Vigile.net - Ian L. MacDonald

The Liberal follies

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2009-09-27T14:27:00Z

There's more to the renewed hostilities inside the Liberal Party than a clash of ambitions between Martin Cauchon and Denis Coderre. It's a much broader canvas than that, involving the two warring Liberal clans, the Trudeau-Chrétien wing and the Turner-Martin side of the (...) - consulter en ligne

Gender parity will rank as one of Charest's greatest achievements

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2008-12-21T16:42:00Z

It is far too early, at the beginning of his third term as premier, to be calling Jean Charest a lame duck. Nevertheless, he is beginning a third consecutive term in office, the first such milepost since Maurice Duplessis half a century ago, and it is quite likely to be Charest's last. His successor, some time after he crosses eight (...) - consulter en ligne

Weather, apathy and Harper ate away at Charest's majority

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2008-12-10T11:39:00Z

So, what happened to Jean Charest's big majority, which became what's known as a short majority when the votes were counted in the Quebec election ? Two things : turnout and blowback. First, the lowest turnout ever in a Quebec election, 57 per cent, down from 71 per cent in 2007. Low turnout normally favours the Liberals as their (...) - consulter en ligne

The Bloc's existential crisis

Ian L. MacDonald - The National Post — 2008-09-12T14:58:00Z

MONTREAL -The Bloc Quebecois has always been a one-trick pony. In its first three elections from 1993 to 2000, it ran on sovereignty. In the last two, in 2004 and 2006, it ran on the sponsorship scandal. In this election, the Bloc is running without the benefit of either. Sovereignty is on the shelf ; even the Parti Quebecois says so. And (...) - consulter en ligne

Quebec's Wounds Have Healed

Ian L. MacDonald - Editorial - The National Post — 2008-05-16T12:30:00Z

MONTREAL -Nearly 30 members of Quebec's political intelligentsia sat at a roundtable on Tuesday, discussing federalism and the future of the Canadian federation. In five hours of presentations and table talk, no one asked, "What does Quebec want ?" And nobody talked about sovereignty, except in the past tense. "The intelligentsia here (...) - consulter en ligne

C'est normal

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-08-25T16:02:49Z

Thirty years ago tomorrow, when the Charter of the French language was adopted by the National Assembly, Réne Lévesque implored Quebec's anglophone and allophone minorities to give Bill 101 "a chance." Lévesque himself was never very comfortable with the interdictions and coercive nature of his government's language law. He found (...) - consulter en ligne

Constitutional trial balloon won't fly

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-08-08T14:45:59Z

La place de la "nation québécoise dans un Canada uni", la "peste canadian" In a carefully orchestrated leak, the Charest government has served notice that it wants a new constitutional round to entrench what it calls "a Charter of Open Federalism," adopting the language of Stephen Harper's famous Quebec City speech, and effectively (...) - consulter en ligne

Beginning of the end for Jean Charest

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-06-02T13:19:40Z

Jean Charest got through the day. Now he needs to get through the summer. Think of him as a contestant on Survivor, trying to persuade the Quebec Liberal Party not to vote him off the island. Well, he's got some hard work ahead of him if he wants to lead the Liberal Party into the next election. And never mind the standing ovation he (...) - consulter en ligne

Tax cut already cost Charest

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-25T10:36:00Z

Jean Charest has already paid for the middle-class tax cut in yesterday's budget - out of his own political capital. He paid for it dearly in the last week of the campaign, in Quebec, in Ottawa and in the rest of the country. And now, if the opposition parties can be believed, he may pay even more for it. But in any case, it has (...) - consulter en ligne

Bloc had chance to guarantee Quebec seats, but blew it

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-18T16:30:57Z

It's one thing for the House of Commons to recognize Quebecers as a nation within a united Canada. It's quite another to demand special treatment in Quebec's representation in the House of Commons. This is exactly what the Quebec National Assembly, in a unanimous resolution, and the Bloc Quebecois in question period, has (...) - consulter en ligne

Marois flexes her muscles

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-16T14:16:32Z

The Parti Quebecois is used to imposing conditions on its leader. Now Pauline Marois, as a condition of becoming leader, will impose conditions on the party. First, no referendum. Second, no more go-go gauche. Take it or leave it. And as she said, political parties that fall out of touch with voters tend to be marginalized, "and even (...) - consulter en ligne

The Deuce' gets caught in cheesy bluff

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-14T12:23:00Z

In the annals of Quebec and Canadian politics, there has never been a crash like the candidacy of Gilles Duceppe for the leadership of the Parti Quebecois. In less than a week, he went from heir presumptive to a spent force in the sovereignty movement. Or as La Presse columnist Vincent Marissal put it yesterday, the Bloc Quebecois leader went (...) - consulter en ligne

Bloc leader can't afford to turn down another date with destiny

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-09T13:25:00Z

After Andre Boisclair, who ? And if not Gilles Duceppe now, when ? Perhaps, like Jean Charest in 1998, Duceppe will have no alternative but to cross the Ottawa River this time, and assume the leadership of a party with no other obvious choice. But Duceppe might already have missed his best chance when the Parti Quebecois leadership came open (...) - consulter en ligne

Bloc offside

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-05-07T13:17:23Z

The Bloc Quebecois was founded as a party of grievance, which has been its raison d'etre through five federal elections. Since Stephen Harper took office last year, though, the Bloc has been surrounded and outmanoeuvred on issues of symbolic or substantive importance to Quebec. From the Quebecois nation thing to the fiscal imbalance, (...) - consulter en ligne

A question of competence

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-04-30T13:09:00Z

The issue that bedeviled the Harper government all last week wasn't Canadian complicity in the abuse of Taliban detainees turned over to Afghan prisons, it was getting the story straight. It's a classic inside-Ottawa story, of who knew what and when. When the story keeps changing, as the government's did last week, then it (...) - consulter en ligne

The Queen would be warmly welcomed in Quebec

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-04-18T11:35:00Z

« Je vous ignore », devise de la Gâzette, 1840-2007... It's entirely predictable, whenever the question of inviting the Queen to Quebec arises, how quickly the media round up the usual suspects to denounce even the possibility, let alone the prospect. Thus, on whether she should be invited to take part in the 400th anniversary of the (...) - consulter en ligne

Liberal blame game should start with Charest

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-03-30T11:15:32Z

If Jean Charest is looking for someone to blame for nearly losing the election this week, he can start by looking in the mirror. The leader is always the first one responsible for what happens in a campaign. Others shape the leader's tour, turn polling and advertising into strategy and tactics, write speeches, keep the media hounds both (...) - consulter en ligne

Charest wins a split decision

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-03-14T06:23:00Z

One look at the five time blocks for last night's leaders' debate left no doubt any defining moment was likely to occur in the last one, on "the political future of Quebec." But, in fact, an old memo provided more of a central focus to the show. First, Mario Dumont, opening his bid to be well regarded and not just well liked : (...) - consulter en ligne

Jean Charest's election to lose

Ian L. MacDonald - The National Post — 2007-02-22T16:56:19Z

Jean Charest's mentor in politics, Brian Mulroney, had a favourite saying at election time : "Don't compare me to perfection, compare me to the alternative." Premier Charest doesn't have to make the comparison. His opponent, Parti Quebecois leader Andre Boisclair, invites it. To the extent that the upcoming Quebec election (...) - consulter en ligne

How Harper helped Charest

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-02-19T16:34:00Z

In St. Joseph de Beauce in January of last year, there were 700 people at a Conservative campaign rally with Stephen Harper. Six days later, his candidate, Maxime Bernier, would win the riding of Beauce by 26,000 votes. In the restaurant where the meeting was being held, Claude Charron considered the blue tide that was then rising across (...) - consulter en ligne

PM passes Year 1 test : Harper government has met the basic requirement of competence

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2007-01-22T18:53:36Z

Between tomorrow's first anniversary of Stephen Harper's election, and the anniversary of his minority government taking office on Feb. 6, there will be no shortage of appraisals of his first year in office. If Jean Chretien was a transactional leader, and Paul Martin proved to be a transitional figure, the most striking thing (...) - consulter en ligne

Playing politics with soldiers

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2006-12-18T17:14:41Z

Every time Gilles Duceppe goes to Quebec City, he says something completely stupid. Earlier this fall he proposed a light-rail link between the provincial capital and New York City, a concept for which no commercial demand has ever existed, and which no serious federal or provincial politician has ever discussed with American counterparts in (...) - consulter en ligne

Opposition will have explaining to do if it brings down government

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2006-12-13T15:19:40Z

Gilles Duceppe is sabre-rattling, threatening to bring down the government over the fiscal imbalance, Kyoto and, now, Afghanistan. On the vertical fiscal imbalance between Ottawa and the provinces, Duceppe has put up an arbitrary and absurd number, $3.9 billion, he says Quebec is owed in terms of the gap between Ottawa's fiscal surplus (...) - consulter en ligne

If Liberals are the party of the charter, Tories are party of BNA Act

Ian L. MacDonald - The Gazette (Montreal) — 2006-12-11T17:24:46Z

In opposing the procedural resolution on whether to re-open the debate on same-sex marriage last week, Stephane Dion said Stephen Harper would invoke the notwithstanding clause to override the Charter of Rights and insisted the Liberals were "the party of the charter." This was nonsense. Harper had no intention of invoking the notwithstanding (...) - consulter en ligne

Don't count out Quebec's native son

Ian L. MacDonald - The National Post — 2006-12-06T15:11:46Z

Stephane Dion may not be a favourite son of Quebec, but he is a native son in a province where blood runs thicker than water. Brian Mulroney used to tell the story of riding in from the airport with a cab driver who had the radio tuned to a talk-show discussion of Pierre Trudeau's visit to Quebec City in 1976, when he famously called (...) - consulter en ligne