Next Manitoba Premier - Part 2

Just as a segue, I was looking back at the last time that the Manitoba NDP picked a leader and in 1986 Gary Doer only beat Leonard Harapiak by a handful of votes. I wonder how different things would have been if Harapiak had won that contest instead of Doer?

Ironically, I think Doer would have become leader in time for the 1990 election anyways. If Harapiak had won the leadership in 1988, I don't think it would have made much of a difference to the NDP's overall result - the party still would have been smoked in the '88 election. I think Harapiak as leader would have ended up with a very similar seat count to Doer's (in the range of 10-15 seats).

The crucial detail, however, is the fact that Harapiak went on to lose his seat in the 1988 election. I don't think there's any reason to assume he would have won had he been leader - Swan River was a Tory seat from 1932 until Harapiak finally won it in 1986 by 65 votes.  In 1988 he lost by a pretty significant margin - 650 votes - and he was able to spend virtually all of the campaign in the riding. Presumably if he had been leader he would have had virtually no time to do any campaigning in his own seat, which might have meant an even larger margin of defeat.

Since NDP seats were few and far between after 1988, I doubt anyone would have been anxious to resign so Harapiak could be parachuted in (nor would there be any guarantee of Harapiak winning the ensuing by-election with NDP popularity at a low ebb), and I doubt he would have led the party from the gallery for the next two years. I suspect that he would have quit shortly after the election, leading to another leadership race, which would have almost certainly been won by Doer.

Agreed that this could have been handled better, and in fact I am not a big fan of this leadership selection process overall. I am not violently opposed to delegated conventions (although my preference would be OMOV), but I do not support the 'plurality voting' method of electing delegates. It's basically FPTP, so theoretically someone could take all of a constituency's delegates with 34% of the vote. If the party must have a delegated convention, then at the very least delegates should be elected based on a proportionate share of votes for each leadership candidate within each constituency. I think that would have made the race more competitive and might have encouraged some other candidates to run. I would also have liked to see internet or telephone voting options as well (at that point, of course, you may as well have OMOV).

At the end of the day, however, Swan's withdrawal and endorsement of Selinger now makes these issues pretty irrelevant in the overall context of this particular leadership race.  Even if Ashton got every single MYND delegate, he still won't close the gap.

Gregory F. Selinger will be the 22nd Premier of Manitoba.

And the party better watch this doesn't turn into an "anyone but Ashton" thing.  He has gathered a big crowd of folks who want to something more than more Doer-esque social liberalism.  Not to mention all the Indo-Candians, Filipinos and Greeks the Selinger and Swan camps want to villainize for have the gall to join the party to support their man Ashton.  Do they really want to alienate these folks? 

Ashton is giving them a voice.  If Selinger wins, he better be prepared to listen.

I heard that Ashton cleaned up up north - that's over 200 delegates

This reminds me of the Ontario NDP leadership race where all these people were going on and on about how Gilles Bisson was going to sweep the boards as a result of having all this support from northern Ontario. Never materialized.

We shall see.

Of course another possible issue is who shows up at the convention. Its one thing to get 117 delegates elected in The Pas. Its another thing to get them all on a plane to Winnipeg! In contrast delegates from Winnipeg only have to hop on a local bus. So, I wonder what sort of an impact that will have.

BTW: My point about Bisson wasn't that his support from the north didn't materialize, just that it wasn't anywhere near enough to outweigh all the votes in the rest of the province.

I was reading in one of the linked articles that in The Pas, the number of delegates allocated was very inflated because so many memberships were sold when there was a five way race for the nomination for a provincial byelection. As a result, there are 1,200 members so the riding gets something like 110 delegates, but the number of people who actually showed up at the delegate selecation meeting was only about 100 (yes, that's right, the number of members at the meeting was LESS than the number of delegates they were electing!). Apparently quite a few people also had their names on the all three delegate slates as well!

To what extent are delegates forced to vote for the leadership candidate who won in their riding? Are they legally bound, or is everyone essentially up for grabs until the moment they cast their vote?

Of course, that's NDP 'supporters' as opposed to NDP 'members' (ie those eligible to vote at the DSMs). This poll is an interesting read, but it may or may not be reflective of the views of the people who will actually be voting.

I don't get it at all.

You know, I like to think that most NDPers aren't bad, they are decent rank and filers stuck in a party with shitty leadership.  So I don't take it out on them when the government does stupid shit - a good chunk of the time when discussing politics they give me some variant of "I agree with you, but..."

But hell, why are these people, even a good chunk of the lefties, lining up behind Selinger?  A friend told me he saw someone who left the party because they were too right wing at a delegate convention wearing a Selinger pin.  What is Selinger's hold on these people?

Don't these people get it at all?  Selinger isn't the last great progressive hope, he was the fucking finance mininster for the last ten years.  He was pretty much Gary Doer's right hand man and the guy doing the budgets for the past ten years for all the right wing shit that these people claim to oppose (but...)

I like to think that most NDPers are more progressive than this government we've been having for the last decade.  But, when they get what is literally a one in 20 year chance, why the hell aren't they showing it and voting for the left-wing candidate?  If all these rank and filers are all a bunch of lefties, then why isn't Ashton, the guy whose been making progressive policy announcements while Selinger and Swan were announcing which centrist hacks decided to endorse them, cleaning up instead of barely staying competitive only due to his impressive campaign skills?

Maybe I'm just fucked in the head, but I just don't understand this and am running out of explanations which are charitable to the NDP rank and file.  I would think a party filled with NDPers but led by Liberals would be an unstable relationship, and the NDPers would take it back at the first chance, no?  Especially when the party is in government, and making decisions that affect everyone.

genstrike wrote:

But hell, why are these people, even a good chunk of the lefties, lining up behind Selinger?

I ran into someone who told me that Selinger was a community activist in many left-wing organisations before becoming finance minister and that the budgets Sellinger signed were a reflection of the philosophy of the Doer-led Cabinet. It's things I didn't know and certainly Cabinet decisions involve more than the affected minister. I can cut him some slack based on that, but ultimately he signed off on all those budgets, so he bears responsibility.

Quote:

MANITOBA STEELWORKERS TO ENDORSE STEVE ASHTON AT UPCOMING NDP LEADERSHIP CONVENTION

WINNIPEG, MB, 1 Oct 2009 - United Steelworkers (USW) members participating in the Manitoba NDP leadership convention on October 17, 2009 will be endorsing Thompson MLA Steve Ashton as the next premier and party leader. The event will take place in this capital city and through satellite meetings in The Pas and Thompson.
 
Over 50 USW members will be attending the convention as USW and NDP constituency delegates.
 
In a vote held among USW local union leaders and representatives from across the province yesterday, the union's endorsement was unanimous. The vote took place following presentations to the union from both Ashton and competing candidate Greg Selinger.
 
"After hearing from both candidates, our union decided that Steve Ashton is the best candidate to represent the interests of all Manitobans in all regions of the province," says USW area supervisor Wayne Skrypynk. "We strongly believe that Ashton will continue to move the province forward on both the economic and social fronts."
 
A former USW Local 6166 member from the Inco operations in Thompson, Ashton was first elected to the legislature in 1981. A former Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, he has served the government in various cabinet roles including Minister of Transport and Government Services and Minister of Labour and Immigration.
 
"Steve Ashton is an experienced MLA that has a lot of respect from the diverse membership of our union," says Skyrpynk. "We believe he will be an excellent premier and future leader of the province."
 
The Steelworkers are Canada's largest industrial union with over 250,000 members in all sectors of the economy, including over 7,000 members in Manitoba.
 
- 30 -
    
CONTACT:   Wayne Skrypynk  204.232.7335

[url=http://www.usw.ca/program/content/6116.php]United Steelworkers District 3[/url]

Here's Irony for you:  Selinger was reputed to be not far off from Ashton on most issues discussed in cabinet. 

Ashton came out hard for the left after Swan came in as Doer jr.  His strategy was designed to work by bringing together and activate the anti-Doer forces.  It worked remarkably well. 

To some degree, Selinger's candidacy has foiled that strategy, especially now that Swan is out.  Selinger's folks talk "fiscal responsibility" and "social inclusion" like its their mantra.  He's counting on the quiet assumption of more stable NDP governments, while campaigning on housing, poverty, discrimination, and public services in the least offensive way possible.  He'll probably win with that.

Although I largely agree with your point, I do think Selinger is a little to the left of where you think, ghoris.  I don't expect a bold shift to the left under Selinger, but I don't expect more Doer either.  I'm curious what kind of profile Ashton would have in a Selinger cabinet.  Selinger would be smart to put Ashton out front and centre after all this -- give him Finance Minister, or Labour, or Justice...

Stockholm:  Ashton was also a USW member when he first got elected.  He's never been a firefighter, though.  

genstrike wrote:

I don't get it at all.

But hell, why are these people, even a good chunk of the lefties, lining up behind Selinger?  A friend told me he saw someone who left the party because they were too right wing at a delegate convention wearing a Selinger pin.  What is Selinger's hold on these people?

What folks who seem to think that Selinger and Doer are cut of the same cloth seem to be missing is that Selinger wasn't initially the establishment candidate at all.  That mantle went to Theresa Oswald, and, when she declined to run, to Andrew Swan.  Since 1999, Selinger has been one of the deans of the progressive caucus within the government.

Both of the remaining candidates have strong progressive credentials, and they differ in approach more than politics.  Ashton is an old school labour leftist with a populist streak, and he styles himself a bit of a Tommy Douglas.  Selinger is more Tommy Shoyama than Tommy Douglas (better comparisons might be Al Johnson or Allan Blakeney, but it's less alliterative!), somebody with a deep understanding of political economy and how governments translate their objectives into effective policies.

Selinger's base of support among progressive activists is entirely intelligible; he is one.  Before public life, he worked for years preparing inner-city social workers, provided support and technical assistance to many of Manitoba's social enterprises and community economic development agencies, and was an effective city councillor who should have been mayor.  Through the 1990s, he played a critical role in building the grand coalition between labour, academic, student, disability, anti-poverty and faith activists that fought the the good fight against the vicious neo-liberalism of the Filmon government (and that often wished the NDP caucus were more on-side than they were).  Manitoba has a robust tradition of progressive extra-parliamentary coalitions, and academics like Selinger who reject the ivory tower and have the humility to grant authority to lived experience have been an important part of that tradition.

As one of those who largely left the NDP after 1999 because I was no fan of the Blairite populism of the Doer part, I am pleased to see Greg poised to take the reins.  I guess that makes me just one more of the many dupes out there wearing a Selinger pin, but I'll wear it anyway.

And since when did "fiscal responsibility" and "social inclusion" become meaningless mantras, or, for that matter, centrist?  I had always thought they were core principles and key legacies of the CCF/NDP.

Tractor wrote:

I saw the two of them together; they looked like they were trying out-progressive each other.

That's good.

Can anyone provide a list of strikes in Manitoba during the last 10 years where replacement workers were actually used?

Serious genstrike? You're actually linking to this horseshit? wow. Top-notch research. If it says it on a blog somewhere, it must be true...

Stockholm wrote:

Can anyone provide a list of strikes in Manitoba during the last 10 years where replacement workers were actually used?

I don't have a list, but they were used at the U of M strike two years ago, and once is too often.

And, I will be willing to bet that they will be used when there is another strike at the U of M (which will happen) in 2010.

Stockholm wrote:

These stories are only telling me how desparate Ashton's people are to win at all cost - and i think that they know their losing and that's why all these last ditch crazy accusations. Only LOSERS start attacking the process.

From what I can tell you have two very progressive people running to lead the NDP in Manitoba and in reality there is probably hardly any ideological difference between them. The only question is whether to elect someone electable like Selinger or someone unelectable like Ashton. If I were an NDP member in MB, I would support whoever had the best chance of winning the next election. Ashton comes across to me as another Howard Hampton type who will do a lot of hollering and lead the NDP to just winning bedrock seats in north Winnipeg and the far north and nothing else.

Okay, what do you base that on? You really know nothing about Manitoba politics, and you don't know that Ashton has a very good reputation as a fighter for his community. Ashton's team isn't raising allegations about the process itself, they're raising allegations that the proper processes aren't being followed. Are these allegations true? I don't know, but they are serious and should be investigated. And as for your contention about Sellinger being more likely than Ashton to win an election? I disagree. Neither one of them are very charismatic, but Ashton can fight very well, while Sellinger is a bit more "robotic."

Actually yes, because as I said, Ashton has a reputation as being a very hard-working constituency person. Hell, I'll dream a bit and sugges that he has a chance of even bringing into play more rural seats.

Well Stockholm, having actually lived in this province for almost my entire life, I would pick Ashton as being more electable than Sellinger any day of the week.

Why don't you give concrete reasoning why Sellinger is more likely to win elections? After all, you seem to know better about what's happening in other provinces than the people who live there.

From my Ontario perch, Ashton has demonstrated a phenomenal ability to organize and sign up new members. That to me tells me he is electable as a premier. In Ontario, our leadership race hardly made a blip on the membership radar. It's not hard to imagine that the ONDP will have equally pathetic results in the next prov. election. Your leadership race has been exciting, engaging and refreshing to watch.

This site is keeping track of the standings

http://yellowsnow125.blogspot.com/

After adding in the Ashton win in the Maples it is now as follows:

Tally:
Selinger: 637
Ashton: 501
Swan or undeclared: 111 (most of these are Selinger's)

Delegates left: 751
-112 delegates at constituencies (eight constituencies go Sunday, the biggest being Fort Whyte and 7 others in the Westman region)

-107 at MYND (on Tuesday)

-430 at Labour

-214 super delegates

The tow will probably split the delegates to be chosen today since the remaining riding seem split in terms of being likely to go one way or the other. The MYND delegates will be split proportionately meaning that its highly unlikely that anyone gets more than a net gain of 10 there. The "super-delegates" will probably go about 75% to Selinger since he has almost all the MLAs and party brass behind him. I don't know what the deal si with the labour delegates, my impression is that while Ashton has a chunk of support from the steelworkers, most of the labour "brass" is behind Selinger as well. When all the dust settles I predict the final vote will be something like Selinger 1,150, Ashton 850.

Let's hear some other predictions.

Stockholm wrote:

If I were picking a new Manitoba leader I'd be asking myself, who can win swing seats in south Winnipeg and not who can increase the turnout in bedrock safe NDP seats in northern Manitoba.

This is where we differ.  I don't give a fuck which party is in power, as long as I get good policies.  Only one candidate in this race has been announcing good policies.  I want my tuition freeze back, and a real one this time (although I don't think Ashton goes far enough), not some bullshit tax credits that the students who need it most won't be able to use until after they graduate, a completely back-assward system.  I want anti-scab legislation, and with what seems to be an uptick in strikes, I want it now.  Ashton says he will bring it in.  Selinger says he won't.  Ashton walked the picket line with striking Hydro workers.  Selinger was the minister responsible.  But somehow they are identical and only differ in style, according to some people.  Although to believe that, I think you might have had to have forgotten the last ten years.  And ignore how seamlessly the brass went into Selinger's camp and is pulling whatever shit they can in order to stop Ashton.  Honestly, if someone pulling dirty tricks like what happened in Inkster in order to stop a left-wing candidate from winning, I have absolutely zero fucking patience for them and hope their party either splits so the few principled people aren't stuck with some bureaucratic morass completely bare of integrity or crashes and burns.  There is absolutely no way that I'm voting for a party whose leader stole the election in order to keep out the last person with a shred of principle.

I know, you're probably going to say that bringing in leftist policies like a tuition freeze will alienate everyone.  Well, freezing or reducing tuition is supported by something like 80% of the population (including those South and West Winnipeg soccer moms who apparently are the only people who matter - try telling to one of them that their kids tuition just went up by this much).  I've heard that support for eliminating tuition is well over 40%.  So, how is dropping the tuition freeze making you more electable?

And, I think Ashton is more electable to boot.  I find it ironic, some of my progressive friends are giving me the same line as you are about not being "electable", but even my centrist, right wing, or apolitical friends are saying "well, Ashton is a straight shooter.  I kind of like him."  Shit, even far-right Neepawa nutbar Ken Waddell is endorsing Ashton because of his personality.  Incidentally, whenever Ken Waddell says that welfare rates are too low when we have an allegedly (well, according to Waddell.  No sane person considers the Manitoba NDP to be socialist) socialist government, there is a fucking problem here.

I wonder, if people on the right of the party like Doer are able to demand loyalty from the left while treating them like shit, is Ashton allowed to do the same to the right if he wins?  It would be nice to see an NDP which actually governs to the left and does things that all these NDPers tell me they believe in.

If we sell ourselves out, like the NDP has been doing for the past ten years, then we've lost before we even started.  Unfortunately, the opportunists, hacks and dupes who make up a large portion of the party don't see it that way.

And seeing how you know more about Manitoba politics than anyone who lives here, why don't you sketch out the scenarios.  You're the self-proclaimed expert.

Personally, I think that if the Tories ever get some semblance of shit together, Greg Selinger will go down as the Paul Martin of Manitoba.