Just a quick response to our friends over at thescottross....
Sure... there are some who might think Iggy has his "stodgy" moments... But... (and it's a big "but"), he's a freakin' NASCAR fan!
You can't get much more "down home" than that. I learned that strange fact after reading dozens of his literature pieces, and meeting him a few times. He let on at a meeting over drinks and South Asian finger food in Richmond, that NASCAR is his secret "pleasure". Iggy LOVES NASCAR. He doesn't pretend to write books on it... and he doesn't pose with drivers (he could, but he doesn't). He doesn't go out and sponsor a CASCAR Series car (he could, but doesn't), but Iggy is a MASSIVE NASCAR fan.
You know, some people (mostly the a-holes on the other side of the floor) may want to paint him as "stodgy", and "bookish", but he's quite a charmer (known to set into motion many an "intellectu-gasm"), and isn't called "the robot" like our neoprene and plasticky Prime Minister. He also doesn't pretend that he's an expert in his field of study - he doesn't have to - he IS an expert... Unlike the PM - who pretends to have learned something in Econ class (always a bonus finishing school in the heart of your kind of politics... sure it helped with the grading when your profs were often political mentors. Lot easier than studying at the World's top schools).
Iggy is James Bond to Harper's Max Smart. He's (Iggy) smooth, sauve, and learned. Not a bumbling wannabe who happened to slip into his role (and a bank full of Liberal surplus to blow in his first 6 months, like a not-so-neglected pile of coke on a certain Harper friend's coffee table)...
Just "shits and giggles" Scott... Just shits and giggles...
2 comments:
WG there's no disputing Iggy's achievements. Yes he was director of the Carr Center at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Great stuff for MI but it's absolutely meaningless for the LPC if the man cannot connect with the Canadian voting public.
The guy ousted Dion without being remotely ready for the job he assumed. There's no such thing as an "apprentice leader." The public doesn't have the patience for that. By the time you complete your on-the-job training, the voting public has already passed judgment on you.
Harper ought to have been easy meat for an effective opposition leader. In reality, the best thing he's had going for him, Harper's very life support, has been two consecutive failed Liberal leaders.
I'm convinced that academia is a poor foundation for a career in politics. The skillsets you require to advance in the higher halls of learning don't carry over well when you shift into the political sphere.
Good post, and it's well deserved. I agree with most of your points, the problem is we're both Liberals and our sample size of 2 isn't exactly representative of the whole population.
The perspective I expressed is not completely my own, it's based more on talking to many people about Ignatieff and seeing their point of view.
In stepping in their shoes I see at least a part of their opinion justified that Ignatieff is all intellectual and no ordinary.... Well except for the NASCAR bit (but that's perhaps negated by the fact he keeps that a secret).
I like Iggy, and you like Iggy, but not all of Canada do we comprise. Iggy already has our votes, I'm trying to get him to win others.
-Scott
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