Coyne is certainly playing up her Trudeau connection.
Liberal leadership race
Sat, 2013-01-12 23:25
#302
Sun, 2013-01-13 21:47
#304
PSS, I agree with Stock here. As a economic and socially progressive individual, it drives me around the bend when the Liberals - strategically - fake left during election campaigns but always when they get into power, they rule to the right. Even on many social issues, they drag their feet and many of their MPs are not socially progressive at all.
Economically they are one part of the corportist agenda, and hence why big business loves them.
Right on.
It is better for progressives to have the vote at center-right split between Libs and Conservatives. Urban voters want fiscal conservatism, but want to put their heads on their pillows at night believing they are 'good people' with hearts. The big opportunity is to equate corporatism with plunder of our resources and selling out to China. This will fracture the centre. Strategically, the best Lib leader is the one with the greatest affinity for doing business with China. At a glance, that appears to me to be Trudeau. His vulnerability will be links to the corporate world. The NDP message to the urban voter should be that you can have heart while being good stewards of our bountiful resource gifts. Liberals will have not many policy places to go without fracturing the vote. NDP runs the ball up the hole created in the line. Just my thoughts on the matter.
Sun, 2013-01-13 22:08
#306
None of them (except maybe Murray) have run a "fake left" campaign (IE, they're not really preaching anything that's particularly left wing). They've all (including Trudeau) run pretty right-wing campaigns so far. I think most of them feel that Igatieff and Dion ran too far to the left (corporate tax increases for the former and the carbon tax for the latter). Cauchon may run a different campaign from the rest though.
Mon, 2013-01-14 00:31
#307
I think a lot of Liberals are relying on the assumption that anything will look good compared to Harper. That did not work for them in the past though.
Mon, 2021-11-22 07:35
#308
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Mon, 2013-01-14 12:58
#309
Hi Jan. Yes, you're probably right. Still, I do think that most of the Liberal candidates are veering more rightward. Chretien in (I think) 1993 was the last one to campaign left with the red book and then govern right. Martin tried to appear sorta left, along with Dion, and even Iggy (trying to contrast the Libs with the Cons by branding the Cons as "Jets Jails and ... " I can't recall the rest of their forgettable slogan) and failed. Now, the candidates are essentially saying that they'd govern fiscally identical to the Conservatives but would be socially more progressive. So rather than campaigning as NDP-Lite the Liberal leadership candidates are campaigning as Conservative-Lite. Regardless, voters will just vote for the real thing, rather than the stand for nothing Libs.
Mon, 2013-01-14 16:37
#310
autoworker
I think Liberals are now presented with the clear choice of being seduced by the charisma of a popular figurehead, who might propel their party to a fortunate victory, or decide to refurbish their brand with a less ephemeral
resolution of aligning behind a more substantial leader, and engage in the hard work of regaining what was so arrogantly squandered.
Mon, 2013-01-14 17:09
#311
With such a crowded leadership contest (making up for quality with quantity, I guess!), does anyone care to predict if there will still be a Trudeau first-ballot victory?
Would anything less than a first-ballot victory be considered a rebuke?
Mon, 2013-01-14 17:27
#312
autoworker
With such a crowded leadership contest (making up for quality with quantity, I guess!), does anyone care to predict if there will still be a Trudeau first-ballot victory?
Would anything less than a first-ballot victory be considered a rebuke?
As far as 'quantity' goes, the LPC race is not unlike the NDP's most recent leadership contest (other than it being less tedious). Besides, the Grits have only two, perhaps three, serious candidates now, all from Quebec. If Justin, the likely winner, fails to win on the first ballot, it will appear less of a coronation. It would also allow him to concentrate his effort in Ontario, while leaving a competent pair of lieutenants to reorganize Quebec, beginning in Outremont.
Mon, 2013-01-14 17:30
#313
In fairness, The NDP had a lot of candidates vying for the leadership as well.
Mon, 2013-01-14 18:53
#314
autoworker
It remains to be seen whether anything of substance will emerge from the debates. I can't see how the candidates can avoid discussing their positions on FN issues. It will be interesting to see how they define themselves, as events continue to unfold. How might a prospective leader weigh in on the tragedy of the situation? Hopefully, Liberals will show that they intend to break with the past, and provide new, inspirational, perhaps even radical, approaches to fleshing out the constitutional bones of Section 35 (30 years on, and counting...).
Tue, 2013-01-15 04:44
#315
I just had a horrible thought. Our kids could be listening to one of Harper's kids using his name to gain political Conservative traction in their goal to get elected.......I think I need a shower.
Thu, 2013-01-17 14:09
#316
Sun, 2013-01-20 13:50
#317
Actually she is siding against the police for not going far enough to rough up the Idle No More protestors.
Sun, 2013-01-20 14:12
#318
Arthur Cramer
Actually she is siding against the police for not going far enough to rough up the Idle No More protestors.
She is nasty. But, someone should ask Trudeau what HE thinks of her remarks. Don't think he'd use the cops like Harper did in Toronto if he though it would suit his purposes. In some ways, that makes Trudeau, and the rest of those louts, MORE dangerous.
Sun, 2013-01-20 17:56
#319
I just finished watching as much of the Liberal leadership debate as I could take. It was a rerun of Back to the Future with Liberal candidates proclaiming Martin's Kelowna Accord as the solution to the current problems faced by First Nation, Inuit and Metis, identifying free trade agreements as the solution to our economic crisis, and swearing they would introduce the greenest environmental policies while conveniently forgetting how their praise of the Kyoto Accord was followed by one of the highest percentage increases in carbon dioxide emissions in the world.
The Anointed One was His usual vacuous self while emphasizing the need for more and more free trade even more than most of the other candidates and attacking Mulcair more than Harper.
The CBC of course showed the debate of the third place party in full after having ignored most of the number two party's leadership's debates.
Sun, 2013-01-20 18:06
#320
The CBC of course showed the debate of the third place party in full after having ignored most of the number two party's leadership's debates.
And CTVnews Net! For a 2+ hour snooze fest.
No aknoweldgement in that time of who the obvious front runner was, nothing even close to a punch thrown aside from the collective take down by the other 8 candidates (and the moderator) of Joyce Murray's cooperation plan.
Trudeau obviously wins any draw.
Sun, 2013-01-20 18:36
#321
Boom Boom
I watched most of it and heard some interesting ideas, but at the end of the day, I remember that the Liberals run on the left, but govern on the right.
ETA: I doubt Trudeau won anyone over in this debate but he does have the best hair. 
ETA: The biggest surprise I guess would be Deborah Coyne. She did well.
ETA: Joyce Murray pushed one-time co-operation with the NDP and Greens as the only way to throw Harper out of office.
ETA: one of the newcomers - I think it was David Bertschi - kept referring to Marc Garneau as being in space while he, by contrast, had his feet on the ground. 
ETA: Martha Hall-Findlay remains the scariest of the bunch for me, but in this debate she was sounding progressive, especially on social policy. But she still wants to push oil through the west coast. Two of the candidates are pushing for a West -East pipeline (stolen from Mulcair?) and one of them visited Sarnia, where the Mayor of Sarnia said they're ready to rock 'n roll with western oil using their refineries in Sarnia.
Sun, 2013-01-20 19:53
#322
Was there a leadership debate this afternoon?
I guess I was too busy watching the Flyers/Sabres game to care!
Sun, 2013-01-20 19:53
#323
The CBC of course showed the debate of the third place party in full after having ignored most of the number two party's leadership's debates.
And CTVnews Net! For a 2+ hour snooze fest.
No aknoweldgement in that time of who the obvious front runner was, nothing even close to a punch thrown aside from the collective take down by the other 8 candidates (and the moderator) of Joyce Murray's cooperation plan.
Trudeau obviously wins any draw.
I dare anybody, anybody at all to say the CBC doesn't have anti NDP bias and pro liberal bias. How can they justify that?
Just sell the CBC already please, or at least dump all the Liberal boot lickers.
Mon, 2021-11-22 07:35
#324
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Sun, 2013-01-20 22:17
#325
I dare anybody, anybody at all to say the CBC doesn't have anti NDP bias and pro liberal bias. How can they justify that? Just sell the CBC already please, or at least dump all the Liberal boot lickers.
What and leave only the Harper boot lickers on air?
Mon, 2013-01-21 06:54
#326
While I don't doubt that there is an anti-NDP slant in the CBC as a whole, I don't fault them for covering the Liberal debate.
After all, Newsworld covered all of the NDP leadership debates.
I did watch the debate yesterday and thought that Garneau and Hall-Finlay were best on style. It was also possible to detect a few cracks in the Trudeau aura - some tangled syntax and obviously packaged answers with little relevance to the topic.
It remains to be seen whether this format will expose Trudeau's essential vacuity in time to save the Liberals from choosing him.
I thought that a similar format for the NDP debates (which also began with nine candidates) would immunize the weak and handicap the strong. Two hours divided by nine is only 13 minutes of exposure each.
But I think over time the stronger debaters like Mulcair and Cullen began to distinguish themselves while Dewar and Nash faded. Maybe something similar will happen with the Liberals, although I think they are so obsessed with picking a masssiah that they will ignore any warning signs.
Mon, 2013-01-21 09:44
#327
After all, Newsworld covered all of the NDP leadership debates.I know they covered some of them, I'm pretty sure they didn't do them all. I'm looking for evidence one way or another now, all the pre-debate stories I turn up on CBC and CTV don't mention any cable coverage (unlike their pre-debate stories for the Liberal debate).
It remains to be seen whether this format will expose Trudeau's essential vacuity in time to save the Liberals from choosing him.There is zero chance of Trudeau not walking away with this contest on the first ballot as things currently stand, none of the 8 lesser knowns found the guts to take him on when they had literally nothing to lose and now there are only 4 more debates.
Mon, 2013-01-21 17:17
#328
Agreed.
Mon, 2013-01-21 17:19
#329
Well said and good strategy Jan.
whenever, I get a call from "friends of the CBC", I politely tell them I will not donate to organization that essentially props up the CBC which is bias against the NDP. I also tell them, the caller, to pass my message on to the powers to be.
Mon, 2013-01-21 19:27
#330
This kind of unimaginative commentary is more than a little boring - is this the best analysis Canada's ero- prone pundits can muster? Just pathetic!
Is Justin Trudeau Stephen Harper's Best Chance?
One of Canada's leading political scholars thinks so. A dispatch from the first Liberal debate.
Mon, 2013-01-21 19:57
#331
One unfortunate thing is that the media seems willing to cherry pick only Justin's best moments for its nightly news sound bites, which create a false impression.
Mon, 2013-01-21 20:03
#332
Even at the NDP's 90s nadir, its leadership races weren't this motley.
Fri, 2013-01-25 15:29
#333
Justin Trudeau is starting to make me think of George W. Bush. Republicans got behind GWB because of his dad's name and got a much inferior product that is still toxic in US public discourse.
Fri, 2013-01-25 18:47
#334
I will be curious to see if Joyce Murray's cooperation platform has any legs. Despite the scorn rained upon him by various sectors of the party establishment, Nathan Cullen turned in a surprisingly impressive third place finish, leaping over such perceived favourites as Paul Dewar and Peggy Nash. We could see Murray's position having a similar resonance among the Liberal Party rank-and-file (and 'supporters' entitled to vote). If nothing else, it sets her apart from the rest of the field.
Mon, 2021-11-22 07:35
#335
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Sat, 2013-01-26 13:05
#336
Justin Trudeau is to this race what Joe Clark was to the '98 PC race. (That's why it's a wonder David Orchard's not running.)
Sat, 2013-01-26 20:01
#337
Nah play up trudeau all you want, I have seen him debate and he will get chewed up. I know some of us have reservations about our now center party under Mulcair, but he really is a very good debater. He usually carries a folder with relavant facts and numbers to not be tripped up later. Trudeau has charisma and a name, but is so vapid that he won't stand up well in a debate.
The more hype he gets the better the NDP will look in comparisons. The CBC pretty much said it was obsolutely in the best interest of the NDP to not go to the polls last time, and they were in fact afraid to do so because they would get crushed by Iggy...umm yeah. CBC is a complete joke and I notice that my best posts, those with relavant facts to how bad the libs are as well as the useless cons usually gets trashed and never posted. Or posted 4 hours after and buried.
Sat, 2013-01-26 20:02
#338
I still hate the new babble forums. Doubl;e post
Sun, 2013-01-27 01:49
#339
Even at the NDP's 90s nadir, its leadership races weren't this motley.
Actually, one of the surprises this year is that the slate of Liberal candidates running for Leader turned out to be stronger than that of those who ran for NDP leader last year.
Other than Mulcair, there weren't many strong candidates in the race. They were mostly ordinary MP's and folks who hadn't been elected to Parliament before. (eg. Brian Topp) I was surprised that although the NDP had moved up to #2 in Parliament, no former NDP Premiers or Cabinet Ministers ran.
The Liberal leadership race contains former Cabinet ministers at both the Federal and Provincial level, and everyone from a former Lieutenant-Colonel to prominent lawyers and law professors, including one who has been endorsed by a former Supreme Court Justice. I remember when Ian Capstick joked on P&P in 2011 that he didn't think anyone would want to run for Liberal leader in 2013, but the race hasn't had any trouble attracting a strong series of candidates.
And nearly half the candidates are women! (4 out of 9) 
Sun, 2013-01-27 03:51
#340
Even at the NDP's 90s nadir, its leadership races weren't this motley.
Actually, one of the surprises this year is that the slate of Liberal candidates running for Leader turned out to be stronger than that of those who ran for NDP leader last year.
Other than Mulcair, there weren't many strong candidates in the race. They were mostly ordinary MP's and folks who hadn't been elected to Parliament before. (eg. Brian Topp) I was surprised that although the NDP had moved up to #2 in Parliament, no former NDP Premiers or Cabinet Ministers ran.
And nearly half the candidates are women! (4 out of 9)
One of the metrics you established for evaluating the quality of the candidates in the respective contests is the number of people who have been elected to parliament. Yes, two of the nine NDP candidates had not been elected to parliament. That of course compares favourably to the Liberals who presently have 4 candidates who have never been elected to parliament. This is of course in addition to Findlay who couldn't hold her seat. Even the rock star lost support in the last election. As for cabinet ministers,yes the Liberals have one former federal cabinet minister and one former provincial minister. Obviously the NDP doesn't have any former federal ministers but they had just as many former provincial ministers running as the Liberals do. (And check out Joyce Murray's website, I wonder why she doesn't highlight who appointed her to cabinet? }
You could have added the category of former provincial leader rather than restrict it to cabinet minister. Of course if you did that the NDP would have one and the Liberals zero. Even by the arbitrary standards you delineated the Liberal race ranks lower than the NDP in some of your categories and no better in others.
Nice try though.
Sun, 2013-01-27 04:55
#341
I actually agree with Debater for once that the Liberal leadership candiates are of relatively high caliber and compare fairly well with the NDP slate last year.
I wonder if he will agree with me, however, that the NDP selected its very most qualified candidate while the Liberal look set to pick their very least qualified candidate.
Sun, 2013-01-27 11:30
#342
I think that the NDP had more diversity so it would take the motley award.
Definition of MOTLEY1 : variegated in color <a motley coat> 2 : composed of diverse often incongruous elements <a motley crowd>
Sun, 2013-01-27 12:43
#343
Arthur Cramer
I actually agree with Debater for once that the Liberal leadership candiates are of relatively high caliber and compare fairly well with the NDP slate last year.
I wonder if he will agree with me, however, that the NDP selected its very most qualified candidate while the Liberal look set to pick their very least qualified candidate.
Nicky, NAILED IT!
Sun, 2013-01-27 13:09
#344
My point was simply that Debater used certain criteria to evaluate the fields of candidates in both parties and that he misused his own critera. To be fair he may have simply miscounted in some instances.
But yes, Nicky's point is the most important. What difference would it have made if the Liberals had run a veritable slate of modern day Lincolns and Pericles if they are bound and determined to select the most unqualified candidate?
Sun, 2013-01-27 14:19
#345
Trudeau polls well and conjures up visions of a new camelot era. The problem is he still untested and evidence strongly suggests he's not up to the task.
The Liberals are like lemmings running off the,cliff.
The smart move would be to go with Martin Counchin or whatever his name is or Mark Garneau although I don't like his positons. Heck even Coyne or Murray would be a better choice then Justin.
Which while good over the long term for the NDP means more media groveling for Justin. I'd better buy more gravel because this will get sickening.
Sun, 2013-01-27 21:12
#346
Gravel? Or Gravol?
Sun, 2013-01-27 22:11
#347
The anti nausia medicine.
Fri, 2013-02-01 09:58
#348
Trudeau has charisma and a name, but is so vapid that he won't stand up well in a debate.
Agreed. Justin is Iggy.
Actually, worse. At least Iggy did not call guns "this important facet of Canadian identity".
Fri, 2013-02-01 23:16
#349
Joyce Murray pledges to support proportional representation.
She has signed the Declaration of Voters' Right -- Politicians' Pledge.
Her website says:
We can create a fair, representative electoral system that:
• Provide more proportional representation of voter preferencesCanada needs an electoral system that respects the votes of all Canadians, and awards power to parties according to the trust they have earned from the electorate.
She supports the idea of shifting Canada’s voting system from the current first-past-the-post arrangement to some form of proportional representation.
Sat, 2013-02-02 15:30
#350
Trudeau polls well and conjures up visions of a new camelot era. The problem is he still untested and evidence strongly suggests he's not up to the task. The Liberals are like lemmings running off the,cliff. The smart move would be to go with Martin Counchin or whatever his name is or Mark Garneau although I don't like his positons. Heck even Coyne or Murray would be a better choice then Justin. Which while good over the long term for the NDP means more media groveling for Justin. I'd better buy more gravel because this will get sickening.
IMHO, 'The Task' for the Liberal Party is to build thier infrastructure, integrate all their disparate databases, and build up, and integrate a lot of new members well before 2015. Justin Trudeau is a proven 'retail' politicain, with enviable ability to connect to people. He rasises gobs of cash as easily as falling out of bed, and his campaign is busily recruiting ten thousand plus supporters every month. If you, and your fellow dippers disparge him for the wrong reasons, you will fall into a common partisan trap, that of underestimating the strengths of your opponents, and over-estimating their weaknesses. You should do yourself a favour, and rationally evaluate the Liberal Party, and their prospective leadership.
Sat, 2013-02-02 15:41
#351
More on Joyce Murray.
Liberals for Fair Voting says “all Fair Voters should now use their networks to drum up, from today until the close of registration on March 3, the largest possible vote for the Liberal candidate most favourable to our goal.”
And Fair Vote Canada takes note in a press release. “She’s saying what all Canadian democrats have been longing to hear from the Liberal Party,” observed Wayne Smith, executive director of Fair Vote Canada. “I hope the other eight are paying close attention.”