Tall, dark and fluent – go, Iggy

From Lysiane Gagnon in today's Globe & Mail. And, as much as I'm a Bob supporter, I fully agree with her analysis...

During the election campaign, many wondered how the Liberal Party would have fared if it had been led by Michael Ignatieff. My guess — and everybody else's — is the party would have been a formidable rival to the Conservatives and the Bloc Québécois. It is not a coincidence that the vast majority of Quebec delegates at the 2006 leadership convention were supporters of Mr. Ignatieff.

Among the potential contenders to succeed Stéphane Dion, Mr. Ignatieff would still be the favourite of Quebec Liberals, even in the unlikely event that Quebeckers such as Martin Cauchon and Denis Coderre — who both nurture leadership ambitions — were in the race. (Justin Trudeau said he wouldn't run, a sensible decision since he is widely considered, at least in Quebec, to be a lightweight.) After having had three leaders from Quebec in a row, the last one being a francophone, the Liberals will surely want an anglophone from another province. Alternating between francophones and anglophones is still the Liberal Party's unwritten rule.

In any case, Mr. Cauchon, a competent cabinet minister under Jean Chrétien, would not be a shoo-in in Quebec because he lacks charisma. And Mr. Coderre would clearly be punching above his weight class if he viewed himself as a future prime minister. Local Liberals enjoy his combative zeal and down-home populist style in partisan meetings, but he wouldn't be taken seriously.

Mr. Ignatieff, on the other hand, has many assets when it comes to winning Quebec voters: flawless, elegant French, and dark, intense good looks that somewhat resemble those of Lucien Bouchard, the beloved icon of the 1990s. Mr. Ignatieff is a public intellectual rather than a straightforward academic, and Quebeckers love public intellectuals — people who are cultured, at ease with ideas and can philosophize on various themes.

More important, Mr. Ignatieff is popular among the nationalists because he was the first to embrace the notion of Quebec as a nation. This was a skewed view — there's certainly a French-Canadian nation, but Quebec as a province is not a nation — but it worked, and now that the idea has been co-opted by Stephen Harper and accepted by large segments of the political class, Mr. Ignatieff can look like a precursor.

By the time the Liberals choose a new leader, Mr. Ignatieff's initial stand in favour of the war in Iraq will have been forgotten and forgiven, especially if Barack Obama is elected president.

The Obama factor might play in the Liberal leadership race. Even though Mr. Ignatieff is 14 years older than Mr. Obama, he's the only Liberal contender (so far) who can generate a bit of excitement: He, too, comes from outside the box, and he's not a typical politician.

Bob Rae, by contrast, is very much a traditional politician, albeit an exceptionally gifted one. If Mr. Rae had been leading the Liberals, he also would have fared better in Quebec than Mr. Dion. His French is very good, he is personable and a good conversationalist, and his failure as Ontario NDP premier wouldn't haunt him too much in Quebec, where most people have no personal memory of his tenure.

As far as Quebec is concerned, John Manley could be a sensible choice. He is fluently bilingual and has a solid record as a cabinet minister under Mr. Chrétien in various economic portfolios and Foreign Affairs. He's relatively unknown in the province and he totally lacks charisma, but, on this count, he would be at par with Mr. Harper. At least Mr. Manley could be sold as a man with gravitas, whose governmental experience could be a tremendous asset in the troubled economic times ahead.

Most of the other potential contenders whose names are circulating would have problems winning Quebec because they aren't fluent in French. A reasonable knowledge of French is not sufficient to win the hearts and minds of Quebeckers, but it's a sine qua non.