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13 January 2017

Conservatives and Millennials #nlpoli #cdnpoli

The talk was supposed to be about the political culture in Newfoundland and Labrador.  Does it ever change?

What Tim Powers wound up spending a lot of time talking about was Donald Trump,  millennials, and Liberal Party databases in the last election.

Not surprising, really, given that Tim is a veteran Conservative backroom guy and the federal Conservatives have been looking at how the Liberals bumped them out of power in the 2015 federal election.  They are so fascinated by the Liberals' internal campaign management system they have been complaining that the Prime Minister's national tour is just an excuse to build up a contact database.

Yes, b'y,  like there is no other way to collect names, telephones, and email addresses and collecting them is all there is to it.

Tim knows there is more to it, of course,  just like he knows how to keep your profile high should you take the plunge and go after the Conservative nod in St. John's East next time around.  Host the province-wide open line show every now and again and produce your own political show a couple of nights a week on the same radio network.  Accepting the chance to speak to a varied crowd of political watchers on a cool January night wouldn't hurt either.  If nothing else, it gave the chance to show off the relaxed and entertaining manner of a veteran public speaker.  When you can charm folks, it never hurts to do so and Powers was nothing Wednesday evening if not charming.

Kevin O'Leary came up a few times in Powers' talk, as well, which is no surprise given that Powers wandered off his topic a fair bit.  Not likely to support O'Leary, Tim was quick to say, in case anyone wondered.

But it is rather interesting that both Tim and Kevin wound up talking about millennial as if they were the political equivalent of fentanyl - cure all that ails you lickety-split - but without the risk of death from easy overdose. "We were particularly surprised by the high levels of support from those in the 18 to 24 age groups,"the head of O'Leary's campaign committee told the putative candidate in a letter released to news media on Wednesday.  "This is an important voter group for the Conservative Party of Canada, and their passion for your candidacy is promising."

Important voter group for Conservatives.

If Tim Powers' talk on Wednesday is any indication, millennials are very important indeed.

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