Wednesday at U of A and Thursday at U of C’s Faculties of Law!
Kinsellacast now on iTunes!
Doug Ford in ten tweets
I hate Twitter threads, but I got started and kept going. Here it is.
1. Doug Ford is good news for Andrea Horwath. If Horwath gets out of the political equivalent of the witness protection program, that is. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
2. Kathleen Wynne is Hillary Clinton to Doug Ford’s Donald Trump? Not really. Here’s why. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
3. Depicting Doug Ford as a racist like Trump won’t work. Ford Nation has always had huge – huge – support among new Canadians who share his views on taxes, cultural change and pointy-headed urbanites.
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
4. Going after Doug Ford because he allegedly sold weed three decades ago won’t work either – given that Ontario’s government this week started aggressively marketing the selling of weed. By Ontario’s government. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
5. Going after Doug Ford because he’s a politically incorrect, rough-around-the-edges guy with a paunch won’t work. Ontario is full of politically incorrect, rough-around-the-edges guys with a paunch. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
6. When the downtown media and the urban commentariat go after him, as they will, it plays into Doug Ford’s hands. “See?” he will say. “They’re not just mocking me. They’re mocking you, too, Joe and Jane Frontporch.” #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
7. Doug Ford is not the city councillor he once was. Back then, he had a brother who was a drug addict and who was always in trouble. Defending his brother, he’s told me, was his entire focus. His brother is now gone, and he *has* changed. #ONpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
8. The people who say Doug Ford doesn’t represent the real Ontario don’t know the real Ontario. To them, Ontario is what they drive through to get to their cottages on the weekend. #ONpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
9. Doug Ford voters aren’t just angry. They feel they’re the forgotten – that they don’t matter to those of us who live downtown and make all the decisions all the time. Ford’s voters love him because he won’t forget them. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
10. Jean Chretien, Bill Clinton, Ralph Klein, Mel Lastman, Brad Wall and so on – they were all smart guys (who hid how smart they were) and had the common touch (when their opponents didn’t). Doug Ford is like that. Underestimate him at your peril. #ONpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 11, 2018
I got tired of waiting for PCPO leadership results
So I tweeted stuff.
Pro tips, PC friends:
- If voters see that you can’t run your own house, they won’t let you run the province
- If you need media coverage, and all opposition parties do, messing up your leadership convention’s media coverage is a really bad idea
- If you think the networks won’t pull the plug on you, you are dreaming in Technicolour
The new conservatives and values
From a few years back:
…as I argue in my book Fight The Right, the political brain is an emotional organ, not a rational one. On voting day, passion generally defeats reason. Values, as simplistic as they may seem to progressives, rule.
Values – that is, hopes, dreams, fears, the ineffable stuff of life – are deeply held, deeply emotional notions. Mountains of data make clear that conservatives are very good at values-based debates, and progressives usually are not.
Conservatives have achieved supremacy in the European Union, Canada and the United States – jurisdictions where the majority of voters identify themselves as progressive – by expertly dominating the values debate, whether the subject matter is class resentments or fighting terror. Progressives, meanwhile, too often become tongue tied when talking about values. They’re not good at it.
As a result, voters (even progressive ones) drift towards conservative politicians and parties because they equate urban, university-educated progressives’ (a) reluctance to talk about values with (b) having no values at all.
Kinsellacast: the Spin Twins™ on tomorrow’s PC vote!
This is brutal (updated)
But that photo they use on the bottom right? It isn’t Trudeau.
That media organization owes its readers, and Trudeau, an apology.
Link here.
In which I praise Trudeau and Trump
Cartoon by the amazing de Adder.
Historic.
I have been critical of Justin Trudeau for (a) sucking up to Donald Trump and (b) getting nothing in return.
But credit where credit’s due: yesterday, Trudeau got a temporary exemption from Trump’s insane steel and aluminum tariffs.
But.
The key word there is “temporary.” As I say to my pal Charles in our weekly chat, below, it looks very much like Trump did what he did to wring concessions from Canada and Mexico at the NAFTA tables. He did it to get the U.S. what it wants at the NAFTA tables – which is something, but it ain’t free trade anymore. It’s giving America all the marbles.
Anyway, here’s me and Charles. These days, Justin Trudeau needed a win – any win. Donald Trump, of all people, gave him one.
Not a coincidence
The #ONPCs are picking a leader on the same day we lose time. Discuss. #onpoli
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 9, 2018