Paging Jack Layton

After Jack Layton stood in the house during Question Period on Monday and asked for a meeting with Harper, which he actually agreed to, pundits called it 'grandstanding'. Those of us who thought there might be an actual opening for dialogue with that development (as slim a chance as that was) held out for what might happen on Tuesday. Then, Layton introduced his private member's bill, the ridiculously named Clean Air Accountability Act (which leaves the Kyoto Protocol in the dust) on Tuesday morning prior to his afternoon meeting with Harper and it became clear that Layton was indeed grandstanding after all.

So, it wasn't surprising when Layton came out of his meeting with Harper and declared that he was 'disappointed' and 'said he wasn't convinced the prime minister understood the urgency of the situation'. What did he expect from control-freak Steve? Maybe he thought that his cozying up with the Cons to drive the Liberals out of office the last time around might merit him a little favour. Who knows?

And now, to add insult to injury, he's being coy about whether he'll force a non-confidence motion during Opposition Day on Thursday because he didn't get his way. This opposition by temper tantrum is a dangerous strategy which he should have been able to figure out since he was the one who pushed this Conservative government into office. Apparently, Jack doesn't learn well from his mistakes.

With the polls showing the leaderless Liberals and the Conservatives neck and neck, there is no chance that either party will achieve a majority if an election is forced again so soon. And with the gridlock that has formed with this prime minister who thinks compromise is a 4 letter word, what possible good could come from re-electing them?

The NDP is a good party with good ideas and Layton is leaving his people flopping in the wind with his brand of so-called leadership. He should fire his political advisers if this is what they're selling him, because the more they take the NDP down this road, the more support they'll lose.