Adrian Dix-led BC NDP

Good ole Rafe but he may have a point!

Rafe Mair to Adrian Dix: 'Row like Hell'

Keep coasting and your New Democrats could lose the May 14 election.

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How to fight Libs' negative attacks

Today's BC Liberals have a lousy leader but a good campaigner at the helm and she will concentrate on two things -- Dix's creating a false memo to help Glen Clark out of the mess he was in over a gambling license and the dismal financial record of the NDP years.

Allow this old pol a few words to help Mr. Dix.

Politics in B.C. is a blood sport and you ignore that at your peril.

You're scarcely the first to promise that you would clean it up. Bob Skelly tried that and was obliterated. Moreover, you're scarcely the one to talk about raising the level of debate.

You have to deal with the memo and it can be done simply. "At least I resigned, which is a hell of a lot different from Gordon Campbell who was in jail from drunk driving and carried on as premier as if nothing had happened."

Moreover, this is the time to talk about BC Rail, an ongoing scandal.

The charge of fiscal irresponsibility must be faced down, which you can do by pointing out that the BC Liberals have tripled the provincial debt. Moreover, they won an election in 2009 with a budget that was $1.2 BILLION dollars out!

The Liberals will claim that they were sideswiped by the recession which you offset with the NDP being hit by fall of the Thai baht -- the so-called Asian flu -- which all but shut down the forestry industry.

If you insist on staying on a lofty plane the Liberals will kill you on these two issues.

http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2013/02/04/Advice-For-Adrian-Dix/

The big question for me is what the fracking hell are they going to do on the LNG file.  If they proceed with the massive LNG projects then they will be at most a one term government.  The LNG is a make or break file for them on the environmental front.  Also they have not definitively ruled out expansion of the Delta port coal facility to ship American coal to Asia nor have they ruled out expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline to ship bitumen out of Burrard Inlet. 

If he blows those two files the Greens will look better and better to many who put the environment as a top priority.

As for housing I would hope the NDP both provincially and federally would be proposing building more Sec 96 coops and less "social housing" run by bureaucrats who are then given control over the people in the projects.

People dislike Christy Clark because she has no credibility, flip flopper extraordinaire with no coherence to her government. Adrian Dix has made virtually no public commitments on anything and just wants to win by default. He hasn't road tested more than 1 policy commitment. It's going to be fun trying to trial balloon policies during the campaign for the first time or better yet run a campaign on nothing about nothing, which is probably what Dix intends to do. So...vote for the guy who will commit to nothing at a time when there are major challenges in BC or vote for the joker who can't figure out what side of the political divide to stand on. Frankly, I will not weep if Dix comes up short due to his "I've got it in the bag" attitude to win-by-default campaigning.

And Topp and Boessenkool partnering like brothers? Who never said the NDP and Liberals weren't same parties, just with different donors.

He could very easily be following the strategy of, "when your opponent is careening off a cliff, get out of the way."

I guess the Globe and Mail has finally resigned itself to the fact that their beloved BC Liberals are going down, and are going down big, and are going down hard. Or maybe it was Christy's brilliant campaign manager attacking the Globe. Whatever, it seems the tide has turned for good at least in the eyes of the Globe and Mail. But don't worry as the Vancouver Sun will still have its useless head buried in the sand until every vote is finally counted on May 14th. Now finally, perhaps the people of BC will finally get to to know the real Adrian Dix.

Adrian Dix: The NDP’s comeback kid in B.C.

With media entourage in tow, Adrian Dix scrambles up an embankment by a logging road deep in the interior of British Columbia. Under a canopy of mature pine, he stops to discuss forestry. Or, rather, he listens to a silviculture expert do the talking.

This baffles his host, a grizzled former tree planter – what politician doesn’t lust for the spotlight? But like many people in B.C., he can see that the odds-on favourite to become the province’s next premier takes a very different approach to politics.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/adrian-dix-the-ndps...

Jack Layton never too far from Adrian Dix's B.C. New Democrat campaign

McGrath said Dix's decision to run a campaign on ideas, policies and debates rather than personalities and attacks is Layton's style.

"He was tough for sure, but he was tough on the issues and the different vision and not on the personalities, and I think that's what Adrian is doing as well," she said.

snip

University of Victoria political science Prof. James Lawson said the Layton legacy continues to gather momentum because of his sudden and tragic departure from the political scene, but also because for left-of-centre Canadians he was able to build a united social democratic movement that included social activists, unions and free thinkers.

So taking cheap shots shows one lack of substance on their position(s). And one needs to distinguish between a "political attack" and a "political attack" on your opponent"s position, record on the issue at hand, or their political record.

Here's one:

British Columbia NDP Courts Big Business in Run-Up to Provincial Vote

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/05/13/elec-m13.html