NDP leadership race #127

This has been a very sad day in the leadership race. 

About a week ago I posted that I thought  the race could go in one of two directions. Mulcair would be perceived as a prohibitive frontrunner and that would result in a respectful and responsible debate for the balance of the campaign. OR the party establishment would embark on a scorched earth campaign to block Mulcair at any cost and regardless of damage to the party.

Unfortunately Brian Topp has steered the contest down the second road.

Make no mistake. It is Topp and not Broadbent. Broadbent says in his Toronto Star interview that he is speaking out because "I was asked to do it."

What is most disappointing is the personal attack on Mulcair, focused on supposed character flaws. This echos the surreptitious whisper campaign at the beginning of the race which was in retrospect so obviously designed to kneecap Mulcair and cripple his campaign at birth.

We have seen it more recently in the despicable Know Mulcair and True Mulcair slander websites. It is apprent to me that they are no longer anonymous except in an utterly unblievable sense.  Topp's fingerprints are as much on them as they are on Broadbent's broadside.

Tom Flannagan today on Power and Politics gloated that Broadbent has given the Conservatives a "great gift" - quotes and videos to be used in future attack adds against Mulcair.

Frankly I think Broadbent's tirde should be denounced by all candidates, including Topp.

If not, it is another reason not only to defeat Topp but repudiate him decisively for these destructive, irresponsible and utterly Nixonin tactics.

The myth of Topp as a formidible strategist should be buried with this latest blunder. Topp didn't have the guts to impugn Mulcair's character himself so he recruited Broadbent to do it for him. He can't deny it because Broadbent said so.

It is obvious now that Topp will do almost anything to win. We can only shudder in anticipation of his next move.

It makes me want to sit out next election as why should I waste my time with a party whose "elderstatesman"  is a meally mouthed backstabber who does not know how to keep his mouth shut.

KenS wrote:

I guess the histrionics of "what is Ed doing to party unity?" follows from being so sure that the party establishment has been intent on forcing something on us, and now they are getting desperate. Then it does follow that when its all over and Mulcair wins anyway, the shit is going to hit the fan.

If.

Who's engaging in histrionics now? If Mulcair wins, "the shit is going to hit the fan."

We don't need to worry about a candidate turning the NDP into the Liberals anymore. We are the Liberals now. Experts at stabbing eachother in the back and anointing leaders from on high.

The best thing Broadbent could have done is keep his big yap shut. He's become an embarrassment.

Poor old addled Ed.

Please Lord, spare me.

"No one is making you read it."

Great strategy...if you don't give a fiddler's fart about those who have to follow and eat Steve's excrement.Or expect the party to trust you, on anything.

Get real.

@ G. :

But see- you are ASSUMING its damaging to the party. And that everyone agrees with that.

Since its obviously true, then.....

nicky wrote:

This has been a very sad day in the leadership race. 

About a week ago I posted that I thought  the race could go in one of two directions. Mulcair would be perceived as a prohibitive frontrunner and that would result in a respectful and responsible debate for the balance of the campaign. OR the party establishment would embark on a scorched earth campaign to block Mulcair at any cost and regardless of damage to the party.

Unfortunately Brian Topp has steered the contest down the second road.

Make no mistake. It is Topp and not Broadbent. Broadbent says in his Toronto Star interview that he is speaking out because "I was asked to do it."

What is most disappointing is the personal attack on Mulcair, focused on supposed character flaws. This echos the surreptitious whisper campaign at the beginning of the race which was in retrospect so obviously designed to kneecap Mulcair and cripple his campaign at birth.

We have seen it more recently in the despicable Know Mulcair and True Mulcair slander websites. It is apprent to me that they are no longer anonymous except in an utterly unblievable sense.  Topp's fingerprints are as much on them as they are on Broadbent's broadside.

Tom Flannagan today on Power and Politics gloated that Broadbent has given the Conservatives a "great gift" - quotes and videos to be used in future attack adds against Mulcair.

Frankly I think Broadbent's tirde should be denounced by all candidates, including Topp.

If not, it is another reason not only to defeat Topp but repudiate him decisively for these destructive, irresponsible and utterly Nixonin tactics.

The myth of Topp as a formidible strategist should be buried with this latest blunder. Topp didn't have the guts to impugn Mulcair's character himself so he recruited Broadbent to do it for him. He can't deny it because Broadbent said so.

It is obvious now that Topp will do almost anything to win. We can only shudder in anticipation of his next move.

+1

Tom Flannagan is having a ball.

But there is nothing Ed said that can be used with the general public... only inside baseball stuff witin the NDP.

He would know the Conservatives dont need Ed Broadbent for that material.

NorthReport wrote:

Just a word to the loser mentality within the NDP - don't let the barn door hit you on the way out

 

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Tandt+Mulcair+would+hasten+Harper+drea...

 

josh wrote:

I see the Mulcairites are out in full force doing what they do best, spinning and smearing.

NorthReport, if you're going to promote stories likes Tandt which openly says Mulcair is like Blair and the Libs and NDP will merge while dismissing the "loser" mentality in the NDP, despite the fact that these "losers" have poured a lot of blood sweat and tears into the party to take it this far, you're actually kneecapping the NDP in 2015. These are the people that will donate all their free time to campaigns. If you want to piss all over them even if they are not a large part of the electorate, you risk the NDP losing if it is a close race should they choose to stay home because of the arrogance of people like you. Should this happen the party will also have to spend more money getting ready to train people in advance of 2015 while the Cons already have legions of passionate and trained campaigners with experience

The insults hurled by the Mulcair supporters since this afternoon are far more cruel and personal then anything that has come out of the mouth of Topp or Mulcair even though they have said things that are ill-advised. Someone who has been in politics a long time and is retired now told me, always take a look at the kind of people that a candidate or leader has around them, it can tell you a lot.

At one point early in the campaign I was putting Mulcair as my #2 or maybe even my #1 but now he's not on my ballot. I was aware of his "Third Way" leanings but interested in a leader that could beat Harper. What turned me off has more to do with his campaign and the people on it than his actual policies. 

LOL!

I predicted on day one that this six-month beauty contest, by a party incapable of (/ afraid of) organizing broad popular consultations on issues of actual importance and principle, would end up in a self-destructive performance by a gaggle of greedy self-serving opportunists.

And so it has come to pass. Attacking each other in public. Undermining each other everywhere. With legions of minions wearing their star's jersey and attacking all the others.

[i]As if it's a noble thing for a progressive organization to have a Supreme Dictator who decides everything, right down to whether the party goes left, right, or straight down.[/i]

And now you have the hallowed Saint Idiot Himself, Broadbent, staggering onto the scene in a last desperate effort to prove that he was right all along.

Oh, and anyone who doesn't like me launching "personal attacks" against Ed Broadbent, can consider themselves personally attacked in advance, in florid violation of babble policy.

On a sad and serious note: We will never build a new world in this way.

But boy oh boy what a $million in attack ads can turn it into. For the edification of the Great Discerning public.

Unionist wrote:

LOL!

I predicted on day one that this six-month beauty contest, by a party incapable of (/ afraid of) organizing broad popular consultations on issues of actual importance and principle, would end up in a self-destructive performance by a gaggle of greedy self-serving opportunists.

And so it has come to pass. Attacking each other in public. Undermining each other everywhere. With legions of minions wearing their star's jersey and attacking all the others.

[i]As if it's a noble thing for a progressive organization to have a Supreme Dictator who decides everything, right down to whether the party goes left, right, or straight down.[/i]

And now you have the hallowed Saint Idiot Himself, Broadbent, staggering onto the scene in a last desperate effort to prove that he was right all along.

Oh, and anyone who doesn't like me launching "personal attacks" against Ed Broadbent, can consider themselves personally attacked in advance, in florid violation of babble policy.

On a sad and serious note: We will never build a new world in this way.

You were right Unionist.

That's okay because we know that no matter how badly the old line parties have run Canada into the ground over the last 35 years, the entire back row will always demand miracles in putting Humpty together again. As far as they are concerned, two redundant conservative parties in-hand will always be worth a first NDP government in waiting. Let them wreck the country some more and see how that works.

TheArchitect wrote:

jjuares wrote:

I am a little disappointed in Broadbent. Traditionally former leaders play the role of senior statesmen.If I remember correctly when Douglas retired he did not criticize Lewis even though there was hard feelings and he did not approve of a man not much younger than himself taking the leadership. Similarly, former provincial leaders have played a role in the party but usually not so partisan as Broadbent.  

Exactly, former leaders traditionally play the role of a senior statesman.  So a former leader wouldn't go out and criticize a leadership candidate unless he/she thought it was REALLY important: that the election of that candidate would pose an immense danger to the party—a danger so great that drastic action was justified to stop it.

I'm just stupefied by the attacks on Ed Broadbent here.  (I'm not talking about your comment at this point at this point, jjuares.)  I've seen Babblers claim, among other things, that Ed is being "manipulated," and, worse, that he secretly was angry with Jack Layton and wanted him to lose.  What a bunch of baloney.

Leadership campaigns, by the very nature, involve conflict.  That's fine.  I never thought I'd see the day, though, that supposedly loyal New Democrats would be launching these kinds of attacks on, of all people, Ed Broadbent.

It's fine to disagree with Ed.  I admit that I was a little disappointed when Ed endorsed Brian Topp so early in the campaign.  But to question Ed Broadbent's loyalty to our party and to Jack, or Ed's commitment to forming government, is just absurd.

Spare me your crocodile tears.

Dont worry. You wont have to wait any more than a month for this to slip below the waves. Forever.

No party can ever be as worthy as the corrupt stooges of the day in Ottawa. Let's stick with the current bozos in federal powerlessness until the day of perfect revolution, or that one which will never happen. That's basically all they ever have to say in so many words.

How can Topp do worse than people's worst expectations of him?

Even a lot worse than the worst.

Is there some overwrought machine somewhere?

Would someone please turn off the autopilot?

TheArchitect wrote:

Leadership campaigns, by the very nature, involve conflict.  That's fine.  I never thought I'd see the day, though, that supposedly loyal New Democrats would be launching these kinds of attacks on, of all people, Ed Broadbent.

It's fine to disagree with Ed.  I admit that I was a little disappointed when Ed endorsed Brian Topp so early in the campaign.  But to question Ed Broadbent's loyalty to our party and to Jack, or Ed's commitment to forming government, is just absurd.

So its no problem when Ed Broadbent decides its his role to attack an NDP MP and frontrunning candidate for leadership, but us lowly members are just supposed to "sit down and shut up" when we think he is wrong???

Sorry, but Ed Broadbent is hardly a saint. I can remember that at David Barrett's retirement dinner, he seemed to be criticizing provincial NDP leaders Grant Notley, Allen Blakeney and Howard Pawley because they didn't side with Broadbent who supported PM Trudeau's plans for the federal government to unilaterally patriate the constitution without support from the provinces.

The whole point of Topp's strategy, because there is no hope in hell of him winning, is to make all the Mulcair supporters feel miserable and thus suppress Mulcair's vote. Then, Peggy Nash, the candidate Ed Broadbent should have had the brains to support in the first place (if he really wanted an anti-Mulcair), will come from behind and win.

In fact, Peggy Nash, Peter Julian, Megan Leslie or anyone other than this cynical backroom hack named Brian Topp, would have made a much much much better non-Mulcair candidate for the establishment.

Gaian wrote:

I predicted here, long ago, that Topp would be tossed early on, and his troops would join Peggy's. That would be some consolation.

And Québec will largely be shut out of the leadership race.

KenS wrote:

But there is nothing Ed said that can be used with the general public... only inside baseball stuff witin the NDP.

KenS is right about this, (but not much else) it's still bad for the party to make a respected elder statsement the point man on your statue of liberty play. 

If Topp or Broadbent really believed the things they are saying about Mulcair they would have gotten out of the race and endorsed another candidate because the party is clearly not buying what they're selling.

algomafalcon wrote:

TheArchitect wrote:

Leadership campaigns, by the very nature, involve conflict.  That's fine.  I never thought I'd see the day, though, that supposedly loyal New Democrats would be launching these kinds of attacks on, of all people, Ed Broadbent.

It's fine to disagree with Ed.  I admit that I was a little disappointed when Ed endorsed Brian Topp so early in the campaign.  But to question Ed Broadbent's loyalty to our party and to Jack, or Ed's commitment to forming government, is just absurd.

So its no problem when Ed Broadbent decides its his role to attack an NDP MP and frontrunning candidate for leadership, but us lowly members are just supposed to "sit down and shut up" when we think he is wrong???

Certainly you don't have to "sit down and shut up"—as I've said, it's fine to disagree with Ed; I myself have expressed disagreement with him at times.  What's unacceptable isn't disagreeing with Ed.  What's unacceptable is saying that he's not loyal to the party and secretly always wanted Jack to lose elections—absurd attacks which, unfortunately, we've seen some Mulcair supporters level against Ed today.