Decorum in Politics, Hah!

Well, I wasn't planning on doing a post on this subject but I recently had a reader ask me to post about my thoughts on the Belinda Stronach / Peter MacKay kerfuffle. And since I pretty much do whatever my readers ask (within reason, unless the money's right), here we go.

My initial reaction to this when I first heard this was, oh man they're up to it again. What I mean by this is that our elected representatives have regressed again to level of schoolchildren in debate. Now, this in no way excuses MacKay's comment. I think Mr. MacKay is still smarting from the public break-up the two had and needs to get past it. And by no means should he have made that statement in the House (or in any sort of public setting). But seriously, I think all of us have probably said some nasty things about ex's that we've had, but 1) not in public and 2) more than likely to someone that is not going to repeat to the other party.

When the first reports came out on MacKay's words, the Liberal Party was pretty mute on the issue. Only after a day or so did the outrage begin to grow, giving the appearance that they had figured the political gains that could be made. Debate then descended to a "did not" / '"did too" level. And then we had a statement in the House from Ms. Stronach (ht to Olaf and CTV for the transcripts):

"'“Mr. Speaker yesterday during question period the minister of foreign affairs used a very inappropriate word to describe me,'” Stronach said, adding that those kinds of comments have a "“chilling"” effect on women who contemplate entering politics. '“For that Mr. Speaker, I simply ask that the minister of foreign affairs apologize to this House,'” she said to a round of applause."

I agree with her on the first point. The second point, well I'm not so sure as I'm not a woman and can't really say what effect it might have. And she is right in asking for an apology. She then made this comment to reporters later:

"I am even more disappointed today as I reflect on the character of this government, we saw it during question period, no one is willing to take responsibility for this and I am worried for the women of Canada how this kind of attitude translates into policy development and the actions that this government is taking."

Ah ha, now to score some political points. Peter MacKay makes sexist comment, MacKay is Tory, therefore the Conservatives and their policies must be sexist. Nevermind that a Liberal (former Defense Minister Doug Young to Reform MP Deb Grey) had done much the same in the past.

Make no mistake, I think MacKay should have immediately apologized, even if he doesn't think it was that big of a deal. But the words "I'm sorry" and "I was wrong" seem to be anathema to politicians nowadays. Hence the need for this proposal from two NDP MP's Joe Comartin and Dawn Black to punish MP's that cannot act like adults in the House. Its a good idea (yes I said that, even though it is a NDP idea) but I think the fact we need it at all is a pretty sad commentary on the state of political discourse in Canada.

Tags: Peter MacKay, Belinda Stronach, Liberal Party, Conservative Party