Khan!!!!

There's a political storm brewing in Canada, and it's centered around my neighborhood. My local MP, Wajid Khan, has been asked by PM Harper to be his special advisor on the middle east. Khan is a Muslim who denounces jihad-ism and murder and all those things. Good for him.

Khan is also a Liberal. That's capital-L Liberal, as in Liberal Party of Canada.

He's said he won't cross the aisle and join the Conservative Party, and he got the go-ahead from temporary party leader Bill Graham. But there's a problem.

Toronto Liberal MP Maria Minna circulated a memo denouncing Khan's move.

“Wajid's appointment is a slick, sick, calculated move on Harper's part. Liberals shouldn't touch this thing with a 10-foot pole,” she wrote. “Wajid should have known that he was playing into the hands of the Conservatives and [Interim Leader] Bill Graham should have said NO.”

I think she's dead-on. Harper is eating it in the polls, pardue toueto his ham-handed response to the Middle East. Conservatives have gone from dreaming of a majority government to hanging on for dear life. So why is a Liberal MP giving them a lift?

Politics is about politics. The Conservative Party exists as a political entity to control Canada. They do that by convincing voters that they have superior knowledge judgmentment on the matters that are important. Matters like war and peace in the Middle East, where Canadian soldiers act as UN peace keepers in Israel (Golan Heights) and combatants (where Canadians continue to fight and die in Afghanistan).

The Liberals exist for the same reason, with a different set of goals, assets, and methodologies.

One of the Liberal Party's assets is it's racial and cultural inclusiveness. When the PC Party sold its soul to join the Alliance, they joined an American-style far right group where people like Wajid Kahn are not welcome. That's just how it is.

So now, for them to co-opt Kahn - for lack of their own Khan - is good politics for them and bad politics for the Liberals. There's a reason the Liberal Party has a Khan and the Conservative Party does not. For Khan to give his services to the Conservatives is to obscure that distinction to voters.

It's not like Khan is the only Muslim or Middle East expert in Canada. There are lots of people - scholars, civil servants, community leaders - who could serve in that role. Harper didn't need an expert - he needed political coverage.

And Khan has given it to him.

So the choice for Wajid is simple: be a Liberal or be a Conservative. That's it.