Sunday convention notes

While the most talked-about events from the Saskatchewan NDP convention may have been over with, there were a few points worth mentioning in today's proceedings.

First off, the party's executive elections featured only one contested vote, that for the at-large vice-president positions. And the results there were rather disappointing: with six candidates for five seats, the lone one eliminated was Mitchell Anderson, a young delegate from Saskatoon Nutana who had been an active and well-spoken participant in Friday's policy panel. While there were plenty of pluses about the candidates elected, it would have seemed a more positive step for the party to have voted Anderson a seat at the table (alongside the SYND's nominee) rather than passing him over in favour of a decidedly old-guard set of nominees.

Second, Don Mitchell offered the one intervention in the morning plenary which hints at some discontent with Dwain Lingenfelter's leadership so far. Mitchell raised a point of order about Lingenfelter's comments to the effect that the convention's nuclear resolution wouldn't necessarily affect how he handled the issue as leader - making for a good point in substance, if not one that was likely to go anywhere as a matter of procedure.

Finally, it might not come as much surprise that Lingenfelter's speech today kept up a his election-focused message rather than spending much time on longer-term renewal. But it's particularly noteworthy that Lingenfelter actually broke out of the usual set of political cliches in order to do so.

Commenting on the analogy of the leadership race being a marathon rather than a sprint, Lingenfelter told the crowd that the real marathon is one with a finish line in 2011 - a take which would seem to make for a fairly significant break from the usual line that a party's work really only begins when it wins power. That said, it may not make entirely for bad news for those of us who hold a longer-term focus; instead, it might suggest that there's a great opportunity to develop the policy agenda that accompanies Lingenfelter's drive for power.