Author: Doug Rutherford

This is the fourth day since the writ was dropped and I cannot help but notice that there isn’t quite the carnage of fallen campaigners as there was last time around.

Last election, three BC NDP candidates withdrew in a week. Two for drug related videos and one for having removed his clothing and being body painted by teenagers. Another Toronto area Conservative candidate withdrew for supposedly not being able to commit for four years, although his online blog postings about gays, women and guns may have had far more to do with it.

It is decidedly possible that potential candidates have realized that what they’ve posted on the internet in the past may come back to haunt them. The proliferation of social media, particularly Facebook and Twitter, has made getting your message across far easier than it was in the past. However, there has also been the history of people posting less than parliamentary comments or behaviour on social media sites, forgetting that such things, stored as they are on someone else’s server, never… ever… go away (please note that the last clause should be spoken with a dramatic echo).

If every national party runs a candidate in each of the 308 ridings, plus Bloc candidates in Quebec, as well as others of the thirty or so registered political parties in Canada do run candidates in some ridings, you are looking at about 1500 candidates running in total (given that not all ridings have nominated candidates, we do have to wait to hear exactly how many). That is approximately 1500 people, each with a past, and each who has done at least one thing that probably doesn’t sell well with the electorate. Some can probably lay claim to more than one.  It looks, this time, like riding associations have done a better vetting job than they did last election, of finding the more blatant and public of those little indiscretions and ensuring that they, or the potential candidate they are attached to, don’t see the light of day.

And maybe, just maybe, we’ll have fewer candidates falling by the wayside from self-inflicted wounds. That is, however, probably way too much to expect in a Federal election.

Well, it appears that we have the names of everyone running for the election in Yukon. We have one seat covering the whole territory, for those not aware. Also, with our small population, elections here always seem to have that touch of “Hey, I know him/her.” Note: no her this time….

Running for the Liberal Party is incumbant, Larry Bagnell. He won the seat three terms ago from NDP Louise Hardy by a small margin of votes in 2001. Green Party candidate, John Streicker, is another veteran campaigner. John, a former Yukon College employee, is an engineer and climate change specialist. The Conservative Party has a new candidate this time around, Ryan Leef. Ryan has been an ex-mountie, ex-big game outfitter, ex-corrections officer and was, up to recently, a professional MMA fighter. Since the NDP candidate won’t be official until Wednesday, I can only hint that Kevin Barr, Juno-nominated musician, and Alex Furlong, president of the Yukon Federation of Labour, are expected to be the choices for candidate.

Revision Note: Kevin Barr was nominated last night.

Well, there’s your choices and there’s more than a month to make up your minds. And, is often the case, that involves picking which one of those, “Hey, I know him’s” based on which one you think will do the best job… or not.

I’ll start this off with the comment that I do think most of the media in Canada are quite good at their jobs. I’ll also admit that some of them suck, but that’s not where I’m going with this.

My biggest complaint is that most are so tentative. Let’s talk about the “H” word. I’ve heard the process named, (i.e., hypocrisy) but no one has used the word “hypocrite.” Stephen Harper is running around using the word coalition as an evil; however, he, himself, attempted to form a coalition with the NDP and the BQ in 2004. No, there is absolutely no difference between his efforts to bring down the Paul Martin government and what Stephane Dion did in 2008.

Almost no one in the nartional media has brought much of this forward. Yes, Andrew Coyne at MacLean’s has said it’s hypocrisy. Why not just say that Stephen Harper is a hypocrite. There’s this reticence to actually hold politicians to account, hold their feet to the fire. No, I’m not saying we should brand the letter “H” into their foreheads. But, maybe we should stop calling a spade an implement for excavation and just call it a god damned shovel.

(By the way, Stephen Harper isn’t the only hypocrite in this election. He prorogued parliament to save his tail after refusing to put a stimulus package in place. He later went out and brought forward a budget that either the Liberal or NDP party could have brought forward. Complaining about running up the deficit for doing what you wanted might also bring the “H” word up in polite conversation.)

Oh, the forehead branding thing. My disapproval probably doesn’t run to repeat offenders…

“Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.”
W. Shakespeare, Julius Caesar.

Well, it’s election time again. This is the 4th time in recent years we’ve done this and the last few have resulted in a minority governments. Don’t think this is a complaint. A minority probably represents the most democratic of situations, where governments must work with other parties to make government work. Think of it as a second chamber of sober second thought.

The problem inherent though, is that the last government really hasn’t been that interested in dealing with the other parties. The last budget was obviously designed to force an election, although the historic and somewhat sad situation of having a government found in contempt of parliament was the actual catalyst for non-confidence. The onus for making government work in a minority situation is directly on the prime minister, so this could have been equally named a motion of non-competence. My only assumption is that the Conservatives think they will win, so forcing an election, while at the same time calling it unnecessary, may be a good idea for them.

So, we will be innundated with polls (only one of those really counts and pollsters even say that they’re next to useless), innudated with telephone calls and innundated with doorbell ringing. Everyone of those callers will be more than willing to tell you everything you need to know.

You just might want to keep a grain of salt on hand, though, to help you deal with that.