The Liberal Party Version of Musical Chairs

Nothing amuses me more right now than following the Liberal Leadership campaign. You can follow every single riveting minute from this very official source.

Irrespective of my own political beliefs, it's always fun to indulge in a little Schadenfreude and watch the mighty fall, only to scrabble around in the proverbial undergrowth and look thoroughly pathetic in the process.

First off, I would assume that the very word "campaign" implies a voluntary and/or deliberate act which generally requires copious drollops of determination and will. Campaigns ilicit images of Hannibal crossing the Alps to wage war on the arrogant Romans with unruly elephants in tow. (I would expect that they're not that keen on extreme sports like mountain climbing, so I can't imagine them being particularly sociable)

Or of John Fitzgerald Kennedy proudly proclaiming that he does indeed have "High Hopes" and promising to be just as adorable in the Oval Office as he was on television. How high were these hopes? Why, as high as apple pies in the sky. If anyone had stopped to consider how often they actually observed baked goods in the upper stratosphere, they might have taken him with a grain of salt. But I digress.

By contrast, one does not campaign by accident. It is not integrated as part of your morning multi-tasking routine of making coffee, reading the newspaper, and listening to the radio while taking part in some hardcore campaigning. You don't typically see two stoned out guys on the couch, filled to the gunnels with delivered pizza, look at each other, shrug their shoulders and say, "You know what? Forget the X-Box 360, what I REALLY want to do is engage in some KRAAZY campaigning."

So there's obviously some importance, gravity and effort associated with campaigning in general. With that established, what is going on with the Liberal leadership campaign?

As a child, I found musical chairs to be the most manic, challenging and rewarding activity to indulge in at birthday parties. The music starts, everyone runs around like decapitated chickens (except for that sly kid who instead walked veeerrrry slowly and never strayed more than a handful of inches from any chair) until the music stops and you have to grab a seat. The poor kid who couldn't grasp the nuances of the game was eliminated, a chair was removed, and the game continued.

The current Liberal version is quite similar. The music starts, as they lost the election, and they're prodded into action by the desperate media whose commentary on Prime Minister Stephen Harper's vest-ware is becoming stale. Sounds remarkably similar right? Sure. But there ARE some noteworthy differences.

1. Unlike the birthday party version, there is only one chair; and
2. The objective of the game appears to be to quit the game as quickly as possible, thereby eventually leaving only one person who must then occupy that chair.

To sum up then, it's basically like birthday party musical chairs, only instead of inviting excited toddlers to take part, you try to get your apathetic teenaged child and their friends involved.

Thus far, Stronach, Godfrey, McKenna, Emerson (switching parties is akin to the strategy of that sly kid I was talking about), Rock, Manley, Tobin and God knows who else have managed to avoid sitting in the chair. They're honorary angst-ridden teenagers who don't want to be seen at the mall with their parents.

If you haven't been following the "campaign" thus far, you've still got plenty of time to watch candidate after candidate come up with innovative ways to quit.

Anyway, to demonstrate that I'm an equal-opportunity critic, here are some pictures of our glorious leader in various stages of vestness.

Stephen "We Shall Never Surrender" Harper

Stephen "Gay Marriage Bad, S&M Good!" Harper