Face It, We've All Changed

For Michael Ignatieff, more difficult days. It was nothing he suddenly did or said in this past week to bring on his latest troubles; rather, he had the misfortune to lead a Liberal Party that just descended to 25% approval rating in a recent poll.  It was like Indiana Jones crossing a certain trip wire, only to have a huge round boulder come crashing towards him.National Post columnist Don Martin, for whom I have a certain affinity, used the latest poll result to question whether Michael Ignatieff can at all survive as Liberal leader.  Don knows full well that the Liberal leader can, and as an insightful journalist, he’s been around long enough to recall those dark and depressing days for the Liberals when Jean Chretien was opposition leader and nothing went right.Shortly after becoming leader, his abilities were immediately questioned because of the defection from his caucus of two francophone MPs due to his opposition to Meech Lake.  It only got worse from there.  He stumbled in his handling of the Oka standoff.  The aura that came with his convention win quickly eroded, and after a year at the helm, Liberal polling numbers slipped from 50 to 32%.  Even hiring Jean Pelletier as his chief of staff to reverse the damage took time to have any effect. Nevertheless he went on to become one of our best prime ministers.I have talked to Chretien about those days and in characteristic fashion he simply stated that they were indeed hard on him emotionally but that they toughened him up enough to prepare him for being prime minister.  I also recall Joe Clark telling me in my office that being leader in opposition was no fun at all.I know Michael Ignatieff pretty well by this point and in all truthfulness I can see his personal growth.  Knowing I’m not very political in temperament, he sometimes lets his guard down and says he knows it will become more difficult before it gets better.  I have always been impressed by how he accepts responsibility for his current showing, but, as I told him the last time we met, I think the context is far bigger than just his performance.From the Sponsorship days to the repeated scandals suffered under Stephen Harper lately, the atmosphere of politics has changed in this country.  Even now it’s hard to imagine Chretien having attained 50% in the polls while opposition leader.  Thanks to changes in Quebec, those days are long gone.  The public has lost huge amounts of interest, in part from the scandals, but also from the repeated temptation to go for the jugular from both media and politicians alike.  We are all behaving badly, and citizens can witness things just as senseless by watching sitcoms on television.  No wonder voter turnout is at an all-time low.Yes, Michael Ignatieff is struggling.  Stephen Harper repeatedly hammers that the Liberal leader has been out of the country too long, yet it now appears increasingly obvious that Harper himself was never in the world enough to comprehend it, and our global stature continues to decline - just ask Joe Clark or Brian Mulroney  What we require are politicians to behave like statespersons and journalists to behave like educators.Ignatieff’s personal numbers are low – it’s true.  But Stephen Harper’s have been declining for over a year, despite his party’s recent increase.  Jack Layton’s personal numbers are up but his party languishes.  There’s no place to go.  The best we can get is stalemate and so we just keep shuffling the pieces around the board.Michael Ignatieff is holding up fine and his caucus remains loyal, yet he's undergoing what all opposition leaders endure, and it’s hard to watch.  But it’s the political world around him that’s changed, and that’s more excruciating yet.