Layton's Choice

I can't print the comment sent at 10.02. There's a hint of corruption.

If I thought or had evidence of corruption. this  blog would not be the place to deal with it. Lives can be devastated. Careers and reputations destroyed.  It is not a matter for idle chat.

Dreary weather had me watching dreary television . The news channel with Charles Adler had a list of items for discussion.

The NDP "secret agenda " was one.

The Honorable Libby Davies M.P. for Vancouver East was the focus. She has apparently tabled numerous motions in the House. Because of her status in the party. she may be a candidate for the leadership. It's never too soon to put her philosophy under the microscope.

Motions in the House are hardly secret.

Mr. Adler with a beguiling  twinkle asks the rhetorical question;

"Do they think we're stooopid"

A second item was about a doctor in Whitby who has set up a clinic that provides prompt and presumably additional care for  families  willing to pay a membership fee of $1,000.

According to Adler, the doctor is being "persecuted" because  charging fees is against the law.

A spokesperson for the Fraser Institute, a right-wing think tank, supported Adler's contention. He said every country in Europe with a health care system includes an option of private care.

He said people in Switzerland were asked if they preferred their own system or the Canadian system.

They preferred their own.

Why were they being asked?

Does Adler think viewers are "stoopid"? .......... Obviously.

The station is now asking why  Jack Layton didn't come clean  about his health, when he undertook the campaign to become Prime Minister of Canada.

They contend the NDP would be first to demand an explanation of Conservatives or Liberals, if they put forward a candidate in similar circumstance.

As if there has ever been similar circumstances ?

If the question succeeds in becoming a brouhaha, as the station clearly intends. the politicians will have created their own rod.

They gave Mr. Layton full honours as a great Canadian at the time of his death.

They knew the circumstances as well as the rest of us.

Stephen Lewis gave Mr. Layton's eulogy. I listened to a couple of sentences before changing the channel.

I thought, had Layton been a Catholic, Lewis would have been calling for canonisation.

Layton was astute and adept in politics. He was dedicated to a particular political philosophy. He did not aspire to sainthood.

At the time the election was called, he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Anyone who knows anything ,knew he could not have been cleared within that time.

He had a choice to make. Thousands of candidates,riding associations and millions of supporters across the length and breadth of Canada depended on him to lead them into the election.

Should he keep his commitment and dedication to his life's work and the people looking to him for leadership?

Should he step aside and fight for his life?

I doubt a politician present at Roy Thompson Hall for the commemoration ,could have answered with certainty, they would , in the face of it, have made the choice he did.

They understood too well.

They know the demands. They know the price.They know the rewards or lack thereoff.

From every level of government, they  accorded him  wholehearted respect for the choice he made.

They did not spell it out.

They left that to history.

Would he have allowed the opportunity to pass?

I think not.