Rocco Rossi, a.k.a. Benedict Baldy, has been going door-to-door for his new federal party of choice, the Conservatives. The Con candidate in Eg-Lawrence is Joe Oliver. The Liberal incumbent is Joe Volpe.

When he gets to an Italian family’s door, he asks the older folks therein if they “will take a sign for [his] friend Joe.”

They say yes, thinking he means Joe Volpe, not Joe Oliver.

The next morning, a blue sign is on their lawn, and the family is upset by BB’s dishonesty. They are registering their unhappiness, big time.  Some with media.

Benedict Baldy: a man of integrity and honesty.

Not, as Bev Odious would say.

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…and another Reformatory campaign day gets blown to smithereens.

Perhaps they will order the RCMP to physically remove pesky journalists who ask questions about the latest Carson scandal.

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• The tale of the tape in Hamilton: The Liberal and Conservatives were in the Hammer last night for rallies.  Thus, journalists were wondering who would have the biggest and best crowd.  Here, then is an account from SFH’s manager, Hammer Dom, who was there to tell the tale:  “W, just back home – attended Iggy’s Town Hall here in Hamilton. Over a thousand people, they let anyone in, he answered 15+ questions from anyone with a hand up. Man of the people.  What a wonderful, charasmatic, intelligent and in-touch individual.  Harper’s rally, 300 people, and the bus load of McMaster students that were at Iggy’s show – we’ll, they were barred from Harpers an hour before.  Conservative shit-show.  Igg’s next PM – I promise you.”
• Is Hammer Dom right? Well, let’s pore through this morning’s entrails, shall we?  The Spectator, the Hammer’s paper of record, has this headline this morning:  IGNATIEFF DRAWS THREE TIMES THE CROWD THAT HARPER DID. Is that a big deal?  It sure is.  Federal Liberals have been dead in the water in the Hammer for almost seven years – principally due to what the Martin team did to Sheila Copps.  The party has had little on the ground there, in the interim, but they still pulled in 1,000 Hamiltonians last night.  Like, wow!
• What do the polls say, in Hamilton and elsewhere? As prognosticated in this space for the past nearly-two-weeks, (a) campaigns matter and (b) the Reformatories have indeed, as Dom says, been running a dismal campaign – while Ignatieff’s has been better than everyone expected.  Sayeth the soothsayers: “The Conservatives are clinging to a six-point lead on the Liberals nationally but the critical gap is closing in Ontario, a new poll shows…“It still looks like Mr. (Stephen) Harper will win a minority, but that is by no means a sure thing – particularly with these differences in Ontario,” said pollster Frank Graves. “What is quite clear is that a majority is really unlikely.”
• The Cons are trapped: As all know now, they were using the RCMP (illegally) to eject citizens. The RCMP has now admitted they made a mistake, and won’t do that anymore.  Now, the Cons are stuck: they can’t do much about protestors on their own – if they touch a person, it’s assault. Thus, they’re stuck with coverage of residents of the Hammer speaking up.  As happens in, you know, a democracy.
• What does that all mean for the good people of the Hammer? It means that, despite being the subject of all manner of Conservative blandishments and affection, Ontario is slowly turning its back on the Angry Man from Alberta.  And, as one of the smart Anderson brothers point out, the Cons need to “up their game” in Hamilton, Ontario and elsewhere – and particularly in the debates.  I have long felt Iggy will do very well in the debates – and that, seeing things thereafter slipping away, the Tories will unleash a barrage of attack ads unlike anything this country has ever seen.  It might work.  It has before (cf. “bomb the bridges,” circa 1988).
• TV talking head is heard from: How nice. Perhaps he could invite the Canada Israel Committee’s favourite white supremacist, too. He has before. What’s the Hamilton angle?  Um, er.
• Salutin in the Star!  On Iggy! I think Rick might be from Hamilton.   He was there once, at the very least.  Anyhow, so sayeth Rick:  “[Ignatieff] was an awful candidate, a gift to Stephen Harper like the second coming of Stéphane Dion. Now he looks comfortable in his own skin, and in Canada. I don’t think he’ll make voters wince, the way he used to…Harper…seems off his game. He keeps flubbing it, starting with his early campaign challenge to a one-on-one debate, which he suddenly retreated from when Ignatieff agreed. Wouldn’t Harper, the acclaimed chess master, have anticipated that move?”
• Pic of the day: Iggy is swallowed up by Grit logo in Hamilton!  Caption contest!

 

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Sigh. Seeing these little fellows makes me so nostalgic.

And, what with Harper being (a) too chicken to debate Ignatieff one-on-one (b) too chicken to take media questions and (c) too chicken to permit polite girls into his rallies, I think they should follow him everywhere on this campaign, don’t you?

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How interesting. His name is Snover Dhillon, and he’s been in a spot of trouble with the law – Bruce Carson-type trouble.

Here’s a nice picture of him, a couple other guys, and Timmy.  Oddly, this photo disappeared from Conservative Party web sites in the past 24 hours.  Must have been an administrative error.  Happily, however, an upset Ontario PC member sent me a copy they’d kept.

I know Timmy would want to have a keepsake of the moment, so here it is.  Clip and save, Timmy!  You could start a crime-fighting scrapbook!

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Perhaps he can deny he ever said it, and then someone at CBC will be obliged to swear an affidavit making clear that he did, in fact, say it.

Here’s a little experiment: fast – anyone know the name of the Conservative Party president?  Anyone remember ever hearing from him/her, about anything? Anyone?

You can’t, can you?

Exactly.

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“Dislodged Conservative MPP Norm Sterling says he would support a Liberal candidate in the Ottawa area riding he’s represented for 34 years, as long as the candidate was the right Liberal.

Sterling said Wednesday he would likely back Ottawa Councillor Eli El-Chantiry, who is considering seeking the Liberal nomination in the riding, over Conservative Jack Mac Laren in the next Ontario election. Last week, MacLaren, a rural libertarian, triumphed over Sterling in a brazen and unusual challenge for the party’s nomination in the upcoming Oct. 6 vote.

The challenge has exposed a deep rift within the party and prompted questions over its treatment of Sterling, the longest-serving legislator in Ontario.”

As I told a group of Ontario Liberal staffers last night, it all strikingly resembles the Manning-Mulroney divide – which led, in the end, to the Conservative Party dividing in two, and more than a decade of Liberal rule.

The next few months are going to be interesting.

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• The pollsters, the pundits and the professors: All seem to agree that – mainly due to a better-than-expected Liberal campaign, and a piss-poor Reformatory campaign – some shifts are underway.  Iggy’s personal numbers are up, and his party’s, a bit; Harper’s own, and that of his party, have stalled.  As things stand now, the much-lusted-after majority is gone.
• So sayeth the Star’s Les: Writes he:  “Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff appears to be winning hearts and minds on the election trail even though his party still lags the Conservatives by a wide margin, a new national poll shows.  At the same time, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper’s performance has led to a slight erosion of his appeal since the election kicked off.” It surprises me, frankly: I didn’t think the stumbles by Harper and his army would start to be reflected in the polls until next week, when the debates are taking place.  It suggests that voters know this campaign has been Harper’s worst since 2004, and have been reacting accordingly.
• Bernard Who? Bernard Lord is (almost literally) the Conservative Party’s Frank McKenna.  He is (a) a male (b) a former Premier (c) from New Brunswick and (d) always talked about by journalists.  In the case of both men, too, the parties they belong to don’t really see them as leadership material, or even particularly remember them.  At all.  So why do terrific columnists still write about them? Beats me.
• The Gunter canary in the coal mine: My personal litmus test for “Harper has gone too far” stories is Lorne Gunter.  If the long-serving Alberta scribe, who is as conservative as conservative gets, says Harper and his team have stumbled, I immediately know that other conservatives feel likewise.  Thus, the Awish Aslam disaster: while Lorne goes to some lengths to describe (accurately) how political parties work to prevent their events from being derailed, he also (accurately) expresses distaste about what happened to this young woman. Worth a read, Mr. Harper.
• A referendum on Iggy: I think that overstates things, a bit, but Mr. Hepburn is certainly right in suggesting that the debates are pivotal. And, given that Harper has traditionally done badly – even against not-so-hot debaters like Messrs. Martin and Dion – I think that, ten days from now, the Reformatories will be looking at a “burn the bridges” plan.
• He wasn’t the first: I was doing dress rehearsals, last night, for Sun TV with David Akin and Mercedes Stephenson.  David suggested that the now-dumped “whites rights” Liberal candidate was a first for the Grits. I reminded him that he wasn’t – we actually had Ernst Zundel run for the leadership in 1968, before he became a notorious Holocaust denier!
• Pic of the day: To illustrate a piece on how politicians deal with confrontations, the Star ran this beaut.  Ah, the good old days!

[Insert your favourite caption here.]

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And I’ll bet Stephen’s creeping Bill’s Facebook page at this very moment!

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Me, my friend Rod Love and Bill Tieleman, on political ads.  Second segment is here.

“And see that green light behind me? It’s green! That means the Green Party is trying to influence your viewers subliminally!”

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