Rules of evidence

Julie Smyth is right to point out that all of Canada's federal parties seem to have caught on to the tactic of claiming victory following last night's debate. But it's worth noting that of all the examples listed by Smyth, only the New Democrats didn't have to make up their own praise in order to do so:

The NDP issued a news release Wednesday night that was full of blog comments praising Jack Layton's performance. The party lifted favourable comments from the online versions of Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, the National Post, the Ottawa Citizen.

Compare this to the Cons in particular, whose trustworthy, unbiased sources of compliments were...the campaign's own co-chairs:

Meanwhile, the Conservatives issued a news release praising the party and Stephen Harper. It included lengthy quotes from all three Conservative campaign co-chairs. The news release, sent out Wednesday night, carried the headline “HARPER SCORES ON ECONOMY” and was full of flattering remarks from Conservative Senator Marjory LeBreton, Conservative MP David Emerson and former Conservative premier Bernard Lord.

No word yet as to whether any or all of the co-chairs were even informed about the quotes that were sent out in their names.

In turn, while the Libs and Greens weren't quite so blatant as to quote their own party's figures as authorities on who won the debate, they too seem to have been limited to making up their own compliments for their press releases.

Which means that while everybody was obviously keen to declare victory, only the New Democrats bothered to seek any outside evidence to support the claim. And that should speak volumes about how much each party's war room can be trusted as the campaign progresses.