Everybody's A Critic

The Liberal shadow cabinet has been announced, and if somebody didn't make it, they had to be really, really bad, because almost everyone else in the 102-member Liberal caucus did.

Some departments are getting two or three critics against one minister. Given the depth of the Liberal intellectual pool, I'd say that's about even.

Bev Oda will face the Canadian Heritage triple threat of Mauril Belanger, Mario Silva and Francis Scarpaleggia (who he?).

Peter MacKay will be up against the Foreign Affairs trio of Stephane Dion, Byron Wilfert and Borys Wrisnevsky Wzrneffski Wryznevskjii the Ukranian guy.

David Emerson also gets to face three amigos on International Trade: Dominic LeBlanc, Mark Eyking and John Maloney.

But some MPs are considered smart enough to handle some major portfolios all by themselves--Sue Barnes for Justice, John McCallum for Finance and Ken Dryden for Health.

Belinda Stronach gets to handle the complex files at Transport, ably assisted by Jim Karygiannis. I suppose she does know something about the job, car parts and all.

And Michael Ignatieff gets to be Geoff Regan's fartcatcher at Human Resources & Skills. The saviour of the party. An associate critic. To Geoff Regan. In Human Resources. In Canada. We did not make this up.

Here's who didn't get anything:

Scott Simms
Lawrence MacAulay
Shawn Murphy
Tina Keeper
Joe McGuire
Brenda Chamberlain
Jean-Claude d'Amours
Paul Szabo
Brian Murphy
David McGuinty
Tom Wappel
Diane Marleau
Joe Comuzzi
Blair Wilson
Jim Peterson
Judy Sgro
Colleen Beaumier
Peter Milliken
Paul Martin

With the exceptions of Milliken and Martin, this is a complete list of official Liberal Party pariahs. They have to really hate you not to give you a role in the most bloated shadow cabinet in history.

Source: Liberal Party of Canada