Layton's passing has left a major hole in the NDP. The interim leader that he appointed when he announced his leave of absence in July has ties to the Bloc Quebecois, and a bunch of his elected seatholders are very, very green (as in rookies). We'd best put our hats in the 'on' and 'lock' position and buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy ride for a while.
Rest easy Jack, you did what you could.
OTTAWA — In February 2010, Jack Layton held a news conference in Toronto to announce that he had prostate cancer, a disease his father overcame 17 years earlier.
"Like my dad, I'm a fighter, and I'm going to beat this," he said, with Olivia by his side. "In the coming weeks, the schedule of treatments might mean I'll have more time to watch the Olympics on TV, so I can be inspired by our athletes as they exercise determination, and they'll inspire all of us."
Layton was looking, as always, on the bright side, and wearing that Willy Loman smile, but it was not an easy moment. At home that night, though, he felt a mysterious happiness.
"I said to Olivia that night that I'd experienced this incredible sense of joy," he told me in April. "Where is that coming from? It wasn't exactly thrilling, upbeat news. The next morning we had all these emails, people saying they'd been praying for me and that I was in their thoughts. And I realized that it was the impact of so many people seeing on the news what we were going through and people sending their thoughts and prayers — people in the 60s would say good vibrations — my way. And that's continuing. Of course I'm getting better."
I would like to think that Jack Layton felt those good vibrations for the rest of his life, especially in his last months, when he was suffering terribly. I know he felt them during his last election campaign, because wherever he went people wished him well.
"It's just that generosity of Canadians, who say to you, 'How's it going?' " he told me. "Most people have been through similar health challenges or someone in their family might have been grappling with cancer or some major surgery. And the result is their first instinct, no matter who they support politically or if they're even interested in politics, they want to send out encouraging words to you, and I have to say it means a lot."
In his extraordinary last campaign, striding purposefully with his cane and his smile, struggling courageously and without complaint through a gruelling cross-country tour, Canadians came to see him in a new light. His forthright appeals for support, which once seemed hucksterish, took on greater depth, and even his opponents privately admired his guts.
He was brave even to be on the campaign. He chose to bring the government down, in spite of his health problems, because he believed the spring budget didn't do enough, in particular for seniors.
He didn't even think about holding his nose and voting for it, and in the campaign that followed he forged a new bond with Canadians and convinced them to vote NDP in record numbers.
It is an extraordinary achievement, the capstone to what was already a fine career.
When Layton became leader in 2003, the party had 13 seats. This spring Layton became the first New Democrat to serve as leader of the official Opposition. The NDP has 103 seats, 59 of them in Quebec.
His breakthrough there was the most hopeful development for federalism in Quebec since the collapse of the Meech Lake accord in 1990 and the ascent of the Bloc Quebecois.
For six straight elections — from 1993 to 2008 — the Bloc held a majority of seats in Quebec, a sovereigntist logjam at the heart of our federation.
Bloc MPs, for all their virtues, delivered a negative, corrosive message to Quebec voters about Canada.
Layton, with his smile, his cane, his hopeful message and his colloquial street French, was "un bon Jack," a good guy. Quebecers voted for him in large numbers and broke the back of the Bloc.
That has been derided as a fluke, the victory of personality politics, and we've all had fun at the expense of the barmaids and poli sci students who were elected on his coattails, but Layton won those votes after years of hard work, carefully tailoring messages for Quebec, and slowly building a bridge to a constituency that others had written off.
He did it by convincing Quebecers to vote for the values they share with English Canadians, and those votes healed the breach that was opened by the collapse of Meech, and widened by the sponsorship scandal.
Layton's death leaves a great gulf, and we can't know whether the bridge he built will outlast him, but he did all he could, and we ought to be grateful to him for that, and take comfort in the fact that our good wishes were a source of joy to him in his darkest hours
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You always hate to loose the good one's. I am amazed at the amount of power Quebec has over the rest of Canada. I thought that had subsided somewhat!
ReplyDeleteLayton had managed to bring a lot of seats into the fold and away from the Seperatists and Bloc, he'll be sorely missed.
ReplyDeleteBreaking the Bloc was a great good thing... for Quebec and all of Canada. Let's hope Mr. Layton's accomplishment holds.
ReplyDeleteA sad story, this. RIP, Mr. Layton.
I'm sorry for Canada's loss. Mr. Layton seems to have been a good man and honorable to the end.
ReplyDeleteDeb,Thanks for your observations re: Jack Layton. As you so ably commented Jack Layton was one of those that made you forget your political stripes. Canada can be proud of him and mourn his passing.
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