Senate of Canada: an incremental improvement

The Senate of Canada needs to be abolished. Of this I have no doubt.
Furthermore, that is the long-held position of the NDP, one of the principal reasons I support that party.
But the NDP has an Achilles' heel on this subject: no senators plus, to paraphrase Otto von Bismark's tested observation, “politics is the art of the possible.”
Those two facts should make party spokesmen and commentators pause before ripping the Liberals and Justin Trudeau for removing 32 Liberal-appointed  senators from the Liberal caucus.
Here's why:
NDPers spouting the party line that the Liberal initiative doesn't address the real issue are not incorrect, but do overlook the fact that, given the requirements of Canada's Constitution, we're unlikely to see the end of the Senate in our lifetime. Getting the agreement of seven provinces representing at least 50% of the population is simply too steep a mountain to climb, and short of revolution, there are no other options.
So abolition simply isn't going to happen, at least, not in any foreseeable future, not even with a majority NDP government. (I love Thomas Mulcair's assertion that, as prime Minister, he wouldn't appoint a single senator. But does anyone believe the NDP would be in power long enough to empty the Senate?)
This implies that, if we are to be relevant on this issue, we need to put some water in our wine and think reformation instead.
Of course Conservatives are also talking reformation, but their favourite reform involves an elected Senate, which would not only perpetuate an already dysfunctional institution, but also give it added legitimacy. It might even prove to be effective, thus giving the Reformers who morphed into the Conservatives two of their three “E”s.
But why would anyone support a Senate with real power and legitimacy in which the Atlantic provinces would have more seats than the entire western half of the country?
I trust the NDP to oppose an elected Senate even more vigorously than it opposes what we have.
(Odds are they won't have to: the Supreme Court is likely to point out that such a change would require a change in the Constitution, which makes an elected Senate just as unlikely as an abolished Senate.)
Which leaves what the Liberals have just done.
Their shot at reform is unlikely to make much immediate difference and is not without its problems. Removing Liberal senators from caucus doesn't stop them from being Liberals or voting as their Liberal brethern in the House do. Nor does it stop them from being unelected. It doesn't even stop them from forming their own Liberal caucus in the Senate. But it does cut the ties between the Liberal Party leader's office and the Senate, and I don't see how any New Democrat could argue that's a bad thing, especially given the relationship between our Prime Minister's office and the Senate.
Besides, if Trudeau really does get to institute his proposal of changing how Senators are chosen, over time the Senate's partisanship really will be diminished.
Again, I don't see why that's not an improvement over what we have presently.
Even if it's far from the ideal.
Frankly, I'd be more impressed with my party if its spokesmen weren't so blinded by Justin Trudeau's rise in the polls that they can't acknowledge an impressive, if incremental, first step.