Monday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material to start your week.

- Susan Delacourt notes that while the NDP's leadership convention points out some of the risks of online voting, the real problem lies in the people working to block democracy through any available means:

While those who use computers have become accustomed to the system-fail message about files being corrupted, we’re talking here about a different type of corruption.

The cyberattack on the NDP was apparently deliberate and orchestrated. As well, it’s looking like the ever-widening robo-calls investigation will reveal something a little larger than mere, one-off mischief.

The worry is that it isn’t the machinery that’s getting corrupted, but some of the people plying the political trade right now. If that’s the case, more than the system needs a reset — and smashing the machines won’t fix it.

And Dave reaches a similar conclusion while noting that the Cons' vote suppression looks to have been the result of an organizational push:

Perhaps it's decades of military training and my experience as a front-line "death technician" that routes my thinking, but I cannot think of any way to pull off a geographically massive, narrowly timed operation without at least four things in place: planning, coordination, deception and delegation1. In a criminal enterprise it is described with one word: conspiracy.
...
All the signs point to a planned, coordinated and specifically-timed national effort to suppress the opposition vote using illegal means. And to add to the elements required to pull off something as large as this appears to be, the direction of such an effort has to come from well up in the hierarchy of a group. In a disciplined, authoritarian-led organization, independent action over a wide scale usually fails.

Meanwhile, the Hill Times reports on Marc Mayrand's recommendations to improve the Canada Elections Act, while Sixth Estate suggests fully enforcing the one we have already.

- Julie MacArthur aptly sums up the Cons' idea of a message on the environment as being that of a "scorched earth hour".

- fern hill (X2, deBeauxOs, JJ and Alison are rightly asking for some progressive unity against Stephen Woodworth's attempts to reopen the abortion debate.

- Finally, John Geddes and Aaron Wherry look behind the scenes of the NDP leadership campaign, while Alice thoroughly dissects the final voting numbers.

Leadership 2012 Lessons Learned - Pundit Edition

With a week's perspective on the NDP's leadership campaign, I'll take a quick look back to see - particularly in comparing my own impressions as to how the vote might play out to what actually happened.

To start off with, let's note that of all the publicly-available metrics available to evaluate the race, none served as a particularly useful means of evaluating first-ballot support. The only ones which correctly pegged the two top of Thomas Mulcair and Brian Topp were fund-raising and endorsements. But the former suggested a much tighter five-way race than proved to be the case, while the latter would have placed Nathan Cullen a distant fifth rather than a strong third.

Indeed, the closest overall single metric looks to have been...media mentions. Which may give rise to some chicken-or-egg philosophizing, but also offers a data point to suggest that those who took the time to cover the campaign did fairly well in collectively assessing its outcome.

That said, there are a couple of points I'll take away from the campaign for future punditry.

First, while it was fairly obvious that different dynamics were at play in different parts of the country, my biggest mistake lay in presuming that one Saskatchewan-specific dynamic would play out similarly elsewhere.

My impression is still that Brian Topp's Saskatchewan endorsements (which he trumpeted at several points in the campaign) were well out of proportion to his share of support among at least the members at the events I attended. And I extrapolated from that view to figure that Topp's support elsewhere was similarly top-heavy. But instead, he had enough grassroots support to come closer than I'd thought possible on the first ballot.

(Of course, it's possible that Topp could have dispelled any false impressions by releasing some of his own campaign's data, rather than treating a perceived lack of momentum merely as a PR issue to be swatted away with a mere "nah, that's wrong". And I'll expand on that possibility in a future post about lessons learned and what-ifs for the candidates.)

The other obvious mistaken impression was as to Paul Dewar's first-ballot support. But that one simply looks to be a matter of reality defying all evidence available at the time of the vote - which if anything should serve as a warning about pretending to know more than we do before a vote takes place.

So the take-aways from the NDP's leadership campaign are to listen more to...spin-meisters and the mainstream media. Which may make for the most surprising outcome of all.

Sunday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your weekend.

- Karl Nerenberg reported on Marc Mayrand's Robocon testimony, featuring some much-needed discussion of what can be done to improve the Canada Elections Act to ensure fair elections rather than creating an incentive for electoral fraud:

Mayrand fretted to the Committee that there are too many grey areas in the current legislation, and he promised to propose changes to the electoral law before the next election.
...
Committee members repeatedly asked Mayrand about the threshold for nullifying the results of an election, and he had to repeat more than once that Elections Canada does not do that.

It may be one of the lacunae in the law that Mayrand will try to have fixed, but for now citizens who believe they were cheated out of their vote, and that the election in their riding should be rendered null and void, have to go to court.

Meanwhile, the Guelph Mercury reported that the infamous Michael Sona was merely following orders in tampering with a ballot box at the University of Guelph - raising plenty of questions as to who actually gave those orders.

- In further commentary on the federal budget, Carol Goar nicely summarized the budget as an attack on the "economically diversified, socially progressive Canada" that Stephen Harper has loathed for so long, while Thomas Walkom looked in more detail at how it earned the title. Iglika Ivanova pointed out that Canadians fully support higher taxes, including reversing most of the Cons' moves to slash federal fiscal capacity. Murray Dobbin wondered why Jim Flaherty seems eager to bring on another recession. The Globe and Mail slammed the Cons' gratuitous attacks on the environmental movement, while Gloria Galloway wrote about how the budget will further restrict the flow about accurate information about what the Harper Cons are up to. Peter Thurley concluded that the first fully-formed majority budget should serve as the ultimate disproof the Cons have any clue what they're doing managing public finances. Tim Harper tried to minimize the damage. Paul Wells pointed out the final elimination of the Public Appointments Commission which was once hyped as the Cons' big idea to take patronage out of civil-service hiring, while Sixth Estate charted just how much political hiring is going on. Steve compared the Cons' cuts to the CBC to the hundreds of millions allocated for further propaganda. And Jim Stanford crunched the numbers as to how much Canadians will lose from the Cons' cuts to OAS.

- And in a point which deserves at least a separate bullet, APTN noted that part of the attack on environmental reviews includes trying to fold constitutional obligations to consult with First Nations into the same time-limited processes being set up to wave through development without any serious review - which looks like a rather promising ground for challenge.

- Finally, Tabatha Southey set a high bar for due mockery of Mitt Romney. But David Javerbaum easily cleared it.

On regional impacts

Back here, I pointed out the prairie numbers from Forum Research's poll about Canada's federal leaders as an indication that the NDP has plenty of opportunity to grow after electing Thomas Mulcair as leader. But Volkov points out the fact that the NDP's chances of making major gains in western Canada look even better based on Forum's party preference data:



That's right: at least one poll reflecting immediate reactions to Mulcair shows a 44-41 lead for the NDP in Manitoba and Saskatchewan which would flip a dozen seats from Con to NDP hands, along with 30%+ support for the NDP in every region of the country (including Alberta which would see three more seats go to the NDP).

Of course, the usual caveats about a single poll apply. But at the very least, there's little evidence that western voters see the NDP's direction under Mulcair as any less a plus than the rest of Canada. And if the Cons are indeed forced to play defence in the West, that should work wonders for the NDP's ability to win over voters in what looks to be the ultimate battleground of Ontario.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- If there's any lesson we should all be able to draw from the past decade in Canadian politics, it's that anything can happen. But it's still rather amazing to see Gerald Caplan get hopeful about the NDP's prospects of forming a social-democratic government:

Faithful readers will know that I’ve spent my adult life trying to get the NDP to be realistic about its modest status in Canadian life. Until last May I repeatedly pointed out that with a single exception, the party always got less than 20 per cent of the national vote, would not in the foreseeable future form a government, and had to learn to live with moral victories as the conscience of the nation.

This was not a status to be dismissed or minimized. The CCF/NDP played a central role, as opposition, in forcing the governing parties to introduce the welfare state, one of the great contributions to the well-being of Canadians, and now in serious jeopardy. As well, research showed that while most Canadians would not vote NDP, a majority were reassured to have the party around to keep the major players honest.

Then came May 2011, 30 per cent of the vote and Official Opposition. But how could it be sustained. Surely this was a fluke resting on the shoulders of one man, and he, tragically, was gone.
...
For months we had heard that the party in the House of Commons had disappeared, its interim leader submerged by the ubiquitous Bob Rae. Yet almost a year after their majority government victory, the Harperites had lost a quarter of their support and were now at 30 per cent, the Liberals had stayed put at a derisory 20 per cent, and the NDP was still at 30 per cent. The party was tied with the badly slumping Conservatives for first place!

Even more remarkably, and all but unprecedented, 49 per cent of all Canadians now believe the NDP can be trusted with government. In fact, that can be said more positively: Half of Canadians believe an NDP government would be good for Canada! Another 20 per cent are unsure, making them potential supporters. It seems the very fact of being Official Opposition means a party is taken more seriously as an alternative government. Now you can’t exactly say with a straight face the NDP is rushing headlong towards government with up to 70 per cent of the vote. But still, whoever anticipated such a breakthrough?
...
And to top it off, post-convention polling continues this groundbreaking trend. As one pollster summed it up this week, “It’s clear that the election of Tom Mulcair as NDP leader has considerably improved the party’s prospects.”
...
Clearly Stephen Harper’s enforcers believe their coming onslaught can undermine the new NDP leader in the same classy way they demolished Stéphane Dion and Michael Ignatieff.

Who knows? Maybe they’re right. But the tides of March suggest this new NDP guy won’t be quite the pushover those Liberals were.

- Paul Moist sets out a road map to deal with inequality in Canada:

Corporations rely on our public services -- they drive our economy. So corporations need to pay their fair share to protect them.

Our current tax system is riddled with loopholes and ineffective tax credits -- along with easy access to tax havens -- that benefit the wealthy while robbing funds from public services that all Canadians need and want.

The most destructive loophole is the stock option deduction. It allows Canada's highest paid executives to have their employment income taxed at half the rate of others. Not only that, this loophole only encourages the reckless speculation that led to the global economic crisis.

The capital gains deduction costs Canada over $6 billion a year in revenues. Yet it doesn't lead to concrete, job-creating investments. It just fuels real estate speculation and corporate mergers and acquisitions.

Successive Liberal and Conservative governments have eliminated top tax rates for the wealthiest Canadians -- the only ones who have seen real income growth in the past 20 years. Today, the top rate is 29 per cent -- whether you make $130,000 a year or $130 million.
...
We need to move to a more progressive tax system. This means closing tax loopholes and cutting off tax havens.

We must also get rid of ineffective tax credits that only benefit the rich. Too many of these credits don't help the poor, and drain revenues from universally accessible services. We need to be directly funding public services that are available to everyone -- like public transit, child care, arts, and sports programs for our families.

And profitable corporations and the wealthiest Canadians need to pay their fair share.

- Meanwhile, Andrew Jackson points out the McGuinty Libs' similar insistence on ensuring that the wealthiest Ontarians don't pay a dime toward the deficits caused by decades of trickle-down tax slashing. And Erin notes that while the Cons have repeatedly imposed back-to-work legislation based on specious arguments that strikes could harm economic growth, it's a series of lockouts (fully embraced by the Harper Cons since they would serve to reduce the influence of workers) which have actually had that effect.

- Nick Fillmore's three-part series on what progressive Canadians can do to counter the Harper Cons' attacks on the idea of social benefits is well worth a read.

- Finally, Atrios points out another regular feature in '90s-era triangulation that desperately needs to be replaced - in Canada as well as in the U.S.:

For the past couple of decades we've all (by "we" I man all the Very Serious People in the chattering classes) bought into the fantasy that all we need to do is pursue Conservative Means to achieve Liberal Ends and everything will be awesome...Right now we have one political party that is very up front about and proud of their desire to mug everyone in the non-millionaire club, steal all their money, and give it to rich people. It's time for the other political party to recognize that the era of dumb compromises is over, and if they'd actually come up with a way to help people, instead of a plan to set up a program to provide the incentives to blahblahblahblahblahblah...

Musical interlude

Moxy Fruvous - River Valley

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Yes, there was huge news in Robocon yesterday, with Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand rightly declaring the Cons' fraudulent vote suppression to be "absolutely outrageous" while sharing the news that reports of wrongdoing have now come in from two-thirds of all of Canada's federal ridings. And Mayrand also noted how the reported numbers relate to the abuses known to have taken place:

Conservative MP Tom Lukiwski suggested to Mayrand that the 800 complaints worked out to only a few in each of Canada's 308 ridings.

But Mayrand said only a small percentage of people complain about receiving calls, noting that the Pierre Poutine calls sent with a disposable cellphone with a Quebec area code, resulted in only 70 complaints on or after election day.

"We know 6,700 calls were placed from the famous 450 number," he said. "We know that many people don't complain, obviously."

Meanwhile, Kady live-blogged the proceedings. And Gregory Beatty pointed out the Harper government's highly suspicious decision to start de-funding Elections Canada just as it's trying to investigate the Cons' own election fraud.

- But it's also well worth discussing the federal budget released yesterday - with a few pieces that haven't received much attention including the declaration that anybody concerned about being lied to by big business can take it up alone against their friendly neighbourhood corporate conglomerate, and the new money being poured into attacking charities in what's otherwise supposed to be an austerity budget (with absolutely no expectation of any return on the investment other than to silence environmental groups). Meanwhile, John Ibbitson discussed the Cons' goal of getting Canadians to expect less public service from government. Pogge aptly described the Cons and their short-sighted resource-sector cronies as "looters in suits and ties". And Dr. Dawg, Erin Weir, Boris, Susan Riley, Andrew Jackson, Paul Wells, Marc Lee, Leftdog, David Macdonald and Mike McNair weighed in as well.

- And a couple of commentators also focused on Thomas Mulcair's role responding to the budget, with Wells nicely framing Mulcair's substantive line of criticism of the Cons while David Climenhaga pointing to Mulcair's fighting spirit.

- Finally, Sharon Kirkey reports on how prescription drug shortages are hurting patients across Canada. And no, handing more free money to the same drug companies both causing and profiting from the shortages doesn't figure to improve matters any.

Setting the agenda

Quick, spot what's different in the NDP's response to the federal budget compared to any other official opposition ever:

NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair today slammed Stephen Harper’s Conservatives for introducing a budget that recklessly cuts the vital services that Canadians rely on—such as Old Age Security and health care.

“Stephen Harper promised jobs and growth, but delivered reckless cuts. There’s nothing on jobs, nothing on inequality and nothing to strengthen our front-line health services.” Mulcair said. “Mr. Harper is once again looking out for his friends, while he ignores growing inequality.”

That's right: Thomas Mulcair has wasted absolutely no time in turning inequality into the NDP's primary economic focus. And there are plenty of ways that choice may shape Canadian politics for years to come.

To start with, it should work wonders in dispelling any remaining concerns about Mulcair's policy direction for the NDP. In the leadership campaign, it was Brian Topp who spoke constantly about working toward greater equality - and it may be that Mulcair figured he didn't want to echo a rival's message. But the theme figures to be the best possible unifying principle both for the NDP's base, and for progressive voters not yet inside the party's tent.

Meanwhile, the quick choice of messages also helps to put Mulcair's honeymoon phase to the best possible use in converting immediate positive perceptions into longer-term policy impact. Where past opposition leaders haven't been particularly focused in using their newfound place in the spotlight to any great impact, Mulcair has wasted no time in choosing a direction to promote.

But wait, there's more - as Mulcair hasn't picked just any policy to push after ascending to the leadership. Instead, of all the possible themes associated with the economy, inequality looks to be the absolute best in drawing positive contrasts no matter what happens between now and 2015.

It's possible that factors largely outside the federal government's control could move job numbers, GDP, deficits or other measures in either direction - meaning that there's substantial risk for any party in trying to point to those factors as the main indicator of the Harper Cons' impact. But with the Cons working as deliberately as they are to place a thumb on the scale in favour of those who already have the most, there's something close to zero likelihood that the NDP won't be able to point to worsening inequality as an indicator of the Cons' actions while in power. And if voters reach the ballot box with inequality as their top-of-mind concern...well, that's almost certainly the ideal end result for the NDP.

Guest Post: On governing authorities

Dan Tan offers another guest post - this one responding to a bit of misplaced advice from Embassy with a helpful reminder as to how policy is formulated within the NDP:

The foreign-affairs publication 'Embassy' recently published the following article: Advocates hope new Opposition leader shifts NDP position on Israel

The election of Thomas Mulcair as leader of the New Democratic Party could signal a coming shift in the party's policy on Israel, some advocates predict...

I am sure many NDP members will treat its content as a sort of "prophecy". But in reality, the article is actually engaging in advocacy, not analysis. The article has no intention of examining NDP policy on Israel/Palestine. Rather, its intention is to send Thomas Mulcair himself a rather crude message.

In an article ostensibly about Mulcair & the NDP's Israel/Palestine policy...it's telling that none of those topics are actually explored. Though Mulcair's name comes up, his Israel/Palestine policy statement (released during the leadership campaign) is completely ignored. The NDP's existing policy is reduced to one sentence from the foreign affairs critic. The grass-roots collaborative NDP policy-making process is totally disregarded.

Instead, the article chooses to highlight various winks & nudges from Canadian advocates of the Israeli government. And in case those advocates were too coy, the author (Ingrid Walter) concludes by presenting Mulcair with an absolutely bizarre claim. Walter cites an Ipsos exit poll of Jewish-Canadian voters. In it, the Conservatives scored a majority of 52%. Without wincing, Walter attempts to convince Mulcair that a "pro-Israel" NDP would also score 52%.

It never crosses Walter's mind that many Jewish-Canadian voters were simply responding to economic policies or a fatigue of minority parliament. [Ed. note: Nor that it's possible to test whether "pro-Israel" policies actually tend to move votes and other support.] Instead, the mere sight of Thomas Mulcair echoing the Cons' foreign policy is somehow supposed to move Jewish-Canadian voters en masse toward the NDP.

Many NDP members (like myself) trust that Thomas Mulcair is intelligent enough to recognize the desperation & comedy behind such an inducement. But for those members who still have doubts, the NDP constitution provides clarity as to where the party's policy is developed:

Conventions are the supreme governing body of the Party and shall have final authority in all matters of federal policy, program and constitution.
...
The NDP Federal Council shall have full authority to issue policy statements and election statements in the name of the Party, consonant with the decisions of the Convention, and to initiate policy statements consonant with the philosophy of the Party in matters not yet considered by Convention.

Thursday Morning Links

This and that for your Thursday reading...

- No, we shouldn't read too much into the first wave of polling following Thomas Mulcair's election as NDP leader. But there are a couple of points where the early returns are far enough out of line with expectations to be worth pointing out. First, there's the comparison between a leader just elected and one who's been given the profile normally reserved for the leader of the Official Opposition for the better part of a year:

Mr. Harper had a moderate lead nationally when voters were asked which of the three leaders they thought would make the best prime minister. Thirty three per cent of respondents nationally favoured Mr. Harper as best choice for prime minister, with Mr. Mulcair at 27 per cent and Mr. Rae at 22 per cent. Seventeen per cent of the respondents said they did not know who they preferred.

And even more interestingly, there's this data point on the question of whether Mulcair can be successful in Western Canada:

The survey found Mr. Mulcair more popular than the other two leaders among young voters and middle income voters. His support was also stronger in the Prairie provinces and the Atlantic, but he placed behind Mr. Rae and Mr. Harper in Ontario as preference for best prime minister.

- Saskatchewan's electoral redistribution commission is up and running, and interested in public input until April 15 on its first proposal. And Gregory Beatty reminds us why it's well worth taking the time to participate.

- Susan Delacourt quotes Peter Aucoin on the use of the levers of government to entrench partisan gain and control over the public service - which the Cons look to be using to maximum effect in today's federal budget.

- Meanwhile, Andrea Horwath is nicely carrying on the NDP's tradition of working with other parties toward better budgets than they'd ever consider on their own.

- Finally, CTV points out another example of distinctive Saskatchewan culture that's withering away under the Wall government, as the Western Development Museum is being forced to start cutting hours for lack of funding.

New column day

Here, on the philosophical underpinnings of the Wall government's choice to demolish Saskatchewan's film industry - and the dangers for the province if we accept them.

For further reading...
- Bruce Johnstone and Murray Mandryk have already criticized the attack on the film industry as ill-advised purely as a matter of dollars and cents.
- And Simon Enoch expands on the Saskatchewan Party's selective laissez-faire philosophy, documenting the massive amounts of public money being poured into the resource sector and other businesses.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Fred Wilson weighs in on Thomas Mulcair's mandate as the NDP's new leader:

(M)any progressives with no interest whatsoever in a "Blairist" agenda had found their way to the Mulcair camp. They supported Mulcair for two reasons -- to maintain the party's base in Quebec, and to immediately step up to the role of Opposition Leader in Parliament and Prime Minister-in-Waiting.

Of course, there are also some in the party and labour who see the Mulcair win as an opportunity to realize a long-held goal of a "big tent" centrist party. But this leadership campaign and decision most definitely did not deliver any such mandate.
...
Tom Mulcair won a mandate instead to do what he obviously was the best prepared to deliver -- an immediate, polished, professional competence as an Opposition Leader and potential Prime Minister. And it's on this basis that Tom Mulcair begins his leadership with the support and goodwill of a much larger majority than his votes at convention.

- And Kathleen O'Hara mentions one intriguing possibility if Harper overplays his hand:

I did detect one area of disagreement between the declarations of the NDP and my employer: the timing of the demise of Stephen Harper. Booting him out in the 2015 election seemed to be the general plan among social democrats. May points out that unpopular leaders, most recently B.C.'s Gordon Campbell, have been pushed out of office well before the end of their mandate. In the name of anti-Conservative unity, I'm sure a compromise can be reached.

- Meanwhile, Bruce Cheadle and Tim Naumetz both report on the unprecedented outside voter suppression aimed at the NDP's members. And Steven Chase and Tamara Baluja report that Elections Canada isn't far from tracking down "Pierre Poutine" - and that higher-ranking Con insiders are on the verge of getting named as well:

Mr. Meier also told Elections Canada that “Pierre” initially telephoned him directly on his unlisted office extension and asked for him by name when setting up his robo-calling account.

“Pierre referred to knowing someone in the Conservative Party,” Mr. Mathews said of the call Mr. Meier received at RackNine. “In Meier's view, these facts mean someone must have given Pierre his contact information.”

- Bill Curry reports that one of the unions most affected by the Cons' anticipated federal budget has been barred from the budget lock-up - with its vocal opposition to austerity looking like one of the main reasons.

- Curry, Janet McFarland and Tara Perkins also point out that the same federal government which has used a tiny amount of provincial disagreement as its excuse for not strengthening the Canada Pension Plan is now trying to strong-arm Ontario into going along with its private-sector-first alternative.

- Finally, Danny Dorling comments on why any actual austerity should be aimed squarely at those who have made the most for themselves while most people have just barely scraped by.

On standards of disproof

In keeping with my own admonition, I won't spend too much time amplifying the messages the Cons want to send in attacking NDP leader Thomas Mulcair. But I do think it's worth pointing out how the main theme could prove to be self-defeating.

One of the points which worked well for the Cons in defining the last two permanent leaders of the opposition is that their criticisms were virtually impossible to disprove. Particularly for anybody who wasn't paying close attention to politics, "not a leader" and "only in it for himself" made for neat talking points which couldn't particularly be countered by personal experience - and the few people in a position to speak to the questions could easily be dismissed as partisan supporters.

But the "angry" label being applied to Mulcair is a rather different beast. It won't be the least bit difficult for even a casual observer to test the based on public appearances, particularly during the 2015 election campaign. And with Mulcair having consistently stayed both calm and positive during a lengthy and contentious leadership race, I wouldn't want to be the party betting on his offering much fodder to reinforce the frame.

In fact, the Cons' choice of attacks may ultimately end up helping Mulcair: by offering a falsifiable label, they've not only set a relatively low set of expectations which Mulcair can be expected to exceed, but also laid the groundwork for discussion (among the pundit class and among Canadians at large) about how their own talking points might prove wrong. And that knowledge should make it far easier for Mulcair to ride out the Cons' inevitable attempts to rile him up in a desperate attempt to make the label stick.

Tuesday Night Cat Blogging

At Jan's request...dapper cats.

Tuesday Evening Links

Assorted content to end your day.

- Carol Goar asked this weekend for a reasonable explanation as to how to allocate the pain in times of austerity. Not surprisingly, the McGuinty Libs came to the wrong answer - and the Harper Cons figure to do even worse. Meanwhile, Trish Hennessy comments on the power of "austerity" as a concept (while Paul Krugman duly mocks the latest attempt to spin it).

- Min discusses the Cons' seemingly bottomless supply of free money for the oil sector even as they slash anything else within reach. And Andrew Nikiforuk highlights the Cons' quasi-religious devotion to the tar sands as the only explanation for many of their decisions.

- Andrew Jackson writes that the Cons' plans to attack OAS won't actually produce any savings - only serve the purpose of making social supports less effective.

- Finally, for those wondering how long it would take for a Lawyers for Fair Taxation group to develop, the answer was...not long at all.

Guest Post: The Progressive Consensus

Last week, I pointed out Greg Lyle's polling showing that the NDP's brand of social democracy enjoys plenty of popular support as a primary value system for a party seeking to form government. But reader Dan Tan looked at the numbers in a bit more detail and with an eye toward consensus rather than mere initial support - and found that taking into account respondents who are neutral on (and thus at worst open to) NDP policies, there's potential to unite a striking number of progressive voters of various party stripes behind the values long promoted by the NDP.

So without any further ado, here's Dan (edited slightly for formatting):

*----------- BACKGROUND -----------*

The Edmonton Journal (among others) recently commissioned a poll on Canadian attitudes from a conservative pollster named Greg Lyle. Based on the findings of Innovative Research Group Inc., the following article was published.

Unfortunately, the article was very misleading & over-editorialized. More importantly, it suffered from a major misunderstanding of a specific answer in the poll. This led the newspaper author (Peter O'Neil) to reach false conclusions (explained further, later).

The poll itself actually contains results which are of great value to NDP members. That's remarkable, given the fact that the sample could easily skew "small c" conservative...by virtue of who the pollster is. That's why it complements a previous Ekos poll (one that is accused of skewing "small l" by detractors).

The following is an analysis I have carried out myself based on the
raw polling data.

*----------- CONTEXT -----------*

To provide some context, the voting intentions of those polled breaks down in the following manner:
Undecided: 10%
Conservatives: 33%
NDP: 22%
Liberal: 21%
Greens: 6%
Bloc: 6%

Of course, the purpose of this poll is not to predict the election. The actual value comes from specific policy statements posed to voters. Furthermore, the polling firm has provided a breakdown of how specific groups answered each question. The groups most important to the NDP are:
- Truly Uncommitted
- 2nd Choice NDP
- Soft NDP
- Firm NDP

*----------- PURPOSE -----------*

These are the various groups who constitute the "progressive majority". Thomas Mulcair has expressed an intent to reach out to these folks through a "re-branding" of NDP policies & communications. But before that happens, this poll allows us to see how the target-audience *already* feels about these important issues.

We'll only examine the most important questions. Currently, the economy is the over-riding concern of the broader population. These are the selected policy statements we'll focus on:
- The government should discourage the export of raw natural resources and encourage the use of those resources to create jobs here in Canada.
- We need to raise taxes on the rich and big business to ensure they pay their fair share.
- The federal government should encourage the growth of unions in Canada.
- The federal government must take action to close the gap between rich and poor in Canada.

We'll also interpret the answers accurately. These were the various reactions to each policy statement:
- Strongly agree
- Somewhat agree
- Neither agree nor disagree
- Somewhat disagree
- Strongly disagree

*----------- MISUNDERSTANDING -----------*

The problem with the 'Edmonton Journal' article was that it misunderstood what the answer "neither agree nor disagree" actually meant. In this poll, the answer means: "I won't stand in your way, whatever you do on this issue".

In a "sleight of hand", the 'Edmonton Journal' either grouped these folks in the "disagree" camp, or they ignored them altogether. By doing this, they drew false conclusions (ie. "the survey found cool support for unions", "avoid old NDP jargon about 'brothers and sisters'" etc.).

The 'Edmonton Journal' article treated each issue as a technical referendum question. So in a referendum, the issue is decided by voters who firmly "agree" or "disagree". Meanwhile, voters who think "I won't stand in your way, whatever you do on this issue" are not counted at all.

But that is not how elections or our parliament work. In an election, those who say "neither agree nor disagree" still count as voters. And their in-action has a dramatic effect on the composition & stability of a government.

It is vitally important for the NDP to understand this: These folks have specifically chosen not to "disagree" with the following policy statements. That means the policies will not influence their vote....and in effect, the party has tacit approval to implement those policies.

*----------- TACIT APPROVAL OF NDP POLICIES -----------*

*1) "The government should discourage the export of raw natural resources and encourage the use of those resources to create jobs here in Canada."*

Truly Uncommitted - Tacit Approval: 86%
(Strongly agree: 39%, Somewhat agree: 24%, Neither agree nor disagree: 23%)
2nd Choice NDP - Tacit Approval: 95%
(Strongly agree: 43%, Somewhat agree: 38%, Neither agree nor disagree: 14%)
Soft NDP - Tacit Approval: 95%
(Strongly agree: 49%, Somewhat agree: 36%, Neither agree nor disagree: 10%)
Firm NDP - Tacit Approval: 96%
(Strongly agree: 57%, Somewhat agree: 32%, Neither agree nor disagree: 7%)

*2) We need to raise taxes on the rich and big business to ensure they pay their fair share.*

Truly Uncommitted - Tacit Approval: 85%
(Strongly agree: 44%, Somewhat agree: 25%, Neither agree nor disagree: 16%)
2nd Choice NDP - Tacit Approval: 83%
(Strongly agree: 54%, Somewhat agree: 17%, Neither agree nor disagree: 12%)
Soft NDP - Tacit Approval: 95%
(Strongly agree: 52%, Somewhat agree: 32%, Neither agree nor disagree: 11%)
Firm NDP - Tacit Approval: 94%
(Strongly agree: 64%, Somewhat agree: 22%, Neither agree nor disagree: 8%)

*3) The federal government should encourage the growth of unions in Canada.*

Truly Uncommitted - Tacit Approval: 52%
(Strongly agree: 9%, Somewhat agree: 7%, Neither agree nor disagree: 36%)
2nd Choice NDP - Tacit Approval: 58%
(Strongly agree: 15%, Somewhat agree: 19%, Neither agree nor disagree: 24%)
Soft NDP - Tacit Approval: 70%
(Strongly agree: 19%, Somewhat agree: 24%, Neither agree nor disagree: 27%)
Firm NDP - Tacit Approval: 89%
(Strongly agree: 30%, Somewhat agree: 20%, Neither agree nor disagree: 29%)

*4) The federal government must take action to close the gap between rich and poor in Canada.*

Truly Uncommitted - Tacit Approval: 90%
(Strongly agree: 40%, Somewhat agree: 35%, Neither agree nor disagree: 15%)
2nd Choice NDP - Tacit Approval: 87%
(Strongly agree: 59%, Somewhat agree: 22%, Neither agree nor disagree: 6%)
Soft NDP - Tacit Approval: 97%
(Strongly agree: 55%, Somewhat agree: 29%, Neither agree nor disagree: 13%)
Firm NDP - Tacit Approval: 99%
(Strongly agree: 79%, Somewhat agree: 7%, Neither agree nor disagree: 13%)

*----------- CONCLUSION -----------*

As has already been explained, tacit approval indicates the leeway a leader has to implement actual policies.

As the polling data shows, a majority of "the progressive majority" would be content with the implementation of fundamental NDP economic policies.

The open question is WHO should implement those policies. This same poll indicates that progressive voters are evenly divided between the Liberals and NDP.

Thomas Mulcair aims to break the tie by professionalizing the NDP. Along with Peggy Nash, he has called for the national body to adequately fund all riding associations. He also pointed to Craig Scott as an example of the type of high-profile candidate the party wishes to recruit across Canada.

NDP members can easily rally around such an effort by our leader. But should our leader attempt to alter our fundamental economic policies, he will be doing so without any justification.

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Stephen Maher and Glen McGregor report that the Council of Canadians is leading the charge in challenging election results which may have been influenced by Robocon. And perhaps the most noteworthy point as to how the move may shine a spotlight on the Cons' black ops is this:

The organization hopes that it can use its lawsuit to discover the volume of deceptive or fraudulent calls in other ridings, by convincing a judge to order phone carriers to turn over records showing how many calls were placed into each riding from numbers associated with suspicious calls.

- Chantal Hebert concludes that Thomas Mulcair is off to a great start as NDP leader.

- And a stream of news about the Cons' utter incompetence isn't hurting matters - as CBC reports Harper and company have known for years that the F-35s they insist on buying don't actually meet the needs of Canada's military, while Pauline Tam notes that they did nothing in the face of four years advance warning of the prescription drug shortages now hitting Canadians directly. All of which should offer all the more reason for suspicion about the Cons' latest plans to gut public protection against ill-advised corporate plans.

- Finally, Paul Krugman writes about the American Legislative Exchange Council and its efforts to take over the normal role of legislators by substituting hard-right boilerplate laws.

On early definition

It's entirely predictable that far too many in the media are starting their coverage of Thomas Mulcair's election as NDP leader with the Cons' instant spin - in some cases even while showing plenty of optimism about Mulcair. (On that front, due credit to the Winnipeg Free Press for criticizing the Cons' immediate attacks without repeating and reinforcing the first set against Mulcair.)

But perhaps the most interesting counterweight is this - as the NDP isn't hesitating to let the media start doing the same to amplify its own message even before any ad campaign is ready:

The NDP has already held auditions for the TV ads it plans to film this week featuring new leader Thomas Mulcair, and a script used for the auditions gives some insight into what themes the party hopes to hammer home.
...
The ad spot, titled "A Leader" opens with images of Canadians and is intended to have "a very day-in-the-life feeling," according to the audtion script. Various actors would read the following lines: "Canada has a new leader who will fight for my family. [New leader's name]. He'll actually help me make ends meet. Help me save for retirement. A leader who will take on Stephen Harper. And win."

The script includes an appearance by Olivia Chow saying, "Jack's vision is in good hands."
...
The audition script includes alternate lines on how the new leader will hire more family doctors, crack down on polluters and make them pay, clean up Ottawa and put an end to scandals.

Of course, I'd ultimately prefer to see less media attention given to merely repeating party messages. But as long as the Cons can count on having their every attack repeated ad nauseum, it makes a world of sense for the NDP to use the same mechanism to contrast Mulcair against the Harper Cons. And the more the message war plays out in the media, the less the Cons' deep pockets figure to affect the public's ultimate perceptions.

Monday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to start your week...

- Remember the Cons' talking point that we should assume all of the Robocon calls which purported to come from Lib candidates could safely be said to have come from that source? Because Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher just shot a massive hole in the claim, finding that the same Pierre Poutine responsible for sending voters to fraudulent poll locations also recorded a call impersonating the Lib campaign.

- Bruce Campbell suggests five tests for the federal budget - though the smart money is on the Cons paying lip service to one and actively refusing to show any interest in the rest.

- Leftdog runs down some of the Wall government's sad legacy of wilful ignorance.

- Finally, in news surrounding Thomas Mulcair's election as NDP leader, Dan Lett highlights the opportunities open to the party following Mulcair's election. Joanna Smith looks at some of the new talent joining the NDP as part of Mulcair's team, while there have already been a few noteworthy departures as well. Robin Sears points out the trade-offs NDP members considered in voting for Mulcair. Frances Russell describes Mulcair's victory as reflecting the NDP turning the page on turning the other cheek. And John offers a nuanced analysis of the campaign.

Sunday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your weekend.

- pogge rounds up last week's news on the Robocon front - while the outside attack on the NDP's leadership vote suggests that the block-the-vote crowd isn't limiting its work to general elections.

- Meanwhile, Dave connects some dots between the Harper Cons, the B.C. Libs and two IT service providers.

- Gerald Caplan points out that it's the most amoral gamblers earning the largest returns from our current version of casino capitalism.

- Finally, in other NDP convention followup notes, Cathie is optimistic that Thomas Mulcair can fight back against the Harper Cons, while David Climenhaga sees him passing the beer test. Tim Harper portrays Mulcair as the safe choice for the NDP, while the Star's editorial board reaffirmed its endorsement after the fact. Mark Kennedy speculates as to a few of the challenges Mulcair will face. And PLG rightly suggests that commentators not overreact to Mulcair's election.

The path ahead

To start off, I'll heartily congratulate Thomas Mulcair on his strong victory in the NDP's leadership campaign. But it's well worth working on what comes next from day one of Mulcair's tenure.

Last night's inaugural interview with Peter Mansbridge already represented a great start on the party unit front - as Mulcair announced that Libby Davies will remain deputy leader, spoke regularly of working the the NDP's caucus in planning ahead and referred positively to the talented group of staff within the party at the moment.

But bringing the NDP together is only a small part of Mulcair's role as the party's new leader. And Mulcair should have two fairly distinct tasks in building the NDP for the years to come - though he seems well aware of both.

The part which may misleadingly seem easy is the need to put down roots in Quebec. Mulcair obviously starts out with the advantage of being a popular household name in his home province, meaning that he won't need to put a great deal of work into defining and proving himself personally.

But in order to make sure the party keeps growing, Mulcair will need to work on building the party beyond positive associations with its leader. And to the extent the NDP hopes to turn Quebec into a long-term base, he may have to go so far as to work on changing the political culture of his home province - trying to encourage the province's citizenry to join, donate and otherwise get personally involved in the NDP in a way it hasn't for any party in a long time.

Fortunately, there doesn't figure to be much standing in Mulcair's way, as a Bloc turning to the right under Daniel Paille may prove particularly ill-suited to try to maintain its support against a popular progressive leader. But Quebec party-building will still be no easy feat.

Meanwhile, the rest of Canada will see the usual battle to define the leader of the opposition.

On that front, Mulcair doesn't yet have a ton of name recognition or personal connection with voters across much of the country. And it'll likely take a combination of an effective personal performance in leading the charge against an austerity budget, a tireless effort to meet as many people personally as he can, and an immediate ad campaign to have any chance of at least keeping Mulcair in at least neutral territory (with room for growth in the years to come) again the inevitable Con barrage of smears and attack ads.

Of course, it's worth noting that the mirror-image problems may have a common solution. If Mulcair can foster increased dialogue and connections between the Quebec progressive political culture which adores him and citizens across Canada who are currently more inclined to vote and donate but aren't yet sold on him personally, that could go a long way toward taking care of both immediate priorities in relatively short order - while also ensuring that "unite the left behind the NDP" becomes a long-term reality.

Leadership 2012 - Third Ballot Endorsement

The second-ballot results leave little room for doubt as to the ultimate conclusion of the NDP's leadership campaign - with the main question now being whether there will be a fourth ballot to determine the party's leader. And after two ballots of working on shaping the issues drawn from the leadership voting results, I'll now endorse giving the MP who did so much to build the party in Quebec the leadership role in doing the same across Canada.

And so, my third-ballot vote goes to...Thomas Mulcair.

Leadership 2012 - Second Ballot Endorsement

First-ballot results are here. My quick read is that three candidates have a remaining path to victory (no, I can't see any chance for Peggy Nash when even her vote combined with Dewar's wouldn't vault her ahead of Brian Topp), and one of those fits with the themes I most want to see emerging from the convention.

Which makes my second-ballot choice a fairly easy one: Nathan Cullen.

Leadership 2012 Roundup

A few of the more interesting pieces of news from the NDP leadership campaign as it culminates in today's voting...

- For those looking for a rundown of the contenders in the smallest possible number of words, John Ibbitson's tip sheet has what you're after.

- A couple of late-campaign interviews worth noting include Brian Topp's talk with Aaron Wherry, as well as Planet S' discussion with Peggy Nash and Niki Ashton.

- Steve theorizes about the magic number for Thomas Mulcair to have a virtually inevitable path to victory - which is certainly a topic ripe for discussion, though I've heard other logical cases based on the actual second-choice polling released by Paul Dewar's camp as to how the actual number may be closer to 30% than 35%. And Dan releases a final set of power rankings.

- TC Norris points out the final number of advance voters at 55,659. But I draw roughly the exact opposite conclusion from the same number: with nearly half the votes left to be cast by last night (even allowing for the number of members who wouldn't ultimately vote), there's every chance that the remaining members could not only determine the order of the 2-through-5 cluster that's been so important all along, but also radically reshape the race. Meanwhile, Stephanie Levitz notes the uncertain dynamic resulting from the two types of voter pools.

- John Geddes, Jeff Jedras, Chantal Hebert and Andrew Coyne all offer their take on yesterday's showcases.

- Frank Graves makes the case for inter-party cooperation, while Greg Lyle offers reason to think that a strong social-democratic message within the NDP can be an electoral winner on its own and Nik Nanos similarly notes that there's no lack of voters willing to look to the NDP as Canada's next government.

- And finally, Paul Wells recommends that voters choose based on who actually inspires passion among NDP members, rather than worrying too much about strategic calculations:

If there’s anyone left out there who’s undecided, just pick the person who makes you happiest to be a New Democrat. It’ll never guarantee victory. But it’ll make both victory and defeat worth the work.

New column day

Here, featuring my musings on how political parties should be able to function without the top-down direction of a permanent leader - and the example the federal NDP has set on that front.

(And as you may have noticed, it's running a couple of days later than usual due to the Leader-Post's Saskatchewan budget coverage in the meantime.)

Musical interlude

In keeping with the convention theme...KTA - Longer than a Lifetime



(And if anybody has audio of the song from Jack Layton's tribute, feel free to pass along the link.)

Leadership 2012 - First Ballot Endorsement

The NDP's leadership campaign has presented such a wide variety of opportunities and questions for party members that it's been difficult to decide who to endorse - and I've reached my own first-ballot decision only after taking time to see how those have been balanced out in this afternoon's leadership showcase. But for what it's worth, here's my endorsement for the many members who have chosen to wait to decide for themselves.

To start with, I'll be shifting my first choice from my preliminary endorsement - not because Brian Topp's positive message is any less important than it's always been, but because his late-campaign strategy has been so closely identified with personality politics directed toward Thomas Mulcair.

My goal on the first ballot is both to shape the choices for subsequent ballots, and to make sure that some of the key themes of the campaign are reflected in the voting results. And given the presumptive lead held by Mulcair so far (meaning that there's no need to vote for him immediately to keep him on the ballot), the choice has come down to two candidates.

Throughout the leadership campaign, Nathan Cullen's joint nomination proposal has been more a source of controversy than strength. But with Mulcair now taking the position that he doesn't want to cooperate with other parties even in a post-election coalition, Cullen's position now takes on some additional importance: undoubtedly it'll be tougher for Mulcair to orient the NDP away from its longstanding and highly successful cooperative approach if the candidate who's encouraging a move in the other direction receives a vote of confidence from the party's membership.

Meanwhile, Paul Dewar's interest in party organization and movement-building stands in contrast to Mulcair's still-unclear position. And a strong first-ballot showing for Dewar could work wonders in ensuring that an eventual leader pays due attention to that part of the NDP's mission, rather than focusing excessively on the conventional-wisdom bubble which so often excludes many of the voters the NDP needs to win over.

As I've mentioned before, I consider Cullen to be the better retail politician of the two, and arguably the one I'd most want to see elected leader as the convention plays out (so long as he himself focuses more on building the NDP rather than what still seems like a futile mission toward multi-party electoral strategies). For now, though, my first-ballot support will go to...

Paul Dewar.

But of course, whether you agree or not, now's the time to vote. And we'll find out soon how all we've seen over the past few months will translate into members' support.

The rainbow coalition

I noted a couple of days ago that Stephane Dion's Lib leadership campaign offered some cautionary tales for the NDP's contenders. But one of his more effective strategic choices has been embraced wholeheartedly.

At the Libs' convention, Dion's green theme set his camp apart in a sea of red. But the NDP's candidates have chosen a wide array of colours to similarly show momentum: Ashton blue, Topp yellow, Cullen green, Nash purple and Mulcair black are all distinct presences throughout the hall.

Of course, no single candidate will stand out as much for that diversity. But the symbolism of bringing all the groups together at the end looks to be a major plus.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Brian-Michel calculates the expected outcome of the 2011 election minus the Robocon election fraud based on Anke Kessler's data. Alison, thwap and Saskboy all rightly lament that a government claiming that a majority entitles it to treat Canada as a helpless plaything may never have had a legitimate mandate in the first place, while Jack Layton had a chance to co-operate to replace the Cons stolen from him.

- And Mark Kennedy reports on some of the results, as the Cons look poised to attack Canadians' standard of living in retirement in a way they'd never have dared without the ill-gotten security of three and half years before answering for their increasing unpopularity in another election.

- Meanwhile, Christian Paradis broke ethics rules in giving preferential treatment to his former caucusmate Rahim Jaffer. And as usual, the Cons think law, order and accountability are only for people they don't like.

- Finally, in the wake of another increase in EI recipients, Erin reminds us that under 40% of jobless workers actually receive benefits.

Leadership 2012 - Policy Highlights

With the NDP's leadership convention set to start tomorrow (and assorted hospitality suites already starting up tonight), I won't be able to finish off my initial plan to put together full policy reviews for each of the candidates. But instead, I'll take some time to highlight a few innovative ideas which haven't received a lot of media attention, but stand out as deserving more discussion within the NDP regardless of who wins the leadership.

Judicare, proposed by Niki Ashton:

Ensuring that all Canadians are genuinely equal before the law starting by creating a dedicated federal transfer for “judicare”, modelled on the Canada Health Transfer, that would allow legal aid programs to expand the range of services they provide to Canadians who can’t otherwise afford a lawyer;

No less an authority than the Governor General has pointed out that more needs to be done to facilitate Canadians' access to justice. But rather than limiting that effort solely to the voluntary capacity of bar associations, Ashton's proposal would ensure that part of the task is carried out through public funding.

Arctic University, proposed by Nathan Cullen:

• Work with the Northern colleges to foster an Arctic University to help develop future leaders, and allow Northerners to pursue higher education without leaving their families and communities.

In addition to being a worthwhile idea on its own, the proposal would also serve as an important starting point in considering what the federal government can do to ensure that Canadians falling under its jurisdiction (including on-reserve First Nations as well as territorial residents) receive both meaningful self-determination and a reasonable standard of services, rather than being alternately vilified and forgotten by a federal government determined to do as little as possible.

International Women's Equality, proposed by Paul Dewar:

- Make economic, educational and democratic empowerment for women and girls a core focus of Canada's development policy;

- Promote women's meaningful participation in peace building as a central plank of our international diplomacy, and implement Canada’s National Action Plan on United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security;

For all the efforts that the leadership candidates have rightly made to point out the continued gender gap within Canada, the need for action is even more glaring abroad. And a concerted effort to include women in international development and diplomacy could go a long way toward breaking down barriers to both gender equality and general development.

One-Stop Consumer Protection, proposed by Thomas Mulcair:

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (Finance)
This proliferation of separate agencies has inevitably made the dissemination of information scattered and difficult for consumers to access. Nowhere is this clearer than in the government’s digital presence. The website for Industry Canada`s Office of Consumer Affairs, for instance, provides extensive content addressing a wide variety of ongoing consumer concerns, but safety recalls on toys must be sought out at Health Canada's website and those seeking information on financial products must do so at the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada's website.
...
Canadians deserve a single point of contact for vital consumer protection information and a single point of responsibility to ensure the interests of consumers will be a priority—not just the interests of well-connected corporations.

With the Service Canada model adopted for so many interactions between the federal government and all kinds of actors, it's stunning that consumer protection - one of the areas of public jurisdiction where there's an especially obvious need for user-friendliness - has instead been both broken into multiple agencies and chronically under-resourced.

Royal Commission on Electoral Reform, proposed by Peggy Nash:

Pursue the implementation of a system of proportional representation by:
• establishing a Royal Commission on Electoral Reform, in collaboration with other parties, within the first six months of forming government to make specific recommendations on which system (or combination of systems) is best suited for Canada as well as the most effective legislative process to implement the changes;

While PR is of course a staple of NDP party policy, Nash's proposal moves well down the road in suggesting how it can actually be implemented: not by following the referendum model that's failed at the provincial level, but instead by engaging in a careful but efficient process to review and adapt our electoral system.

Leadership 2012 Roundup

I didn't think much could come along at this point in the NDP's leadership campaign to significantly change my voting considerations [edit: other than the type of organizational problem discussed here]. But the CROP poll published in Le Soleil may well do just that.

No, it isn't a surprise to see Thomas Mulcair well ahead of the field in Quebec. But for all the best efforts of the rest of the campaigns as well as two debates centred on the province, not a single other candidate ranks ahead of "none of the above". And while I've emphasized the importance of allowing for three and a half years worth of growth rather than simply assuming candidate profiles will stay where they are, it's rather difficult to ignore the lack of progress so far for the rest of the field - particularly as others point out the potential for Mulcair to extend the NDP's Quebec reach.

Meanwhile...

- Paul Dewar's endorsement from two Sikh student groups may be a highly significant development if it allows him to win over enough down-ballot support from Martin Singh's camp - though of course Singh's own stated second choice would seem to render that possibility moot.

- Alice discusses Peggy Nash's candidacy:



- Brian Topp releases his closing argument:



- Environics places the NDP in a dead heat with the Cons nationally. Chantal Hebert and Antonia Maioni discuss how the leadership campaign will affect the broader political scene in Quebec, while Carlito Pablo considers it a matter of defining the NDP. Marcus McCann worries about the effect of a large number of new members on down-ballot support - though accounting for about 10,000 new Quebec members, a few thousand apiece attracted by Nathan Cullen and Martin Singh and the normal sign-up work we'd expect from the rest of the candidates, I'm not sure I see much reason for concern. But Joan Bryden's report on the complexities and uncertainties involved in a preferential voting process will certainly make the weekend interesting. Geoffrey Rowan analyzed the candidates' messages. And finally, CBC broke the race down into four main themes.

Thursday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Thursday reading.

- Sixth Estate catches a right-wing election contractor defending vote suppression, then theorizes as to how Robocon may have come together.

- The introduction of Doctors for Fair Taxation is certainly a positive step in ensuring that Canadian physicians show their support for a more fair and equal society. But I do wonder whether there's any advantage to dividing matters along professional lines rather than generally uniting behind, say, Canadians for Tax Fairness as an indication of more widespread support.

- Frances Russell laments the polarization of Canadian politics. But particularly given that we don't seemikely to be rid of the Harper Cons anytime soon, I'd much rather see a strong opposite reaction than follow the U.S. model in which the right-wing party is able to drag politics in its preferred direction with little opposition.

- Steven Chase reports on the potential for other factors to supersede money in politics by noting that half a dozen NDP MPs were elected without spending a cent.

- Finally, I'm not sure there's much room for doubt that part of the small-c conservative model includes undercutting independent art and culture. And sadly, the Sask Party looks to be getting its way in eliminating any vestiges of what was once a thriving industry under the NDP's government. Meanwhile, Scott looks at the Saskatchewan budget more generally.

On warning signs

It may be that upwards of 70% of the NDP's leadership votes are already in before the convention this weekend. But here's another suggestion as to why it's worth being in the minority who wait for all the available information before casting a ballot - as well as a cautionary tale in what to look for from the convention presentations.

Much of Stephane Dion's tenure as leader of the Libs was defined by a basic inability to handle even relatively basic planning and message coordination when it counted - ranging from his campaign interview false-start, to the late-delivered and poor-quality video that did so much to undermine the 2008 coalition. But less noted is that Libs had an obvious hint as to his difficulties in the area: at the leadership convention where he was elected, Dion had the plug pulled on a convention speech which seemed to bear little relationship to the time allotted. (Of course, that seemed to be forgotten by the next day as Dion made his way up the middle of the Ignatieff/Rae divide.)

So while it'll be worth watching how much the candidates can inspire the crowd on Friday, we should also pay close attention to whether anybody's campaign shows signs of disorganization on the biggest stage the leadership candidates will face. And while I suspect there shouldn't be much problem with the NDP's field of contenders, I'll be especially wary of any candidate who fails that test.

Leadership 2012 Roundup

Another day, another set of NDP leadership campaign stories.

- Niki Ashton won the support of the NDP's Socialist Caucus.

- Nathan Cullen expanded on his joint nomination proposal with a far more appealing discussion of co-operation in general:

Cullen isn't shy about what he has in mind.

"If the explicit question is put to me: Am I willing to work with the Liberal party in a coalition government, then yes. I was last time."

Moreover, he said the parties should make it clear while they are seeking votes from Canadians that a coalition is a "possible scenario."

"Here is the challenge that we cannot avoid. It is that you can't say the Liberal party are evil incarnate or the worst things ever before an election but we're willing to work with those same people after. It's discordant. It doesn't sit right, particularly with progressive voters."

In the last election, Harper centred his strategy around repeatedly warning voters that he needed a majority government to prevent the opposition parties from forming a coalition.

The next time, said Cullen, that argument won't wash with many voters because they have seen how Harper's Tories have governed so pompously with the current majority...

Meanwhile, both Frank Graves and Barbara Yaffe talk about some of the possibilities for cooperation.

- Alice offered her assessment of Paul Dewar:



- Thomas Mulcair offered up an election strategy including a 338 Fund for riding-level campaigns and a commitment to have at least some campaign ready in every riding across Canada. That offers some useful indication as to how he's thinking about organizational issues - but still doesn't answer the question of what his plans would be between now and 2015.

- Tim Naumetz reports that other campaigns are "shocked" about Brian Topp's lack of organization. But let's give Topp this much: he's still apparently convinced Jeffrey Simpson and L. Ian MacDonald that he's one competitor in a two-person race - while Carol Goar slightly more thorough summary of the choices.

- Duncan Cameron reiterated his support for Peggy Nash, pointing out her positive reviews in the media during the leadership campaign as a new reason for the endorsement. The Ottawa Citizen recognized how much Ed Broadbent's comments last week were blown out of proportion. Tim Harper commented on the race to define the NDP's new leader. And the imminent election of the NDP's permanent successor to Jack Layton is also leading to plenty of discussion about what Jack accomplished - ranging from winning 3.5 million new votes for the left to building a bridge between social democracy and the wider public (with some associated costs) to "sinister mind control experiment!". Which offers an always-appreciated excuse to link to IP.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Dan Gardner writes about the Cons' backup plan of answering their own wrongdoing with criticism of anybody who dares to investigate it - and points out the dangers of that approach:

(W)hat happens if Elections Canada delivers a report even a fraction as damning as the one Sheila Fraser produced in 2004? Will the government express contrition and call a judicial inquiry? Or will it carry out the mother of all hatchet jobs on Elections Canada?
...
Stephen Harper has impugned the professionalism and good faith of everyone from the RCMP to the Supreme Court of Canada, and he has done so when the stakes were relatively small. So how likely is it that he would respond to an unfavourable report from an agency he has long despised, on a matter that could imperil his government, by launching a vicious campaign to impugn the professionalism and good faith of that agency? The answer must be “very.”

And if that happened, it would be a disaster for the country.

The goal in all of this isn’t merely to catch and punish anyone who engaged in vote fraud. It’s to assure Canadians that such despicable behaviour will not taint future elections. This is about restoring faith — in our electoral system and in the legitimacy of the governments it produces. To do that, there must be universal agreement that a full and fair investigation was conducted, as there was when the auditor general’s report on the sponsorship scandal was released.

But a campaign to impugn Elections Canada would destroy any hope of universal agreement. Instead, perceptions would break along partisan lines.

Faith in our electoral system could suffer, causing cynicism and detachment to spread like bacteria in a Petri dish.

- Steve Rennie reports that the Cons received - and ignored - advice that using the nuclear option to deal with every single conceivable labour dispute might not be a bright idea.

- Joe Couture lists some possible Saskatchewan NDP leadership candidates - with some particularly noteworthy news in that both Ryan Meili and Yens Pedersen both mention they're considering another run.

- Meanwhile, CUPE points out the mess the Sask Party is making in the meantime with corporate-first arrangements like the Amicus long-term care facility. And a group of health-care unions is reaching out with suggestions for revamping and legitimizing the essential services law that's been struck down.

- And finally, Paul Wells notes that while the Cons' attack ad on Bob Rae has drawn more attention, it's their latest bit of jingoism that looks like a sign of a worried government - and not without reason given how many Canadians are concerned about the country's direction.

Tuesday Night Cat Blogging

Cats bound for the floor.

Tuesday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher uncover an apparently-fictitious employee listed as one of Con contractor RackNine's key contacts - nicely paralleling the obvious coverup behind "Pierre Poutine". And Dr. Dawg places the latest revelations in context with the rest of the Cons' misdirections and coverups.

- Meanwhile, the Cons are applying their theory that "the less anybody knows, the better" on the international stage as well.

- Hugh Mackenzie deconstructs the questionable assumptions used in Don Drummond's report to try to foist massive cuts onto the province without any real assessment of the value of public services.

- Finally, Craig Scott's by-election victory in Toronto-Danforth may not come as much surprise. But the fact that Scott was able to hold not only the seat but also the vote share of the most popular party leader in Canadian politics - even with at least one other party pouring its every effort into the seat (unlike in the general election) - surely signals that there's ample room for the NDP to grow in Toronto.