Content-free

Last week, I discussed the NDP's terms for supporting the Cons' upcoming budget. By way of contrast against the NDP's clear discussion of policy, take a look at the Libs' press release on the budget, which appears designed to be the favourite if a new Bulwer-Lytton category is created for press releases:

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion today called on the Conservative government to change direction and demonstrate a real commitment to meeting Canada’s challenges by using the upcoming budget to set a long-term course for success, instead of squandering the budget on short-sighted measures aimed at an early election that Canadians don’t want or need.

I suppose one can find a small amount of content in Dion's desire to avoid an election. But for all the passage otherwise says about what the Libs believe, they presumably also have press releases in the works on the subjects of "forward, not backward", "upward, not forward" and "always twirling, twirling, twirling toward freedom".

At the very least, one would hope the rest of the release would be an improvement from that woeful start. But no such luck: instead it only alternates between the Libs' bad habits of offering nothing more than their last platform and criticizing the Cons for using their ideas. In fact, there's literally not a single policy suggestion in the release other than "do what we were doing" - which speaks volumes about just how little Lib renewal has actually taken place under Dion.

It remains to be seen whether the Libs will be widely called on their lack of anything useful to offer - or how long it'll take for them to develop some substance under Dion. But if they plan on being this useless for long, the NDP has all the more reason to think it can become the strongest alternative to continued Harper government far sooner than most would anticipate.

(Edit: typo.)