The Racist Cons and the Fake News Election

I spent most of the long weekend far from the madding crowd, recovering from a particularly gruelling exam.

With only the sound of the rain beating down, and a passing yacht club boat chugging along to remind me that Spring had finally arrived.

But what I was also reminded about was that there are now just six months before the next election.

An election that will determine in a very real way, whether this country as we know it lives or dies.



For let there be absolutely no doubt that if Andrew Scheer and his ugly Cons do manage to win that election, they will make the dark years of the Harper Regime look like a walk in the park.

Especially after a campaign that the Con friendly host of Power and Politics Vassy Kapelos predicts will be ugly. 

One person working on the Liberals' campaign told me the federal election will make Alberta's "look like a day at Disneyland." Hours after Jason Kenney's win, a federal Conservative — victory drink in hand — told me the federal "battle" will be "bloodier, much bloodier."



With some of the cartoons in the Con media already verging on cannibalism.

And with Scheer's ex-rebel campaign manager Hamish Marshall recently sending out a mass mailing to their bestial supporters, which seems to suggest that the Cons are preparing to unleash an epidemic of fake news.

Beyond surveying supporters’ news diet, the mail-out asks whether the party should “bypass” the news media and instead hone “an aggressive social media strategy to communicate with people directly in their homes or on their mobile devices” and whether the party “should focus on direct voter contact … that will allow us to take our message to voters unfiltered.”

 It also asks whether the campaign should prioritize local and community media outlets, and invest more in advertising and a “sophisticated ground game” in order to “counter the efforts of pro-media news organizations.”

And at a time when far-right bots are already popping up everywhere like some foul fungus, everything suggests that the Cons are getting ready to amplify those messages and bury reality under a heap of fake news excrement.

Which of course makes sense because the Cons are increasingly anxious to bury two stories. One, the story of how the Cons are prepared to let Canada and the planet burn by not doing anything to fight climate change.

And two, the story about how they have become the party of  far-right extremists, and the home of the racists.

For this poll result couldn't be clearer.



And the results couldn't be more troubling. 

With even supposedly small-L liberal Edmonton becoming a stalking ground for far-right extremists.

And yellow vested fascists rearing their ugly heads all over the country...



And what makes all of this even worse, is that although Andrew Scheer has helped promote some of their deranged racist conspiracy theories.



And although he has played footsie with them, most recently at that rally on parliament hill...



The Con media seems to think it's OK for Scheer to call Trudeau a criminal, but not OK for Trudeau to call Scheer a bigot.  

The prime minister’s rhetoric in recent days suggests that in the six months before the next federal election, the Liberal leader is not planning to rely solely on his “sunny ways” playbook of 2015. 

Yes, he still talks up climate change and the strength of Canada’s diversity. But he is more than willing to take the gloves off and hit his opponents hard.

With Tonda MacCharles who promoted the fake scandal with the intensity of a religious fanatic, dredging up analysts to condemn Trudeau.

While Andrew Coyne, who lost both his credibility and his marbles over that scandal, even suggesting that Liberal bots not Con bots are the real problem:


Which forced me to reply like this:



Because the fact is, as far as I know, there are no Liberal bots. If people like Coyne are allowed to get away with bullshit like that we might as well rollover and play dead. 

And the non fake news story all Con media outlets should be promoting instead is that Andrew Scheer has just been exposed, again, as a serial liar and a cheat.


Which is one more good reason why that creepy Con must never become Prime Minister.

And the good news?

Justin Trudeau is right. The next election is going to be “about what kind of country we want to live in, and who we want to be.”


Lynn Meyers/Tofino

With six months to go the battle to save that country has begun. 

And we'll get a chance to send the Cons not one but two messages.

This country belongs to us, Trumplings.

And bigots are not welcome...