Unfit to govern: Costing confusion on Connie Plan leaves media bewildered

Check Bob Fife's debrief on the Conservative newser and media briefing over at CTV.ca.

As Fife put it, the confusion was such today that: "[w]hen you can't explain that it adds up immediately, it raises questions about their [the Conservatives] whole ability to be able to govern."

The Conservatives will outspend the New Democrats in a combination of tax cuts and spending that adds up to $75 billion dollars. After much too and fro - and apparently some confuddled explanations - the figure was revised to $60 billion. In between the number hit $67 billion and then the Conservatives apparently announced more spending.

This comes from something called "reallocation", which apparently means there will be some sort of "slow down" in spending for Human Resources Canada and Industry Canada. There is also an expectation of growth in the economy resulting from tax cuts.

Decipher that doublespeak about slowing things down in at least two departments and you can see the words "program cuts". Something has to go to make room for other things. The question will be what is set to be killed off.

There was some initial confusion over the numbers. Before the formal announcement of the platform, journalists were given a first look at the costing in a media lockup.

From CTV.ca:

CTV's Ottawa bureau chief Robert Fife said it took puzzled Tory officials a long time to come to an agreement over the total net cost.

"It turns out that total promises for the Conservative party adds up to $75 billion. When there is reallocation we are told it is $60.7 billion," said Fife.

He added: "It took a combination of effort by everybody, the media and the Tory officials, to get to this $75 billion -- and then some subtraction and fooling around until we finally got to, what they say, is the accurate figure of $60.7 billion."

From the clip:

Fife: Well, they finally released their total platform document and they tried to give Tuesday costing figures but I have to say there was a lot of confusion, a lot of voodoo economics this morning as we tried to figure out where the Conservative platform was going in terms of cost.

For a long period of time they could not add up the figures.

Reporters as you know, we are not good at mathematics but one of my colleagues were saying that they were trying to do Liberal math compared to Conservative math and my friend Tom Clark says it is only math can you please add it up for us.

It turns out that their total promises for the Conservative Party adds up to $75 billion. When there is reallocation we are told it is $60.7 billion. But this took about an hour or so of discussions and adding up to get to this figure of about $67 billion. Total tax measures are about 44.9 billion. Other spending initiatives I don't want to go there because it was so confusing even Monte Solberg the conservative finance critic did not explain that ...

It is a slip-up. I mean, this is a very important part of the Conservative government's [sic] platform. They have done a very good job from day one, issue-driven, a policy a day, well thought out, generally well thought-out policies, populous policies, consumer-driven policies that seem to have struck a chord with Canadians.

When you put it together you want to be able to tell the Canadians look, this plan adds up. When you can't explain that it adds up immediately, it raises questions about their whole ability to be able to govern. And I mean, that is the questions that he was getting in the room today is we wanted to know, tell us how much it will cost. How does it add up when they weren't able to do that and then they started to give conflicting numbers, a lot of head-scratching which the journalists...

Ravi: What about Monte Solberg, was in in command of the facts there? He being the finance transit critic.

Fife: Monte Solberg is a good guy. I would not give him high grades for his performance today.

Release the Zeisman form

British Columbia Conservative spokesperson Colin Metcalfe [<-- requires RealPlayer] told CBC in British Columbia that Derek Zeisman filled out a form as part of the nomination process in which he was supposed to disclose relevant information.

If Zeisman failed to disclose, then the Conservatives can simply make the completed form public. Any sensitive information can be blanked out in a noticeable way. It's a fairly simple thing.

Of course Metcalfe couldn't explain how this guy could appear in court several times and no one noticed.

No one.

I am not making this up.

Then there's Zeisman, Day Three of Connie spin

The Vancouver Province is quoting Derek Zeisman as saying that the federal Conservative party knew all about the "administrative charges" he faces.

"Administrative charges". That's the new Conservative-speak word for allegedly trying to smuggle a Mercedes-Benz and 112 bottles of liquor across the border. The maximum penalty on conviction for these "administrative" infractions, which will be heard in British Columbia Provincial Court, could be a fine of up to $50, 000 and up to six months in jail.

Zeisman said: "The Conservative Party is aware of this [the charges]."

Now that's interesting. I was suspicious of the Conservative position from the get-go. It would be standard procedure for any political party, let alone the party of Law & Order [every night, on some channel and still on NBC] to do a background check on prospective candidates.

Heck I think these guys likely have their own CPIC account. That's the nationwide police criminal database.

(Left: Conservative Party background checker Ralph Wiggum, shortly before his retirement as Springfield chief of police.)

But to listen to Stephen Harper, he is surrounded by by people who didn't see fit to ask even the simplest of simple questions: are you bondable? Or maybe even: is there anything that might pop up in the media about you that might be a problem?

Harper didn't even ask the checkers those simple questions.

Compare that Jean Boyle-like shifting of responsibility to the way Prime Minister Paul Martin has handled the "military ad" thing. One pushes it away. One steps up to the plate. Hmmm.

Both Zeisman and Conservative Party campaign chair John Reynolds used almost identical phrases, referring to "administrative procedures" or "administrative charges" when talking about the matter.

That was when the Conservatives were standing behind their man fully.

The other thing you'll learn from the Province is that the former incumbent, Zeisman's old boss, won the seat by only 780 votes.

It was curious why the Conservatives didn't just forfeit the seat by having Zeisman resign for all his alleged and real failings. (Alleged = smuggling; real = failure to disclose relevant information]

Now we know:

They want every vote they can count on. This seat is a potential squeeker and they want to make sure it squeeks Conservative.

It all bobs to the surface

Call them floaters.

The stuff you'd like to go away but just won't sink. Thanks to Canadian Press and the story at canoe.ca for helping things bob to the surface.

Like Stephen Harper and Kyoto. He admitted in Halifax yesterday that under a Harper government, Kyoto: up the chimney faster than carbon dioxide emissions from a coke plant.

Like Jack Layton. Turns out that Jack had hernia surgery at a private clinic in the 1990s.

Like Stevie again and missile defence. Canadians said no. Harper would wait for a formal invitation before doing something. The wording suggests that the idea could be turned over to a free vote. Take a close look at the wording of the quote though and you'd think the option of turning the proposal over to a free vote in the Commons is the bit that hinges on it being in the national interest.

Incidentally, since when is a matter of national defence not in the national interest?

Sounds odd.

A bit like saying the provinces jurisdiction in international affairs must be recognized.

Or that Canada has had a handgun ban for decades and it's working just fine.

The Orchestra pit theory of political news coverage

This is as good a time as any to remind people of the Orchestra Pit Theory of political communications.

Credit for coming up with the little anecdote to illustrate the point goes to Roger Ailes, who these days heads up Fox News but in a previous life was a Republican Party communications whiz.

Basically, if there are two politicians on stage, one announces a cure for cancer and one falls into the orchestra pit, the guy in the pit will get the coverage.

There are a couple of versions of this going around. google and you'll find one. James Carville and Paul Begalla tell a slightly different version of it in their 2002 book Buck up, suck up and come back after you foul up.

As Carville and Begalla put it, news media love "to cover only four things in politics: scandals, gaffes, polls and attacks. Three of them are bad. So if you want to get coverage go on the offensive and stay there."

Of course, it should go without saying that it all depends on who you at aiming at in the offensive. Candidates normally aim at their opponent and as long as the attacks are factual, everything is just fine.

There will be people who bleat, complain and pontificate, but political campaigns are a winner-take-all affair.

After all, people have a right to see the sharp lines between candidates. Voters are choosing people to run our country, to make decisions that will affect each and every one of us on a daily basis. The choices aren't the same as which brand of toothpaste to buy. People deserve the chance to see the sharp lines between candidates and heaven knows there are sharp lines out there among all the contenders.

For some reason, this election has largely been about erasing the distinctions among the parties. Fundamentally, that's wrong.

[Fundamentally it's wrong for a crowd to sanctimoniously condemn attack ads and then run an entire campaign of their own around attacks.

But I digress.]

With all that in mind, have a look around and see if you can find genuine distinctions between candidates or among parties. There aren't as many as you'd think on major policy issues. In fact, it is almost scary the extent to which Conservatives are taking up New Democrat turf of supposedly detesting Americans, New Democrats want to get tough on crime and Liberals are the guys preaching fiscal responsibility, more cash for health care and people are pounding them.

Sharpening up the distinctions at election serves a useful purpose beyond giving political junkies something to blog about.

Planning a campaign that aims to differentiate a party from its rivals clears the political skulls. It sets a clear goal that the party can shoot for.

And voters would be able to hold political candidates and political parties genuinely accountable for things they would actually be able to do.

However, when campaigns are designed to blur distinctions, or push you to vote against something, everyone is getting shafted. We don't need proportional representation, or a reformed senate to fix elections.

We need political parties to actually stand for something different.

Consistently.

Harper now backs ACOA

Stephen Harper has decided that if he gets to 24 Sussex in a few weeks, he'll keep the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, an organization he vowed to get rid of just last year.

h/t to Andrew Coyne.

Harper shifts position, temporarily, on accused candidate

UPDATE BELOW

What a difference the light of day makes.

A difference, alright, just not much of a difference.

On Wednesday, the Conservatives were standing behind Derek Zeisman.

On Thursday, after the case of the candidate accused of smuggling gained national attention, Conservative boss Stephen Harper has announced that Zeisman will still carry the Conservative banner in the federal election but he just won't be able to sit in a Conservative caucus if elected, at least until the court case is resolved. [Corrected to reflect the details of the Canada Elections Act, as pointed out by a more-knowledgeable reader.]

Zeisman's bio has been removed from Conservative.ca, but he will apparently still be the official Conservative candidate on the ballot.

While he has not been convicted, Zeisman failed to disclose the charges against him to Harper and the federal Conservative Party didn't check Zeisman's credentials. When asked about it, Harper sloughed responsibility for the problem onto other people for failing to complete the appropriate checks, despite being the person ultimately responsible for approving candidates.

Compare Harper's position on his own responsibilities to the Conservative position on ministerial accountability. Harper made his initial comments in front of a Conservative backdrop featuring the word "accountability".

Update: The correction above notes that apparently the Conservatives can't punt the guy and block him from carrying the party banner. Fair enough.

Two things still apply:

1. This should have been caught by the approvals process. Harper's attempt to push the responsibility for this situation to the candidate and to unnamed officials of the party isn't good enough to meet the standards of accountability to be expected here.

2. Why was the first response to back the guy up and downplay the charges because they weren't under the Criminal Code?

Zeisman should have been strongly encouraged to resign from the ballot. Period.

Of course, given the guy's background, Harper can count on his vote if he gets elected, regardless of where in the House he sits.

Outside of caucus isn't much of a change.

Connie campaign chair sets the bar low

These comments from Connie campaign chair John Reynolds may give a sense of the high standards of integrity we can expect from a Conservative government.

Speaking of Derek Zeisman's charges for attempting to smuggle a car and 112 bottles of liquor across the border, Reynold's said that even if Zeisman were convicted "it's not a criminal offence."

So breaking the law is ok, as long as it isn't a violation of the Criminal Code.

Reynold's just gave us the sense of the ethical standards a Harper government would apply.

Talking about change isn't good enough, John.

Connies to grab more taxes from 200, 000 Newfoundlanders and Labradorians

According to David Cochrane of CBC Radio news, the Conservatives plans to raise taxes and lower basic personal exemptions will see more than 200, 000 Newfoundland and Labradorians will be seeing tax increases this year. That's two thirds of the province's workforce, if memory serves

The Conservatives will reverse Liberal tax cuts that took affect this year for those in the lowest income brackets.

Local Conservative candidates Norm Doyle and Loyola Hearn voted against a tax cut last year and will now support a tax increase. They claim a cut to the GST is just as good or better.

The Harper GST cut will shave a maximum of two cents off a large double double cup of coffee. It would take tens of thousands of cups of coffee annually to save the $400 the Conservatives claimed an average family would save from the cut.

Great visuals, Steve

Yep, right there in front of a big backdrop with the word "Accountability" plastered on it:

Stephen Harper, defending the Conservatives for running as a candidate someone who is charged with smuggling a Mercedes and a huge quantity of liquor across the border, by saying "I depend on other people to do stuff like background checks for me."

The last thing a leader does is sluff the blame onto someone else, especially when it's your signature at the bottom of the candidate's nomination paperwork, Steve.

Best line from accused smuggler and Connie candidate Derek Zeisman's official bio:

"In his capacity as a foreign service officer with the Canadian Diplomatic Corps, Derek served as a policy analyst on issues relating to the Canadian-US. border."

Zeisman contributed an essay somewhere along the line on what he would do as prime minister. Among his proposals:

- abolish the Charter of Rights and Freedoms - "While, in theory, a liberal and democratic concept, the Charter actually flies in the face of every democratic virtue cherished by Canadians.";

- abolish all taxes on corporations, industries and business;

- implement a user-pay approach to infrastructure spending;

- "explore" a North American monetary union (single currency);

- annex the Turks and Caicos (what is it with Connies and Caribbean islands?)

- "run-off" elections, involving two voting days for each of the 308 seats in the Commons;

- a senate appointed by provincial premiers, based on party standings in the provincial legislature at the time of appointment.

Meanwhile, Berk doesn't have anything on this story that led CTV's nation news Wednesday night. Nope. He's leading with a story that Susan Murray said the word "bullshit" live on air during an interview...and oh yes...Angelina Jolie is having Brad's baby.

Bourque Newswatch: Bigger. Bolder. Better.

Thanks for the free air time

How much news time has been devoted to the Liberal Party's most recent television commercials?

Measure it in hours.

Bourque Berk teed off on the Liberal's John Duffy and praised Mike Duffy for standing up to the Liberals before a controversial spot went to air. Then the Puffster aired the thing, just like CBC did on national radio news today.

Smart communications people know how to multiply the impact of their efforts by picking up tons of free/earned media. Nothing like dropping an ad and then pulling it back to stir a controversy and get to talk even more about the veracity of the ad campaign that just got covered, for free, as part of the news.

Thanks for the free air time ladies and gentlemen.

And thanks, Berk. Either you are the second most successful Liberal mole in history or you are a lot less media savvy than you claim.

and to that certain long-time Liberal Eastern mole in the Connie camp:

John has a long moustache.

The chair is against the door.

You know what to do next.

*Wink* *Wink*

[Note: From Andrew's link below, I realised he didn't get it that I was referring to the Liberal mole running part of the Connie campaign. He is likely the most successful one in history, having served longer than the Cambridge ring served the Moscow cause. Hence, the clarified reference to the Liberal mole. We don't need an extra click on the conference calls. Our mole has his own dial-in code.]

Update:

Thanks for the traffic, Andrew Coyne.

Of course, it's a given that Conservative and New Democrat supporters will think the entire Liberal ad campaign at this point is "desperate" or "false" or whatever else.

Sorry to disappoint you, my Con and Dipper friends, but you aren't the target audience.

Think about it this way.

Front page of the Globe today: Full colour panels of the spots, other than the military one, all featuring great quotes. Front page. Starting above the fold. Across the country.

Then there's Jason Kenney's newser today in which he talks about "the most vicious, baseless attack ad that our politics has ever seen."

I guess Kenney's hyperbole would be creditable were it not for the genuinely baseless and debased attacks mounted by the Conservatives against Jean Chretien in 1993 and the Harper attack on Paul Martin as a child molester from last year. The Conservatives withdrew the Chretien smear "eventually" as CTV reports and last time I checked, the Conservatives spent a lot of time deciding whether or not the child molester thing was good or bad. Even Mr. Harper himself seemed to stand behind it.

Then, of course, there's the orchestrated campaign to label Belinda Stronach a "whore".

Or, the entire Conservative campaign this time around built around a deliberate misrepresentation of the Gomery Report.

Compare that to what happened in the last 24 hours or so.

The real problem here might be that, with the exception of the military spot, the rest are all genuine Stephen Harper quotes. If they weren't likely to have an effect, the entire Conservative election machine wouldn't be spewing venom and spittle over them.

In 1993, the public rejected the Conservatives genuinely desperate efforts to cling to power. They didn't need to be told what to think.

Just relax guys and take a breath: We'll know in a couple of days whether or not the ads worked.

Harper's CIA: CP and the Sun catch up

From the Toronto Sun today, a story on the Harper plan for a Canadian overseas spy agency, covered here days ago.

Bond Papers readers heard all about it last Friday.

Canadian Press missed a key point though: rather than expand an existing service as the Harper backgrounder stated, a Conservative government would have to create one.

They also never asked why the whole issue was buried at the tail end of a backgrounder to a media event largely devoted to exploiting the gun violence in Toronto.

Connies adrift on Atlantic - updated

Check out the Conservative television spot aimed at what they label as "Atlantic".

Then listen to the fake presenter talking about Stephen Harper's connections to the "Martimes", as if the two were the same thing. Then there's a switch by Harper to talking about Atlantic Canadians. Mixing the two is a habit for Canadians not familiar with the places east of Cornwall, Ontario. Maritimes is a term that predates Confederation in 1949.

Then the guy who talked about a culture of dependence in Atlantic spouts a new message: a positive one about wanting to help Atlantic Canadians.

or was it Maritimers?

To put this in perspective for people not from Atlantic Canada, lumping Newfoundlanders and Labradorians in with people from Nova Scotia is like saying that everything from the Ontario border to British Columbia is "the West": a big, homogeneous mass without specific issues and different cultures within each province.

It's like listening to people not from Atlantic Canada talking about driving through all four provinces in a day.

Take a map of Atlantic Canada.

Place the easternmost tip, at St. John's, on the Ontario-Manitoba border.

Where does the western tip (Edmundston, New Brunswick) wind up?

Vancouver.

If you get the geography or the names wrong, odds are good you don't fundamentally appreciate very much else, either.

Update:

A sharp-reader took issue with my distance experiement.

Fair enough.

The experiment described above was one used some time ago to impress upon people the size of Atlantic Canada. It's a long-standing local joke the number of people who think they can drive around easily, as I said. Sort of like a European friend of mine who, on coming to Canada, figured we could pop down on the weekend to California. By car. When you have never lived more that 150 miles from the ocean, big is a concept that is a little hard to fathom.

So, I hauled out the atlas and worked it out. East-West the distance goes from the Man/On border to just about Calgary, give or take a bit. It's the north-south distance from the northern tip of Labrador to Cape Sable that stretched on a map far enough to hit Vancouver, give a take a few miles.

The point of the exercise?

Atlantic Canada is a physically large place and within that there are differences of culture, geography and everything else as well as four distinct provinces. It's just as diverse as anywhere else in Canada.

If you go back to the Harper spot, let's take a look at the messages. Harper is asked about his deep roots in "the Maritimes". He talks about how his father had to leave to find opportunity elsewhere, like so many from his generation.

Then he bridges out to a statement that he believes the region should have control of its own resources and that "made in Ottawa solutions are not the answer".

To put it bluntly, this little spot is designed to do two things. First of all, the Conservatives are trying to get past the culture of defeat comment that has dogged Harper since he first made it. He wanted to leave the impression he was fully aware of the region through his father's family. Second of all, the spot is designed to deal with what is perceived to be a common regional attitude.

Unfortunately, what we have here is a caricature - a perception of Atlantic Canada or the Maritimes being the same. And the solution he talks about is an equally simplistic caricature. The "region", actually each of the four provinces, controls its own resources already. There are no "made-in Ottawa" solutions.

At no point, does Harper mention anything specific that a Conservative government might do to deal with this "problem".

Immediately above the "Atlantic" spot on the CPC website is one targeted specifically at British Columbia. That's a telling part of the Conservative approach in this spot - four provinces get lumped together as being somehow as homogeneous in attitudes and opinions as British Columbia. Atlantic Canadian or Maritimer is the identity for local people in the same way that people from the other coast would call themselves British Columbians.

But here's the thing: the sense of identity implicit in the spot is wrong. It comes from people who are not from here. It's a convenient way to describe people in the same wrong-headed way as we sometimes see all people west of described as "westerners" or, indeed of describing all people in the centre of the country as Ontarians.

However, those convenient labels miss so much that is important.

Like I said, get the name wrong and you are likely to get a lot more wrong as well.

Poll-er magic

Take a look at results from an NTV/Telelink poll in Newfoundland and Labrador and the national race looks like a re-run of the same results from last time.

Provincially, Liberals are at 46.4%, Conservatives at 40.5%, NDP at 11.4% and the Greens with 1.7%. Margin of error is 3.1%, 19 times out of 20. Undecided is at 39%.

Flip those numbers through the Hill and Knowlton predictor and the seats stay the same as they are now, with five Liberals and two Conservatives.

On a riding by riding basis, the results are harder to assess, since the margin of error climbs to a little over 8%.

Allowing for that margin of error though, the three seats on the Avalon peninsula are all still in play. In the two seats on the northeast, both Conservative incumbents are not so far ahead that they can be comfortable. In Avalon, where incumbent Liberal John Efford is not running, NTV is reporting the Conservative slightly ahead of Liberal Bill Morrow .

The choice between the past and the future

Elections are about choices.

At no time in recent history have the choices for voters in St. John's South-Mount Pearl and St. John's East as clear as they are in this election.

The two ridings embody not only the current booming oil economy in Newfoundland and Labrador, but also the face of the modern province and its people.

The days of voting for your grandfather's political choice have long been dead across this province, but nowhere more than in the northeast Avalon. True, the ridings, in their old configuration have been Tory (and lately Conservative) almost continuously since Confederation (1949).

The last federal election proved just exactly how much times have changed.

If one looks at Elections Canada vote transpostions, one can see that in the current configuration, the majority of voters in the ridings have traditionally voted Progressive Conservative.

Loyola Hearn believes he had a rough ride last time because public servants were upset with Danny Williams. Nonsense. Mr. Hearn lost 15% of his core vote last time because local Progressive Conservatives could not bring themselves to vote for Stephen Harper and, in Mr. Hearn's case the man who helped Mr. Harper erase the Progressive Conservative Party and its values from the national landscape.

As if that were not enough, earlier this year Mr. Hearn's slavish devotion to his new leader placed him in the most hideous of predicaments. Having lambasted John Efford for supposedly putting Party before province, Mr. Hearn did exactly the same thing. Local Progressive Conservatives, genuine centre-right or even centre-left in their political beliefs, openly expressed their disapproval.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the Hearn campaign and that of his Conservative partner, Norm Doyle. They are desperately trying to tell us that all is well in the local federal Conservative campaigns. They proudly display the pictures and print the quotes from a handful of provincial politicians. Some of the quotes are so out of whack with reality as to be laughable and yet they are presented with the straightest of straight faces. No matter how much they repeat the message, telling us that it is so does not make it so.

There is no small irony either that Mr. Hearn, in particular has taken to presenting himself as someone who will fight for Newfoundland and Labrador. John Efford used to talk of himself like that too. There is no surprise since, despite their being in different political parties, both men are as alike as alike can be. They are relentlessly partisan, were elected to the provincial legislature at the same point in history and, as their public pronouncements would show, devoted to the ideas that were in vogue 20 years ago.

They talk of grievances that are long since past. Their solutions are also from the past. Joint management of the fishery? Sharing decisions about fisheries between two sets of politicians may have made sense when Loyola Hearn first sat in the House of Assembly a quarter century ago. But the fishery of tomorrow cannot be built by continuing to do exactly what we have done in the past, time and again, without success.

Custodial management? That too is an artifact from a bygone era. Ownership of resources? That battle was fought - and won - when both Hearn and Doyle sat in Brian Peckford's cabinet. What else do Hearn and Doyle talk about besides old ideas? Precious little, save what is in the current Harper playbook.

Compare that to the two Liberal candidates or the two New Democrats in the northeast Avalon. In these four we have men and women who represent a new generation of political leaders. Any of them would be creditable members of the national parliament. Take Hearn and Doyle from the choices and one is left in a quandary.

Sadly, not all can make it. What works against both Mike Keough and Peg Norman is not the virtue of their party platforms or their personal qualities and qualifications. What works against them as a political choice is that their party cannot form a government. Their leader, Jack Layton, has set his sights on being the third party in the Commons. Had the New Democrat campaign aimed higher, then voters in the northeast Avalon would have a harder choice.

Put Hearn and Doyle back into the picture and the choice sharpens. Put Hearn and Doyle back and we see the approaches to politics and our society that have been tried and tried and failed and failed.

Put Hearn and Doyle back in the picture and we see the choice between what we have experienced and to which we do not wish to return and the chance to do something different.

We have the choice between past and future.

Siobhan Coady and Paul Antle represent the modern Newfoundland and Labrador. They are both accomplished in their professions. Both own businesses, Antle in environmental services and Coady in both the fishery and in genetic research. They have extensive volunteer backgrounds and involvement in local and national conservation, community service and business organizations. They have represented our province and our country both nationally and internationally; Antle as a delegate to the Johannesberg environmental conference and Coady as chair of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce.

They both value financial responsibility balanced with social responsibility - the hallmarks of the majority of voters in St. John's East and St. John's South-Mount Pearl. They do not say things merely because words can be convenient disguises. They value diversity of opinion and people. They are not urban or rural, townie or baymen - those are labels that simply don't apply anymore. They are as comfortable in Ottawa and Toronto, New York and London as they are in Pouch Cove and Mount Pearl.

Neither shrinks from a challenge.

Coady, in particular, worked tirelessly last year on the offshore deal. Unlike some who attended no meetings that mattered, Coady met the Prime Minister or spoke with him on several occasions including before his visit here in June 2004. She had no difficulty making her position plain and in persuading the Prime Minister to state his position on the offshore unequivocally.

Staunch Hearn and Doyle supporters will not vary their vote, most likely. To the staunch Liberals or the New Democrats, the choice is easy.

But to the 15% or more of progressives who abandoned Mr. Hearn, Mr. Doyle and their leader, there is a choice. There is a choice that represents substantive local change that can, in turn produce substantive national change. To make that work, local Progressive Conservatives who left Hearn and Doyle, the local voters who turned their backs on the past once can take another step by voting for candidates who, personally, are closer to them in outlook and values than any of the others.

The challenge the province faces today is how to build on what we have. The challenge we face is the challenge of change. That challenge can only be met with fresh eyes and an approach that does not look to shopworn approaches and words that were all the rage in the 1970s and 1980s. That challenge can only be met by individuals who have shown they can work together with people from different backgrounds and different ways of doing things.

On January 23rd, we voters in the northeast Avalon must turn our face toward the future and make a choice.

From that perspective, voters in St. John's South-Mount Pearl and St. John's East can make their choice confidently.

Harper health pledge already exists

Remember Stephen Harper's pledge to let people travel to other province's to get health care?

He called it the Patient Wait Times Guarantee.

It already exists.

It's already part of the publicly funded health care system in Canada.

Has been for decades.

That's because the Canada Health Act provides for accessibility to the system at public expense, irrespective of where one is located. If a service isn't available in your area or if you have to go elsewhere to get treatment based on medical advice, then the provincial health care plan has to cover the costs of the medical services.

Harper can implement his plan right away because it already exists.

What Harper isn't talking about is defraying the cost of travel and accommodations.

That system already exists, too, at least in some provinces. The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador announced changes to its program today, which covers the costs of sending people outside the province for medical care. It covers not only procedures that just aren't available. It also covers patients who can't get timely access to care, as determined by their medical practitioners.

The government release is actually a little misleading when it talks about the program starting in 1998. Medical transportation assistance in Newfoundland and Labrador actually dates from the start of the medicare system. It is provided based on the accessibility provisions of the Canada Health Act.

The old program was canceled in 1997 by the Tobin government only to be replaced the next year with a similar program - only major difference is that it went from being fully government funded to being one where the patient and government split the costs.

Medical travel is based on doctor's advice for each patient.

The policy decision is made by the provincial government - the province decides how to spend the cash.

The upshot of it all?

Harper's wait times guarantee is already in place. And for anyone who isn't getting financial assistance to help width travel costs?

Steve doesn't speak about that at all.

Funny + True = Mercer

Rick Mercer's contribution to the Harper machine's election would be even funnier if these people hadn't actually said those things, not in jest but in all seriousness.

Rick does a great service to Canadians by reminding us all of the sorts of people who Stephen Harper is leading.

A tip of the salt n' pepper to Mark.

Martin wins: NLSDU judges

Judges at a fundraiser for the Newfoundland and Labrador Speech and Debate Union (NLSDU) awarded the debate tonight to Paul Martin.

Steve Harper and Gilles Duceppe tied for first in the opinion of judge Liam O'Brien.

Defining moments for your humble e-scribbler and NLSDU judge:

- Paul Martin pledges to remove the notwithstanding clause from the Constitution; Harper wants to keep it just as it, for some unspecified reason.

- Harper scored the only factual errors, claiming that Canada has had a handgun ban for decades and that provinces have jurisdiction in international affairs.

- Harper has a hard time explaining his own tax plan.

- Jack Layton alternates between running for third place with the third option mantra and channelling Lilo and Stitch: no one gets left behind or forgotten.

- Gilles Duceppe keeps pushing what will prove to be a fourth rate book by a fourth rate scribbler, namely Normand Lester.

Hearn backs NAFO and American fishermen

Anti- NAFO crusader Gus Etchegary might want to reconsider his endorsement of Loyola Hearn.

Gus may have missed Hearn's worry that the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization would fold when Americans didn't get their fair share of some fish species.

As VOCM reported in February last year:

Americans may leave NAFO

The opposition fisheries critic says the United States is unhappy with NAFO and may pull out. Loyola Hearn, the MP for St. JohnÂ’s South-Mount Pearl, says he met with a delegation from the US yesterday. He says the Americans are not happy with their fish quota, especially yellow tail flounder, and he says they have a legitimate argument. Hearn says the Americans pay 20 per cent of the costs of NAFO, but get only a fraction of the quota. Hearn sys the Americans have been CanadaÂ’s closest ally in the North Atlantic Fisheries Organization.

or as The Telegram put it two days later:

U.S. ready to leave NAFO: Hearn

The Conservative fisheries critic says the United States is unhappy with NAFO and may pull out.

Tory MP Loyola Hearn says he met with a delegation from the U.S. Tuesday.

He says the Americans are not happy with their fish quota, especially yellow tail flounder - and he says they have a legitimate argument.

Hearn says the Americans have been Canada's closest ally in the international regulatory body.

Of course, the Yanks didn't leave.

But I am wondering why Gus supports Hearn, who supports NAFO when Gus keeps arguing NAFO is the root of all fisheries evil and that foreigners should be driven from the Grand Banks.

Here's one of Etchegary's more temperate remarks:

"I was 25 years with both organizations [NAFO and its predecessor] as a commissioner, representing the industry, and year after year we came out of those annual meetings reporting to the powers that be that these were useless organizations. Both organizations legitimized overfishing practices and killed out fishery. It's as simple as that," he charges. [Emphasis added]

Now reconcile all that with this statement from Hearn's website:

As stated by respected fisheries advocate, Gus Etchegary, "Finally its agreed by political leaders that Custodial Management of fish stocks outside 200 miles by Canada is the only possible way we can save our rural population. We have to thank MP Loyola Hearn for his persistence and tenacity in having a supporting resolution recorded in the House of Commons. Without his dedication it would never have passed."

Gus thinks having Canada take over fisheries management outside the 200 mile limit by illegal means is good; NAFO is bad. Hearn was fighting to save the same NAFO that Gus thought was a joke.

Meanwhile, Hearn's boss, Stephen Harper is backsliding on his promises to Hearn, Etchegary and the people of Newfoundland and Labrador to extend custodial management.

Custodial management is a legal nonsense, of course, but if these three guys - Hearn, Harper and Ethcegary - want to push for it, the least they could do is actually agree among themselves.

Harper backpedals; O'Brien buys a tractor to shove(l) harder

Note: Scroll to the bottom to get to the new bit.

As predicted here a couple of days ago, loyal local Connie Liam O'Brien is defending his leader's backpeddling on custodial management insisting that Harper's Connies are indeed committed to taking custodial management of the Grand Banks.

Ok. Let's look at O'Brien's claims and then let's look at the evidence:

First, let's take the prediction...

**Prediction:

Conservative supporters will dismiss this as irrelevant, insisting Harper is still committed to the concept of protecting fisheries even if he has no commitment actually to do anything any more.

Some Harper loyalists will insist that saying you will do something and saying you'd consider doing something are the same thing.**

Then O'Brien writes:

"Stephen Harper's Conservatives have been committed to taking custodial management over the stocks on the Nose & Tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap for a long time now. Few statements make this clearer than the Party's 2005 Official Policy Document:

"...We will not hesitate to take custodial management of the stocks on the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish cap.... " (Article 99 [ii]) [Emphasis added in O'Brien's original]

This [the Conservative commitment to custodial management] was re-enforced time and again in subsequent releases and visits to NL [sic]. Ed tried his best to read all sorts of things into the fact that the news releases aren't carbon copies of one another. He ignores the CPC's own black and white committed-to policy, the CPC's call for emegency debates [sic] on this very issue in the House, and the fact that this policy is indeed supported by just about everybody -- Liberals, NDPers, Tories, Unions, Industry etc..."

Then in classic Liam fashion he shifts to a different topic.

Let's stick with O'Brien and wipe that up first.

Liam is right. The Conservative statement in the policy manual from last spring, as the party was getting ready for what it thought was an election the, was absolutely unequivocal. "We will not hesitate..."

But if that is the policy, then why isn't it consistently repeated over and over again, as Liam insists it has been in the past?

When the wording of a political commitment changes it usually means the commitment has changed and one can't get any clearer than the Harper changes.

March 2005: "We will not hesitate to take custodial management"

December 2005: We will hesitate for five years; custodial management within five years in a media interview.

As he is quoted by CBC, it would be a top priority, occurring within five years. *Using the fishing village of Petty Harbour as a backdrop, Harper said the Conservatives would make custodial management happen during their first term in office.

"My hope would be that once we start to move in this direction the international community will come to the table and resolve the issue," he said. "It is a reasonable time frame."*

December 2005 news release (at the same event; not updated since): Vague - "Moving towards extending the 200-mile limit to the edge of the Continental Shelf, the nose and tail of the Grand Banks, and the Flemish Cap in the North Atlantic and exercising Canadian custodial management over this area". Like saying "in the fullness of time", "eventually" or "when we get around to it."

January 2006: Letter to Danny Williams. "A Conservative government would support extending custodial management of the Continental Shelf beyond the 200 mile limit, to the nose and tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap in the North Atlantic."

In the space of a year, we have gone from a firm Conservative commitment to custodial management expressed in clear language, through the equivocation of a public statement and a news release issued the same day saying different things through now to the point where what once will occur is something a Conservative government would support...

but what?

take no action on?

like it if someone else did it for them?

Liam.

Boobalah.

It's really simple.

Say what you mean and mean what you say.

Res ipsa loquitur. The facts speak for themselves.

Or do they not teach newbie lawyers anymore the basic idea that things are what they are?

Thing 1: Stephen Harper is backpeddling on custodial management.

Thing 2: Liam O'Brien insists that something that is changed substantially is still the same.

As predicted.

So the backpeddling and the shifts of language now are all the more strange, Liam, in light of the strong statements before and all the motions and posturing. You haven't undermined the argument I made; you reinforced it by pointing to the strength of the old Harper commitment.

The contrast between Harper the "Clear" and Harper the "Kinda When We Can" is so dramatic now as to be unmistakable.

Anyone can see it.

Now we just have to explain why Steve Harper is backpeddling.

Update: A lengthy addendum to his original post has appeared over at RGL. Liam uses smaller typeface which means that his explanation of his explanation of the consistency of the inconsistency is actually longer than the original explanation of the consistency where there is inconsistency.

Confuddled?

Evidently so is Liam. He tried everything from flat-out denials, to saying I just plucked out a bullet point, to promising more will follow at some point in the future.

But just to save Liam any further wriggling, here's a sample of what the three statements might have read if, and that's a big if, the Conservatives weren't backing away from custodial management.

March 2005: "We will not hesitate to take custodial management..."

December 2005 (speaking notes and news release): As stated in our policy manual, we will not hesitate to take custodial management of the nose and tail of the Grand Banks. Therefore, I am announcing today that a Conservative government will extend custodial management within its first term in office...

January 2005: As you are aware, I committed that a Conservative government will extend custodial management in its first term...

See?

That's consistent.

That's what a leader would say if he were genuinely committed to a course of action or a policy.

Compare that to "will", then "move towards", then "would support".

In Spain, they are noticing the difference as we speak.

Liam better hope more people who he is counting on to support his team don't notice what everyone else can see.

Upperdate: Three - count 'em - three posts and Liam is still boashing his head against the simple point that Mr. Harper is no longer as firmly behind custodial management as his party was less than a year ago. Actually it's one long post and two longer and then longer still add-ons, but we'll call 'em three.

He tries everything, from branding me as a Liberal (quelle surprise!) to saying I don't support custodial management (It's a legal crock) to a bunch of other stuff that has nothing to do with the point. He even resorts to repeating the lengthy quotes he quoted before and then quotes and quotes and quote some more, until as Dr. Seuss would add, the quotes pushed Liam out the door.

I have figured out a couple of things about Liam over time. One of them is that the longer his posts, the less he actually has to say. The other thing, related to that, is that the longer his posts, the more likely it is you have him skewered. The other other thing to learn is that the more Liam goes off topic, the closer to the truth you come.

That must be why he hates the term Reflexive Grit Loather so much.

So now we know:

Stephen Harper is backing away from his support for custodial management.

Voting records

Since Loyola Hearn is especially proud of the number of times he has risen to speak in the commons, it is useful heading over to howdtheyvote.ca.

On dissentions, that is voting against the party line, Loyola did so only once, on second reading of a private member's bill on student loans. Every other time he followed his leader, including in the plans to bring down the government last spring and thereby scuttle the offshore deal in favour of Stephen Harper's equalization reform gambit.

Norm Doyle joined Loyola on that student loan vote, but also voted against his party on second reading of a private member's bill to prohibit replacement workers during labour disputes. There's another dissention by Doyle, but the site doesn't actually list it. Loyola and Norm both voted to bring down the government last spring, standing cheek by jowl with their leader.

Scott Simms voted against the party line 17 times since being elected, a clear indication of both the flexibility of his party and his own independent-minded nature. That gave him a 13 place rank among parliamentarians for dissenting votes.

Bill Matthews voted against the party line 13 times for 24th place.

Gerry Byrne bucked the party seven times, for 57th place.

The late Lawrence O'Brien's stats aren't there.

Now some people will point to these figures and claim that there is a problem when someone votes against his or her party.

Others would look at it and says the dissentions speak volumes about the tolerance in the party for different views. In the top 57 dissenters, the majority are Liberals.

But flip to the bottom of the charts - there you will find cabinet ministers, who obviously have to support the government, and almost the entire Conservative and Bloc caucuses.

It gives some food for thought.

Memo to Bourque

Before Bourque posts another piece of tripe about Normand Lester's book and Pierre Pettigrew, the old boy might want to have a look at Paul Wells' observations.

"They [Conservatives and New Democrats jumping on the Lester bandwagon] should know, as apparently they don't yet, that Lester is a vile, scuttling anglophobe with a demonstrated history of ignoring inconvenient facts, getting others flat wrong, and waving around a dusty, ancient and barely-rewritten clip file as if it were the Dead Sea Scrolls.

...

Anyone willing to hop into bed with the likes of Normand Lester has no moral claim to lead this country or to hold the balance of power in a minority Parliament. Is that clear enough?"

Crystal clear, Paul.

Connie reality check on finances

An assessment produced by CBC shows that the Conservative campaign promises will cost taxpayers on the order of $66 billion over the next five years.

That puts them in second place behind the New Democrats who have promised $71 billion in spending.

The Liberal platform was costed at $59.4 billion while the Bloc's platform would cost $55 billion over three years.

Note that all parties have platforms that exceed the projected federal surplus up to the year 2011. The November 19 mini-budget put that figure at $55 million.

Based on that projection, and looking at only the three national parties, Canada will overspend by:

- $16 billion under the New Democrats.
- $12 billion under the Conservatives.
- $ 6 billion under the Liberals.

Genuine fiscal Conservatives must be in a tizzy trying to figure out how to vote. Their traditional voice in the Conservatives turns out to be willing to promise New Democrat-style deficit levels in order to gain power.

Logically, that leads us to one of two conclusions:

Either fiscal conservatives will flock to the Liberals since the Conservatives appear to have lost their financial marbles.

or.

They'll vote Conservative knowing full well the party won't live up to most of the promises it has made.

Odds are good, though, they'll live up to one little plan they tried to keep under wraps:

Lower income Canadians will face a tax increase under the Conservatives.

Norm Doyle: No socon silence in Newfoundland and Labrador

With a tip of the festive hat to Mark at nottawa, let's flip over to this story from the Halifax Herald.

A couple of Connie contenders there have been muzzled by their national party over the issue of equal marriage.

**"We'’ve been told by Ottawa that we don'’t talk about that," Paula Henderson told The Chronicle Herald on Thursday. "That'’s a dropped subject."

Ms. Henderson is a campaign volunteer for Rakesh Khosla, the Tory running against Fisheries Minister Geoff Regan in Halifax West.

Paul Francis, the Conservative candidate for Sackville-Eastern Shore, also attended the meeting and he too refused to comment.

"We'’re actually referring all inquiries on that meeting to (Tory spokesman) Rob Batherson," said Jeff Alexander, communications director for Mr. Francis.**

Before this all blew up as an election issue, St. John's East Connie candidate Norm Doyle was free to chime right in and back his leader's plans to turn back the clock in Canada. He openly spoke for his social conservative (socon) agenda, an agenda that according to some reports is causing him to bleed support among younger Progressive Conservatives.

When the legislation was being debated in the Commons, Doyle said:

"[Equal marriage] is a step in the wrong direction for our society."

"At the height of this debate, a column in The National Post by Barbara Kay recently caught my eye. The headline on the column reads, "“It's time to think about the children"”. Ms. Kay made this point:

Canadian researchers have made no effort to harvest the views of those who have the most invested in the gay marriage debate--children. Nobody has asked children if they "“strongly prefer, strongly reject or don't care"” whether they have: a single mom, single dad, mother and father, two moms or two dads.

She says that children are, by nature, "“social conservatives"” and will by nature respond that they prefer a mom and a dad. She concludes by saying:

Canada is one of only three places on Earth poised to endorse the use of children as social guinea pigs without their consent. And all because our intellectual and political elites "“haven't ever really thought about it."”

Ms. Kay makes a good and valid point. Researchers or government, nobody knows what the outcome of this reckless piece of social engineering will lead to.** [Emphasis added]

Yep.

Doyle thinks equal marriage is a "reckless piece of social engineering."

Loyola Hearn didn't say much during the debate on this crucial issue, but he voted the socon party line nonetheless.

I wonder if a reporter stuck a microphone in either of these guys' faces, what would the reply be?

Hmmmm.

Liam caves on child care.

Well sort of.

He caves, alright, but the dear old fellow will:

1. insist there was no change; and
2. this is the same position as the one he took all along.

I can see him in court now:

"Yes, M'Lud, while the forensic evidence clearly shows my client was in three houses illegally and stole a quality of jewelry in excess of $5, 000 value, he insists that in fact he is a small pink pussycat and even if he isn't a small pink pussycat, my client insists he was at home with his wife at the time the crimes were committed.

Yes, M'Lud, I acknowledge that his wife has given evidence that she was in fact at bingo that night and yes, I am aware of the three witnesses who were at home at the time and took photographs of my client in their homes at the time alleged holding the jewelry and climbing out a window, but in fact M'Lud, the price of tea in China is extremely high right now and my client is victim of a massive, evil liberal conspiracy of which you, M'Lud, are a part, and...

Look over there!

A purple dinosaur."

Distraction, obfuscation, even flat-out denials don't change the facts - on child care, Liam O'Brien is now advocating that Stephen Harper's:

"focus should remain on maximizing the size of the transfer of funding to parents and let them decide how to spend their money in order to care for their children."

To see how dramatic a shift this is, understand that initially O'Brien insisted that $2.30 cents a day gave choice in child care. That's right. My wife and I could keep one of us at home to raise our child on $2.30 a day. Now, according to Liam, Harper needs to maximize that amount.

This is the guy who quoted American right-wing political lobbyists and presented them as child care experts to bolster his case that $2.30 a day gave choice in child care.

This is the guy who howled when I pointed out, as a parent, that $2.30 was choice, my foot.

In his verbose reply, he said this:

"Ed, you fail to offer a very simple answer: if your problem is with the amount of funding offered, why aren't you advocating a system that does indeed put fund in the hands of parents?"

Of course, it wasn't my plan to fix. I have another idea I think is better.

But after a month, Liam has seen the error of his ways.

Or maybe, just maybe, Liam realized that all his rantings against the non-existent "nanny state" looked kinda dumb, since his own leader has always advocated a minimal amount for subsidized daycare. It's part of the strategy to appear more Liberal than Liberal, emphasis on the word "appear".

Either way, Liam will insist that everything is the same as it always was.

The way Liam insists change is the same, and now likely that a tax increase is a tax decrease, the next thing he'll do is headline a post: "Harper: Double Plus Good!"

Harper: Up is Down for taxes

CBC is reporting that Stephen Harper admits he will raise taxes on lower income Canadians, if elected, but feels that his own plan will actually lower taxes for those same people.

"The problem with general tax reductions [of the type already implemented by the Martin government], as the Liberals have shown in the past, is they're always offset by other measures," Harper said. "That's why nobody's going to notice this particular tax reduction."

The really odd thing is that only last year, in 2004, Stephen Harper proposed exactly the sort of tax cuts he now criticizes as being a waste of energy.

On the Goods and Services Tax [GST], Harper pledged only 18 months ago to increase the GST credit for low and fixed income Canadians.

Harper must be using the kind of logic he used when devising his plan to give each Canadian family $1200 annually for each child under six years of age, but to tax the money so that Canadians actually get as little as $2.30 per week day. Harper calls this choice in child care.

Wow.

Now Harper wants to cut the GST by a mere 1% in the first year of a Harper government and thereby make more money available to Canadians who have larger incomes. GST cuts of the type proposed by Harper generate greater savings to Canadians with larger disposable incomes. Those people aren't on fixed and low incomes.

Search conservative.ca and see what happened to the increased GST rebate for low and fixed income Canadians. You won't find anything even vaguely like it.

In a Harper Canada, apparently even the laws of gravity will be repealed.

Up will be down.

And I only have 19, 960 cups of coffee left to get my $400 bucks, Steve.

My kidneys are thanking you.

Bourque berks - misses links to Connies

In his seemingly limitless efforts to slander anyone associated with the Liberal Party, Bourque has decided to attack not only Pierre Pettigrew but the Council for Canadian Unity, which he refers to as a shadowy group. Before I finished the post, the berk moved the top of pager to here.

May I suggest google to dispel the shadows?

Enter the keywords and you will wind up at the site of the Canadian Unity Council, which seems to have been referred to sometimes as the Council for Canadian Unity.

The board of directors includes Bob Rae. Yep. He's pretty much an underworld type.

Included on the board of governors, no more shadowy a figure as Peter Lougheed. Then from Manitoba there is another unsavoury type - Gail Asper, corporate secretary of CanWest Global.

Ontario's Lincoln Alexander is another known skulker mingling with this dastardly crowd.

Let's not forget retired general Charlie Belzile - he's in there too with this nefarious group.

Maybe Bourque has some bone to pick with Donna Dasko of Environics, another governor of the unity underground?

Closer to home, let me offer up another example of the sort of people involved in this group: Ali Chaisson, of the Federation des francophones de Terre Neuve et du Labrador.

Would you believe Steve Kent, mayor of Mount Pearl?

And that's just a handful of the people involved in this non-partisan group, formed in the early 1960s to inform and engage all Canadians in building and strengthening Canada.

But wait.

These guys are affiliated with a bunch called the Dominion Institute and their honourary patron John Ralston Saul. The advisory board of this bunch includes clearly disreputable people like Ann Medina, Jack Granatstein and Richard Gwynn.

Do a quick google on Option Canada and one can easily find a little compendium of articles on the subject in English and French.

And what pray tell might this be?

A 1997 Montreal Gazette article written by Claude Arpin describing grants made to Option Canada. Ok.

Arpin describes OC as "a Montreal lobby group set up eight weeks before the Oct. 30 referendum vote.

Option Canada included businessmen, along with political organizers from three parties - the Liberal Party of Canada, the Quebec Liberal Party and the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada."

Look at that last bit again.

The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, now without the progressive bits.

Look at the number of articles in the little compendium here and the dates associated with them and you'll see a long-standing anti-federalist campaign dating back to the 1995 referendum designed to "get" the side that won.

Maybe, just maybe I am missing something here, but it seems to me that a tiny bit of research would demonstrate that what appears to be something hideous for Liberals, as it has been painted, is either:

a. nothing much at all; or,

b. something that is going to splash a bunch of people including...wait for it...Conservatives.

In any event, we can safely say Bourque must be French for berk, at best, and that once again we have Stephen Harper in bed with Gilles Duceppe criticizing Liberals on national unity.

The only thing I'd like to see is the list of Progressive Conservatives tied up with Option Canada so we can see how many of them have ties to Mr. Harper.

And as a last thought?

If people want to make this election about the future of Canada:

Bring it on!

Just for curiosity...

This election a couple of seat projectors have come up on line. They are linked down the right hand column, under Election 2006.

The hill and Knowlton one just needs numbers to plug in.

The democraticspace one is considerably more complex and I won't pretend to understand the intricacies of the math involved.

But I can say I find the outcome of the process at odds with where I'd put the seats in this province based on observation and intuition.

Just for curiosity, slip over and have a look at democraticspace.com.

It shows the Liberals safe in three seats (Labrador, Random-Burin-St.George's, and Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte).

Ok. I'll buy that.

Then it shows the Conservatives safe in the two St. John's seats and the Liberal seats in Avalon and Bonavista-Gander-Grand Falls-Windsor being too close to call.

Now that's a tough sell.

Avalon has been a strong Liberal seat and even with re-apportionment, the more populous northern portion of the riding is decidedly Liberal. It has been Progressive Conservative but it's
never been hard core Connie country.

Yes, it has a good Conservative candidate this time around, but his strength is in the southern portion.

Two close to call, which is what democraticspace.com would call this seat seems a little bit off.

Ditto for the central Newfoundland seat held by Scott Simms. Simms is capable and popular and has been an effective member of parliament. While some people are playing up the weather office in Gander story, there's no sense that has produced some sort of tidal shift away from Simms.

In fact, the Prime Minister's recent announcement of moving weather research to Gander is considerably more believable than the Conservative promise. After all, Harper is just agreeing to undo something that has been done and that won't actually improve the quality of weather forecasting.

Ditto as well for identifying the two St. John's seats as being solidly Conservative.

Nothing public has changed the starting position in this campaign. At best, the Conservatives are marginally ahead.

Both Siobhan Coady and Paul Antle are excellent contenders, with Coady clearly carrying great momentum from her last run at St. John's South-Mount Pearl in 2004. A supposedly safe Conservative seat slipped dramatically and Coady came within a hair's breadth of unseating a veteran Connie.

For both seats, the Conservative incumbents suffered serious damage in their efforts to dance on the offshore deals.

A sign of how deep were their self-inflicted wounds is their current ad campaign. It all stresses the exact opposite of what occurred and has a bunch of people coming forward giving testimonials to things that, frankly, these guys never did.

If they were genuinely safe, both incumbents wouldn't be trying so hard to convince us they had the seats locked up.

Add to that the small number of Loyola Hearn signs in St. John's South-Mount Pearl and his heavy media buy aimed at his core audience. This guy's strategy is to hold on to what he's got; he isn't trying to win back anyone he lost or gain anyone new.

My own prediction hasn't changed on the Newfoundland and Labrador ridings, based on observation and what polling has been publicly available. It isn't scientific but more of a gut instinct.

Liberals solid in five.

Liberals solidly in contention in two, with a strong possibility that both Conservative incumbents will be collecting second pensions on January 24.

What will tip the difference in the next few weeks will be the heightened visibility of the Liberals in St. John's and Mount Pearl.

As I said before, keep an eye on these two easternmost seats.

They are the ones to watch

Local News Notes for Saturday

1. Canadian Press (CP) has picked up the Harper/spy agency story. The Telegram is running a CP wire story on the issues including quotes from Stephen Harper. No electronic copy appears to be available.

2. Hit 'em where it hurts. The hitcounter went off the scale on Friday here at Bond Papers, topping out at a number of visitors not seen since January 2005 during the offshore fight.

Biggest story overnight? The anti-clamping candidate in British Columbia who wants to end the practice of clamping umbilical cords after delivery.

3. St. John's South-Mount Pearl Liberal candidate Siobhan Coady made the Telegram today. She didn't get a hit from her release yesterday on the Lower Churchill. Instead, she got coverage on some of her campaign signs which have been vandalized. The page three story lowballs the cost estimate of the signs but quotes Coady as saying she is shocked and saddened by the incidents.

Now if only she could catch Loyola or Peg defacing her signs, a la Ray O'Neill in last year's pathetic municipal election...

4. Elsewhere in the Telegram, there's a full page story on the need for a new military headquarters building in St. John's. Plans to replace the existing Second World War era buildings have been underway for a decade and now is the crunch time. The existing decrepit buildings are due to be sold this year.

So far no candidates have picked up this issue although it's been swirling around the community for years.

Estimated cost of the new building - $68 million.

That story is linked on the Telly site, under the Lifestyles section. Don't ask me why it's there and not in the news section.

Harper backpedals on commitment to custodial management

Conservative leader Stephen Harper is backpeddling on his commitment to extend Canadian fisheries jurisdiction beyond the 200 mile limit within five years of becoming Prime Minister.

Flanked by Conservative candidate Loyola Hearn at a staged photo op in Petty Harbour, Newfoundland and Labrador, Harper said that a Conservative government will extend custodial management within five years of taking office.

(Left: Conservative candidate Loyola Hearn gestures frantically for some unknown reason. Perhaps the forceful gestures were intended to distract from Harper's evident weak commitment to his won words. Photo: Greg Locke/Picturedesk International)

The official Conservative news release contained no such commitment or time frame. Instead, Harper committed to "moving toward extending the 200-mile limit to the edge of the Continental Shelf, the nose and tail of the Grand Banks, and the Flemish Cap in the North Atlantic and exercising Canadian custodial management over this area..."

Rather than repeating even the weaker words from the news release, Harper's letter to Williams now contains even more conditional and less emphatic language. Harper's new commitment is that he would support. The use of the word "would" suggest a "but" is not far behind.

Here's the bit from Santa's Letter to Danny.

"A Conservative government would support extending custodial management of the Continental Shelf beyond the 200 mile limit, to the nose and tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap in the North Atlantic."

----------------

Prediction:

Conservative supporters will dismiss this as irrelevant, insisting Harper is still committed to the concept of protecting fisheries even if he has no commitment actually to do anything any more.

Some Harper loyalists will insist that saying you will do something and saying you'd consider doing something are the same thing.

Shadow Harper spokesperson Sue Kelland Dyer, who tried to hide from local media on the Harper bus in Petty Harbour, will call Open line repeatedly to insist this flip flop is actually working against the interests of central Canada and the central government and therefore because the word "central" doesn't appear in the Harper release, it is obviously good.

Given her evident phobia about the word central, Dyer is next expected to defend Harper's plans to eliminate "central" heating.

Tories to hike taxes - on lowest income earners

Conservative candidate Jason Kenny confirmed Friday that the federal Conservative Party would raise taxes on low income earners.

That's right.

Raise taxes.

On low income earners.

CBC News is reporting:

"A Tory plan to raise personal income taxes on low income earners is part of an overall tax strategy that will result in more tax relief for Canadians, Tory MP [sic] Jason Kenney said Friday.

Kenney was reacting to a CBC News story that revealed part of the Tory tax plan if they take power is to reverse a Liberal tax cut introduced before the election."

Following a CBC story on the tax cut/tax hike, Conservative staffers called CBC to confirm that while Stephen Harper had previously said he'd allow Liberal tax cuts to stand, he now plans to raise taxes on some Canadians - the lowest income earners - shortly after being elected.

Can the Anti-Circ Party be far behind?

This story, from Canadian Press, is just too funny.

Why can't we have candidates like this one across Canada?

I mean really.

OTTAWA (CP) - Some may see it as the ultimate in political navel-gazing - an Independent candidate in the Jan. 23 election wants to clamp down on the clamping down of umbilical cords.

Donna Young believes homosexuality can be explained by whether a person's umbilical cord was clamped immediately after birth.

Young, 63, is running in the British Columbia riding of Prince George-Peace River and says she makes no judgment about people's sexual preferences.

While not exactly a debate about innies or outies, Young is serious about her theory that people who had their cords clamped are missing hormones to match their sex organs.

Young also said in an interview that the clamping causes health problems.

"Basically, this is the last field of emancipation and a woman controlling her body," said Young.

Harper's reply to Williams - the full text.

Following is a copy of Stephen Harper's response to a letter from Danny Williams. The original Williams letter can be found here, under the title "Danny Williams letter to Santa".

Some editorial notes are required and these have been placed in square brackets.


Danny Williams, Q.C.
Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador
8th Floor, East Block
Confederation Building
St. John's NL A1B 4J6
Fax: 709-729-5875

Dear Premier Williams,

Thank you for the opportunity to discuss our policy initiatives and to share with you how a Conservative government would work hard to benefit the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. I look forward to discussing these initiatives with you in the future.

Fisheries: Does your party support providing an early retirement program on a 70/30 Federal/Provincial cost-shared basis for workers impacted by changes to the industry?

I recognize challenges faced by those affected by changes to the fishing industry. I agree that it is important for governments to proactively assist those affected by these changes and to take a positive approach to creating new opportunities for these individuals. These individuals have an enormous amount of experience and talent to contribute to the labour force and to the future prosperity of Newfoundland and Labrador.

A Conservative government would focus our efforts on assisting these individuals through retraining programs and not on early retirement. I believe that it is more beneficial to these individuals and to the communities of Newfoundland and Labrador that we maintain a well-trained and highly skilled workforce, which includes older workers and those who no longer have employment options in traditional industries.

A Conservative government would prefer to work cooperatively with the government of Newfoundland and Labrador to assist these individuals by developing programs which focus on retraining opportunities rather than focusing on an early retirement package. However, I understand that retraining is not always an option. Prior to any commitments being made, a feasibility study must be conducted to determine the affordability of an early retirement initiative, as well as a study on the impacts of such an initiative on the labour force as a whole.

Does your party support this request for a Northern shrimp allocation?

I believe that economic development at the local level will be a significant component to the future prosperity of First Nations' communities. However, economic development must be balanced to ensure the sustainability of the resource. A Conservative government must be confident in the long term viability of the shrimp stocks in that area before a reallocation of quota could occur. Once we are assured of the sustainability of the stock we will give serious consideration to this initiative.

[Note the original letter referred to an allocation for Conne River and for the non-aboriginal community at Harbour Breton. Whoever drafted this letter perceived this issue purely as a First Nation's matter.]

Will your party support imposing custodial management on the continental shelf immediately outside Canada's 200 mile exclusive economic zone to preserve fish sticks from unsustainable harvesting practices?

A Conservative government would support extending custodial management of the Continental Shelf beyond the 200 mile limit, to the nose and tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap in the North Atlantic. Under 12 years of Liberal mismanagement, cod stocks have collapsed in the Atlantic. International over fishing has contributed to this collapse and cannot continue. It is both a matter of environmental stewardship and of protecting Canada's economic interests. A Conservative government would commit to protecting these resources.

[Note: This letter does not contain the time frame committed to during Harper's announcement in Petty Harbour.]

Does your party support the province's view that recovery of cod stocks is best achieved through the implementation of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Cod Recovery Strategy, and not through the listing of cod as a species at risk of extinction under the deferral [sic] Species at Risk Act?

I do not believe that listing cod as a species at risk will achieve the desired results of cod stock recovery. A Conservative government wants to see the stocks return and I think an important aspect of this is ensuring that the provinces have a greater role in managing the fishery. [Emphasis added. This does not mean joint management.]

Another aspect of the recovery will involve an investment in science and management. Science is not enough, however, and I believe that for too long, the wisdom of those who actually derive their living from the ocean has been ignored. A Conservative government is committed to changing that and will consult more widely with corresponding provincial departments and with fishermen.

Does your party support the development of a comprehensive Aquaculture Framework Agreement, including the provision of financial support for the establishment of a cod aquaculture demonstration farm?

The Conservative Party of Canada is committed to rural Canada. I believe that aquaculture provides an excellent opportunity for rural and coastal communities to diversify and revitalize their local economies and contribute to the province's overall economic growth.

A Conservative government would consider supporting a federal/provincial aquaculture framework agreement with the possible direction of research and development funding toward such an initiative.

Energy: Does your party support efforts to develop the hydro-power resources of the Lower Churchill River System for the primary benefit of Newfoundland and Labrador, including the provision of a Federal Government guarantee to proceed with the project?

We support this proposal in principle and believe that it is important for Newfoundland and Labrador to have greater control of its energy mix.

A Conservative government would welcome discussions on this initiative and would hope that the potential exists for it to proceed in the spirit of past successes such as the Hibernia project.

[Note: As David Cochrane reported today, this apparent willingness to back a provincial loan would make it easier for the provincial government to develop the Lower Churchill on its own. This commitment from Harper must be considered in light of the federal involvement in the Lower Churchill Development Corporation (see Lower Churchill Development Corporation Act, RSNL 1990, Chapter L-27) and the Hibernia precedent cited. In the case of Hibernia, the federal government acquired an 8.5% interest of the project and the consequent revenues flowing from that interest.]

Does your party support the transfer or sale of the Federal Government's share in Hibernia to the province of Newfoundland and Labrador provided the Federal Government is kept whole on their expected return at the time of their initial investment?

Presently, this is not an endeavour that a Conservative government would support, but we would be willing to discuss this in the future. [Note: This represents a modest change from Harper's answer to the same question last year. In 2004, Harper stated flatly that the Conservative party would sell the shares for the benefit of all Canadians. This remains the fundamental position, by implication, although Harper is obviously prepared to talk about a deal.]

Federal Presence: Does your party support immediate efforts to significantly increase the Federal Government's presence in the province, commencing with the immediate restoration of forecasting services at the Gander Weather Office?

There is an over-concentration of certain federal government services in some areas of the country and an effort must be made to ensure that there is a fair distribution of the federal government presence across the country. Each specific region of Canada has its own unique weather forecasting challenges and requirements and I think it is unacceptable that weather forecasting services were ever removed from Gander. A Conservative government would support the restoration of forecasting services at the Gander Weather Office.

Equalization: Does your party support these reforms to the equalization?

Much of the tension that has arisen between the federal and provincial governments over the last decade is a result of the fiscal imbalance. Paul Martin's government denies the fiscal imbalance exists despite the fact the provinces are struggling to deliver essential services such as health and education while the federal government accumulates surpluses.

I don't think this is fair and I don't think this is right. A Conservative government is committed to bringing balance to the fiscal relationship between the federal and provincial governments.

A Conservative government would also support changes to the equalization program to ensure provinces and territories have the opportunity to develop their economies and sustain important core social services. We will remove non-renewable natural resource revenue from the equalization formula to encourage the development of economic growth in the non-renewable resource sectors across Canada. The Conservative government will ensure that no province is adversely affected from changes to the equalization formula.

[Note: This restates the position from June 2004. The federal Conservative never supported the Williams proposal for an Atlantic Accord, preferring instead to revamp the entire Equalization program. At the same time, the Harper response appears to meet only one of the four stated aspects of the Williams letter, namely the one on non-renewables.]

Labrador: Does your Party support a Federal-Provincial cost-shared agreement to complete the TLH [Trans-Labrador Highway]?

Yes, a Conservative government would support a cost-shared agreement to complete the Trans-Labrador Highway.

Is your party committed to both maintaining a foreign military training program at 5 Wing Goose Bay and utilizing the base for regular Canadian Forces training activity by designating an operational requirement for it?

Further, is your party committed to building a substantive and meaningful federal presence in Goose Bay, as part of a broader economic diversification effort, to compensate for an expected decrease in military activity?

A Conservative government will establish in Newfoundland and Labrador the following new operational requirements for the protection of Canadian sovereignty and security:

* Station a new Rapid Reaction Army Battalion (approximately 650 regular force personnel) for enhanced Atlantic army response at CFB Goose Bay.

* Establish a new Territorial Defence Battalion composed of approximately 100 regular force and 400 reserve force personnel in the area St John's, to assist the Federal and Provincial governments in countering threats to our security as well as responding to natural
disasters.

* Station a new long range Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) Squadron at CFB Goose Bay to provide surveillance over the Atlantic Ocean and Eastern Arctic.

A Conservative government will also maintain a foreign military training program at 5 Wing Goose Bay and actively encourage increased allied flying training operations at 5 Wing Goose Bay.

Overall, the Conservative plan for national defence will result in a significant increase in employment in Goose Bay and the St John's area, resulting from a significant expansion of the federal defence presence in Newfoundland and Labrador.

[Note: At no point have the federal Conservatives indicated how several new battalions of infantry will be raised and the timescale involved. Harper does not answer the second portion of this question, seeking a commitment to increase the federal government's non-military presence in Goose Bay.]

Does your party support establishing a reserve at Sheshatshiu by June 30, 2006?

A Conservative government would have to consult with effected First Nations communities on the establishment of a reserve at Sheshatshiu before proceeding with such an initiative.

Although every effort would be made to proceed in a timely fashion, it would be premature to commit to a timeline until such consultations have taken place and a satisfactory agreement has been struck with the Sheshatshiu Innu First Nation.

Marine Atlantic:

Does you party support these actions [ a one time 15% rate reduction, and a commitment to outlaw strikes and other disruptions to the Marine Atlantic service] ?

A Conservative government would live up to and respect its constitutional responsibilities to the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and would give serious consideration to implementing your stated recommendations, however we would have to review the financial implications of the rate reduction.

I recognize the importance of a reliable and affordable ferry service to the economy of Newfoundland and Labrador. The ferry service is a literal as well as symbolic link between Newfoundland and Labrador and the rest of Canada. In many ways it is as important to Canada as it is to Newfoundland and Labrador. It is crucial that the federal government respect that link to the benefit of both Newfoundland and Labrador and the rest of Canada.

Economic Development and Infrastructure: Does your party support the Federal Government entering into bilateral, cost-shared agreements to address economic development and infrastructure priorities in Newfoundland and Labrador?

The federal Liberal government has neglected the infrastructure needs of the provinces. A Conservative government would develop infrastructure programs which will allow provinces to address their unique needs and requirements. I cannot commit to specific projects, but I look forward to partnering with provincial governments to address the infrastructure deficit resulting from 12 years of Liberal neglect and inattention.

Does you party support ensuring provincial facilities, such as the Marystown Shipyard and Bull Arm Fabrication Site, benefit from federal shipbuilding and repair contracts to help transform this sector's capacity to the mutual advantage of Canada and Newfoundland and Labrador?

A Conservative government would be bound by specific guidelines governing the awarding of contracts but would welcome competitive bids from Newfoundland and Labrador shipyards on any contracts which arise in this area.

Does your party support the Federal Government cost-sharing the above project [a provincial government $200 million waste management and reduction plan]?

First of all, let me applaud your efforts in instituting a waste reduction and management plan. Responsible waste management is an important component of modern environmental stewardship. A Conservative government will develop a multi-pronged approach to reducing greenhouse gases and to preserving Canada's environmental integrity which has been threatened by the federal Liberal's broken promises on the environment.

In the future, I would certainly be interested in examining your proposal further to determine if funding for your plan can be accommodated through our made-in-Canada plan to reduce greenhouse gases.

Thank you once again and all the best to you in the New Year.

Sincerely,
//signed//
Hon. Stephen Harper, P.C., M.P.
Leader of the Opposition

Leader of the Conservative Party of Canada

Santa Harper answers Danny's letter - breaking

Steve's answer to Danny is in.

I have a copy.

I'll post it ASAP.

For those who have been following the list of bullshit battalions Harper has announced, remember the prediction of a Regular Force rapid reaction battalion for Goose and at least one more for St. John's comprising a mix of Regular and Reserve soldiers?

Wednesday Jan 4 on the Bond Papers:

"Meanwhile, people in Goose Bay are eagerly awaiting the confirmation that Harper wants to put a battalion of infantry in the community.

My guess is that in addition to Goose Bay, when Harper returns to the province there will be at least one other infantry battalion coming to St. John's as well as one located in Stephenville."

Harper's letter?

• Station a new Rapid Reaction Army Battalion (approximately 650 regular force personnel) for enhanced Atlantic army response at CFB Goose Bay.
• Establish a new Territorial Defence Battalion composed of approximately 100 regular force and 400 reserve force personnel in the area St John’s, to assist the Federal and Provincial governments in countering threats to our security as well as responding to natural disasters.

Wow.

There's much here to blog about.

More to follow.