The polls suggest that Peter MacKay is the front runner in the Con leadership race. And he is the only candidate so far to have paid the entrance fee. Just one week after officially launching his leadership campaign, MacKay has submitted the full $300,000 fee required to officially enter the race to replace Andrew Scheer. But if anyone thinks that MacKay is the one who can give the Cons a brighter future, they are doomed to be sadly disappointed. For he seems to want to take the Cons back to the past.
Even by the standards of Stephen Harper's Big Brother Batty government it was a surrealistic and sordid sight.
The Cons going after Frank Graves and the CBC like a pack of rabid teabaggers. Accusing them of starting a culture war.
“They [the opposition MPs on the committee] voted AGAINST a Conservative motion to require CBC executives to explain themselves for using Frank Graves, a Liberal-supporting and self-described ‘progressive’ as the network’s ‘neutral’ pollster on party politics,” the talking points say.
“By voting against this motion, they are endorsing Graves’s call for a ‘Culture War’.” At the next election, the Tories say the choice is clear between a Conservative government or a “reckless coalition” that will wage a war to divide the country.
When the only reason they are going after the CBC is because they hate Canada soooo much. And they were the ones who started this war from the moment they came to power.
The Conservatives have been waging a non-stop political culture war of their own against "Liberals, socialists and separatists" ever since they won power in 2006, daily accusing their opponents of being anti-Semitic, anti-American, soft on crime, soft on child pornography, unpatriotic, attacking and undermining "our troops," and the list goes on.
Virtually every wedge issue in the political handbook has been pile-driven into the Canadian body politic, the impact doubled by a perpetual election campaign of attack ads to destroy, not just their opponents' policies, but their personas.
All Frank Graves did was call this assault by its proper name. And point out that it's really a clash between Canadian and Amerikan values. That we are the Canadians and they are the AmeriCons.
And of course, that if the cranky old rednecks in Alberta don't like it they should move south and vote for Sarah Palin and her teabagging scum.
By attacking Frank Graves like a bunch of Bush bullies they have only proved his point. By putting their evil ideological agenda before the lives of poor women, they have exposed themselves as the monsters who would change our country beyond recognition.
Either we as a nation are officially casting ourselves as hypocrites in our dealings with others, since abortion is a right for all women in this country.
Or, by signalling such a position, Stephen Harper is sending a not very subtle message to his political base that a majority Conservative government in Canada would reopen the debate on a woman's right to choose in this country.
They want to ban abortion. They want to exterminate gay rights. They want to turn this country into a theocratic jungle.
But we won't let them. Because unlike these AmeriCons we love our beautiful Canada. And we will teach these misogynistic, homophobic, religious extremists a lesson they will NEVER forget.
I tuned in to Power and Politics this afternoon to see Frank Graves getting mugged by the Con flunky Kory Teneycke because of some advice he gave the Liberals. Frank Graves of Ekos Research, in agreement with the analysis, has told the Grits that the wedge politics of the Conservatives provide them with an opportunity to stake out a stark alternative. Stop worrying about the West, he’s told them. No need to fear polarizing the debate. It’s what worked for Mr. Chrétien against Preston Manning and Stockwell Day.
“I told them that they should invoke a culture war. Cosmopolitanism versus parochialism, secularism versus moralism, Obama versus Palin, tolerance versus racism and homophobia, democracy versus autocracy. If the cranky old men in Alberta don’t like it, too bad. Go south and vote for Palin.”
But I think that a Con like Korny calling anyone too partisan is like Harper calling anyone a liar and a dictator. And that Frank Graves deserves a medal, because he's absolutely right. That is the missing narrative, and the ONLY way to go.
The Cons have been playing wedge politics from the moment they came to power. They've been waging a culture war against our precious Canadian institutions. They are racists, homophobes, dangerous religious fanatics, sinister autocrats, they're raping our values, and trying to turn us into Amerikans. If that isn't a culture war what do you call it?
Michael Ignatieff has been playing a fool's game by sucking up to Alberta.
When NOTHING he ever says or does will make the rednecks and oil pimps in that province vote for him. And his support for the oil sands only loses him votes in a province like Quebec.
Instead he should be attacking the province for torching the planet, smearing Canada's reputation abroad, and destroying manufacturing jobs in provinces like B.C. and Ontario...where the next election will be decided. Attacking the theocons in the PMO and standing up for our secular values.
I think it's time to give the Cons a taste of their own medicine. Let's give them a wedgie they can CHOKE ON.
Nothing will heal the divisions in this country. Stephen Harper has made sure of that. So let's use them to our advantage to beat these AmeriCon thugs over the head, and win the war for the country that reflects our CANADIAN values..
Because it's about time
It isn’t complicated. The choice between Harper Conservatism and progressive Liberalism is amply clear. Thus far, Mr. Harper has done a better job of articulating his brand than the Liberals have done of theirs. He knows how to fight a culture war. They've barely been trying.
Oh yeah...and if those Cons and rednecks don't like it we tell them to go south and vote for Palin eh?
