The Lib take on NDP policy
a year ago at what was supposed to be their policy renewal conference:
At the time, those were the two big, important, structural differences in policy — the only two, if I recall correctly, although readers are welcome to remind everyone of other differences in the reopened comment board below — between the two largest national left-of-Harper parties. Layton’s big populist play (and sop to the auto unions) was to shy away from a clear, simple tax on carbon by employing a variant on the cap-and-trade shell game. Dion’s attempt to hang onto some corporate street cred, despite his Green Shift, consisted of insisting that corporate tax cuts proceed as Harper had announced.
After this weekend, those big structural policy differences between the Liberals and NDP no longer exist.
The Lib take on NDP policy
in this year's election campaign:
The main points in the Family Pack as it was styled by Leader Ignatieff, mirror much of what Jack Layton proposed for the last federal budget. Any doubts about who the Liberals are looking to get on side in this election now can be laid to rest: they are fishing for the centre-left vote, proposing demographic specific measures aimed at seniors, young voters, women, and "middle class" families.
The Libs' hastily revised take on NDP policy
now that they're flailing around for a raison d'etre while the NDP has become the Official Opposition:
Without Layton in the picture, some Liberals believe the public's attention will switch to the NDP's policies, and many voters won't see themselves reflected in its positions or tactics.
Alexandra Mendes, a former Liberal MP who was defeated last May and is now running to become the party's president, told The Huffington Post Canada she's convinced at least 95 per cent of the people who "voted for Jack" had no clue what the party really stood for and what it championed in its platform.
While it may very well be true that many new NDP voters in this past election were voting more for Jack Layton as opposed to voting for the NDP, it's incredibly condesending to those voters that they only do so because of Jack's charaisma. It's as if Alexandra Mendes is telling those voters, "Yup, you're gonna fell pretty dumb soon. Vote Liberal!"
ReplyDelete<span>While it may very well be true that many new NDP voters in this past election were voting more for Jack Layton as opposed to voting for the NDP, it's incredibly condesending to those voters that they only did so because of Jack's charaisma. It's as if Alexandra Mendes is telling those voters, "Yup, you're gonna fell pretty dumb soon. Vote Liberal!"</span>
ReplyDeleteThat's one of the asinine parts of Mendes' comments to be sure. But the other is that the Libs themselves copied more and more of the NDP's policies with every passing election - making it particularly rich for their leaders to now be declaring that nobody could possibly have supported them (and indeed voted for the party which was more likely to follow through on them).
ReplyDeleteWell of course they might argue that while everyone including Liberal voters presumably knew the Liberals were lying about most of that stuff, if the NDP was saying it that might mean they were actually planning on doing it if they ever got the chance.
ReplyDeleteThe Liberals: It's safe to vote for them because they'll never actually do any of the progressive stuff they say!
Which is, of course, why I'd never vote for the Liberals.
ReplyDelete