I wonder if Singh reads the news from Burnaby? It's brutal, but true.
Burnaby South's Jagmeet Singh is pushing the NDP into irrelevance
Jagmeet Singh (now the MP for Burnaby South) ... has proven an utter gaffe.
In the last election, Trudeau was portrayed as just not ready, the least qualified to offer for the office of prime minister, but Singh eclipses that concern. On issue after issue he has been unconvincing and unconvinced in his position. He appears to not have an aide who stays abreast of the news to tell him about it. He has revived in unflattering ways the term “waffle” to the NDP. He and his party have not produced a single big idea to think about at the ballot box.
Moreover, while as leader he awaited a riding vacancy for nearly two years in which to seek a Commons seat, he didn’t borrow from Trudeau’s playbook and build relationships in touring the country.
Polls before elections carry question marks and asterisks, but the current batch suggest an NDP substantially reduced from its 44 seats in the 338-seat House of Commons, itself a sharp drop from that of 2011.
In British Columbia, where the NDP won 14 seats last time, about half of them are now unlikely. That would be its worst showing since 2004 – despite the presence of a provincial NDP government.
The real drama is in Quebec, where in 2015 Mulcair salvaged 15 of 59 seats secured under Layton in 2011, but where the party has since dropped roughly 15 points.
There might be but one, two or three seats to stay with the party there. Singh has not connected with the province, and his strategists now talk of Quebec as a lost cause.
We are all attracted to winning, so it should not surprise that the party’s MPs do not see the same opportunity in 2019 perceived last election. At last count, 11 of the 44 sitting NDP MPs will not contest office this fall. Coupled with three who resigned and one who was expelled, that totals more than one-third of the 2015 alumni – the highest attrition rate of any party with official status in the last six elections.
Many columnists have written the party off before, only to watch it rebound. Now, though, the left-of-centre has a more exuberant option in the Greens. Provincially its Albertan time came and went, its Ontario promise never materialized, and the Horgan government is its last stand.
The party has never before been so eroded from both sides with so little prospect of an uptick. You have to wonder if this is its last hurrah.
https://www.burnabynow.com/opinion/burnaby-south-s-jagmeet-singh-is-push...
In real news: Georgina Jolibois’ bill to make Sept. 30 (orange shirt day) a national holiday for truth and reconciliation has passed the House of Commons.
https://www.quesnelobserver.com/news/bill-passes-to-make-sept-30-national-day-for-truth-and-reconciliation-statutory-holiday/
Jagmeet Singh to publish his memoirs to be released prior to the election - book entitled "Love and Courage"
Tom Mulcair and Justin Trudeau did the same (publish a memoir) four years ago prior to the election.
Jagmeet Singh's NDP are going to tax the offshore tax-free havens (former Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin / Canada Sreamships anyone?) to help pay for some of their proposed programs. Excellent!
https://environicsresearch.com/insights/nine-ten-canadians-think-morally-wrong-canadian-corporations-use-tax-havens-new-poll/
There's no longer any case for waiting. It's going to be too late for anything he says to make any real difference if he holds off 'til the actual campaign. Parties in opposition are SUPPOSED to use the time between elections to make a case for change. When they don't to that, they waste the opportunity and end up focusing on things that can't make a difference to any part of the electorate like, say, endless parliamentary crusades to nail a powerless, irrelevant Conservative senator on corruption.
And I don't think I need to remind you that the NDP approach before and during the 2015 election led to comprehensive failure at the polls(other than in B.C., where there were gains, and congratulations to the candidates who made them, but gains too few to matter when weighed against the collapse in the Maritimes, Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba).
https://www.thebeaverton.com/2019/04/ndp-offers-free-tote-bag-to-any-mem...
He isn't waiting. He has started highlighting the priorities of the party, the issues that will be addressed in the platform.
In the olden days of the slow news cycle and thoughtful editorals opposition parties said more. Now elections are decided in the last few weeks based on platforms and very current events. Anything said in between is more likely than not to be cut up and used for attack ads.
The NDP came within a hairsbreath of forming government in 2015.
You do realize that Singh cannot afford to look like an angry man?
Whether or not Singh can sound like "an angry man", he has nothing to lose by a passionate, commited man who offers a REAL program for change. And there's no good reason for his positon on Venezuela to be anywhere close to Trudeau and Scheer's-there's no "Left" case for U.S.-orchestrated "regime change", and no broad demand in Canada that the existing, elected president of Venezuela be removed from office and replaced by a Milton Friedman freak like Guaido.
.
Mulcair was in first place during the election period until he blew the deficit issue and refused the debates.
I haven't seen any comments from the NDP suggesting regime change or installing Guaido.
Ken Burch - your efforts are appreciated, but you're wasting your breath.
See, that was a correct use of the English word "breath".
Not like Pondering's solipsistic neologism "hairsbreath".
Which I assume was supposed to be "hair's breadth".
But who cares, it's only words.
Yes I did indeed mean hair's breath. You managed to comprehend what I was saying despite my misspelling so it seems the goal of communication was achieved. You must be so smart to have figured it out! The putdown, (or is it put down?) well either way that was downright clever of you. I had to look up the meaning of the word solip whatever but I couldn't care less. I care so little I am not even going to try to remember what it means. What I will remember is that people who use the solip word in any but an academic sense are full of hubris. Close enough. I am not even going to bother with the neological shit. Old logical is fine by me.
I do usually make an effort to use correct grammar and spelling. I am sorely tempted not to just to aggravate you, or is it agravate? No I think aggravate. Whatever, it looks right. Who cares anyway? Or is that Who care's anyway? Who knows!
SNC-Lavilen, or was it SNC-Lavalin, I think Lavelin. Yeah that's it. From now on I will refer to SNC-Lavelin in your honor, or should I say honour, or maybe honeur? I like the sound of honeur. Makes me feel like a 3-musketeer.
I really like this je ne sait quoi joie de vive sort of approach to writing. Lavelin, Levalen, what's in a name? Is not a rose still a rose? This is all so freeing I feel like a hippie. I know, I know, step away from the pipe. Just because it is Friday night is no reason to get all crazy with non-traditional spellings. What is this world coming to!
Unionist her approach to words is the same as her approach to politics. She thinks that political philosophies like liberalism and democratic socialism and socialism are all the same and people like JWR have no fixed political views and therefore can be slotted into any party as leader with no concern for the views of the membership.
hare's breath - like, you gotta get weally, weally, close to a hare to feel it's breath.
anyway, you're just splitting them. which is cruel to the wabbits.
And you still think members of parties have power. The mix of hubris and naivete is amusing :)
I like hare's breath.
P.S. Also enjoying the alternative views of JWR as either evil Liberal or indigenous Joan of Arc.
Your grasp of other people's views appears to be rather delusional.
Given the number of typos in my own posts that I often do not take the time to fix, I am very uncomfortable with spelling flames.
Interestingly: I have noticed how we type automatically -- I think there is some muscle memory in typing that sometimes comes out when it does not for pen on paper. I think the connection between sound and typing is somehow there as well. It is not as if people do not know the difference, for example, between there and their or hear and here but typing might actually have the wrong one come out.
There have been times when there was a joke I could have made related to a mispelling that I really (weally) wanted to make but held back for all these reasons as I cannot make it clear that I am going for the humour and not mocking the person for soemthing I could do myself.
And where again is a good spell check mechanism here? -- no, copying into word and back is just not viable.
Interesting point -- there. I don't think that many people here think she is either. However, she is a symbol of a crisis in Canada around reconciliation. I cannot back away from that easily and I suspect others here who are very aware of her not being a social democrat feel similarly. My guess is that this perspective is shared by many in the NDP including the leader.
The NDP has made serious mistakes in candidates ... they could do worse than admit JWR. That said, there is a good argument to make that there are already other strong Indigenous voices within the NDP. Still, it is not my opinion that there are enough -- or near too many.
Actually the idea that there is a single "indigenous" politics is itself indicative of why we need more dialogue. Many indigenous leaders do not like JWR's acceptance of the treaty process and what they see as its fast track to assimilation while many others agree with her views and consider them pragmatic.
Strange how on this board Georgina Jolibois has no cachet as a indigenous woman's voice but a Liberal could lead the party.
There is no single Indigenous politics and more dialogue comes from more Indigenous voices being heard. This is not about a preference here.
I am not saying necessarily that JWR should be accepted but the NDP has accepted others who should not have been candidates. I can see the purpose of the consideration both for the NDP and for voters.
JWR's claim to fame is that she is prepared to stand up for the "principle" of prosecutorial independence, even at the cost of her "dream job" (which is how she herself described her cabinet position).
If that suffices to make someone a member, or supporter - let alone leader - of a democratic socialist party, then we all need to take a significant quantity of pills, and wind down this progressive discussion site.
It would be hilarious if it weren't tragic.
I agree. I only ridicule spelling errors in the writing of self-important writers who can say and do no wrong. No danger that I will ever flame your spelling.
I'm not sure Georgina Delabois has "no cachet" on this board..it's probably just that she hasn't been on the national news in the way JWR has been. And in fairness, there has been a lot of skepticism as to whether JWR should be approached by the NDP or, for that matter if she'd even WANT to join the NDP(she may have been dropping a visual hint of her destiny when she word solid blue for her appearance before the committee).
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/singh-ndp-speech-1.5177568
Here's a nice article on Svend:
Svend Robinson: ‘Our Last Chance to Turn Things Around’
Once the NDP’s radical star, he’s back with an agenda to rescue his party and planet.
https://thetyee.ca/News/2019/06/24/Svend-Robinson-Last-Chance-Turn-Thing...
I still think he would have made (and might yet make) a great leader for the NDP.
If Svend gets the nomination in his riding, I'm probably gonna go up there and help doorbell for him.
Svend won the nomination several months ago (he was acclaimed I think, since he was unopposed).
Terry Beech is the incumbent Liberal MP.
It would be better if the Liberals & NDP weren't fighting each other. Could end up benefitting the Conservatives.
Thanks for clarifying that Svend was already nominated.
Paul Taylor was nominated in Parkdale High Park. The article about Svend was very well done and led me to researching Paul a bit. Here is what his current job's website says about him.
This promo for his nomination campaign tells me he might do well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhDe9GNPmPA
One of his opponents actually ran for mayor of Toronto on an explicitly left-wing platform. Oh well, looks like a nomination contest between 2 people who were super great candidates. Too bad only one of them could have advanced. Contragulations to Paul, and look forward to seeing you as Parkdale's next MP.