04.23.2010 06:36 AM

Culture War

Sounds like a name for a punk band.

My view?  If you have an electoral strategy, don’t talk about it.

Say who you are, be who you are, and do what you need to do.  But don’t say you want to have a “war” about anything.

21 Comments

  1. Catherine says:

    We’re back to wanting to be in the centre.

    Only, if reference to the ‘centre of attention.’

    The Harper party wants it all of the time, and if anyone else is getting it, they sulk and pout.

    And throw a little tantrum.

    Watch a two year old when a new baby arrives home with everyone fauning.

    That two year old has more maturity than the thin-skinned Harper bunker.

  2. parnel says:

    besides trying to frame the opinions of graves Graves as that of a Liberal, Kory did nothing to suggest his party was none of the above. its typical of the deceipt the cons strive for.

    • MJH says:

      Graves is a Liberal supporter and his polls for the CBC show a definite bias. The results cant be trusted. He has bee outed and the reliability of his output will always be suspect.

  3. Michael Bussiere says:

    What the hell is this about the PMO setting up outposts in 3 key cities? Who is paying for that?

  4. Whoa says:

    Conservatives are desperately trying to change the channel from the greasy conflicts of interest of Guegis-Jaffer to picking on a pollster.

  5. nastyboy says:

    Screw the West get the rest has been the LPC strategy for as long as I can remember. Nothing new here.

  6. Ian says:

    Interesting to see Kory try to freeze the discussion on the word tolerance. The Canadian Oxford Dictionary when defining tolerance as a noun describes it as, “the disposition to adopt a liberal attitude towards the opinions or acts of others”, and “a willingness or ability to accept or allow without protest or irritation”. I find it ironic that Kory would try and paint his Conservative Party as tolerant when in reality they are highly and visibly intolerant towards anyone who fails to walk in sync with them on any issue. Branding themselves as being tolerant is a part of their Culture of Deceipt.

  7. Reality.Bites says:

    The “west” – or to be more accurate, Alberta, has adopted as a political strategy giving all their votes to the Reform/Alliance/Conservative party, come hell or high water.

    As a result, neither the Conservative, nor the Liberal Party has any motivation to do anything to earn their votes. The Cons can’t lose them and the Libs can’t win them, so both parties ignore Alberta when in power.

    It’s the singularly least effective provincial voting strategy in the country.

  8. Martin Partridge says:

    I am delighted with the new federal Liberal direction toward an all-out war of culture versus deceit. In the swing riding of Northumberland–Quinte West, I sense that it would be just the ticket.

  9. auntie-em-m says:

    Hmmmm, ‘culture of deceit’ is sticking with me, too.

  10. rabbit says:

    RealityBites:

    It’s not a “political strategy”. Alberta vote conservative because Albertans themselves are (mostly) conservative.

  11. Elizabeth says:

    Albertans just don’t want anyone to interfere with their preferred lifestyle. Which is making money and buying toys.

  12. Elizabeth says:

    The link doesn’t work.

  13. Michael Watkins says:

    In the spirit of unbiased criticism of both actors: I’m always surprised when some “strategy” is being talked about out in the open. You’d think that the Liberals after watching the Conservatives act, and react, for many years now would have learned that lesson. To what purpose does floating a trial balloon loaded with explosives serve? It only gives the opposing parties war rooms something to to shoot down not to mention build their own campaign to pre-empt the roll out of whatever grand strategy is being verbalized. Idiotic.

    Ooh, Teneyke just compared Graves to Trudeau. LOL

    As for Kory, read his twits and you’ll quickly discover he is one. A twit.

  14. Jon Evan says:

    “Say who you are”

    Exactly, WK has it right! That’s the issue with Graves: he doesn’t! And it’s Graves who looks silly.

    It’s very obvious that Graves is more Liberal than MI. DUH!
    And it’s very obvious that Graves hates me — a Westerner! How useful is he to the LPC.

    Thank goodness WK put him in his place!

  15. MJH says:

    Graves recommends that the Liberals pit east against the west!! What a brilliant strategist for national unity.

  16. hugger says:

    Well, whoever hired Snowdy for the current venture into the Culture war was none too bright.

    On the theme of not too bright, I offer the ramblings of the sweetheart of the Reform movements Western Blogospere, the one and only Five Feet of Mouth.

    Quote; “As I said on my blog this morning, I’d welcome a “war” such as this. Timid Canadians cling to “unity” (except when they are clinging to “diversity”).

    Why NOT pit Canadians against each other, if only to finally clear the air about our legitimate differences?
    Posted by: Kathy Shaidle at April 23, 2010 2:14 PM ”

    If this is the path we are going down, I’m gonna move to a boot.

  17. Tceh says:

    Kory’s assertions are not supported by fact.

    From http://threehundredeight.blogspot.com/2010/03/pollster-firm-leanings-quebec-update.html

    The top pollster for the Liberals is Environics, polling them 5.9 points higher than average. The worst is EKOS, which polls them 3.5 points lower than the average.

    The top pollsters for the Conservatives are Ipsos-Reid and Nanos, polling them at 1.4 points higher than average. The worst is Environics, 4.0 points lower than the average.

    The top pollster for the New Democrats is CROP, 3.4 points higher than average. The worst is Harris-Decima, 2.0 points lower than average.

    And for the Greens, the top pollster is Strategic Counsel, 6.2 points higher than average. The worst is Nanos, 3.0 points lower than average.

    The most consistent pollsters seem to be Ipsos-Reid, with no more than a 1.6 point difference than the average, and Angus-Reid, with no more than a 2.2 point difference.

    Other references worth checking out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_in_the_41st_Canadian_federal_election

  18. luke says:

    I’ve been a supporter of our leader since before he even declared himself a candidate when he got back to Canada. But it’s become apparent to me that regardless of the messaging, I don’t think he’ll be the one bringing us to victory. I think there is a bit of a culture war going on, and this is something that needs to be highlighted and made THE major issue to the Canadian people. Do we really want a party filled with and supported by as many bigoted and backward people as the CPC? I don’t think so. Right now the numbers say that most canadians don’t support the CPC and their views, but the numbers are also on the CPC side for vote distribution.

    But as Martin says in his article, Ignatieff is moving left. Why? Did he have an epiphany of some type? Did he read a policy review that transformed his thinking? Has he come to recognize that ‘reality’s well known liberal bias’, meant small l rather than Big L? There’s no real vision being offered. There’s no real policy being offered. Letting the public know just what the CPC represent is an important thing, but I don’t think that will be enough to lead us to victory without a sound and inspired vision and policy.

    FYI: if we really want to bring up a culture war, we need to start putting out videos comparing statements by militia groups in the US to statements by their MPs. We need to use names like Anders, Vellacott etc every chance we get. We need to make as many links to the Bush/neo-con movement as we possibly can. But I don’t see anything of that happening. There are quotes GALORE out there to use (I know, I found lots of them at the LRB), but unfortunately they aren’t on youtube and we aren’t using them.

  19. Elizabeth says:

    I thought that Evan could have done a better job of directing the interview – he let KT walk all over Graves, and what KT was bringing up wasn’t legit – it wasn’t balanced. Graves was being civil, KT was not. Graves was not able to get out what he wanted to get out, and KT, being more experienced at this sort of TV interviewing; just barely shut up long enough to listen to him, and not even.

    At least Evan did clarify CBC’s position on polling, how they use polls; but I thought he could have done a better job of finding out exactly what Graves wanted to say. It’s terrible to watch these interviews now – people just walk all over each other, and it’s being accepted as normal.

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