Shocking and awful

There have been a few comments on yesterday's media tour of the Cons' campaign headquarters. But even this seemingly innocuous paragraph helps to hint at the serious problems behind the Cons' facade:

There were no employees toiling in the headquarters during Monday's visit -- but in a main room that holds about 100 brand-new desks, the computers were plugged in and running.

Keep in mind that the forthcoming election will be one where every other party is going out of its way to be environmentally friendly: the Libs and Greens have stated their intention to pay for emission credits to counter the effects of the campaign, while the NDP is looking for ways to reduce its emissions in the first place.

Against that backdrop, the Cons have firmly established themselves as the party of conspicuous and wasteful consumption, running a room full of computers even with no staff present for the sake of impressing the media.

Of course, there may be one other reason for the Cons to see a need to turn the computers on for the benefit of the press. With their track record of playing fast and loose with the facts, it could well be that anything short of completely visible screens would have led the Cons' guests to wonder what might only have been a prop:

"While Baird claimed to be walking us through a room full of computers, the furthest two rows or more could easily have been made out of Lego. And I could swear I saw a few TS 1000s mixed in."

Either way, though, the Cons can only be seen as irresponsible - whether based on a callous tendency toward overconsumption, or on their facing a chronic credibility deficit of their own making. And if voters catch on to those problems, all the spotlights and TelePrompters in the world won't be able to help the Cons stay in power.