With Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi calling out Conservative Candidate Joan Crockatt for not participating in a by-election all candidates debate, I thought today would be a great time to tell you where I stand on all candidates debates during elections.
As some one who has been fortunate to participate in politics and live in a lot of major centres in Canada I can tell you that these debates all have one thing in common.
It is this: They are a waste of time!
The first thing you would see if you went to one would be all the wanna be politicos,campaign managers, candidates and party volunteers.
What you would be hard pressed to find would be actual voters who want to learn about the issues.
The reason for this is that these debates are stacked with political volunteers who ask their candidates softball questions to make them look good. Most people know that.
The average person get their news from the internet because there is no time to give up 2 or 3 hours for a partisan debate.
If you are the frontrunner( no matter what party) it is a night of all three parties ganging up on you.
Another thing, in my experience is that everybody and their dog wants to host a debate.
In the last federal election I can recall being invited to at least 8.Most of these are devised by people or groups whose sole reason for being is one issue.
Do I ever recommend candidates participate in an all candidates debate? If it is hosted by a Chamber of Commerce or Board of Trade then yes. They are mediated properly and keep partisan bs to a minimum.
In truth and in fact, politicians and voters would be much better of engaging on the door step.
Firstly a candidate will reach more voters by door knocking.
Secondly,the discerning voter can ask the questions they want answers to and demand an answer. Most good candidates will either know the answer or if they don’t say so and promise to get back to you.
All candidates Debates? They are a big waste of time and Naheed Nenshi made my case for me.
Tom Flanigan and the “Calgary School” are Liberal partisans? Alberta is Conservative there are no leftys there.
Take a look in Edmonton Strathcona; it’s full of lefty’s!
I would not be at all surprised if Sunday’s debate was stacked with anti-Conservative people who would have attacked Crockatt — media at the ready to broadcast any misstep on her part. Many of these debates are deliberately set up to support a favoured group. That may be why Crockatt’s campaign manager did not have her attend.
Most Likely and in fact that is probably the Socialist Mayor was there tweeting. I can oly imagine the tweets he would have sent if she had of shown up.
You can’t win at these things.
These so called debates are knowingly partisan. They are put on by the bleeding leftists university crowd and sponsored by the like of cbc.
Yes for the large part, that’s what I meant by 1 issue hosts.
Agreed. an election is a terrible time for candidates to explain their positions with the public. Crockett is a Conservative in Calgary. She has no reason to be accountable to voters and certainly not the debate sponsor, the City of Calgary.
She went on Saturday and made her views known as was shown in the newspaper. I can’t blame her for not going on Sunday.look at the press from Saturday combined with the sensastionalism of the mayor and his tweets.
That’s not a constructive debate it’s a joke.
Conservatives in Calgary have no need to explain themselves to voters. This is a Conservative gimme. Let’s just get it over with.
Everybody has to explain themselves to voters,just not in a partisan forum.I agree though. Lets just get this over with.