MONTREAL - As the Bloc Quebecois reached adulthood earlier this year, the same old question swirled around the sovereigntist party and its leader, Gilles Duceppe.
How useful was a party that came into being 18 years ago saying it only wanted a short life before Quebec independence was achieved?
The Bloc's strategy over the years has been to portray itself as the only party able to defend Quebecers' interests in Ottawa.
In this campaign, the Bloc took the same approach, constantly hammering away at Stephen Harper's Conservatives and accusing them of harbouring values alien to most Quebecers.
At the heart of the Bloc's campaign, as always, was Duceppe, whose 11 years at the helm of the party make him the federal leader with the most seniority.
When the campaign began, the Bloc looked to be in trouble in many ridings because of surging support for the Conservatives.
But Duceppe's experience and steady-as-you-go approach -- and a few Tory missteps on key issues in Quebec such as culture and youth crime -- helped reverse the trend as the campaign unfolded.
The leaders' debates gave Duceppe a perfect platform to highlight his "I'm-the-best-politician-to-defend-Quebec" spiel.
The English debate also enabled him to fire off a zinger at his rivals.
"I know I won't be prime minister, and three of you won't be prime minister, either," Duceppe said. "Some of you know it, but you won't say it."
Later in the campaign, Quebecers got to see Duceppe's prickly side when Conservative candidate Luc Harvey waylaid him and began heckling him at a farmers market near Quebec City.
A seething Duceppe dismissed Harvey in short order.
"I've always thought that he was an imbecile," he said. "He once asked why Canada was not in the European Union."
Duceppe might not have uttered such a remark in earlier campaigns when he was often mocked, particularly in 1997 with the publication of a photo showing him wearing a hairnet at a cheese factory.
He still doesn't exude the charisma that had Quebecers giving an almost Moses-like status to the first Bloc leader, Lucien Bouchard, but he has managed to maintain the party's hold on Quebec.
And the Bloc faithful appear to have forgiven him for his dalliance with the Parti Quebecois leadership in 2007.
Just 24 hours after announcing he wanted to replace Andre Boisclair, Duceppe pulled out after realizing that Pauline Marois was headed to certain victory against him.
That incident left observers wondering how much homework had been done by Duceppe, who has a reputation as a master of his files. While he said he consulted his family as well as Bloc and PQ members, reports surfaced that he actually had little support in the PQ caucus.
Some were miffed by comments from a Bloc member who said Duceppe -- who once had the nickname "The Little General" for his authoritarian style -- would be just the guy to "kick some butts" in the unruly provincial sovereigntist party. Pequiste posteriors would not be such an easy target, his detractors sniffed.
The Bloc quickly welcomed Duceppe back, giving him a 95 per cent vote of support and closing the door on any further public discussion of the matter.
