i've been leading up to this for a while, so it should be of little surprise. the force of which i'm doing so may, however, take some people off guard.

with careful consideration and much dismay, i need to endorse the liberal party. actively. and almost - i said almost - enthusiastically.

it's largely a reflection on the ndp, which i'm seeing in a very poor light over this election. the ndp leadership under mulcair has systematically eliminated any reason i had previously seen them as superior to the liberals. the few traditionally left-leaning things that are left, like child care, are of rather low importance and largely infeasible, anyways.

there's a number of things that i like about the liberals better if you line them up, but the reason i'm almost - i said almost - enthusiastic is the shift to sustainable manufacturing, which the ndp do not seem to have any interest in.

a few days ago, naomi klein & maude barlow set up a press conference where they put together a 15-point declaration that they expected the next government to adopt. now, my politics are certainly closer to those of naomi klein or maude barlow - without question. but, if you read the list the obvious conclusion is that it's a summary of the green platform, in an attempt to galvanize left-leaning ndp voters that are understandably drifting elsewhere. i understand why they felt the need to do this, and they're absolutely right that they needed to do this - but it's far too little and far too late. the media made the obvious maoist connotation and wrote them off as distracting from the ndp's centralizing messaging; mulcair said something like "they don't speak for the party", and in the process essentially disowned them. the media was almost solely interested in costing a vague 15-point plan that by nature cannot be costed.

it is clear that the ndp leadership will not act as anything better than a hurdle in adopting the points in the manifesto. but, voting for the greens isn't going to accomplish anything, either.

shortly afterwards, the ndp released a "budgetary framework" document with oil at $67. this of course stays within the ndp's existing narrative of obsession with fiscal conservatism. worse, it tips it's hat on the importance of oil revenue to the government. everything that the ndp has been promising has been constructed with the intent to maximize oil revenue. this just cements the irrelevance of the klein/barlow clique in the new ndp. the new ndp wants to encourage dirty industry, tax it and redistribute the proceeds. in some sense, this is traditional socialism - but it's best before date was about 30 years ago. well, it's a party run by people on the brink of retirement.

this isn't the first time in the history of the world where liberals seem like a better choice than nominal socialists, however liberal or however nominal - and in canada the liberals are very liberal, and the ndp's socialism is very nominal (if that, they denounced it). but it's still always difficult for a leftist to come to terms with this when it's in front of them. and, today, it's in front of us.

the crux of what the liberals are pushing is in setting up a new environmental infrastructure bank as an arm of the bank of canada that funds itself via floating "green bonds". this is an update on the infrastructure tactic we used after world war two, which allowed us to build most of what we see around us. i get the impression that this is meant to be a very large scale project. the reason klein et al suggest tobin and carbon taxes is that it's seen as more feasible than floating bonds; the liberals are quietly presenting an even better funding tactic. if there's a party that's going to move towards the manifesto issued by klein & barlow, it's crystal clear at this point that it's going to be the liberals and not the ndp.

and, we're left with the hard truth that we're seeing a confluence of platform positions on the left in canada - but that it's under the liberal party. what's emerging is a reality where elizabeth may, maude barlow, naomi klein and the rest are seeing their visions most likely accomplished by the liberals - and only the liberals, because the ndp are moving in the opposite direction in planning everything around profit made from dirty oil.

it's not what i want to be saying. there's some things about the liberals i don't like, but i think they're mostly reduced to issues that *must* be largely worked out in court. however, the reality is that they are the only major party that is serious about putting the proper steps in motion that we need to have set in motion to move into a post-carbon future, even as they're refusing to turn the taps off any time soon.

pragmatic and realistic leftists need to see things as they really are and vote accordingly.