Will and Testament

Hearing notice that someone well known as a public figure has suddenly died comes as a personal shock. It is personal because of the fact that the individual was well known, simply because he was a public figure. Shock, but perhaps not total surprise, in the case of Jack Layton, since it was well enough known that he was in ill health, recovering from treatment for prostate cancer, and from an operation for a hip fracture.

He soldiered on, in pain and with stalwart determination despite his delicate health situation, when he should have been in recovery mode to be restored to full health, because he desperately wanted to be involved in the election campaign that resulted in a May sweep netting the NDP more seats than they had ever before had. Rewarding Jack Layton with the title of leader of the Official Opposition.

Clearly, a position he revelled in. During the campaign he often spoke of himself and his party as the next prime minister and party-in-power, defying the scoffers among the electorate, those who could not see the NDP as a viable alternative to any responsible, reputable political party gaining governance in Canada. The 'other' challenger to the Conservatives had declined to 'not-there' status.

Doesn't everyone gravitate to the affable, ebullient, confident and voluble among us? A politician who portrays himself as trustworthy and caring, and delivers his bombastic accusations against counterpart parties and their leaders with conviction and a smile? It's human nature to like the friendly ones, and take a step away from those who are entirely too grave in demeanor.

So people liked Jack Layton and voted him the most trustworthy of Canada's federal party leaders. He could do things that other leaders weren't allowed to get away with, because of his clear relish of what he enjoyed most in life; being a politician. He could live in assisted housing with his wife, he could spend far more tax-funded expenses than other parliamentarians, he could play footsie with Quebec separatists, he could place himself naked in a squalid massage parlour.

But that was Jack Layton, take it or leave it. His critics looked askance, and his adoring followers felt they were unfair detractors because they envied and feared the man's political skills, his welcome among the common voter, the working men and women whom he asserted he defended with all the political skills at his clever and witty call.

Jack Layton recommended that Nycole Turmel continue to replace him until a 'permanent' successor would be elected, and since Jack Layton's wishes are now hallowed, she might be elected. The moving letter - that this man suffused with enthusiasm and elan that so captivated voters whenever he raised his cane during the campaign - addressed as though it were his own alone, was not.

It was another campaign effort, co-written by Jack layton, the effervescent campaigner for whom politics was his life, along with others, a letter-by-committee. Who huddled in consultation with one another to produce a last will and testament of the irreplaceable Jack Layton to encourage his followers to stay the course and continue supporting his party of choice.

With that party of choice as the official opposition Canadians might think they have two parties; one of the left, the other of the right. But they're not quite there in that estimation, since the left party, under Jack Layton, who carefully assessed his party's chances of success to arrive at the conclusion he and it would have to move closer to the centre, did so.

And the ruling party, under its clever and principled leader also assessed his party's opportunities to succeed for a majority, coming to the conclusion that he would have to lead it too closer to the centre. Canada now has two centrist parties; one edging closer to the left, the other to the right, but not that extremely disengaged from one another.

Jack Layton: He did what he could with the talents he had, and they were many, for it is the Grim Reaper that is a formidable foe, not the leader of a different political party.