Thursday, September 11, 2008

The Unravelling of the Blue Sweater Vest

More gaffes from the Con's today and I don't just mean the Sparrow incident.

Kady is reporting that the Con War room is using tape from various networks without permission on their juvenile website and Robert Fife is reporting that the PMO is using the RCMP to keep the media away from Harper.

I guess Harper thinks because he came out before his speech today and announced that Sparrow had been suspended, he's under no obligation to discuss it anymore. During that little announcement, Harper mentioned that he set a tone and an expectation for this campaign and he expects to see that carried through. Well I'd say it is being carried out and it's a tone no different than we've seen from this guy since he took office. Lie, manipulate, control, get nasty and flaunt the rules.

When you consider what he said today about the Green Shift,

The Tory leader told reporters the Liberal plan would be an economic catastrophe and suggested it would trigger a recession worse than one that struck in the early 1980s.

He added that it would jeopardize national unity. Not only are these assertions ridiculous, they are reckless. He's lying to Canadians and instilling fear in order to grab votes.

This is the same Harper that we have seen since day one. If you disagree with any of his positions, he goes into hyper nasty partisan mode and hurls insults, lies and ignores the rules. That's the tone he's set for his party and it's staff and that is precisely what they are following. They employ all the tactics they have seen Harper use for months and go for the jugular.

What do you think Sparrow was doing? Mimicking his boss. What do you think their webmasters were doing? Mimicking their boss. What do you think all the MP's are doing with these mailings? At the very least they are playing at the margins of the rules and taking yet another opportunity to lie and mock the leader of the opposition. So, mimicking their boss.

How is all of this happening? Because until now, we've seen precious little honest reporting on it. With the exception of a few, such as Steven Chase to whom I linked earlier, journalists just aren't doing their homework.

Today, I cannot count how many reports I've read or heard, praising the Conservatives for reacting so quickly to their gaffes. Why would you praise a political party for doing exactly what any reasonable person should expect from a government? Ridiculous.

The blue vest may not be completely unravelling yet, but there is a definite snag in it. Let's see where the focus goes from the media. Will it be on the snag, or how nice what remains of the vest, looks?

Best line of the day? Dion's reaction to Harper's national unity threat.

"While he was busy talking about building firewalls in the West, I was fighting to keep my country together," Dion said in New Brunswick, where he was speaking to the Board of Trade. "I do not need any lessons from Stephen Harper on fighting for the national unity of my country."

9 comments:

Steve V said...

Let's hope today acts like smelling salts for our media, who just bought into completely to the kinder, gentler crap, demonstrating a shocking lack of sophistication, nevermind the attention span of my black lab.

THIS is the Harper you have known for 2.5 years, not sweater guy, quite being so gullible.

Anonymous said...

You might say after the puffin and sparrow that Mr.Harpers' campaign has "gone to the birds"

Red Tory said...

Moderating comments... Wow. That's sad.

Karen said...

It was a temporary measure RT. You wouldn't believe what was coming in and I knew I wouldn't be here for a while.

I'm all for free speech, in fact I'm more than that, but I am tired of the juvenile discussions and channel changing.

That's going on in the main stream. If you disagree with me fine. Debate me. If you're trolling or have just come to make trouble, I'm sorry, I'm done with that.

I wouldn't take it in person and I don't intend to deal with it here.

To paraphrase a friend, there are plenty of venues where you can spew nonsense, I don't choose for this to be one of them.

In a nutshell? Harper and his minions do enough of this and journalists allow it to stand. I won't, not now.

Debate? Great! It's the idiocy I'm done with.

Karen said...

btw, I hope the e-mail I have for you still works.

I think I understand your most recent post, but you'll be missed, especially now.

Steve V said...

RT

What's sad is watching civil discourse turn into a pissing match, with operatives simply meant to provoke. No need to be philosophical, that entirely misses the point, it's about adult conversation.

Anyways, good luck to you, and I'm sure we'll see you again.

Omar said...

RT,
Your sudden departure is very surprising to say the very least. The speed in which it occurred speaks volumes I think. Almost like a removal that was excised with surgical precision. I just can't figure out who performed the surgery? Was it the left? The right? A consortium (my new fave werd) of both? The full skinny, as I read it, has yet to be revealed.

Anonymous said...

There is an EKOS poll out today with a large sample, 2300.

Cons 37
Libs 26
NDP 19
Bloc 8
Greens 10

They also give a seat prediction with the Toreis getting 156 which is a majority, although just barely. To put this in perspective in the Mulroney sweep of 1984 Liberal support was 28%.

The Liberals have to pick up their socks or they will be overtaken by the NDP. Did you see the knockout NDP adds targeting Harper in Quebec? Tough and effective.

penlan said...

It's time for the Liberals to step up the campaign. Even with all the so-called "gaffes" the Cons have done this week they are getting away with them.
The media thinks Harper is great because he apologizes immediately & takes action against whoever pulled them.

WE know his peons have learned from him & are just following suit, or sweater if you prefer. Even Fife (CTV), who was making a big complaint about being hustled away from Harper by the RCMP today when he wanted to ask questions about what Sparrow said, is now ok with it because Harper apologized to him. So what? This is typical Harper.

I want to see Dion & his heavy hitters, like Rae, Iggy & Hall Findlay, start attacking Harper - loudly! Go after him on the broken promises, scandals, etc. Stop only doing responses to what Steve has said. It's time for more or we are going to see the Libs dropping more & more in the polls.

It's time to hit back - & hit hard.