01.13.2011 08:51 AM

Chances of Harper taking campaign advice from this guy…

Zero, zippo, zilch.

23 Comments

  1. Lance says:

    I also doubt that he’ll take that advice. Why?

    Because he likely already thought of it. Why do you think yesterday he said he is willing to try again to get rid of the vote subsidy?

    Did people lin the Liberal party laugh at, deride, and mock Harper when he first came onto the federal scene? If they did, I bet they’re not laughing very hard now.

    • jStanton says:

      … a little realism please. Mr. Harper has a accomplished nothing of significance, and continues to show little talent for leadership or governing. His singular achievement has been the muzzling of his fellow wingnut caucus members. His current circumstance of apparent strength is more accurately defined as weakness on behalf of his opponents.

      Folks are still deriding Mr. Harper, because he has earned it. And they are still laughing at him, because he continues to exhibit the wisdom and maturity of an adolescent, and has done nothing to garner their respect.

      • wilson says:

        If everything you say is true,
        how is it the LPC have been in opposition so long that PMSH is now in the history books as longest serving PM ‘ever’ in a minority Parliament?

        • Namesake says:

          Someone’s probably also in a history book for eating the most goldfish, ‘ever,’ too: not all record achievements are particularly significant. Particularly when it’s such a small field: there’s only been, what, 13 minority federal govt’s in Canada to date — two of them headed by Harper?

          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_minority_governments_in_Canada

          That’s like winning the Grey Cup: a dubious achievement. And part of how he achieved that is by… cheating: cancelling the season when it appeared he was going to lose — twice.

        • jStanton says:

          … that is hardly a meritorious accomplishment. Nor is having generated the largest debt, with the least benefit to Canadians, or having destroyed the most jobs, or being responsible for the highest number of peacetime deaths and casualties.

          Mr. Harper is still Prime Minister simply due to circumstances… few of which he is responsible for. Firstly, his opponents are weak, and those within his caucus have been neutered. Secondly, his blue-collar, conservative constituency are unlikely to ever vote any other way.

        • Michel says:

          Being in the history books as longest serving PM ‘ever’ in a minority is not something to be overly proud about. It implies that, even with such shitty leadership in the LPC, Stevie still couldn’t get a majority. It’s a loser’s record. Next election, Stevie may, just may, match his number of minority governments with Chretien’s number of majority governments.

        • Lance says:

          It isn’t so much an accomplishment that the Liberals bear some (well, a LOT actually) blame for being the ones who enabled this government to survive for the last five years. What Wilson is saying is that the Liberals can’t, on one hand, say how awfully terrible this government was(is) and on the other hand, have let it survive when they had the ability to put a stop it many, MANY times over, but didn’t.

          • jStanton says:

            … you may have missed the point. The LPC has been impotent since the coup d’etat. They couldnt even beat a Rob Ford, if he was running, let alone a geeky zealot with a chip on his shoulder, a Napolean complex, and the Canadian treasury at his complete disposal. Heck, the LPC couldn’t stop a bus at a bus stop.

  2. Namesake says:

    Bull. Nicholls, who knows his mind better than you since he worked alongside him at the NCC, is likely totally right about this: Harper DOES care very much which Parties remain:

    Harper doesn’t want there to be viable and indentifiable CENTRE-left party, because he knows full well that that’s where most Canadians are politically, so it’ll always be to take away votes from a supposedly right of centre one.

    He’d probably just as soon there be NO other viable federal political Party but his own in Canada. But in the meantime, he only wants there to be a single straw-man opposition Party: a far-left one that he can brand as socialist, utopian, irresponsible, etc. which it’d be economic suicide to vote for.

    Which is why they’ve been doing their ‘Subliminal Man’ routine for the past 2 years & have been running around telling everyone that there IS already a socialist coalition, and that they WILL be running against a single, wrong-minded socialist party in the next election, appearances notwithstanding.

    And there’s very little that has been or would be “frank” in that political discussion.

  3. Ted H. says:

    The vote subsidy was introduced to compensate for the loss of large donations by wealthy individuals, corporations and special interest groups. So, remove the subsidy and go back to the previous regimen for political contributions. It will be of more benefit to the Liberal Party than any other.

    • Namesake says:

      Better yet, extend Elections Canada’s ‘truth in advertising’ regulations to all the parties’ fundraising appeals all the time, so they can’t raise funds premised on scare-mongering lies. Then watch the CPC coffers dwindle to nothingness and the vote subsidy quietly be… increased.

      • The Doctor says:

        And who is it, exactly, who’s going to decide what is a scare-mongering lie and what isn’t?

        I recall a pamphlet being circulated by Liberals in Vancouver during a federal election a few years back in which said Liberals were claiming that Stephen Harper was going to take away a woman’s right to abortion — despite the fact that the CPC campaign platform document clearly said, in black and white, that a CPC government would not introduce any law restricting abortion. Was that a scare-mongering lie?

        • Namesake says:

          Maybe / probably, so, yup, they’d be fined for it, under my proposal (“all the parties”).

          As for who: I already said — Elections Canada, the same ones who decide whether advertising during campaigns are within bounds.

          My (shouldn’t have had to be regarded as) radical proposal — which, as I noted yesterday, the CRTC is in the process of UNdoing — is that ALL news reports and official political party communications should be subject to sanctions if they’re knowingly spreading falsehoods or being deliberately misleading.

          http://warrenkinsella.com/2011/01/140-characters/#comment-22509

          • The Doctor says:

            Yeah, well, good luck with that.

            It sort of reminds me of that quest a few years back, in BC, to nail Glen Clark to the cross for the so-called “fudge-it budget” fiasco. I dearly wish Clark had been so nailed, because he lied his face off, and we all knew he did. But the attempt to legally nail him for it failed.

          • Namesake says:

            well, here’s an alternative, more workable, virtually no-cost proposal, then, which could take some of the wind out the sails of this ill-intentioned & dishonestly presented move by the CPC to cancel the vote subsidy and/or actually help the other parties’ fund-raising efforts if it’s implemented (Private Member’s Bill, please!):

            Require all the parties to post those (mostly scaremongery) fundraising letters, telemarketing scripts, & e-peals onto a public site.

            That way, instead of only occasionally hearing about them when Jane Taber has nothing else to write about,

            then, every time the CPC shamelessly sounds the alarm about separating socialists & hugged thugs & Tamil terrorist queue jumpers etc. etc. to scare more seniors into forking over ever more cash (like so many Televangelists)…

            well, the rest of us can be kept continuously informed of that (thanks to Twitter!), and our disgust from the particularly egregious ones will likely lead us to match those frightened seniors’ donations dollar for dollar.

  4. Art Williams says:

    I didn’t think he was giving advice but reflecting on prior conversation he’d had with Harper. Anyway, he wouldn’t be the first pundit to suggest that Harper’s ultimate motive is the weakening of the Liberal Party.

  5. james curran says:

    Nothing new here. Flannagan has always said Harper seeks the total destrucition of the Liberal Party. And he’s damn near acheived it already.

  6. Windsurfer says:

    I don’t give a Flying F about any of this.

    That’s why I just sent in my $1100 to the Libs for my Laurier Club renewal.

    I told Michael to just go out and fight the good fight while taking the battle to the CON’s.

    Let the Canadian political fortunes fall where they may.

  7. Mr. Chamberlain says:

    Not the most balanced column. Missing was any mention of Mr. Harper’s habit of costing his party majorities at election time, despite incredibly favourable odds. Partisan to point of being a liability for his party. Unpredictable. No, not a master tactician. That is propaganda. A good example of giving Mr. Harper more power than he deserves. The Liberals aren’t governing because of their own mess.

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