Things are heating up in Guelph

All of a sudden, it seems like everyone is paying a lot of attention to Guelph, as sitting (and MIA) Liberal MP Brenda Chamberlain has announced that she's officially stepping down on April 7th.

I've been closely watching the national media for stories about Guelph, with a by-election impending.  (even set up my Google News with Guelph specific news reports)  Wow, talk about a jump in activity... the local paper, the Mercury, of course has a lot of stuff on it, but even the national papers are starting to pay attention to this, until recently, completely unnoticed riding.

Jack Layton even made an appearance in Guelph yesterday, calling on the Prime Minister to call a by-election as soon as possible.  (h/t to Dr. Roy and Joanne)

I think the article on MP's voting record that Mr. Layton and Mr. King refer to is this one from the Ottawa Citizen that I (and others) posted on Thursday.  Here's the specific quote regarding retiring Guelph Liberal MP Brenda Chamberlain:

"Ontario Liberal MP Brenda Chamberlain, who retires next month, has made it to only 10 votes since the session began in October."

Yikes, that's 10 out of 76... a whopping 13%.  Still, she's got a better record than her old boss, former Prime Minister Paul Martin... who registered, or should I say, didn't register, at 0 out of 76... yea, that's zero, zip, zilch, nada.

Which makes Jack's request to Mr. Dion even more interesting... now that Ms. Chamberlain has decided to "Do the right thing" and resign her seat, (by the way, that's Guelph's Liberal candidate Frank Valeriote's campaign slogan) maybe Mr. Dion should be asking his former boss, Prime Minister Paul Martin, to also "Do the right thing" and give up his seat in Montreal for a by-election?

So, Mr. Dion, Jack Layton asked you a question about your absentee MP's... a question that deserves an answer.  Will you "Do the right thing" and ask your MIA MP's like Mr. Martin to resign?  Just asking.

Oops, silly me, I almost forgot, that's a really dumb idea for them right now... we all know that their organization is so shot in Quebec that Mr. Dion can't risk another Outremont fiasco...