A bit of a break

Expect light to no blogging from this space over the next week as I'll be on holiday. In the meantime, though, here's a bit of Monday morning quarterbacking to consider.

For all the (misdirected) flak the NDP has taken for not simply echoing the Libs' position on Cadscam and other issues, I do have to wonder whether the NDP missed some significant opportunities in trying to turn attention to other issues altogether.

In particular, now that the Cons are more interested in patronage than populism, my recollection is that the NDP is the only party in Parliament calling for a restriction on floor-crossing. And while Cadman's situation might not have fallen within the scope of floor-crossing as such, the proposed justice committee hearings would seem to offer a great opportunity to discuss both the possibility of limiting transfer of MPs into a federal party through means other than Criminal Code provisions, and the plight of independent MPs under our current election financing laws.

Of course, the likely result would be to provoke the Cons and Libs into a pie fight as to why their past gain/loss of Brison/Stronach/Turner is entirely different from the other party's gain/loss of Emerson/Khan/Comuzzi. But that would seem to serve all the better to paint the Cons and Libs as indistinguishable from each other - making the NDP's position stand out as a populist alternative, rather than being buried as the same one shared by other actors.

So, should the NDP have taken up the Cadman story as a means to talk about empowering individual MPs rather than parties? And is it too late to do so now?