Angry in the Great White North

Watch Green Party leader Elizbaeth May run roughshod over Warren Kinsella in this interview on Mike Duffy Live.  I found her insistence on getting the last word in, even if it meant drowning out Mike Duffy, particularly repellent.

[Oh, and gas prices have been going down, but never mind that.]

Now imagine this screeching harridan being told that she has to restrict herself to only 20% of the available time in a leaders debate.  Indeed, imagine Elizabeth May being told she has to let Prime Minister Stephen Harper make a statement, without interruption, that she doesn't agree with.

Heck, imagine Elizabeth May trying to hold her tongue while Stephen Harper simple says "Good evening".

She would go ballistic, no doubt about it.  She would blather on and on, and every issue would be answered with "Climate emergency!"

Giddy with being in the debate, she'd never be able to control herself.

And with that, I start to understand why the Conservatives and the NDP don't want Elizabeth May in the debate, and why the Liberals do:

The Green Party is out of the leaders debates after the Conservatives and the NDP refused to share the stage with Elizabeth May, and no other party would go to the wall for her.

"They said it was a no-go," a source said yesterday about the Conservative position on Ms. May's participation in the campaign classic.

The reason is that the Liberals and the Green Party are fighting for votes:

In B.C, the New Democrats have shaved off some of the Conservative gains, and in Quebec, the Bloc has bounced back. And in Ontario, there are modest indications the Liberals have stanched the bleeding of support to the Greens.

The Liberals have been hurt by this movement of votes:

“The Liberals are having trouble in their own backyard,” said the Strategic Counsel's Peter Donolo.

“The Conservatives … are not grabbing a disproportionate or particularly large share of that Liberal vote,” he said. “It seems to be going to the Greens predominantly.”

So what does this have to do with the leaders debate?  If Elizabeth May was allowed onto that stage, her predictably rude and bombastic performance would, in all likelihood, alienate a number of her soft supporters, who would return to Stephane Dion and the Liberal Party.

On the other hand, if she remains marginalized, reported on only at the end of election news wrapups, if at all, those votes and more might go from the Liberal to the Green Party.  As long as the Green Party remains an abstraction and Elizabeth May name and little else, those voters might just stay there.

In other words, the Liberals have every reason to have Elizabeth May at the debate so that she could self-destruct.  Not surprisingly, none of the other parties see it that way.

Hey, it's just a theory.