Musings —08.02.2015 04:46 PM
—My big tweet of Day One
Check out the number of retweets and favourites. I’d say there’s a consensus Team Orange made a big error on Day One of the Long March, wouldn’t you?
Cue the Dipper Trolls who’ll argue that it was strategic and brilliant.
He was going to Flora MacDonald’s funeral. It’s not strategic in the sense that it helps his electoral senses, I suppose.
After stating my displeasure with Mulcair for not taking any questions in an earlier WK post, seeing that he actually went to Flora MacDonald’s funeral and neither did Harper or Trudeau, I take it back.
http://www.ottawasun.com/2015/08/02/flora-macdonald-mourners-were-flora-fanatics
Flora MacDonald was a trailblazer for women in Parliament. I have daughters. And if Flaherty deserved a state funeral, she deserved one doubly more.
The problem is not that Mulcair did not answer questions, it is that the NDP war room did not react fast enough to explain why. Get it together folks.
I am irked at their rationale for dropping a couple of debates on the media. The rationale sounds to me as though it tis based on the assumption that we should have only two parties. This has me doubting their commitment to electoral improvements to get more accurate representation in our House of Commons.
Yeah, I think answering some questions should have been part of the job today. (I did not see all of JT’s q &a, but what I saw looked pretty good.)
Watching the NDP campaign start actually made today a little interesting . Can’t wait to see how this unfolds…
It has been a highly successful strategy for Harper. That said, I expect to hear a lot more from Tom as the campaign moves on.
Warren, obviously you are not aware that the best way to contrast yourself with your opponent is to act exactly like him.
Exactly he had a funeral to go to, why alot of the media, its wrong that the Star and the CBC failed to mention this, they made it out to be a snub, it wasn’t.
He answered tons of question the week before and over 74 days he’ll answer far more then that.
I think a bigger blunder was not having Trudeau on the ground to respond. He made the point himself that his party isn’t relevant.
I plan to vote NDP and I thought the decision by Mulcair not to take questions was dumb. Just because I support team orange does not mean I have to cheer poor decisions. That being said, the silly mistakes of August are likely to be forgotten come voting day.
I saw three comments before I did and I thought I would have seen at least one dipper troll for sure.
I agree, it was a bad choice. But if it’s a one-time thing, in another ten weeks nobody will remember or care.
My question is whether he intends to continue this. Drawing a contrast between himself and Harper by being even LESS responsive to the press does not seem like a terribly good strategy…
Warren,
Don’t you have to be repetitive and not factual to be labeled a troll?
Warren,
If he was going to Flora’s service, he should have said so. Otherwise, he left the impression that NDP support is nothing more than a house of cards. Hence, the necessity for not taking questions not to risk the lead.
Orange crush, baby. You can’t hold back the tide!
That’s pretty dumb, although the funeral thing seems a valid excuse.
I am currently more pissed at the Ndp for the debate retreat. I was legitimately looking forward to the exchanges between Trudeau and Mulcair without the Harper distraction. It would have been the perfect forum to decide which party seemed most likely to it depose the connies. But alas, it will not be. And I honestly wonder if Mulcair is not actually a trifle nervous of how a Mulcair-Trudeau exchange would play out.
Back to the the orange and red fence I go. My bum is getting sore.
Luke,
I think our host might agree with this: when we get to the last few weeks of the campaign, we will start feeling it in our gut as to which party is going to win on election night..
Maybe, but you’re talking to a guy who was too dumb to clue into the orange wave and voted Liberal last time around. Oh well, Megan Leslie won anyway, and she seems pretty OK.
agree 100% Luke – that would have been a very worthwhile debate for us to watch.
I’d rate the TM launch as a net positive – the visuals (which I noticed flashing by tv channels), being in Ottawa, attending Flora’s funeral, the economic messaging (which I haven’t seen from the NDP in forty plus years as NDP leaders have always avoided talking about the economy, which I always viewed as a mistake), a laser like focus on PMSH). As WK notes, not taking questions was problematic. This can be corrected over the course of the next 78 days. (yes, 78 days – if he answers a question per day that’s 78!). Meanwhile, Harper probably canned the guy who told him to answer those five questions which completely got him off message, having to defend the call, the cost, thereby losing his security/economy talking points. The most disastrous NDP launch was in 1988 when ED didn’t mention free trade (per my point above about not mentioning the economy)….but that’s a story for another day. (in the campaign I ran back then that’s all we talked about….and won).
Tim Gallagher,
Over at the Conservative Party, it’s a one-way elevator coming from the top down. No one tells Stephen Harper anything. He tells them. This limit on questions is long standing and it comes straight from himself.
I’d rate the TM launch as a net positive – the visuals (which I noticed flashing by tv channels), being in Ottawa, attending Flora’s funeral, the economic messaging (which I haven’t seen from the NDP in forty plus years as NDP leaders have always avoided talking about the economy, which I always viewed as a mistake), a laser like focus on PMSH). As WK notes, not taking questions was problematic. This can be corrected over the course of the next 78 days. (yes, 78 days – if he answers a question per day that’s 78!). Meanwhile, PMSH probably canned the guy who told him to answer those five questions which completely got him off message, having to defend the call, the cost, thereby losing his security/economy talking points.
please delete the second comment, somehow I hit the submit button twice!
For a minute there I thought you were two Conservative candidates.
Mulcair is a national leader, funeral or not. He should have answered questions. At least five of them.
Advantage Harper.
At Harper’s election announcement speech he did a lot of campaign outline. He read from a prepared script. I thought interesting the choice to mention ‘environment’ in the French version, then did not mention it the English version. They had to know that the difference would be noticed, and they have criticized others for saying one thing a French audience, and another for an English audience, yet they included this different wording anyway.
CTV: “NDP leader Tom Mulcair is not campaigning today and has no immediate plans to do any active campaigning this week. He is instead focusing on preparing for the first leaders’ debate, set for Toronto on Thursday.”
Either Mulcair is not ready for a debate scheduled months ago or something is up. He had more than 2 hours between his press conference yesterday and the funeral, so that’s not the reason he didn’t take any questions.
Is this simply a front-runner strategy? No questions, no appearances for a week? Usually, even front-runners come out for some well-controlled events.
TM has an event in MTL today at 11 am.
The NDP/Cons/Libs have all accepted the Globe and Mail Debate. Plus the TVA French Debate (which will also include the Bloc but no Greens).
Mad Tom is mad Tom ..that forced smile his handlers make him put on makes him look even worse….he is no Jack Layton …
Tom’s had a bad Day 1 and Day 2 (taking today off while the others campaign to debate prep. according to CP24).
I have a friend from overseas visiting who hasn’t a clue who any of the leaders are. The news was on, some election coverage, and she just said she likes the only one who is “in good shape” of the three.
Lol…that wasn’t a leader…that was Reshmi Nair.
Nothing matters this week. Mulcair is likely making ads and preparing for the 1st debate. No need to get all worked up about things in August when the election isn’t until Oct. 19. Nothing to see…