Angry in the Great White North

There were high hopes two weeks ago for fundraisers to help the seven Liberal leadership candidates pay off their campaign debts:

Liberal Leader Stephane Dion is sharing the spotlight once again with his former rivals at a series of fundraisers aimed at paying off almost $4 million in cumulative leadership debts.

The first took place last night in Halifax as about 60 people paid $250 each to rub shoulders with Dion and six of his former rivals at an "intimate" cocktail reception.

A second fundraiser is set for tonight in Ottawa, with two more next week in Toronto. Two more fundraisers are planned for Ontario next month and more will be held across the country in the fall.

For some former contenders, the fundraisers will be the best, perhaps only, way to reduce debts.

So you must be wondering how it went. The best and only way to reduce campaign debts? Let's hope the Liberals have a Plan B:

Special Liberal fundraising events have so far failed to put much of a dent in the almost $4 million in debts racked up by 11 former leadership contenders.

The first event in Halifax two weeks ago - a cocktail reception featuring Leader Stephane Dion and six of his erstwhile rivals - attracted about 60 people who paid $250 each. After expenses, however, party insiders say the event netted only about $5,400.

The spoils were divvied up equally among the seven former leadership contenders who participated, leaving each with about $750. Insiders with several camps complain that the event didn't make enough to cover even air fare to Halifax for some candidates, much less help retire their combined debt of $3.6 million.

Didn't even cover the air fare?

Wow. So I guess the Liberal Party would be better off not hosting fundraisers.

Those two follow-up events in Toronto mentioned in the first report have now been cancelled. And the blame game has begun. The great thing about assigning blame is that you can do it for free! Which makes it the only thing Liberals can afford to do right now:

But insiders in various camps lay the blame squarely on Dion's office for the flops thus far. They say the leader's office didn't consult with local Liberals about the best timing or location for fundraisers and gave them only a couple weeks notice to try to rustle up potential donors who hadn't already contributed the legal maximum of $1,100 to leadership campaigns.

Gerard Kennedy, the fourth-place finisher in the leadership, allowed that summer is a difficult time to stage events, especially given the short notice.

"To make it worthwhile, you do need a longer lead time," he said.

Kennedy said the events were hastily arranged to coincide with Dion's summer travel schedule. Nevertheless, he said the first two events were "a good trial run" that will help the party learn how to stage more successful fundraisers in future.

For fun, though, do the math. At $850,000 in debts, Stephane Dion will have to attend about a thousand fundraisers between now and the deadline of June 2008, just under a year from now, if he averages $750 or so per fundraiser. That means three fundraisers a day, including weekends.

Stephane Dion does not strike me as such a party animal.

Offer up all the platitudes you want. A good trial run. A show of solidarity. A sign of commitment.

I'm willing to bet when the total take from the Halifax event was revealed to be $5,400 ("You mean $5,400 each, right?" "No sir, I mean $5,400 for all of you together"), there was not a lot of thought of solidarity.

Just a lot of bitterness. I wonder if any of the candidates gave thought to the fact that if he or she had held the fundraiser entirely on his or her own, the $5,400 pot would not have had to be split seven ways.