So Stephen Harper has changed his tune. Now he's indicating that the Conservatives will support Bill C-43, which implements the original budget that the Liberals brought down, and only oppose Bill C-48, an amendment which represents the deal that Martin made with Jack Layton and the NDP.
There's an interesting opening here for Paul Martin if he wants to take advantage of it.
With Conservative support for the original budget, Dithers doesn't need the NDP. If he reneges on his deal with Layton and withdraws the amendment he can sail through Thursday with his minority government intact for another week. And as an added bonus, Tom d'Aquino might start taking his calls again.
Of course it would likely be the end of any further cooperation between the NDP and the Liberals. It might well be short term gain for long term pain. But how would that be different from the way Dithers has been operating lately?
I think I'll stock up on popcorn. I already seem to have more than enough cynicism.
Cross-posted at the E-Group.
Well, except: I thought the reason Harper had decided to support C-43 was his two Newfoundland/Labrador MPs. C-43 includes the Atlantic Accord, and those two MPs are under a lot of pressure at home to support it.
I can't believe Dithers would have the nerve to double-cross Layton that blatantly, by withdrawing C-48. Or at least, that hadn't occurred to me. It would take such a fiendish mind to think of th ... Oh! Sorry! Hi, pogge.
I can't for the life of me imaging Martin withdrawing C-48 at this point. No one would ever trust the guy again and, more importantly, he probably wants a spring election now.
But, yeah, the thought had crossed my mind too...
Bill:
I waffled back and forth about whether or not to let your comment stand. I'm not that easily offended, but it didn't really add anything to the conversation either. What pushed me over the edge was the fact that your link was so long it was causing side scroll. Comments here support HTML and there are services like tinyurl.com that will allow you to shorten a link to a manageable size. If you want to play tricks on the internet, you should probably learn how to use the tools.
That said, I'll probably delete the same comment if I see it again. It wasn't even that funny.