Layton admits party divided on next federal budget.

So Layton is busy trying to decide whether the NDP should submit to blackmail. I would think that it is not a good idea to let yourself be blackmailed! Of course it is a strange sort of blackmail. When you are blackmailed usually you have to pay someone else but in this case Harper is paying the NDP to vote for the budget. It is not blackmail but a bribe.
Doer is quite happy to accept the bribe since he can use the federal aid money but then Doer is not running for the federal NDP. Apparently he does not care that Harper stays in power as long as he pays off Gary Doer.
If the NDP props up the Conservatives it might as well forget about running federally. There is already a larger group of opposition wimps we can vote for, the Liberals.

This is from the CBC.
Layton admits party divided on next federal budget
Last Updated: Monday, January 14, 2008 | 7:47 PM ET
The Canadian Press
NDP Leader Jack Layton admits his party ranks are divided over whether to support the next federal budget to ensure $1 billion in promised economic aid flows to the provinces.

Layton has accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper of resorting to political blackmail by tying the aid package to passage of the budget expected in February.

But some provincial NDP leaders, including Manitoba Premier Gary Doer, want to get their hands on the federal money as soon as possible.

Layton, who held a strategy session with the party's 10 provincial leaders Monday, acknowledges that they don't all see eye to eye on the issue.

But he says the federal party will have to make its decision on the coming budget based on its overall economic impact, not just on the aid offer for laid-off workers and ailing industries.

Layton says the party's precise budget strategy will be hammered out next week at a caucus retreat with his MPs.