ryan,

Who is behind the sleazy "push poll" that's got home telephones throughout Alberta ringing?

A push poll, for those of you who have not yet stumbled across the term, is a political campaigning technique in which a political party or interest group attempts to change the opinions of the people whom they contact by pretending to conduct a poll.

Usually push polls are designed to smear opposing politicians by suggesting something nasty about them, things that often have enough truth to them to make them dangerous but which occasionally are outright fabrications.

The people of Canada have spoken and it was the Liberal Party and the Bloc Quebecois to which they emphatically said "No!"

But, oddly enough, it is Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Conservatives who find themselves between a rock and a hard place.

Let me explain. As long as the Conservatives led a minority Parliament, they could tell their most radical supporters that, so sorry, they were unable to advance their far-right agenda because those perfidious Liberals, unpatriotic Bloquistes and annoying but insignificant New Democrats kept getting in the way.

I had an astonishing conversation with a Conservative Member of Parliament from Alberta last week.

The MP in question, who shall remain nameless to protect the guilty, was complaining to me about how the current federal election campaign seems to have gone right off the tracks. Thanks (in his opinion) to the news media's irresponsible fixation on matters of picayune consequence, all anyone wants to talk to him about was that darned Facebook fracas!

He, on the other hand, only wanted to deal with substantive issues, serious policy matters and high-minded discussion of the future of Canada, which is what a federal election campaign really ought to be about. Right?

The Liberal Party of Canada is a fascinating outfit; a perennial case study for political apprentices.

Sometimes referred to as Canada's "natural governing party," because they were in power for much of the 20th century, Liberals cling to that undemocratic-sounding designation, scrambling to find the next big thing to put them back in their "rightful" place.

But as they search for a winning formula, by changing leaders and political staff at a furious pace, the recent past is riddled with dark omens.