NDP MP quits for Ontario Liberals

This story reports considerable local consternation with Thibeault's defection, including in the Liberal riding executive.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/2014/12/16/thibeault-says-he-is-running-fo...

The story includes an online poll in which Thibeault's move is opposed by a margin of 72% to 25%.

He may not have as smooth a transition into the provincial cabinet as he thought.  

terrytowel wrote:

ajaykumar wrote:

This whole thing is going to backfire for Wynne, just like Adam vaughan / Christine innes saga backfired for Trudeau

I don't see how it backfired as Vaughan won the seat.

onlinediscountanvils wrote:

I couldn't care less that this guy has switched parties, but he's not likely to go straight into cabinet, is he?

I suspect if he wins he will be appointed the Minsiter in charge of Ring of Fire. I think that is Glenn motivation.

Last week, NDPers enjoyed quoting John Ivison's column when he made snarky remarks about the new Federal Liberal candidates.

Let's see if NDPers enjoy John Ivison's new column:

---

Latest NDP defection speaks volumes about which direction the party’s fortunes are heading

December 16, 2014

The idea of the NDP as a government-in-waiting always seemed a bit ambitious — like the back end of the pantomime horse wanting to play Peter Pan.

There have just never been enough people who truly believed that the party could be trusted to run a $2-trillion economy.

The defection of Sudbury NDP MP, Glenn Thibeault, to Kathleen Wynne’s Ontario Liberals, where he will run as a candidate in an upcoming byelection, speaks volumes about which direction the party’s fortunes are heading.

Mr. Thibeault is the sixth New Democrat to skedaddle since the 2011 federal election, remarkably all to different bolt-holes.

---

More:

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/12/16/john-ivison-latest-ndp-de...

Debater wrote:

ajaykumar wrote:

This whole thing is going to backfire for Wynne, just like Adam vaughan / Christine innes saga backfired for Trudeau. A bit rich for the NDP to criticize GT when mulcair was himself a prov. Liberal , and part of a right wing govt. For years he tried moving NDP to the right, and after losses he suddenly remembered that the NDP was a progressive party.

The Adam Vaughan candidacy did not backfire on Trudeau -- it worked out very well.  Vaughan won Trinity-Spadina by 20 points, and the win further cemented the lead the Trudeau Liberals have over the Mulcair NDP.

There is a conflict between Trudeau & Innes/Ianno, but it's very different from the Wynne-Thibeault situation.  Trudeau had some genuine reasons for banning Innes/Ianno.  This duo had been exercising undue influence over the T-S Liberal riding association for a long time, and most significantly, Ianno has been involved in an insider trading scandal in recent years and was banned from trading for 5 years.

Btw, glad to see you point out that Mulcair used to be a provincial Liberal and that he has tried to make the NDP right wing.  Some Mulcair supporters here don't like to acknowledge that.

ajaykumar wrote:

This whole thing is going to backfire for Wynne, just like Adam vaughan / Christine innes saga backfired for Trudeau. A bit rich for the NDP to criticize GT when mulcair was himself a prov. Liberal , and part of a right wing govt. For years he tried moving NDP to the right, and after losses he suddenly remembered that the NDP was a progressive party.

Not really the same at all. Mulcair didn't drop the Liberals to join the federal NDP in order to sign up to the governing party with a majority mandate, and a possible cabinet post, in fact he quit his cabinet post with the governing Liberals and then joined the NDP when they were polling in single digits in Quebec, and he was a long shot canidate in Outremont, and when the NDP were no where near even official opposition.

There were no "plums" being offered to Tom Mulcair to join the NDP.

In fact, if my memory serves me, he even turned down offers from the governing federal Conservatives, to choose the NDP, the fourth party in parliament.

ajaykumar wrote:

I think Olivier might be running for the federal liberals now that the seat is open.

Brilliant! Sounds like a winning theme for a new comedy series, or maybe a video game.

ajaykumar wrote:

I think Olivier might be running for the federal liberals now that the seat is open.

It will be interesting to see whether Olivier approaches Justin Trudeau's team, or whether they approach him.

I know that Gerald Butts has been asking the Liberals to find a strong candidate for Sudbury, particularly now that the seat is open.

Although the Liberals did poorly in Northern Ontario under Ignatieff & Dion, Sudbury was a Liberal stronghold until 2008 (even stayed Liberal in the 1984 Mulroney landslide when Turner won only 40 seats).

Hopefully a strong Liberal candidate will come forward and win the seat in 2015.

Former Liberal MP Anthony Rota who only lost Nipissing-Timiskaming by 18 votes to the CPC in 2011 has been re-nominated, and the Liberals already have a candidate in Thunder Bay-Superior North to run against Green MP Bruce Hyer.  So there could be Liberal growth in Northern Ontario in 2015.

sherpa-finn wrote:

Debater wrote: Last week, NDPers enjoyed quoting John Ivison's column when he made snarky remarks about the new Federal Liberal candidates. Let's see if NDPers enjoy John Ivison's new column....

Let's see:

Ivison #1: Liberal candidates are a self-serving bunch of opportunists and careerists who are only in politics for themselves.

Ivison #2: Tom Mulcair has some serious caucus management issues. 

Yeah, OK. I am good with those two assessments. 

Ivison said more than that about Mulcair & the NDP.  You glossed right over it to minimize the criticism of the NDP.

1.  Ivison took a shot at the NDP's economic credentials right in the opening passage by saying not many people believe the NDP can be trusted to run the economy

2.  He says there are rumours of other NDP floor crossings

3.  That to lose 6 NDP MP's "borders on ineptitude"

4.  That the NDP is at risk of falling back to 3rd place in 2015

5.  And that Mulcair, while a smart man, is no Jack Layton.

Are you really 'good' with that assessment?

Debater wrote:

He says there are rumours of other NDP floor crossings

Such high journalistic standards that our media sets, to report things based on rumours rather than verifiable facts.

Debater wrote:

sherpa-finn wrote:

Debater wrote: Last week, NDPers enjoyed quoting John Ivison's column when he made snarky remarks about the new Federal Liberal candidates. Let's see if NDPers enjoy John Ivison's new column....

Let's see:

Ivison #1: Liberal candidates are a self-serving bunch of opportunists and careerists who are only in politics for themselves.

Ivison #2: Tom Mulcair has some serious caucus management issues. 

Yeah, OK. I am good with those two assessments. 

And that Mulcair, while a smart man, is no Jack Layton.

Of course. Jack Layton was no Tommy Douglas. I remember those discussions in these parts quite well.

Ontario NDP house leader Gilles Bisson was friends with former NDP MP Glenn Thibeault

Not anymore

Saying "It says a lot about the values of (Premier) Kathleen Wynne and the Liberal party,”

“They are willing to allegedly bribe a lifelong Liberal to make way for a turncoat MP who is more interested in his own career than the people of Sudbury.”

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Debater wrote:

He says there are rumours of other NDP floor crossings

Such high journalistic standards that our media sets, to report things based on rumours rather than verifiable facts.

Debater wrote:

sherpa-finn wrote:

Debater wrote: Last week, NDPers enjoyed quoting John Ivison's column when he made snarky remarks about the new Federal Liberal candidates. Let's see if NDPers enjoy John Ivison's new column....

Let's see:

Ivison #1: Liberal candidates are a self-serving bunch of opportunists and careerists who are only in politics for themselves.

Ivison #2: Tom Mulcair has some serious caucus management issues. 

Yeah, OK. I am good with those two assessments. 

And that Mulcair, while a smart man, is no Jack Layton.

Of course. Jack Layton was no Tommy Douglas. I remember those discussions in these parts quite well.

Jack Layton was no "Jack Layton". In fact, his party languished between 15% and 17% in the polls from the time he was elected leader of the Party until about two weeks before the 2011 election, and much of the momentum for the "Orange Crush", was built upon the astute decision to bring a credible Quebec politician to lead the way in Quebec.

And that Quebec politican was Thomas Mulcair.

There would be no "Jack Layton" legacy to talk about, if it were not for Thomas Mulcair.

Unionist wrote:

Debater wrote:

Most notoriously was the way the NDP lashed out at Lise St. Denis - they tied up her phone lines for hours with harassing phone calls and ended up receiving a several thousand dollar fine from the CRTC.

Interesting... I don't ever recall hearing about that incident, but [url=http://www.ndp.ca/news/statement-ndp-national-director-nathan-rotman-crt...'re right[/url].

 

I wouldn't have said it if it wasn't true. 

I usually try to be accurate in what I post, even if some of the NDP partisans here don't think so. 

Jack Layton's "charisma" is something that people talk about a lot, but I never saw it, and nor do his election results speak to this. There were a few things going on in 2011 that created the ground swell of support for the NDP, and people like to identify Layton's "charisma" as the key factor, but it was a multifaceted event.

The Jack Layton "magic" is just a simplistic way of explaining the utter defeat of the Liberal party in 2011, because Liberals have a problem understanding anything beyond showmanship, aesthetics and optics.

Quote:

Like everyone else in the north I was stunned by Glenn Thibeault’s decision to quit the Federal New Democrats and join the Kathleen Wynne Liberals. It was only a few months ago that I was in Sudbury to celebrate Glenn Thibeault’s nomination as the federal candidate for the New Democratic Party. Our leader Tom Mulcair was there as was provincial leader Andrea Horwath. I remember the excitement among the volunteers as a Mr. Thibeault promised to represent the NDP vision in the coming election. People took Glenn at his word.

            Now, a few months later, Mr. Thibeault tells us he has found a supposedly better offer. His volunteers and colleagues learned about his defection to the Provincial Liberals from an article in the Toronto Star.

The news came asI was meeting with unemployed mill workers from Iroquois Falls. These men and their families are facing bleak and tough choices. It was bitter irony to know they are losing their jobs as a direct result of failed Liberal hydro and resource policies. Over the last number of years, I have seen too many victims of this lack of vision for the north from the shut down of the OntarioNorthland Railway to the loss of jobs at mills like Smooth Rock Falls, Xstrata Timmins and Iroquois Falls. Nobody is offering these families a cushy insider’s job. 

During each of these crises provincial Liberals were nowhere to be seen. It was New Democrats who showed up to work with the communities and pick up the pieces. 

When I was in Iroquois Falls these unemployed mill workers were asking me about Glenn. “What kind of guy breaks faith with the people who put him there?” was the sentiment I heard at the local hockey arena.

            Mr. Thibeault’s decision speaks to a cynicism that is choking Canadian politics. Some politicians seem to forget that they were elected, not on their personality or brains, but because a lot of ordinary people did the hard work of putting up signs, working the phones and door knocking. These people volunteer because they believe that the candidate will represent the vision of a party.  

I am very sorry that Glenn Thibeault decided that a back room deal with insiders trumps this covenant. It sends a message that you can’t trust the promises of politicians.I spent my political life fighting this cynicism. The reason I joined the NDPis because I believe the “best offer” a politician can have is to stand up for the ordinary people of this country who are not being represented by insiders and the well-connected. This was the vision I shared with Jack Layton. It was why Jack spent so much time in the north, particularly during the brutal Vale strike when provincial the provincial Liberal minister from Sudbury was on perpetual vacation.

This commitment to the vision is why I work with Tom Mulcair to elect the New Democrats to government in 2015. I am only sorry it is no longer the vision of Glenn Thibeault.

Charlie Angus MP

Timmins-JamesBay

Chuck Angus weighs in on Facebook.

Yes Libby is going to be missed.

And there is a good possibility to replace her. 

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/reevely-wynnes-big-gamble-on-star...

 Your list makes no sense what's so ever Cortina.

I did think Jack was over-managed throughout most of his tenure as leader, but always felt that he had a unique ability to connect with people when left to his own devices.

wage zombie wrote:

Aristotleded24 wrote:

I remember until about half-way through the 2011 campaign, Jack was constatnly derided as a "used car salesman," and even in the early days of the 2011 campaign, there was talk about how tired he looked and that he couldn't attract crowds.

Yes exactly.  After his death I was talking with some non-political but progressive friends in Toronto.  They were sad about his death, because he was "the only politician" they felt ever cared enough to matter, and how impossible he would be to replace.

I told them the same thing you said, that up until recently he was dismissed as a used car salesman.  After thinking about it a bit, they realized that they never really felt much (if any) affinity or warmth towards him personally in 2004, 2006, or 2008.  It was like he was a non-person until he was a saint.

All that being said, I admired him greatly, especially his optimism.

That was those awesome, but completely vapid ads.

Debater wrote:

But as Justin Ling wrote in a column earlier in the year, when you leave the NDP, the NDP doesn't allow you to leave quietly - it seeks vengeance.

I can assure you none of the parties take it all that well when one of their caucus members commits an act of treachery. Remember when Belinda Stronach left the CPC after Paul martin bribed her with a cabinet position? Lots of Tories called her all kinds of unprintable and unrepeatable things and she was publicly called a "whore" (sic.)? Remember when David Emerson quit the liberals and joined the CPC after harper bribed him with a cabinet post in 2006? The Liberals were furious and they passed out thousands of signs in Emerson's riding that said "de-elect david Emerson".

Debater wrote:

Michael Moriarity wrote:

Rokossovsky wrote:

Jack Layton was no "Jack Layton". In fact, his party languished between 15% and 17% in the polls from the time he was elected leader of the Party until about two weeks before the 2011 election, and much of the momentum for the "Orange Crush", was built upon the astute decision to bring a credible Quebec politician to lead the way in Quebec.

And that Quebec politican was Thomas Mulcair.

There would be no "Jack Layton" legacy to talk about, if it were not for Thomas Mulcair.

I agree with this analysis. While Mulcair wasn't the sole cause of the NDP resurgence in Quebec, he was a very important factor, and it would never have happened without him, however well Layton performed in the 2011 campaign.

That is supposition.

The Mulcair fans here may want to claim Mulcair was the big reason for the Quebec breakthrough, but Chantal Hebert and others have said that it was Jack Layton personally who won Quebec - not the NDP itself.

No. It's analysis by people familiar with the internal politics, and who knew about Jack Layton well before he appeared on your radar. Jack Layton, had some strong personal principles as I remember him, but he was not personally charismatic. His biggest asset was consensus team building, not public speaking, in which he was gaff prone and wooden, even when trying to sound "folksy" and "off-the-cuff".

When trying to sound emphatic and inspired, he often sounded histrionic and forced: Here is one of his better flubs.

Brachina, you have been one of Mulcair's biggest fans on this board since the early days of his leadership.  I'm not sure if you can be objective about him.

An interesting read, thanks Debater. It isn't clear what the resignation of VP Bisson has to do with l'affaire Thibeault, if anything. Also interesting that Wynne has decided she needs to go to Sudbury herself, right away, to put out the fire amongst the riding executive, who probably consider Thibeault as appealing as ebola. It will be interesting to see how that goes.