Editorial - Five in the heat

Windspeaker would like to congratulate the men who have put their names forward in the race for national chief of the Assembly of First Nations. A list of the eligible candidates was released on June 17 and Shawn Atleo of British Columbia, John Beaucage of Ontario, Perry Bellegarde of Saskatchewan, Terrance Nelson of Manitoba and Bill Wilson of British Columbia will be on the campaign trail until the July 22 election at the AFN's annual general assembly in Calgary.
It's a courageous act to throw a hat into the ring for a position on the national stage, and don't let anybody tell you differently. That's why we also wish the families of these national candidates well. Let's hope they're prepared for what's to come, because there is nothing worse than seeing a husband/father/son take body-blow after body-blow for the duration of a term in office.
You see it's a completely different ball game going from provincial leadership to national leadership, and we don't just mean having to balance the agendas and grassroots needs of 633 First Nations.
As a national leader you have to deal with the agenda of the federal government, who quite honestly is prepared to throw people, even their own, under the bus at a moment's notice.
Just ask Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt about the skid marks on her back. Raitt apologized for the blatant ambition she embraced when she said in a taped conversation that she viewed the isotope shortage in Canada as a career booster. But the apology came a day after the story broke. What took so long for her mea culpa? Conservative insiders let it be known to CTV's Craig Oliver that she had been invited to a meeting with the prime minister to discuss the scandal, but she blew the meeting off, preferring to sit in her office crying and feeling sorry for herself. Ouch. Thanks, comrades. What's that old saying we have in grizzly country? 'I don't have to be the fastest. I just have to be faster than you." That's what it's like on The Hill.
And speaking of the very vicious national press corps. They'll fall all over themselves looking for ways to tear a person apart. Need examples? Look at what they did to Patrick Brazeau, the former national chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, when he was named to the Senate. The Globe & Mail's Bill Curry got a taste of blood in his mouth over that one, and turned over every rock, including the one Brazeau's ex-wife was hiding behind, to prove that the Aboriginal leader wasn't Senate material, and just another political payoff for playing nice with the Harper Conservatives.
Let's face it, it's not personal. It's what they do. They did to Stockwell Day when he became the leader of the Canadian Alliance.
Day was touted as the John F. Kennedy of the north by the right-wing papers-we kid you not. That was before that press conference he held wearing a wet suit. How embarrassing. And as Opposition leader he refused to scrum in the hallway outside the House of Commons-a Canadian journalistic tradition-preferring instead to hold very mannerly press conferences, which the press corps mightily chafed at. 'And the horse you rode in on' was the reply (or should we say watercraft?) and the man who would be king was soon heaped upon the bone pile of supportive press.
And for those who can remember poor Joe Clark when he had his brief moment at the head of the pack, you'll recall the mittens on strings that cartoonist Andy Donato would draw hanging out of Clark's business suits to suggest his political immaturity.
We're just saying the next national chief must be made of sturdy stuff. Outgoing National Chief Phil Fontaine has managed to keep out of the ditch for three terms, though it hasn't been easy we're sure. Soon one of these other fine gentlemen will feel the heat of the national spotlight. Will he glow or will he burn?