Jack Layton resumes his battle with the big "C" ....

and all Canadians are hoping he will come out the winner like he did in the last election. Without Jack Layton, no matter how much we might criticize his politics, there is no NDP. The party will disintegrate into nothing if he does not recover. He is the only adult voice that keeps the gang of yahoos glued together.

...In retrospect, we should have seen the signs.

His last public event was apparently the annual gay pride parade in Toronto on July 3. It is something he has made a point of attending every year and, had he missed it, people surely would have wondered why.

Even as he rode the parade route sporting a cowboy hat with a multi-colored ribbon, his wife Olivia Chow at his side, the gauntness that was so startling at Monday’s news conference was beginning to show.

Mr. Layton said he received just last week the results of the tests that found a new type of cancer – one different to the prostate cancer that was diagnosed in 2009. But he clearly knew for weeks the findings would not be good.......