On plausible outcomes

Angelo Persichilli's theory on Lib self-destruction is looking more and more plausible by the day. Yesterday, word came out that only three of the least-inspiring leadership candidates had built enough resources so far to pay off their initial campaign loans. And today, that has the rest of the campaigns making excuses ranging from not understanding disclosure rules to the classic Lib claim of "we'll get to it eventually":

Taras Zalusky said the Bevilacqua campaign misunderstood Elections Canada's rules requiring quarterly disclosure and therefore never sent in any donations by the June 30 deadline.

As a result, two June fundraisers totalling more than $80,000 were not counted, he said. Had they been, Mr. Bevilacqua's numbers would have placed him in the middle of the pack with candidates such as Gerard Kennedy and Scott Brison, rather than second from the bottom ahead of Liberal MP Hedy Fry's 15 donations totalling $15,150...

Stéphane Dion, now viewed by many in the party as a top-tier contender for the leadership, reported only $32,250 in donations — but his campaign says it has raised far more now...

He said because of the time lag for the party's processing of fundraising records, even the proceeds from some late June eventswere not included in the tally, and the campaign's fundraising is only really taking off now.

“We always expected to concentrate on the fundraising campaign in the summertime and especially in the fall,” Mr. Bevan said.

Ken Dryden's campaign manager, Mark Watton, also said that campaign has now raised more than $100,000, and that fundraising efforts only intensified in late June and early July...

Ms. Fry's campaign spokesman, Doug Fry, said her totals are lower because she entered the leadership race later than most “and we've been a little slower in spending the time fundraising.” But he said they are not worried about lacking the money to go on.

The Bevilacqua campaign's failure to follow the rules has to reflect poorly on the party, particularly given that the same excuse ended up as one of the final fall-backs in the Cons' cheque-swapping scandal which should be a strong message against Harper. Which means that Bevilacqua will apparently join Dryden and Volpe on the list of candidates who can only stay in the race at the party's peril. Though perhaps unsurprisingly, nobody seems to have considered dropping out for that reason just yet.

As for the rest of today's excuse-makers, Canadians have heard the Libs put intentions ahead of actions for long enough to know better than to put much stock in any promise that a candidate was just waiting for the right time to get something done. Meanwhile, the remaining three candidates (Iggy, Rae and Volpe) can be easily painted as lacking the ability to seriously challenge Harper. Which could indeed open the door to an outside candidate - or completely torpedo the Libs' supposed effort at renewal.

Of course, there isn't yet a strong contingent of Libs themselves making those arguments. But the combination of an internal intention to use them and their sheer plausibility has to call into question whether the supposed renewal effort is already headed downhill...and whether progressive Canadians should turn their attention elsewhere.

Update: And now the Star undercuts Ignatieff in particular, as well as Rae and Dryden to a lesser extent. Could there be a better time for a push to get new blood into the race?