Cameron: The Liberal Bounce & What the NDP Must Do

edited because I need to start reading other posts more thoroughly!

I think the NDP needs to make the next election about class. It's important to keep our emphasis on the environment with so many other "me-too" parties popping up now, but none of them really have the political will or courage to make wealth or a lack thereof a real issue.

[ 13 December 2006: Message edited by: meades ]

Bang on article, Duncan.

Dion has cast both a "green" and "left-wing" aura since he was elected leader, but when it comes down to it, he is just another pro-business, free-trade liberal.

Although the NDP clearly has the best policies on the environment, it may be hard for the NDP to establish that as clear distinction between itself and the Liberals (or the Green Party) in the coming election.

On economic justice issues, otoh, Rae could have been a real threat, but Dion looks much weaker. He was part of the Liberal cabinet that embraced NAFTA, gutted unemployment insurance, refused to back anti-scab legislation for the 13 years they were in power, and sat back and watched the gap between the haves and the have-nots grow. It's time for the NDP to hammer the Libs, Cons and Greens on these issues, because it is the clearest distinction between what we represent and what the pro-business parties do.

[ 13 December 2006: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]

This a great idea for the NDP campaign. Dion doesn't have much cred as an economic populist. And it's important for the NDP to move away from "lend us your vote" and distinguish themselves from the Liberals.

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Originally posted by Coyote:
[b]Okay, but what would that program look like? I'm all for a campaign on economic populism, but right now Canada's economy is doing pretty good - red hot in West. When unemployment was high, a campaign of "jobs, jobs, jobs" had some appeal; but in today's market employers are finding it hard to fill positions.[/b]

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Alberta is [i]one[/i] province experiencing a bit of job growth in exchange for allowing multinationals to rob them blind out there. Lots of Canadians don't want to, or cannot travel to Alberta for lots of legitimate reasons, lack of jobs skills training, lack of means to travel, severe shortage of housing in Alberta, etcetera.

Meanwhile, in Canada's largest province, the Royal Bank downgraded Ontario's expected growth rate from 3.1 percent to 1.5 percent in mid-October and pointing to the likelihood of a [url=http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.html?id=35e00f6d-... in our manufacturing sector. Canada's manufacturing sector is now more than 50 percent foreign-owned and controlled since our two old line parties started us down this road of neo-Liberalization. No other developed country economy allows a third as much foreign ownership of its manufacturing base. The NDP should be pointing this out as part of the weak underbelly of Liberal-Conservative party mismanagement of the economy and neo-Liberal ideology that says we must handover our natural wealth to foreign control for a song.

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“Dalton McGuinty’s [url=http://ofl.ca/index.php/publications/issue/focus_on_queens_park_septembe... take a hands-off approach to plant closures and layoffs. As a result, since June 2004, [b]Ontario has now lost 118,000 manufacturing jobs – more than 10 percent of all manufacturing jobs in the province.[/b] Thousands of working people in Ontario are losing their jobs. They deserve a Premier who stands up for them and their jobs, not a Premier who abandons them,” NDP leader Howard Hampton said.

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McGuilty's Liberals are about as left as what Herbert Hoover's government was - as in, not at all.

[ 13 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

How much cred will Layton have as an economic populist?

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Originally posted by Stephen Gordon:
[b] The [url=http://www.rabble.ca/babble/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=25&t=001373]N... recipe[/url] is high consumption taxes and low taxes on investment income.[/b]

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So we can tax the poor to pay the poor. Meanwhile, Canada is still a hewer of wood and drawer of water mid-power banana republic exporting more energy to colonial-corporate America than any other nation. We've got oil, nat-gas, minerals and timber up the wazoo. I think we have just a few more options than the Scandinavian countries where resources are fewer and exceedingly more competitive than Canada.

And part of the reason they are more competitive than Canada is that they don't have Liberal Party governments stealing billions of dollars from EI funds that could be used to re-train workers for industries fickle about wanting workers with high tech job skills. The Swede's and Fin's are economically competitive [i]because[/i] of higher social spending as a percentage of GDP than is true in Canada, not in spite of it. The two old line parties didn't seem to mind putting us in a debt hole with wrong-headed ideology in the 1980's. A good place to start would be to just clean the two dead weight parties out of Ottawa altogether. The NDP is a lot closer to that Scandinavian model you nail up every now and then than our two old line parties will ever be.

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Originally posted by John K:
[b]The NDP's platform needs to do a better job of appealing to middle class voters.

Too often, the NDP tailors its message to the poorest third of voters.
[/b]

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And, ironically, we don't do as well amongst the poorest third of voters as we do amongst some other demographics.

Economic populism has to be the key. Bread and butter.

In a handful of seats - BC interior and Vancouver Island, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, rural Nova Scotia - we have some opportunities to appeal to NDP-CPC swing voters. (Yes, Urban Leftist, these voters do exist.)

In most of the country, we need to distinguish the Liberal reality from the Liberal rhetoric. And we need to be tough about it. We shouldn't (generally) lead with this, but we should be merciless.

For example, when the Liberals talk about childcare, we should ask what they did about childcare for 13 long years. Were they too busy stealing money in Quebec to do anything about childcare? Likewise the Environment. As bad as the Tory record is, they have done more in one year than the Liberals did in 13.

And in Vancouver Kingsway, the key message is obvious.

"In 2006, the people of Vancouver Kingsway elected a Liberal and got a Conservative. Don't make that mistake again. Vote NDP."