A Major Mistake?
Does anyone remember the last time a minority government decided to act as if it had a majority? Well, it was in 1979, when the Progressive Conservative government, led by…
Political Strategy
Referendumbs and Equalization
So, the Kenney-led UCP government in Alberta wants to hold a referendum on equalization. Here’s the proposed question: I want to bring two points to your attention here. First, is…
The Strategic Two-Step #nlpoli
There’s a sheet of paper taped on the underside of one of the drawers in the Premier’s desk on the 8th Floor. It’s very old. No one knows for sure…
The Austerity Budget Pantomime #nlpoli
According to the Oxford dictionary, financial austerity means "difficult economic conditions created by government measures to reduce public expenditure."Reduce government spending.Three key words.The most important is reduce, meaning to lower…
The Manipulation Manipulation #nlpoli #cdnpoli
/What a difference 36 years makes. There’s New Democrat strategist Robin Sears in a National Post piece complaining about the way the Liberal are running their guy named Trudeau in…
Political Calculations #nlpoli
As you look ahead to the fall election, the bigger political addicts among you are likely trying to figure out different aspects like how the parties might run the campaign.…
For want of a nail… #nlpoli
Dwight Ball demonstrated last week how very simple things can turn into problems very quickly. He handed his political opponents a stick they can use to beat him with. The…
UK ELECTION: THE WINNING TORY STRATEGY
The Man who smote Miliband Who says strategy is not paramount? Cameron’s Conservatives had their course set for them by strategist Crosby, and it carried them to a victory that…
The little things will get you #nlpoli
Maybe someone can point to this information somewhere please. Maybe your humble e-scribbler missed it. But in the past couple of days, there’s been a simple number missing from the…
Contending Political Strategies #nlpoli
Starting last Friday, the ironically-named Conservatives currently running the place started holding a series of “pre-budget” announcements. They started with news that to deal with the massive financial crisis they…
Arseny Yatsenyuk and the Ukraine’s ‘End Game’
Foxy Yatsenyuk could be a Ukrainian Hero I have started innumerable draft posts about Ukraine over the past few weeks, but there was little room for anything but speculation. The…
Whose efficiency? what efficiency?
Efficiency is formidable. It rears its head most everywhere. Witness the tyranny of the target at more and more workplaces: from more greets per hour to more exam points per…
Trudeau’s Liberals going for the Conservatives throat.
I am not a big fan of the accepted wisdom that politics happens on a left/right continuum. That creaking old paradigm does not mean much to most of the electorate.…
The relentless collapse of the Green Party of Canada’s grassroots.
Back in May I laid out the evidence to support my contention that the Green Party of Canada is suffering a sustained collapse at the grass-roots level. To summarise my…
Trudeau just SKEWERED all his critics in one fell swoop!
In a desperate attempt to take Justin Trudeau down a peg or two, the NDP and Conservatives have been crafting a narrative around Trudeau’s public speaking business, and his accepting…
Green Party grass-roots haemorrhage: Liberals and Dippers be advised.
Well here we are, the Elections Canada filing deadline for Electoral District associations has come and gone, (June 1) so I thought I would update which GPC Electoral Districts are…
BC Liberals Advertising for the Greens in Victoria!
Vote Green! Brought to you by the BC Liberals I was tooling around on Facebook this morning, and some of my Green Party of BC FaceBook friends were talking about…
Liberal Party open contested nominations: Awesome plan, but Pro-Life is the fly in the ointment.
At great risk to life and limb, I am going to open a can of worms that the Liberal Party is just going to HAVE to deal with soon. Over…
Actually, jury is still out on efficacy of Attack ads against Trudeau
Hmm, this is a bit embarrassing. Yesterday I posted that the Ipsos Reid poll commissioned by postmedia and CTV demonstrated that the attack ads were not working. The word I…
An Opinion poll actually worth noting: Conservative Attack ads emphatically are NOT working.
Opinion polls can be extremely significant when they are used properly. When you are quantifying what things are of interest to specific people, you can garner useful actionable data, useful…