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They can do what they want - the question is whether its wise to call an election while the HST is still a live issue.
So. It looks like they took my advice and canned the "emergency meeting" concept and went for negotiations on the Q/T with a latter caucus meeting when they have all the issues hammered out. Then James can present to the public with all her ducks in a row. Very sensible. All that crap about "blowing up the party" and emergency meetings was way over-the-top and amateur.
Indeed Cueball saner heads are hopefully prevailing. Our local MLA's were in the Burnaby Now opining on the situation and all I could think of was why feed the fire? It is time for a healing and a moving forward on an accelerated timeline towards a leadership race.
Carole stepping down and an interim leader appointed to speak for the caucus on current political events would be a good first step. Then Carole and other prominent NDP'ers can tour the province showcasing their individual skills and passions for the issues. It will become clear in a leadership campaign what the consensus items are and that will help in drafting a platform. It will also show the people of the province that the NDP has depth and intelligence in its MLA's. I hope the party gets on with proudly showing the voters who they are and what they stand for.
Thats what you want. And I would agree that it would be the best thing to do.
But it fails a key test miserably.
Its not a compromise.
Carole James has the right to stay, and do what she has been doing. She has backed off from that. It is too much to expect her to go all the way to what her hardest opponents want: her to step down now.
Live and let live.
Breaking News....
Carole James will be making an announcement to the media at 11:00 am Pacific Time. (~25 minutes from now)
Resignation?
I would really like to see the BC NDP revived and empowered to fight the next election. Carole has no divine right to the leadership. Leaders lead and I hope that she does something to lead the party out of the wilderness. I don't for a minute think that the party is guaranteed a win in the next election but I also think that it has the possibility to win a resounding victory. The public needs to hear more from the party not less. Lying in the weeds waiting for power to be handed to them is IMO a losing strategy.
The party is in peril if it ignores this public meltdown and tries to pretend until next November that everything is fine and Carole will be confirmed in a review. That strategy is the MSM media's and Fiberal's preferred option. The focus can remain on the Fiberal leadership race throughout the winter and early spring. Free propaganda for the Fiberals to once again try to get that sheepskin coat back over their real fur. The recall campaign is going to peter out because the threshold is actually an impossibly high bar to get over. But the Fiberals will get months to poll and temper the HST message until they have diffused the anger. In the meantime the NDP is waiting for their review in November and the MSM media will just ignore them as usual. There is no pool of Fiberal voters that is just waiting to switch their votes to the NDP. If the NDP does not get its message out to the voters who don't believe any party has anything to vote for then we are lost.
So far since the last election the party has taken second or third place on the HST bandwagon and tried to figure out ways of using the parties membership on the recall campaigns. Why would an anti-tax voter be attracted to the NDP instead of a revived Conservative party? How is an HST fight going to resonate with people in poverty when the Fiberals up the ante on rebates to the poor and other cosmetic goodies? A cheque in hand for every poor person in the province is just the thing to undercut any traction the NDP might get in this misguided effort to be populist. I know there are other ideas in the party and people who want to focus on bigger and more important issues. I hope they get the upper hand and the people can see something worth going to the polls for.
I would argue that with 40% of her Caucus in open revolt and with her threatening to remove 40% of the party to fix the revolt, she has lost her mind.
She had her alice in wonderland moment. "Off with their heads"
She has lost the respect of most of the voters at this stage. So sure, the Sihota group still have more numbers in caucus. (I think).
But they have bumped up against people to whom matters of principle are important.
In the NDP constitution the leader is only the lead spokesperson on policy for the provincial exectuive, so what is the big deal?
They still have 18 available spokes people. One or two of them are probably coherent. I would respect James a bit if she said "fuck it, I am speaking for myself from now on" or "sihota made me do it". She is the biggest pawn of them all.
News reports say that a couple of representatives of big labour are at the meetings. Why are they there at all?
The interests of government workers are not seen by the general public as being the same as the interests of poorer people.
Lots of people see the union leaders as jimmy Hoffa type people with similar connections.
The newspapers do not need any more easy fodder so keep them out of the meetings.
Breaking News...
Carole James just announced that she is resigning pending announcement of an interim leader.
Thank you Carole, you have regained my respect and admiration.
So I hope no one on this board is going to continue the in-fighting. Lets rebuild this party.
[Hyphen added for Unionists sake]
Prediction: Now the media and the pundits and the rank and file will immediately start penning all these valedictory hosanas about what grace she showed in her resignation speech and that if only we could have seen more of this Carole James she might have had more success and then in a few months people will start referring to her as the "best premier BC never had" blah blah blah...(I've seen this story enough times to know that this always happens)
It's over for CJ
Yes ! She is gone! Praise the Flying Spaghetti monster!
I wish her well but politics is tough and she was to nice to be leader but she would make a great cabinet minister.
Carol has style she has grace but is to nice, not nice enough or just right and now she is gone. Who is going to be the next NDP leader and make sure no one nice belongs. Before the members start picking their new party leader maybe what the MLA's need to do is let the 13 MLAs first take their pick so it dosen't blow up in the leaders face.
I can hardly wait to see the new improved old NDP as their 13 strong come out with real passion against the real issues plaguing British Columbians but no holding my breath because I didn't think the party has it in them but apparently its all changed thanks to a few members who decided the NDP leader has to go and went for an all out broadcast. Barely a wimmper for a child who was unlucky enough to be born in a province who has penciled them out as Kwan is as soft spoken as you can get and wish someone who can make a difference takes her out.
A leadership convention needs to be called and why not do it along with the Liberals so the public gets a good look at the contenders in the race and can give their feedback in picking a new leader for the NDP especially now that party members have the full attention of the public lets get on with the race.
I find the above post utterly incomprehensible
Stockholm, show a little grace.
ETA this is in response to your comments on what happens next, not the remark about incomprehensibility (which I share).
I'm not sure what you mean by "showing grace". I'm the one who's been trying to be fair to Carole James every step of the way. My post #40 was simply my prediction based on past experience of how the media tends to fall in love with you the moment you're down. I predict that now that Carole james has resigned - everyone is suddenly going to start saying all these nice things about her - it happens every time!
I'll be curious to see what people think of her once they start looking at her potential successors and they see that the perfect replacement for her does not exist.
Sorry Stockholm I'll try not to confuse you but the NDP as a Opposition have been quiet as a mouse on the real issues and it dosen't help there isn't any legislature going on during the day.
So it is surprising for me to see the NDP MLAs broadcasting their dissatisfaction with their leader and really getting it out there not something I've have ever seen from the NDP is real coverage on the issues only when taking Clark out. It is what is needed to be able to be an affective opposition and is why the NDP takes a great deal of criticism from voters for being a horrible opposition and is the biggest complaint.
And stealing the Liberals thunder by picking a new leader at a convention is not a bad strategy after all the public can have a look at the NDP party members and the Liberals and what they have to offer for leadership material all at the same time.
Vaughan Palmer gives a good run-down of the major contenders to succeed James. Its interesting that almost all of them are from the pro-James camp. The 13 dissidents are very unlikely to produce a new leader (you know the old saying - he who kills the king - is never destined to become king himself)
http://communities.canada.com/vancouversun/blogs/viewfromtheledge/archiv...
Unfortunately though some BC NDPers just don't know when to shut up, and David Schreck is a perfect example of that. I am in no way gloating, people need to show some compassion here for our current Leader, but Schreck is certainly is an example of a very bad loser. My God, how stupid can one man be. Schreck is obviously part of what Charlie Smith the Georgia Straight columnist described as that group think that was unfortunately surrounding Carole. People need to take a deep breathe here, and perhaps a quiet time for reflection would be best.
Schreck has his place in the media well carved out. Can't blame a sycophant for making a living. Him and Moe are two of the old problems in the party. Both with their media presence make the NDP look like an irrelevant party still run by the old elitist guard.
Women of BC! Boycott the NDP!!!
Has a nice catchy ring to it, eh.....should stick in people's minds fairly easily....
....have already started using it, so far it has been well received.
I'm surprised at what has happened to the BC NDP and Carole James. I thought she had a good chance at becoming the next Premier after the BC Liberals got into all the trouble with the HST and Gordon Campbell imploded and resigned.
What if the next leader is another woman - like Dawn Black?
No sign of humility from James. No sign of compromise.
http://www.publiceyeonline.com/ has her exit on video
It was all about the work that needed to be done. Carole had that to say about coalition federally too.
Her comment was "get back to work. Get back to work". At the time the Federal NDP was trying to build popular support for a coalition to oust minority harper. I thought "Jees Carole, do you give a shit about politics at all?"
Remember? There were people with candles in the street as I came home from work. Little candles for democracy.
I can just imagine James going up and down that line "get back to work" and blowing out the candles.
The CEO of NDP corp has been deposed by popular shareholder uprising.
But the board of directors who kept her there is still in charge.
She still speaks their lines.
Are you recommending they go BC Lib or Green?
It's naive to assume that after the public attack on Carole James, and the divisive battle that just took place, that those on the pro-James side will simply shrug off the loss. The party will be divided, (and I fear quite badly) for a long time to come.
It may be better if both sides could let bygones be bygones, but it ain't gonna happen. It's a natural and predictable consequense almost anytime a political leader is taken down in such public fashion that the bitterness lingers.
Don't believe me?
Ask any senior at a BC NDP function what they think of the Barrett-Berger days. Ask any former Harcourt loyalist what they think of Glen Clark. Ask any former Clark supporter what they think of Ujjal Dosanjh (ask any of us former Dosanjh supporters too for that matter, but that's another story).
Neither, Brian, "women of BC, boycott the NDP, and stay at home", is the advice.
Also, followed it up with a critique of the millionaire, former Reform Party member, and Gordon Campbell groupie, Jane Sterk. :P
Those pictures of Jane Sterk, BC Green Party leader, sucking up to Gordo last election, are priceless.
I can't claim to be an expert in BC politics, so take this with a grain of salt (and/or provide an answer to my question). But to date, I have yet to see a single coherent, plausible explanation presented by anyone, anywhere at all, of how the BC NDP's primary problem right now is Carole James' "Carole James"-ness itself, rather than the facts that any woman leader, no matter how competent, is going to be at a disadvantage in a power struggle with men, and that any NDP leader, no matter how competent, is going to be at a disadvantage in BC politics if they're facing a right-wing that's united behind a single party.
Enlighten me, please. What is it about Carole James that made her such a terrible leader, and what is it that will make any other leader so much better?
It's either that or stay home on election day. Abstaining fromvoting will have the equivalent effect as voting for all of Gordon Campbell's anti-women and anti-child rights policies of the last decade.
Stay home and vote for the crooked Liberals same thing.
She is a Metis woman.
It will be a white man.