I've been reading Andre Boisclair's blog for a few months. Today, he announced his candidacy for the leadership of the Parti Quebecois. Check out his campaign web site.

Anyone who's made a point of order in a mind-numbing meeting should read this excerpt from a House of Commons committee meeting. Monte Solberg and Judy Wasylycia-Leis seem reasonable. The chair does not. Ugh.

Two good stories related to the O'Brien anti-Martin (and anti-same-sex marriage) defection (how many more of the "Grit God Squad", as Kinsella calls them, will do the same?). Not a flip to the Tories, as I have been suggesting, but the comfy middle ground. This will probably help the Liberals and it will (assuming that O'Brien votes non-confidence in the Liberals and the government is dissolved) ensure that same-sex marriage, not the Adscam junk, will be the most visible and talked about election issue. The Liberals will invoke the "scary social conservatives" image and frame the issue in terms of equality rights, and the Tories will probably get sucked into campaigning on the issue and framing it in terms of fundamental freedoms (freedom of relgion, specifically). What a shitfest. This is one prediction that I would like to be wrong about.

Update: The conspiracy theorist in me imagines that this could be arranged by Tim Murphy. Wouldn't a great way for O'Brien to get the kind of hearings he wants, and for Martin & Co. to deflect attention from Adscam during the election, be for the government to fall on a vote of confidence decided by a former Liberal who just wants better hearings? It would certainly confuse the situation enough and allow the Liberals to bring out the "socon" bogeyman, especially if they allowed O'Brien to run under the Liberal banner in the election. But no, that couldn't be! (it is fairly late).