In an age of political ambition and ego, neither one has driven Rona Ambrose’s career in elective office.
Rather she has measured success by the advancement of her objectives such as women in politics and balancing the economy and the environment.
Ambrose has stepped into positions of leadership when she was asked, and not to advance her career. Indeed, her two years as interim Conservative leader and leader of the official Opposition in Parliament came at the expense of eligibility to run for the permanent leadership of the party in 2017.
What would tip the balance, as she considers a Conservative Party leadership run in 2020? It would be to be asked to address issues worthy of the personal sacrifices she would have to make.
Here’s a large issue worthy of Rona Ambrose’s exceptional skill – the undivided Conservative Party as the leading national party in the 21st century.
There’s a rule in internet politics and the 24-hour news cycle that if a politician or political party doesn’t define itself journalists and political opponents will.
While the Conservative Party has been running around like a chicken with its head cut off since Andrew Scheer’s untidy resignation, it is being defined as divided and eating its young.
However, it’s not divided, it is leaderless.
When Rona Ambrose enters the leadership race that ends because she is both a leader and a unifier.
The only card journalists could pay would be to advance a lesser figure at the expense of their credibility.
The party, fed up to the bone with Prime Minister "Blackface," wants a national leader with an established conservative identity and brand, a unifier within the party with popular appeal outside it, and a thoughtful person who has a 21st century vision.
Not surprisingly the majority also want Rona Ambrose because she is all that.
She would be the Conservative unifier in chief.
She has many political skills, one of which is her tireless ability to work with people, even those who disagree with her.
She has toughness leavened with fairness and wisdom enhanced with practicality.
With hard work and discipline an Ambrose-led Conservative Party would demolish Justin Trudeau.
Ambrose has already made a permanent impact on Canadian public life in the 16 years, 13 of those in the House of Commons, since she entered politics in 2004 as the unexpected winner of the Conservative nomination for Edmonton-Spruce Grove.
As the minister of five government departments and president of the Privy Council, Ambrose dealt with the main issues that Canada must address in the third decade of the 21st century.
She has built the biggest Conservative tent in Canada.
Earl Dreeshen, the MP for Red Deer-Mountain View, noted in a recent Mountain View Albertan interview with Kristine Jean that the Conservative Party has, “lots of people that have the ability to move us forward at perhaps a new direction.”
That said, no one fits that description better than Rona Ambrose.
She was the right choice for leader in 2017. She is still the right choice in 2020.
Frank Dabbs is a veteran political and business journalist and author.
