Hey Stephane, Don't Forget To Check Your Baggage Tags

I posted Saturday about how the Liberal leadership convention did not bring about the renewal they needed as a party. I thought I would add a bit more to my argument by pointing out some information about a couple of key Dion supporters.

Dion had Don Boudria as his co-campaign chair. And many of you may remember that Boudria held a few key positions.

1) He was the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons for Chretien’s government from 1997 to 2002.

2) He was also the Minister of Public Works right after Alfonso Gagliano. How close to Chretien would Boudria have to be to get appointed to a position which may have been instrumental in the Sponsorship scandal right after the main bag man got canned? I would almost liken it to calling in the trustworthy cleanup crew.

To add a bit more fuel to the fire, another senior member of the Dion crew was Herb Metcalfe. Herb is one of the co-founders of Capital Hill Corp, a very well known lobbying firm. His wife, Isabel, ran for the Liberals against our current Minister of Defence Gordon O’ Connor and as I have mentioned before, Capital Hill Corp’s number 3 man behind David Angus and Herb Metcalfe is Chris Collenette.

Does the name Collenette sound familiar to you? It should.

Chris is the son of very well known Liberal David Collenette who was Chretien’s Minister of Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs from 1993 to 1996, and then the Minister of Transport from 1997 to 2003. Two very key positions in the Chretien government. Add in the fact that he is also the son of Penny Collenette, one has to wonder what kind of debt Stephane Dion will have to repay Capital Hill Corp should he ever become the Prime Minister.

In the last leadership race, Chris was a strong supporter of the anti-Martin movement. Macleans had a clip regarding the “dust up” over the election of the Ontario Young Liberals executive.

The future of an anyone-but-Martin movement in the unofficial Liberal leadership sweepstakes is looking doubtful after an early setback. At the Oct. 20 general meeting of the Ontario Young Liberals in London, combined forces backing Health Minister Allan Rock, Industry Minister Brian Tobin and Heritage Minister Sheila Copps failed to elect a slate of their supporters to the new OYL executive. Paul Martin’s team grabbed 13 of 16 positions. But this defeat might have gone unnoticed had it not been that the Rock-Tobin-Copps crew was talking up the meeting in advance. It was the first time they had closed ranks to try to prove that Martin is not a shoo-in to replace Jean Chretien, whenever the Prime Minister decides to step down.

In fact, the buzz generated by the three allies had spooked some Martin backers to the point where they were nervously downplaying the meeting’s importance. Obviously the Martinites needn’t have worried. Among those nursing wounds after the dustup is Rock staffer Chris Collenette, a key organizer of the failed anti-Martin bid — and son of Transport Minister David Collenette and Penny Collenette, the former patronage czarina for Chretien

Bolded emphasis mine.

To elabourate on the term “patronage czarina” that Maclean’s used, I will quote from Penny’s online resumé.

Penny was Director of Volunteers for Jean Chretien’s leadership race in 1984 and Campaign Director in the successful 1990 bid. She worked as National Director and Director of Legal Services for the Liberal Party of Canada for the 1993 election. She was subsequently named Director of Appointments in the Prime Minister’s office, a position she held for over 4 years.

With friends like these, I must ask again…Do the Liberals really think that making Dion their leader counts as a renewal? I think the Dion baggage can easily be confused with that of Jean Chretien on the carousel of Canadian politics.