It seems everybody has an opinion as to whether Brad Wall should run and also why Conservatives want to draft him to run.
I am a Conservative who has lived and networked in most places in Canada ( including Regina) and I will tell you unequivocally why people like me want him to run.
It has nothing to do with keeping the party united ( although he would do that with ease). I have spoken to many Conservatives and none of them have raised this as an issue no matter who wins.
We want him to run because Brad Wall would make a great Prime Minister!
He has proven time and time again he is a great leader who knows how to win elections because he listens to people.
If you are part of the so called parliamentary caucus and your reading this, do the right thing and ensure that Michelle Rempel becomes interim leader.
If you are a volunteer or party member persuade or turn the screws to your “parliamentary caucus rep” to get behind Michelle.
If you just said what’s a parliamentary caucus rep. its your newly elected Conservative MP or sitting Conservative Senator.
Why Michelle?
SHE is young ( younger than Trudeau in fact) and that will ensure the new electorate will take notice.
SHE is highly energetic and will hit the ground running. The party can’t afford to sit around and wait to get things going,it gotta happen now and that includes fundraising and area that Michelle will be of great help.
SHE has sharp elbows and will not be afraid to hold the new government accountable.
SHE is a team builder and more than ever we need that skill now.
Did I mention she is a female? That will send an amazing message to another part of the electorate that needs to hear our message.
Michelle is the right choice, Make her the interim leader now and without delay.
This was the election that was the referendum on Stephen Harper.
It was dubbed as the Anybody but Harper campaign.
It ended badly for Mr.Harper we know that now.
The Conservatives, on the other hand will live another day.
The NDP might not be so fortunate.
Before the election was dubbed the “Anybody but Harper Campaign” the discussion centered around whether the left could exist as two bodies and defeat the Conservatives without splitting the vote.
That was put to the test in this election and from where I sat and watched only one survived.
As soon as Tom Mulcair said the NDP stood for balanced budgets they became Harper lite.
Justin Trudeau and the Liberals pounced and said they would run deficits creating a clear choice in the voting public’s mind. Would they vote for Harper and the Conservatives ( Which the NDP was now lumped) or would they vote for Liberal deficits and spending.
While the voters where mulling that over, Thomas Mulcair put what I think was the final nail in his and the NDP coffin.
It wasn’t the niqab ( although that didn’t help him ).
At the September 28 debate Thomes Mulcair shot him and his party squarely in the foot.
Mulcair invoked the death of Justin Trudeau’s father, Pierre Elliot Trudeau.
Trudeau made a passionate defense of his father as would I of mine.
Trudeau took full control from that moment on and made the voters choice easy, a compassionate party with a left leaning economic vision versus two balanced budget parties that were mean.
In my mind the election was over that night.
At the same time the Trudeau Liberals swallowed up the NDP and gave those progressive voters a home they could win on.
And win they did.
Next election the economy will still be the topic ( It always is) but the NDP wont have much to say in the outcome.
It will be tax and spend of the Liberals versus the Conservatives fiscal economic planning.
The Conservatives will have a new leader who will have gotten the message from last night.
There will be no Anybody But Harper Campaign. The fight will be for those new voters who came out this time.
The NDP? There is no longer room for them, they had their chance.
To those of us who are old enough to remember; the title of this blog piece is a line from a famous song by the Guess Who.
To those of us old enough to vote that line may well be the ballot box question during the Canadian federal election in October of 2015.
As of right now the cops and the military need guns to protect the people from the bad guys.
Add to that the farmers need guns because they are to far away from the cops and the military to get quick help and you have a formula for a another Conservative party of Canada win.
Everybody always says it’s the economy stupid and this will be no different.
After all if everybody is safe and sound and buying guns won’t the economy just hum along.
What do you think the ballot box question will be?
One of the neat things about having lived in most major cities in Canada is that you get to meet lots of interesting people.
When you follow politics as close as I do, you also meet lots of politicians both good and bad.
Frank Klees is a good one!
I first met Frank Klees when he became an MPP in 1995 and I was a fundraiser for the party with the likes of Jim Ginou,Gord Walker and John Craig Eaton.
I met him after a presentation he did for a small group of us in the Albany Club. In fact I slipped him my card and told him I would be glad to help him if he ever needed it.
For those of you that don’t know, those were the days of the Common Sense Revolution.
I watched Klees move up thought the ranks through cabinet and take a couple of runs at the leadership. ( helped him from all the way out here in BC!)
He is the consummate team player and one of the best politicians I have had the pleasure of calling my friend.
Ontario will miss Frank more than they realize. He is a tireless MPP who goes to the wall for constituents and holds the current government’s feet to the fire.
Frank ,Thank you for your years of service. I have appreciated your work and all that it has taught me.
You have been a mentor form afar.
Prime Minister Harper would be on the right track to reach out to Frank and ask him to put his retirement off a bit.
The results are now in in tonight’s by-elections and the Conservatives held onto their two seats and the Liberals won their two.
What does it all mean?
In a nut shell Justin Trudeau aint exactly the next great thing.
Lets face it the Liberals won two seats that they should have, lost one they could have and got blown out in the other.
In the great battle that was Toronto Center the Liberals won a Bob Rae seat in a by-election where nobody bothered to vote. ( 27.8 % of registered voters voted)
In Quebec they won Denis Coderre’s old seat. So what; they won that with great leaders like Ignatieff and Dion .
In Manitoba the Conservatives won big where they were expected to and squeaked by in Brandon-Souris.
In other words with the deck some what stacked against them the Conservatives still won.
To wit;
a) it so goes that sitting governments rarely win by-elections
b) the senate scandal
c) so-called problems with the nomination process
d) the Liberals ran a candidate with the last name Dinsdale a very popular candidate in the riding
e) the Conservatives ran a candidate who already lost the riding once
f) the mainstream media threw everything at the Conservatives they could to help Trudeau
This was the Trudeau chance to show greatness and steal one for the team and he couldn’t deliver.
What are the take a ways from all this?
The Conservatives have to keep the nomination process whistle clean and they should be fine. After all almost 45 % of registered voters turned out in their squeaker and they still won so I don’t think the public will be influenced at all by the so-called senate scandal come election time.
For the Liberals : Trudeau is not the piece of gold you quite thought he was. The west wasn’t buying what he was selling. Without a platform and a vision it is the voting public who will give him the finger when his train leaves the station.
For the NDP : Tom Mulcair might be excellent at question period but he is a dipshit on the campaign trail. He couldn’t motivate anybody to vote for everybody’s favorite socialist Linda McQuaig.
What will the mainstream media say? That Harper will worry over the results tonight.
In truth he won’t and it will be the media and the opposition that will be worried.
I would say the prospects for another majority look a little rosier now than they did a few hours ago, don’t they?
It’ll be an interesting run up to the 2015 election and Political Insider will be there to bring you all the action.
Already the landscape is cluttered in the new riding of West Langley-Cloverdale .
You have already heard that Gurmant Grewal,Dave Hayer,Paul Brar, Dean Drysadle and Mike Garisto have already thrown their respective hats ( I have never actually seen any of them wear hats) into the ring and declared they will rung for the federal Conservative Party of Canada nomination.
This is only October 2013 and the nominations has not even been declared open.
But now the rumor mills are working overtime and I am hearing that Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts is pondering a run for the roses.
A Watts entry into this race would make it very exciting with most likely most of the aforementioned candidates volunteers ( not Gurmant’s) bailing on their candidate to help pave the way for a Watts coronation.
In fact some of the candidates would likely bail on their volunteers ( not Gurmant)