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Patrick Smith - Report Card Results

Week Five (June 20 to June 27) Grades

Political Parties

Bloc Quebecois

The Bloc won the battle of Quebec . Paul Martin single-handedly revived the Bloc at the start of the campaign courtesy of the sponsorship scandals; then Gilles Duceppe ran a generally flawless campaign – minus the PQ Leader Bernard Landry’s ‘referendum’ comments late in the day; one result of that might be that Duceppe gets to replace Landry in time to be a Quebec PQ Prime Minister – but that is getting a little ahead of events for June 28 th, 2004.

Challenges:

• No change in tack – and no talk of June 28 th as about ‘sovereignty now’

Upsides:

• It pretty much is all upside for the Bloc in June’04.

Conservative Party

It might seem harsh to give “just a B-” to “he who might be Prime Minister” but after a tightly scripted if not overly exciting campaign, the last days saw the unscripted BC Senior Tory MP Randy White offering a final reminder that there MIGHT be truth in some of those negative Liberal ads about a secret Harper/Conservative social policy agenda. Stephen Harper’s lacklustre ‘response’ to White’s rant (“it’s very much a personal view of his”) did little to help with perceptions of Harper as a possible Prime Minister

Getting ‘off message’ – as in past Refo rm and Alliance days – will cost the Conservatives; whether enough to deny them a shot at leading the country, albeit in a minority, not even voters know. [Our electoral system is simply too unpredictable at the edges around possible ‘take-off’ points for extra seats for small % increases of votes.]

Challenges:

• having sidestepped the Klein private health care cow-pie, Stephen Harper now has the party’s right wing social agenda reminders as a more dangerous land-mine in the electoral filed to avoid.

Upsides:

• the bell for the last round has rung. Given the ‘more efficient’ Tory vote, it i s p ossible for them to be behind on % votes but ahead on seats. That makes June 28 th still a toss-up for Harper and the Conservatives. With their best hope as a minority shot, maybe Paul Martin will ‘offer’ to let Harper have his chance, hoping that the Tories in office might finally land on one of their own landmines and force either Parliamentary defeat and replacement by a close Liberal crew or another election shot.

Liberal Party

The Liberals improved – slightly - this week because Paul Martin finally found a little passion. The problem was thi s p assion depended on more negativity (for the new Tories) and untruths (“we’re almost the same as the NDP, so vote for us”) – all in a desperate push to stay as PM

The Liberal’s ‘made in BC’ campaign had no get-up-and-go so any hope of new Liberals (at least MORE Liberals) from BC seems unlikely. As for central Canada , the Bloc remains a lock for Quebec majority and in Ontario , dropping ¼ to 1/3+ of its seats seems not at all unlikely for the Grits. Given contests elsewhere, it just does not seem to add up for Paul Martin’s Liberals in June 2004

That spells the only hope for Liberals is minority governing and hope at another chance in 18 months.

Challenges: at the end of the campaign:

• not winning his own seat (which seems assured), but getting to actually run for PM again in 18 months for Paul Martin.
• there will be no end of Liberal naysayers, several with leadership ambitions, offering advice in July and months following. We might even hear from the ‘little guy’.
• calls for ‘loyalty’ to the leader may be a hard sell for Paul Martin – as a potential Macbeth-ian tragedy continues to unfold.

Upsides:

• This week’s ‘helper is Sr Tory MP Randy White – taking on the courts, the Charter, abortion and same sex rights in a blab fest of right-wing social agenda chatter
• If the ‘Hail Mary’ does not work, there is always ‘requiem in pace’

New Democratic Party

The NDP has finished strongly – helped by Liberals too preoccupied with Tories, the strange notion of Paul Martin that NDPers should voter Liberal as ‘we are all the same re: core values’, and Tories continuing to shoot selves in their social policy feet – offering more hope for the NDP in major urban ridings. It would be interesting to ask Vancouver Centre Tory candidate Gary Mitchell about the socially conservative comments of Tory MP Randy White, leaving this urban riding – as many others - now as an NDP-Grit shootout and with a former Liberal Cabinet Minister/incumbent limping at the end.
Beyond those ‘gifts’, the NDP message has formed a major part of the campaign. The last BC poll indicated 80% of BC voters were ‘turned off’ by campaign negativity. The ‘positive message’ of Jack Layton and the NDP might resonate with them. That should translate to a BC bounce for the NDP on June 28th.

Challenges:

• Getting their vote out, generally an NDP strength, and capitalizing on continuing voter anger vs. the governing Liberals and uncertainty with Harper’s new Conservatives

Upsides:

• Layton’s energy and a clear/positive NDP message should mean at least doubling NDP representation in Parliament. What follows is the next big question.

Past Political Party Grades

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