National Affairs
Is that Tory applause we hear?
Claire Hoy

Perhaps it's because he has spent most of his adult life working outside of Canada - and outside the Liberal Party of Canada - that leadership front-runner

PMichael Ignatieff gushed at the end of Sunday's Toronto leadership debate that "I think this is one of the best afternoons to be a Liberal I can ever remember."

Or maybe he just wanted to inject something positive - anything - into a campaign which has lurched from one disaster to another lately. Whatever the reason, one suspects that the only debate-watcher who truly felt it was a "wonderful" exercise was Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

No doubt Harper took great delight in the main bout of the afternoon - a nasty tiff between Ignatieff and failed former NDP Ontario premier Bob Rae - over their respective, ah, shall we say, evolving positions on war and the Middle East.

To hear Ignatieff tell it, Rae is a flat-out flip-flopper. And a liar to boot.

To hear Rae tell it, Ignatieff is a flat-out flip-flopper. And a liar to boot.

Is that Tory applause we hear in the background?

The best line of the debate went to former Liberal minister Stephane Dion who, despite difficulties making himself understood through his French accent, said he was "proud" to be a Liberal, and he didn't have to wait until a leadership contest to show it.

Indeed, barring something completely unforeseen, the Liberals are almost certain to settle on either Ignatieff or Rae, neither of whom have a track record with the party; one of whom (Ignatieff) has practically no track record as a Canadian living and working here; and the other (Rae) has a terrible track record as NDP premier of Ontario.

Of all the mistakes Rae made as premier - including the still festering enmity he created over his ill-conceived "Rae Days"- one statistic sums up how badly this man performed as premier of what was then Canada's richest province.

By the time he left office, more Ontarians on a per capita basis were living on welfare - enjoying far and away the most attractive rates in the country - than in any other province. Now there's a record to be proud of, eh?

Well, it seems Rae is proud of his record. He actually boasted at the leadership debate about it. Geez. Is it any wonder Rae did so poorly in delegate selection in his own province? That doesn't exactly bode well for a party which depends on Ontario for its very political life. Rae - no question about it - is far more popular outside of Ontario, where people don't know him. Yet.

As for Ignatieff, he pointed out that Rae was recently arguing against the extension of Canadian troops in Afghanistan, but is now arguing the opposite, adding, "...I actually don't know where you stand on this issue."

This, even by the low standards of political expectations, is pure chutzpah. It may be that Rae has taken liberties with his Afghan policy, but nobody has flip-flopped the way Ignatieff has over his dumb-headed comments on the Israel- Hezbollah war.

Unless you've been visiting the moon - or, like the majority of Canadians, you simply have no interest in the leadership campaign - you will know that Ignatieff attempted to "correct" a serious gaffe he made last summer when he dismissed the deaths of several Lebanese civilians, including children, as something he wasn't "loosing any sleep" over.

Not being a stupid man - indeed, he and Rae are both high in IQ, while a tad low in street smarts - Ignatieff was asked about this in a Quebec interview, a province with a large Lebanese population, and admitted that his early comment was thoughtless.

Fair enough. Except - alas - he went on to say that being an expert in these matters, Israel - which had fired the rockets into the Lebanese village - had committed a "war crime... That's clear."

No, it's not clear. What is clear is that however regretful the deaths of civilians were, Ignatieff knows full well - or certainly should know - that a)- Israel did not intentionally target the civilians, and b)- Hezbollah's strategy is to use homes and public buildings from which to fire their rockets (this, you'll remember, is the same Hezbollah which started the war by launching unprovoked rocket sallies into Israel).

Ignatieff has since tried to scramble even further by suggesting that "both sides" have committed war crimes, a position which also remains to be seen, but worse, suggests there is a moral equivalence between a terrorist group, i.e. Hezbollah, which deliberately targeted Israeli citizens, and a democracy, i.e. Israel, which did everything it could reasonably do in a war to avoid civilian deaths.

No wonder Stephen Harper is smiling these days. Who wouldn't be?