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Can you explain why you'd hold a candidate's partner's political preferences against that candidate?
Saganash I know had to be out of town fast.
And I think Mulcair had a busy schedule planned in NB that started pretty fast, if not immediately. After they all wnet for the This Hour shoot, and visited their own after parties, I suspect Mulcair's ride was off with or without him.
One of the NS MLAs I like is married to an ex-PC MLA who I doubt has changed his political opinions. No divergences in my family and we still dont discuss politics much.
Didn't know that - this is news to me. If he wins the NDP leadership and she's elected to Sarkozy's right wing party, that would result in strange optics - no?
She has been a candidate. I dont imagine she will be repeating if he was Leader.
Hopefully someone will enlighten us. Though it may end up you have to email the party if you want to know.
But you can very safely bet voting will not BEGIN before Saturday noon, EST.... which means it could very easily stretch to very late Saturday night for those of you on the WRONG side of the Atlantic.
Agreed. The attitude is worthy of a leadership candidate many on this board love to hate.
We've lost a lot of long time babblers in the last while, is nobody concerned? is there nothing we can do?
Didn't know that either. And I have to say I find this troubling. Not so much for what it says about Mulcair, but because it suggests there may not be as broad a gulf between today's NDP and the French centre-right as I'd like to imagine.
Saganash: Peace and the Middle East
When I went to Mulcair's Toronto event the night before the Toronto debate, I was interested in the fact that his wife had come to Toronto with him. I chatted with her, and asked if she ever had the same reaction as Maryon Pearson who famously said that, if she had to drink one more cup of coffee at a meet-and-greet, she would vomit. She pleasantly replied that, as a pychologist, she enjoyed people-watching and she was getting lots of opportunities. Unfortunately I was not bold enough to ask her about being on Sarkozy's team, since I was there to be positive about electoral reform. Otherwise, I would have, since she was holding herself out as Mulcair's political partner by being there.
(My wife was a long-time Liberal until Pierre died; it took last year's campaign before Jack and Olivia finally inspired her to make her own spontaneous donation to the party. But when she was a Liberal she never came to an NDP event with me.)
I see Mulcair just got endorsed by Howard Hampton and Shelley Martel. I guess that's not a bad catch for him. Its interesting that one of the knocks against Mulcair is that he's not a loyal enough to the party and not a real "member of the tribe" and yet he keeps getting endorsed by these old war horses who are nothing if not "tribal" (Nystrom, Schreyer, various former heads of labour federations and now Hampton).
1. Catheine Pinhas was a candidate for the UMP in the last French parliamentary election almost 5 years ago, not at present as implied in some posts. This of course was before Tom was recruited by Jack.
2. Tom today was endorsed by Howard Hampton and Shelley Martel.
Actually, I just remembered that Mulcair's wife being a candidate for Sarkozy's party (troubling in itself) was mentioned in the thread (either on this board or another) where Mulcair's French citizenship was discussed. So, yeah, I had read it before.
FWIW, the political spectrum in France is so far to the left of Canada that Sarkozy's party probably isn't that far from the NDP on most issues.
I somehow doubt the NDP would be enthusiuastic about being seen as not far from Sarkozy.
They are so far left that their socialist party is a bunch of right-wingers
Because for me politics is about values, as is selecting a life partner. While not the final word on a candidate, a spouse that runs for a conservative party raises questions about values that might be shared between the candidate and spouse.
For many issues, this would be correct, but Mulcair's wife's political affiliation bothered me too. The reason being that there are many good reasons to dislike Sarkozy. For one, in 2005 he basically ran as a racist (to undermine the FN vote), and it probably helped his victory. For another, everyone knew what a huge flake Sarkozy was, then as he is now. He was an "I'll say anything" kind of politician with Donald Trumpesque gravitas. Furthermore, one of the policies the UMP is best known/most consistent for is being the party of France's wealthy and trying to protect them (at least somewhat) from the tax collectors. They have also long been a party of crony capitalism, inside deals, and unethical (can I make a buck?) foreign policy (i.e. when Libya rose up, lots of Sarkozy's cabinet had personal business dealings with the dictator that they had to explain).
I'm not saying that the Socialist Party is any better, but at least they did not run in 2005 as open racists and at least they have always made some pretense about being on the side of the poor. So yeah, disappointed, but I'm glad nicky reminded me that this happened in 2005 before Mulcair joined the NDP. Also, as others have pointed out, it's more important what Mulcair's beliefs are than those of his spouse.
I agree that Stockholm's comparison is more than a bit glib. The UMP is most likely where a small l liberal would vote. But you do so knowing not only about your ideological 'broad spectrum' bedfellows, but also the generally unsavoury characters, the really blatant racism that would make a Canadian blanche [and Catherine Pinhas has lived here at least 20 years]; and as Howard said, it is self conciously the party of the other side of the class divide... more so I think than the UK Conservatives. When you run for them, you are buying into ALL of that more than if you were merely voting for them.
I've heard a lot of petty attacks on Miulcair. Many start like this recent one with I like him or would like to like him or I acknowledge this or that strength he has....BUT...
But attacking him because his wife's politics 5 years ago is getting pretty silly.
There were 1.3 million people in Quebec who never voted NDP before the last election. Why don't we just put up a big billboard proclaiming to them that they are not pure enough to have any influence in the NDP because they cannot trace their lineage back to the Regina Manifesto?
I agree with Nicky, this should be water under the bridge. Let's move on.
CFL