Conservative Party of Canada Leadership Race Megathread-May 27th 2017

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Actually. IIRC Van Loan comes from the PC rather than the Reform/Alliance camp.  Just saying.

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Another interesting thing about Saroya is that he was McCallum's underdog opponent in 2011--thus, now every single Conservative who ran in the 905 belt in 2011 has had his/her turn in Parliament.

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Though West Toronto tradition usually had it that "Poles go Liberal, Ukes go Tory"--I reckon that political figureheads had a lot to do with that (Yaremko for the Ukes, Haidasz for the Poles)

These days, I suppose the mayoral-race equivalent would be "Ukes go for John Tory, Poles go for the Fords"

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I'm told anecdotally that Peggy Nash did very well with Poles in Parkdale-High Park...but who knows?

PiS Dippers?

Or maybe Arif Virani insufficiently Euro-stock?

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So Forum did a poll and Peter MacKay is winning the name recognition contest

Funny how Bernier *isn't* among that crowd.

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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/why-michael-chong-would-be-a-good-fit-as-tory-leader/article27306077/

Who knows; Chong could make McKay redundant, albeit as a bit of a "Corbyn of the Conservatives" leftish outsider or something...

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And besides, if the Cons are looking for a "fresh face", Pallister is 60 plus.  (And Clark is too historically capital-L Liberal.)

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If Christy Clark is capital L anything, she'a capital L Liar, but she seems to pretty much have no ideology beyond doing whatever gets her in front of a camera or a microphone as much as possible.

It's not about ideology, it's about affiliation--prior to her Premiership, she was indeed more commonly identified with the federal Liberals (to the point where it was a factor in her lack of caucus support as leadership candidate), and of course her ex-husband Mark Marissen was very much part of the fed Grits' BC machine. (And if she isn't so now, I did use the "historically" qualifier.)

If she's at all Conservative leadership material, it's only from the perspective of "Liberal, Tory, same old story" jaundice (fueled by how the BC Liberals are presently a "free enterprise coalition" entity, i.e. Not. The. NDP.)

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Considering she has opposed pretty much every policy of Trudeau since he won (from the right), I'm not sure they are interested in her.

But it doesn't mean the *Cons* would be interested in her, for opposite type reasons.

In the end, on "slipperiness" grounds the Libs still seem the most fitting home for Christy Clark--she's only a "Blue Liberal" insofar as far as it serves the caucus she leads.  And remember, too, that when it comes to strains of Liberalism banished by Trudeau, she isn't exactly socon a la, say, John McKay.

Maybe not as *leadership* material, but the federal Grits would gladly, even now, have a Christy Clark in their caucus--if only to show off the degree to which the Cons have terminally "lost the centre"...

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I'm not sure about that. I know at least one person who was with her at the mock Parliaments for university students (I forget what it's called) and he or they both said she was very right wing for a Liberal even back then.

I agree she seems to flip back and forth between the different branches of liberalism and all the way into conservatism on economic issues both before she became Premier and as Premier.

*Economic* issues.  So?  That's how Paul Martin warded off the ReformAlliance threat.

And, "very right wing" vs *what*?  In the case of BC, that'd disproportionately be the NDP--and whether you're federally Lib or Con, it'd still be you vs the Socialist Hordes.


Look: just because Christy Clark 's been Liberal doesn't mean she'd be Dosanjih Liberal (or even Wynne Liberal).  After all, when she ran for Vancouver Mayor it was for NPA, not Vision Vancouver.  Yet at the same time, it doesn't mean that Justin's out to sideline anyone who *isn't* a Dosanjih Liberal.  Whatever her "principles" are, Clark's a "big tenter".

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I'm not sure what point your trying to make.  Christy Clark was a member of the Federal model Parliament according to my friends, and she was right wing in comparison to a lot of the Progressive Conservatives there.

Note: *Progressive* Conservatives.  And if we consider *when* she was in said model parliament (presumably 25-30 years ago), that would've been fundamentally pre-Reform Party, right?

Red Tories still existed then--and who knows how many of them have themselves since migrated to Liberal/NDP/Green...

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Red or blue, I agree that the tone of the Christy-bashing in this thread is beside-the-point youth-parliament juvenile ("If Christy Clark is capital L anything, she'a capital L Liar, but she seems to pretty much have no ideology beyond doing whatever gets her in front of a camera or a microphone as much as possible.", or "The only "ism" Christy Clark believes in is NARCISSISM!")--not that Lotuslander's historical pattern of Christy-basher-bashing angry-ex-husband disgruntlement's any better, of course.

Yes, it's not relevant to the discussion.  And I'm glad to rip the testicles out of *both* Adam T *and* Lotuslander in one post...

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I gather you don't live in British Columbia.  

<<<YAK YAK YAK BLA BLA BLA YAK YAK YAK>>>

Anyway, she's not running for Conservative Party leader, so she's not really relevant to this thread and hopefully she won't be relevant to British Columbia in about 16 months.

Listen--You.  Don't.  Have.  To.  Explain.  Anything.  To.  Me.  Whether I live in BC or not is totally immaterial.  And I'm not even *denying* any of what you're offering--mainly because it's tedious and redundant under the circumstance.

However, let me explain the seed through which this thread got derailed: it's when the discussion got into the potential jockeying-into position of the current-and-pending "conservative premiers".  And maybe out of the accident of *my own* respecting the thread's subject matter, I misconstrued that particular tangent by thinking in terms of Brian Pallister or Christy Clark themselves as hypothetical "federal Con leadership material" relative to Brad Wall.  And as I said, Pallister's too old, and Christy Clark's too historically Liberal.  But then *you* get into this whole "what Christy Clark is all about" jag, and you've *continued* to do so.  Look: I'm not necessarily in disagreement; that she leads a "right-wing" government is kinda "duh" given the nature of BC politics--indeed, I'm likely more in your camp than Lotuslander's (and my acknowledgment of the "slipperiness" of the Liberal brand, even now federally under Justin, can stand as its own implicit critique of "what Christy's all about")--***but that belongs in a different kind of political discussion forum, to say nothing of a different kind of thread.***.  And all it's showing me is that you're gallingly *incapable* of viewing *any* of these matters from a disinterested-third-party perspective.

Though it's funny, because you and Lotuslander have something in common: you both go by that "you don't live in British Columbia, do you" stance re opinionating outsiders..  Yet what I'm witnessing from the two of you re BC politics is, metaphorically speaking, a whole tedious lot of "he said, she said" blabber--next to which, I'm like the proverbial kid rolling his eyes at his bickering parents.  Which also leaves me wondering if, esp. relative to a message board like this which *ought* to be a godsend to the disinterested-third-party psephologist sort, this bickering-parent state of BC political being is a logical outcome of how the provincial electoral scene has almost always defaulted t/w dumb, dull, nuance-free US-style binarydom, i.e. you're overcompensating for the fact that your elections suck, so to speak.  (And that's nothing to do with *who* gets elected.)

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O'Leary's more like a Peter Pocklington for our time.

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I see Obhrai less as a proxy for Kenney than as a Con leadership race version of Harinder Takhar in the 2013 Ontario Liberal leadership race, i.e. less as genuine contender than as ethno-bloc rallying point.  (Which kind of dovetails back into Kenney's strengths, too.)

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As a "winner", he'd be more of a Canadian Conservative Corbyn in whatever regard.

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I would say that as other candidates enter the race or the candidates already in the race get better known, Bernier's support could obviously decline in Quebec (especially maybe if another Quebecer like Steven Blaney gets in the race)

I see Deltell as more "leadership-like" than Blaney--though didn't Deltell rule himself out already?

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Right now  Raitt probably wins, with Bernier in second and Clement in third.

IMO Raitt's too much of a federal Christine Elliott to win.

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Steven Blaney left his opposition critic role so it seems he is ready to run for leadership.

If he wins, brace yourself for a barrage of bald jokes.

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O'Toole is in.

Looks like there's no chance of an 'Ontario Candidate' happening.

What's O'Toole's appeal anyway?

One of the more competent latter-day Harper ministers?

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I'm not too familiar with him.  The Conservatie M.P from West Vancouver with a similar last name, John Sexton, was higher profile and was a Red Tory who seemed to be a likable person.  He was also defeated in 2015.

You mean John *Weston*, don't you?

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Steven Blaney officially entered today.

My suggested campaign slogan for him: Bold ideas.

Watch that get lampooned as "bald ideas".

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It's odd that during the 9 years the CPC was in power we never heard a peep from them criticizing Castro. Inst ad they increases trade and boasted about the role they played in getting the US to lift sanctions. How do you spell hypocrite

Probably more of an opportunistic foot-in-the-door gesture on the Cons' part, i.e. preparing for the "inevitable" post-Castro democratization...

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Wasn't really an issue because Reform had almost no candidate east of the Ontario. Most of them only got Alliance candidates in 2000.

Actually, Reform had already established a Maritime foundation in 1993, managing high teen percentages in its NB/NS strong spots...

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Besides, Bernier's atypical-of-Quebecness could be his own best advantage (i.e. the Beauce as Quebec's Alberta, so to speak.)

And of course, he has a kind of "rugged look" more typical of some idealized image of Western conservative politicians (or Mike Harris)