He only listens to himself
 

by Angelo Persichilli
THE HILL TIMES

In December 2006 in Montreal, Stéphane Dion was the only candidate for the leadership of the party who failed to finish his speech. He was stopped by organizers when he went over his assigned time. The day after, when he actually won the race, he started his acceptance speech by saying that one of the perks that come with winning the leadership is that "now nobody can stop my speeches!"

He was right, but that's exactly the problem the Liberal Party has been facing ever since: nobody has been able to stop him since. At least that's what many of those who helped him to win are now saying.

There's no doubt Dion is a good person, educated and intelligent. But unfortunately for him, there aren't universities that give degrees on how to lead a national political party.

In order to succeed, you need charisma, communications skills, and an ability to listen and understand people. You also need to be, or at least appear to be, humble and caring. You don't need to know everything, but you should know about everybody. You should know and respect your team, and choose the best and let them work. A leader is also a coach and a motivator. These are qualities that you either have or don't have. Yes, you can improve them and learn how to use them, but you cannot improve or use things that you don't have.

Unfortunately for the Liberals, as we have seen during last week's debates, despite the strenuous effort of the media to create some excitement around the performance of the Liberal leader, Dion doesn't have it.

When asked two weeks ago by reporters about the criticism against him by the former Liberal Party president Stephen LeDrew and others, his answer was short, to the point, but very revealing: "Ignore them." That's exactly where his problem is: he listens only to the people who say what he likes; basically he listens only to himself.

Liberals knew since December 2006 that they were in trouble, and they now know that, with a different leader, their chance to be back in government after Oct. 14 would be greatly better and not fighting just to keep the keys of Stornoway.

But this is a self-inflicted wound. They didn't vote for the candidate they believed to be the best, but voted against each other and chose a transitional candidate who would have helped them to keep their dream alive.

Unfortunately for the Liberals, the dream is becoming a nightmare because nobody expected their second choice to be so hard to deal with. In all fairness, I believe Dion was given a chance to do his job. Many journalists, and I was one of them, recognized Dion's communication problems, but also acknowledged his qualities and we wrote that he did deserve a chance to lead.

The results of the federal election are, by all means, still open and anything can still happen. I've also heard two weeks ago some Liberals saying that all the leaders still have to go through the two important televised debates and could give a chance to Dion, especially if one of the opponents makes mistakes. Well, we have seen the debates and the miracle they were hoping for didn't materialize. Dion was only one of the gang of four attacking Prime Minister Harper. And the fact that Gilles Duceppe, Elizabeth May and Jack Layton mostly ignored him during the four-hour debates, speaks volumes about the chances the Liberals have to be the next resident of 24 Sussex, or even Stornoway.