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Weary and out of time, the politicians get honest in the last days of their campaigns. They have no other choice.
With voting day in sight, the leaders reveal how they believe they’re doing by where they spend their time. Justin Trudeau is barnstorming ridings his party hasn’t held in years, especially around Toronto; Stephen Harper’s showing up to protect seats that would have been considered safe Tory territory six weeks ago; Tom Mulcair’s abandoning lost causes in Quebec while hitting potential pickups in places like Edmonton where he might establish beachheads for future campaigns.
None of them is here in the capital, even with some close races still uncertain. Too little bang for the buck. One rally in the riding-dense 905 belt could make a difference in multiple seats, whereas ridings in sprawling Ottawa need to be hit one at a time. Maybe we’ll get a quick swing-through by a leader on his way somewhere else.
More than their strategic deployment of their leaders, when candidates and campaigners are worn out and overwrought with euphoria or desperation, we get to see who they really are.
The Liberals, looking at the polls and smelling victory, suddenly have to contend with a campaign co-chair, Dan Gagnier — whose day job is in the consulting business — telling clients how to prepare to lobby the new government, as if they’ve learned not a thing in the last 10 years. Here in Ottawa, they brought in Jean Chrétien for rallies in Ottawa West-Nepean and Pontiac like he’s some kind of a hero. (Remember APEC? Adscam? Shawinigate? God, those were the days!) Ottawa Centre candidate Catherine McKenna, hoping to squeak past the NDP’s Paul Dewar after many months of top-quality campaigning, rolled a video urging you to vote for her primarily because she’s a woman.
The New Democrats, hoping to save the furniture, released a platform stuffed with promises Tom Mulcair hasn’t really talked about on the campaign trail. Old-school NDP stuff, like regulating bank-machine fees, hiring an ombudsman to “investigate complaints about practices in the gasoline market,” and passing an “Environmental Bill of Rights” to complicate all legislation forevermore. The leader’s run a centrist campaign but now that things look bleak, the NDP’s reverted to type. They’ve also been whingeing endlessly about Gagnier.
Maybe worst of all, the Conservatives have unleashed the party id even as they’ve locked down their actual candidates — accusing the Liberals of being pro-prostitution and pro-drugs, sending Stephen Harper out to play game-show host with kaching!-kaching!-kaching! sound effects as a willing volunteer piles money on a table to show how the Liberals will bleed you dry. And then rallying with Toronto’s comic-book-villain Ford brothers. For days, they’ve been headlining press releases with “Hold on to your wallet” as they decry the Liberal policy target du jour. The Harper Tories’ selling point has always been that they might be tools, but at least they’re tools with some principles. Love of power has obscured the last of those.
There are good reasons for them all to behave this way. The Liberals used to benefit from an aura of inevitability and it seems to be helping them again this time. New Democrats’ fortunes rise and fall, but they seem to do best when they aren’t pretending to be centrists. And the Conservatives suck up to their core voters by demonstrating that, whatever the merits of their positions, or their friends, at least they’re angry about the right things.
There’s stuff to dislike in all of them: entitlement, goofiness, contempt. All on display now that the filters are down. This shows us how they’ll behave when things get difficult for any of them in government, as it inevitably will no matter whom we elect — when they don’t know what else to do, they will do something like what they’re doing now. This is useful information, like what we learn when Mary Walsh charges up to a political leader flapping a plastic sword.
Which of these parties can you stand when they’re at their worst? That’s probably the best way to vote.
dreevely@ottawacitizen.com
twitter.com/davidreevely
查看原文...
With voting day in sight, the leaders reveal how they believe they’re doing by where they spend their time. Justin Trudeau is barnstorming ridings his party hasn’t held in years, especially around Toronto; Stephen Harper’s showing up to protect seats that would have been considered safe Tory territory six weeks ago; Tom Mulcair’s abandoning lost causes in Quebec while hitting potential pickups in places like Edmonton where he might establish beachheads for future campaigns.
None of them is here in the capital, even with some close races still uncertain. Too little bang for the buck. One rally in the riding-dense 905 belt could make a difference in multiple seats, whereas ridings in sprawling Ottawa need to be hit one at a time. Maybe we’ll get a quick swing-through by a leader on his way somewhere else.
More than their strategic deployment of their leaders, when candidates and campaigners are worn out and overwrought with euphoria or desperation, we get to see who they really are.
The Liberals, looking at the polls and smelling victory, suddenly have to contend with a campaign co-chair, Dan Gagnier — whose day job is in the consulting business — telling clients how to prepare to lobby the new government, as if they’ve learned not a thing in the last 10 years. Here in Ottawa, they brought in Jean Chrétien for rallies in Ottawa West-Nepean and Pontiac like he’s some kind of a hero. (Remember APEC? Adscam? Shawinigate? God, those were the days!) Ottawa Centre candidate Catherine McKenna, hoping to squeak past the NDP’s Paul Dewar after many months of top-quality campaigning, rolled a video urging you to vote for her primarily because she’s a woman.
The New Democrats, hoping to save the furniture, released a platform stuffed with promises Tom Mulcair hasn’t really talked about on the campaign trail. Old-school NDP stuff, like regulating bank-machine fees, hiring an ombudsman to “investigate complaints about practices in the gasoline market,” and passing an “Environmental Bill of Rights” to complicate all legislation forevermore. The leader’s run a centrist campaign but now that things look bleak, the NDP’s reverted to type. They’ve also been whingeing endlessly about Gagnier.
Maybe worst of all, the Conservatives have unleashed the party id even as they’ve locked down their actual candidates — accusing the Liberals of being pro-prostitution and pro-drugs, sending Stephen Harper out to play game-show host with kaching!-kaching!-kaching! sound effects as a willing volunteer piles money on a table to show how the Liberals will bleed you dry. And then rallying with Toronto’s comic-book-villain Ford brothers. For days, they’ve been headlining press releases with “Hold on to your wallet” as they decry the Liberal policy target du jour. The Harper Tories’ selling point has always been that they might be tools, but at least they’re tools with some principles. Love of power has obscured the last of those.
There are good reasons for them all to behave this way. The Liberals used to benefit from an aura of inevitability and it seems to be helping them again this time. New Democrats’ fortunes rise and fall, but they seem to do best when they aren’t pretending to be centrists. And the Conservatives suck up to their core voters by demonstrating that, whatever the merits of their positions, or their friends, at least they’re angry about the right things.
There’s stuff to dislike in all of them: entitlement, goofiness, contempt. All on display now that the filters are down. This shows us how they’ll behave when things get difficult for any of them in government, as it inevitably will no matter whom we elect — when they don’t know what else to do, they will do something like what they’re doing now. This is useful information, like what we learn when Mary Walsh charges up to a political leader flapping a plastic sword.
Which of these parties can you stand when they’re at their worst? That’s probably the best way to vote.
dreevely@ottawacitizen.com
twitter.com/davidreevely
查看原文...
