Michael Ignatieff Finds His Voice

Michael Ignatieff has finally come up with something that can play as a game changer if he doesn’t let it fade away. He told Canadians today to “Rise up” at a rally in Sudbury, Ontario and addressed the reaction of the populace to Harper’s actions. Ignatieff clearly makes the case that Canadians don’t need to stand for the actions that the Harper government has been doing and can say no to Harper and vote for change – stating that it wasn’t for the Liberal Party, but for Canadian democracy.

Ignatieff tells crowd to “Rise up”

Ignatieff told the crowd:

“We’ve got a prime minister who shut down parliament twice and Canadians kind of shrugged,” he said. “We’ve got a prime minister who’s found in contempt of parliament. It’s never happened before in the history of our country and people say, kind of, ‘So what?’ We got a prime minister who tried to shut down the long-form census and people thought, that’s crazy, but kind of, ‘So what?’ And then we have a prime minister who just went out and smeared a member of his own caucus, tried to destroy her public reputation, and people say, kind of, ‘So what?’

And then we’ve got a prime minister who’s got a convicted criminal who was his chief of staff. Convicted five times of fraud and people say, kind of, ‘So what?’

And then we’ve got a prime minister who’s got, right now, in his election campaign, four people accused of election fraud. And people say, ah, kind of, ‘So what?’ And then we’ve got a prime minister who allows only five questions to the press, the press are following him around, they only get five questions and if they ask six he walks away. And people say, kind of, ‘So what?’ And then we’ve got a situation where at Guelph university the other day, students lined up for two hours, some of them voting for the first time in their lives, to vote. And a Conservative operative tried to shut it down and stop it and some smart Conservative lawyer downtown tried to write a letter to get 700 votes by Canadian students disallowed in a federal election in Canada and people say, kind of, ‘So what, it’s just all political games, who cares?’

And I kept hearing that refrain from Bruce Springsteen—Rise up. Rise up. Rise up, Canada!

Rise up! Rise up! Why do we have to put up with this? Rise up! Rise up! … Rise up! This goes beyond partisan politics! This goes beyond the Liberal party! This is about our country! This is about our democracy! Rise up! Rise up!

We have got to fight here. We have got to stand and fight. This is not about me. This is not about the Liberal party. This is about the kind of democracy we hand to this child and this child and this child. We gotta rise up. We gotta stand and we gotta fight and we gotta win. This is not about the Liberal party of Canada. This is about the country you love. So rise up, Canada!

A week is a lifetime in politics, and there are two left to go. Maybe this will enlighten the electorate and sway the outcome of the election.

For more information on Harper’s list of scandals, read:

• Conservative Contradictions; Only Tip of The Iceberg
• The Harper Government
• Stephen Harper’s Campaign Handbook
• Auditor General: Conservative Government Mislead Parliament
• Can We Really Afford to Lose Our Identity?
• Another Conservative Charged with Fraudulent Activity
• Harper’s Campaign Woes
• If Elected, Harper Will Scrap Democracy
• Harper Government Defeated on Contempt

On May 2, Canadians will make their decision: Forgive Harper and reelect him, or punish him and oust him. With the list of things that Harper stands for, it would be surprising if Canadians forgave him easily. Actions speak louder than words.