Kennedy’s political pinball
If at first you don’t triumph, try again. And again. We bring you — for the third time (lucky) — Gerard Kennedy.
Perhaps Canada’s most battlehardened leadership candidate, Kennedy knows a thing or two about how to lose a race: first to Dalton McGuinty way back in 1996. Then to Stéphane Dion in 2006.
But that was then — and again. And this is now.
There’s an upside to the double jeopardy of losing two leadership conventions: all that double exposure has endowed Kennedy with name recognition, catapulting him to the top of the polls (albeit between elections, when voters aren’t paying attention).
It gets more complicated, however, when you’re soundly rejected by voters in a real election, as Kennedy was in the 2011 federal campaign (his Toronto riding was one of the few to go NDP). How do you persuade your fellow Liberals that you can spearhead renewal if you can’t retain your own seat?
Oh, and why the provincial-federal-provincial hopscotching?
Consider this comment in a 2011 Star article on defeated candidates: Kennedy mused about being approached to run in the last provincial election, but pointedly said he’d declined. Hmmm.
“My commitment right now is federal,” he explained 13 months ago. Hmmm.
Why revert so suddenly to provincial politics? After all, there is now a vacancy for that federal leader’s job. Kennedy described to me the strain of federal politics on family life — which seems a peculiar reply from someone aspiring to be Ontario leader, criss-crossing this vast province for the next decade or so. Perhaps if Justin Trudeau were not in the way . . . Since his defeat, Kennedy has run his own firm, Enterprising For The Public Good, working with private clients and non-profits. It has no website, but Kennedy’s LinkedIn profile describes him as President and Lead Enterpriser of the company, which is pretty much a oneman band (up to three people join him in busy periods on “marketing and branding” projects). Win or lose, Kennedy says he’d give it all up to run in the next provincial election. One senses he means it. Beyond name recognition, Kennedy has the advantage of travelling light: Six years after quitting Queen’s Park, he’s not carrying any baggage from recent McGuinty government controversies. That’s quite a contrast to another candidate who declared on the weekend, former immigration minister Charles Sousa. Unlike Kennedy, Sousa has virtually no name recognition outside of his Mississauga riding, and is weighed down by radioactive baggage. This came through at Sousa’s impressive Saturday launch at a banquet hall in Mississauga — the same city whence he personally made another grand announcement just over a year ago: As the panicked local MPP fighting for re-election back then, Sousa proudly proclaimed that a gas-fired power plant planned for his riding would go up in smoke if the Liberals won. That $190-million promise came back to haunt the premier — not to mention Chris Bentley, the energy minister (and Liberal heir apparent) who was hounded out of the leadership race by the fallout. If Liberal delegates were to anoint Sousa as their chosen agent of resurrection, over Bentley’s political corpse, the opposition parties would recite a prayer of thanks, post-prorogation, before every question period. Therein lies the pathos in today’s tale of two candidates: Kennedy has only carry-on baggage; Sousa is paying a price for excess baggage. Kennedy is a self-styled entrepreneurial progressive; Sousa is playing up his image as a prudent steward of the economy, pointing to his years of service for a big bank. Together, they serve as bookends in the leadership race as Liberals try to turn the page. Martin Regg Cohn’s provincial affairs column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. mcohn@thestar.ca, twitter.com/reggcohn.