To sound callous yet again, pretty much sums up my thoughts. He wasn't a "great" man, he didn't make "Canada better". A politician died. Terrible way to go. It's sad in an abstract sense. Canada will not be the worse for it, just the NDP party...
What's so callous about that? Layton was a good man who was charismatic, well spoken, loved Canada, and was a politician (that has been one of the best things to hit the NDP in god knows how long) who died a somewhat slow death that you wouldn't want to go through. That's all there is to it.
I'm not sure that I'm onboard with a state funeral, it seems like a bit of political one up man ship.
As much as I respect Layton for his passion and his destruction of the Bloc, I'm not sure that a party leader that up until this year was a fringe party is really State Funeral material.
State Funerals should be for former Prime Ministers, or great Canadian's who died in service of their country.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Here in Saskatchewan, the provincial NDP leader declared Layton the “greatest” and “most important” leader of the Canadian New Democratic Party. Can you IMAGINE if he’d said that two days ago? Or even two days from now? The Tommy Douglas’ Faithful would blow a gasket. But instead, the 10-second melodramatic sound bite, as shallow as it is, reigns as the only acceptable statement. It’s so transparent that it’s left unchallenged – in the meantime, diminishing the legacy of not one, but two leaders.
That’s just one example – we heard them time and again today – going beyond the respectable and appropriate and into the absurd, each talking-head one-upping the one before them, by way of downright made-up, bloated grandstanding. Layton’s legacy will be determined in the months and years to come – was he a one-man band, or a game changer? Either way, it’s not negative, and should be allowed to develop on its own.
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Nobody is suggesting that any of the sentiments – some touching, others profound – Jack Layton expressed in his final hours were not completely genuine, in fact that letter in it’s entirety exemplified who he was to the core: passionate, political, strategic. Blatchford’s pointing out the shallow, over-the-top saccharine soppiness of those that took the easy way out when reflecting upon his death – instead of paying honest respects – doesn’t disrespect genuine sadness… it highlights the importance of it.
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I'm not sure that I'm onboard with a state funeral, it seems like a bit of political one up man ship.
As much as I respect Layton for his passion and his destruction of the Bloc, I'm not sure that a party leader that up until this year was a fringe party is really State Funeral material.
State Funerals should be for former Prime Ministers, or great Canadian's who died in service of their country.
I think that the leader of the opposition is well deserving of a state funeral.
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In Canada, state funerals are traditionally offered only to prime ministers and governors general, whether current or former, as well as current cabinet ministers.
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I know that people are enamored with the Orange Crush, but up until this election, the NDP were a non entity in Canadian History.
And up until this election he was not the leader of the official opposition.
I don't mean to begrudge the dead, and I have a lot of respect for Jack and what he did. But what he did isn't really worthy of a State Funeral.
I know some people may be enamored with the Orange Crush, but I'm certainly not one of them. TBQH, I'd have been quite disappointed in the guy I voted for (Harper) had he not given a state funeral to the Official Opposition leader, even if it was Captain Creepo Ignatieff. I think it's just respect for the leader of the party that the second most amount of Canadians voted for.
Besides, Layton has been "serving Canada" for like 30 years. It's not like he just parachuted in (like most of his new MPs). The guy, love him or hate him, always has time to answer for himself (he's been lambasted on Rutherford countless times, and still agreed to interviews to rebut), and he's pretty much always working.
So we can definitely agree to disagree. I just wanted to explain why I, a staunch anti-NDPer, am pleased that Harper offered a state funeral to Layton.
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Only one previous Leader of the Opposition has died while in office, and it was Wilfrid Laurier. As a former Prime Minister, he would have qualified for a State Funeral anyway.
I've never been big on pomp and circumstance, but I think the Opposition Leader's role in government is probably on par with the bigger Cabinet positions, so I don't really have a problem with him being given a State funeral.
From a cynical political POV, it's harder to criticize Harper for giving Layton a State Funeral than it would be to criticize him for not giving the State Funeral.
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If the Minister of Sport (who's been an MP for 3 months) is automatically granted a state funeral, I can't think of a single reason why the sitting official opposition leader shouldn't get one as well. Harper made a good decision on this one IMO.
To sound callous yet again, pretty much sums up my thoughts. He wasn't a "great" man, he didn't make "Canada better". A politician died. Terrible way to go. It's sad in an abstract sense. Canada will not be the worse for it, just the NDP party...
In many ways this reminds of the Lady Di hysteria, on a much smaller, local scale of course...
Yes, I am a bad man.
In terms of Layton's legacy, his death came at the absolute highest point of popularity he could have hoped to reach. I've seen a lot of comments about how Layton was one of the only honest politicians around. Well, it is easy to be honest when you are the 4th or 5th party on the fringe of the political world. But as the opposition, with a hugely divided caucus between Quebec and the ROC, and trying to fill the Liberal gap and maintain support from his traditional socialist base, Layton was going to have to begin to promise all things to all people, and consequently fall back to the same mode that all other PMs and leaders of the opposition have done.
That, however, is now someone else's problem, and Layton is free for beatification. I won't go as far as Peter12 went in arguing that the emotion is insincere, but it is actually ironic that a lot of people respect him more simply because he died.
Or perhaps "respect" is the wrong word. The death of a man who showed such vitality a few months ago cannot help but to force a person into considering their own mortality. It is in that respect that Layton's death has the greatest impact on the country. I wonder how many people made a donation to a cancer charity yesterday? I hope a lot. Forget all the meaningless platitudes and political doublespeak praising a man for the very same politics they criticized him for mere days ago. The most honest way to remember a politician 99% of us never met is to help the groups that are working to prevent someone else from dying in the same fashion.
