Don Mills is the latest fan of the provincial Conservatives to turn on them savagely.
The St. John’s Board of Trade had Don back to deliver a luncheon speech this week. According to CBC, Mills said:
"The downside of Danny Williams, and I have a lot of respect for him, is that he doubled the provincial budget within that timeframe too," … "He left the province with a structural budget problem that is going to be difficult to fix."
Mills also endorsed the private sector as the engine of economic growth, something Williams firmly opposed.
A decade ago, Mills couldn’t say enough about Williams the Wonderful. Now, Mills cannot distance himself enough from Old Twitchy and his legacy of what Mills calls “a structural budget problem.”
Back then Mills marvelled at how popular Williams was. Unprecedented popularity. And when asked about the prospect that Williams was massaging the polls, Mills declared his polls were ungooseable.
Sure, they were, Don. Sure they were.
Mills was so tight with Williams’ way that when Old Twitchy and his folks wanted to withhold a public opinion poll because it contained proprietary information, Mills agreed.
The thing is, though, that Williams never changed. Mills did. He’s not alone. An awful lot of the people - like Mills – who helped foster delusions about Williams have turned on the former Glorious Leader. The crowd who helped sustain what Mills now calls a “lost decade.” have changed their tune.
That’s what happens when demagogues and their progeny fall from power. If Williams still had any political mojo, guys like Mills would be minding their tongue like they used to. As the Conservatives teeter on the edge of political oblivion, people seem to have discovered the rights of things. They haven’t really. Kicking the corpse doesn’t take much in the way of principles or balls.
There’s no accident the Board of Trade brought Mills over from Halifax. The Board has been moving away from the Conservatives over the past few months. Mills fits their new way of looking at the world. Ditto some of the media types who once considered the first draft of history was best rendered as hagiography. Things have shifted to the point where even provincial Conservatives are openly turning up at Liberal Party events.
Just as the opinion leaders are changing their tune, so too are the ordinary folks.turning against the Conservatives. In a few months time you won’t be able to find anybody who knew a provincial Conservative let alone voted for one.
That’s just the way politics trends in Newfoundland and Labrador.
-srbp-
