Looking for a payoff

Dalton McGuinty makes his presence felt again - but rather than pushing a good plan for a commission on equalization, he's looking for another handout just months after previously securing $5.75 billion extra from PMPM:

Mr. McGuinty says he will not shy away from trying to get another potentially divisive debate on the federal election agenda: the estimated $23-billion gap between what he says the province pays Ottawa and what it gets back to help pay for federal services...

“We will continue to campaign on behalf of Ontarians to reduce the $23-billion gap before, during, after any federal election, and we will work with all the parties at the federal level to ensure that we're just getting a fair deal here in Ontario,” Mr. McGuinty said during the interview.

Translation: never mind taking a close look at the entire system, Ontario will apparently accept the status quo if it gets enough hush money (aka "fairness") in the heat of a campaign. A rather different position from last week, to say the least.

This should be the time for Martin (and the rest of the federal leaders) to hold McGuinty to his previous plan. If the system needs fixing, which hardly seems to be in dispute, then the only appropriate response is to take a complete look at how to change it - not to sign even more side deals to complicate the picture. And if a commission finds that Ontario isn't suffering in the current system, then McGuinty should be willing to accept that fact and deal with underfunding at home rather than looking for more federal money.