POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY RICK SALUTIN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL
He's a bit of a snot actually.
I don't know why he even pursued politics except that backroom boys promised him the top, and Ignatieff thinks being at the top will cap his family's achievement.
Besides snottiness, Ignatieff just really does not like mobs of people. It's obvious in his facial expressions in many, many pictures. Maybe he has Asperger's Syndrome?
You cannot cure a quality like that. It is equipment no politician should have.
Then there is his clear inability to even say anything that excites or interests people.
He's a writer - a man who spends hours a day bent over a keyboard, talking with no one.
He is not a public speaker. He is not a people person.
But above all for me is his groveling - there's no other word for it - posture towards American imperialism.
Essentially that was his master at Harvard. The stuff about human rights was window dressing, much like hearing a man of Bush's quality talk about women's rights.
Ignatieff is simply not a liberal in the best meaning of the word.
His only poor service to Canadian politics is effectively extending Harper's ugly minority rule.
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"Let's face it, the only thing ingrained here is our anti-intellectualism, which borders on anti-intelligence (Canadians are actually proud of it)."
This and similar comments are ridiculous.
Most people who oppose Ignatieff do not do so because he writes books.
They oppose him because he has almost none of the classic political skills. In political terms he’s an idiot-savant.
His only true meaning in the political world has been to extend Harper's time for smashing up Canadian traditions.
And I find an (effectively) appointed leader repulsive to my democratic values.
We need intelligent people in government, and I dearly hope we never go the way America has, taking seriously people like Sarah Palin or George Bush, people with brains the size of a gnat's.
We've had many intelligent leaders, and, truth be told, Harper is intelligent, although I reject his values and the nasty minority crowd he tries to please.
Intelligence in government must be effective - effective for action, not for writing books.
While Ignatieff can write books, he almost totally lacks the kind of effective intelligence required in a good politician.
Intelligence for me is always a primary quality in a politician, but I find Ignatieff utterly unappealing and almost laughably ineffectual.
And apparently so do a lot of other Canadians.
