Tory support plummets (Canada)

Tory support plummets

By GLORIA GALLOWAY
Thursday, June 9, 2005 Updated at 5:04 AM EDT
From Thursday's Globe and Mail

Ottawa — The federal Conservatives have fallen well behind the Liberals in voter popularity -- and are only slightly ahead of the New Democrats nationally -- as a new poll suggests the release of the Gurmant Grewal tapes may have further damaged Canadians' confidence in the party.

The Decima Research survey of 1,000 Canadians suggests support for the Conservatives has fallen to 23 per cent of decided voters across the country.

That puts Stephen Harper's party in a tight battle with the New Democrats, who had the support of 21 per cent of respondents while the Liberals were 14 points ahead of the Tories at 37 per cent.

In Ontario, where the Conservatives were tied with the Liberals a month ago, the poll conducted late last week and released yesterday to Canadian Press, suggests the Tories have fallen 26 points behind the Liberals. The Liberals had 48 per cent, the NDP was at 24 per cent and the Conservatives were in third place with 22 per cent.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050609.wxtory09/BNStory/National/

I, like most Canadians, likely, would trust a (possibly) corrupt Liberal party to a Conservative party any day.

I think what she said upon leaving, and what was said about her by some of the Conservative members, made some people realize what a bunch of neanderthals Mr. Harper and friends really are.

Sid

Edit: Also, I wish the Globe would stop calling them Tories. Joe Clark was a Tory, Bill Davis was a Tory. Hell, even Brian Mulroney was a Tory. Stephen Harper is a Conservative. Big Difference.

Reform/Alliance is like some shapeshifting, alien Thing in Canadian politics. They absorbed the federal PC party just to assume its identity in the minds of middle Canadians. Calling them "Tories" further fudges their real character.

Though I wouldn't support it, Canada needs its traditional national, moderate, conservative party. The party of Diefenbaker, Stansfield and Clark. Harper is helping to implode the illusion that the "Conservatives" are that party, so perhaps the PC rump will be able to organize and reassert itself.

and, I suspect, there will be a move to form exactly that, if it is not already in the works, as there are moderate conservatives that have to be feeling very alienated by the faux Con party's direction.

The situation we've got now is like those nature documentaries where a parasitic wasp deposits its larvae in a still-living caterpillar -- which then proceed to hollow the caterpillar out from the inside.

Was anybody else irked by the episode of "The Greatest Canadian" where they slapped the new "Conservative" logo next to Sir John A.'s picture?

Steven Harper is the problem. The conservative message is the problem. Their attacks of the current liberal gov't remind me of the GOP. They try so hard to claim moral superiority - and it does not wash the same way up here as down in the good ol USA.

Canadians voted for a liberal government for a reason. They trust liberals MORE than conservatives and I cannot understand how it is that the conservative party have not yet figured out why. Here - I'll give them a hint - BRIAN MULRONEY. FREE TRADE. the GST.

Brian Mulroney tried to force through the Meech Lake accords which would give Quebec special privilages above and beyond the other provinces. The accord failed. And in the rubble of that failure, rose up a former cabinet minister to Brian Mulroney by the name of Lucien Bouchard he resigned from the conservatives and formed his own party...the founder of the Bloc Quebecois...a national party whose sole purpose was to promote seperatism of Quebec at the national level. And the conservatives of today blame the liberals for this.......and they foolishly think we Canadians have short memories.

From their web site:



The progressive-conservative tradition of Sir John A. Macdonald and Sir George-Étienne Cartier continues.

We are guided by the Constitution and Policies of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada as they were at the time it was removed from the registry of Elections Canada on December 7, 2003.

Our purpose is returning the PC Party to its proper place in Canadian political life as a moderate, centrist option for the electorate.
...

Progressive Canadian Party responds to Stronach Defection

Dartmouth, May 17, 2005 – In the wake of Belinda Stronach’s dramatic decision to leave the federal Conservatives, the Progressive Canadian (PC) Party today reaffirmed its status as a political home and an emerging alternative for the millions of Canadians who once voted for the former Progressive Conservative Party.

<http://www.progressivecanadian.org/>

able to use the word Conservative so they are now using Canadian which allows them to still use the short form PC. The founders of this party are those who are outraged at the hostile takeover of their party, I hope they are able to benefit by the latest outrage of the faux Con party's inclusion of Focus on the Family candidates as it shows their true agenda, one which would mirror the Repubs in the US.

-taping conversations surreptitiously.
-portions of said tapes missing (14 minutes instead of 18 minutes).
-releasing transcripts, then abridged tapes, then full(ish) tapes.

I mean, was Grewal channeling Richard Nixon?

Harper showed his usual bad judgment in not recognizing the political memories this would trigger in a lot of people. Sometimes it is hard to believe people can be this stupid.

The whole tape thing was a fiasco from start to finishh; the garbage that Tony Abbot and other MP's were saying abpout Belinda were just a window to their soul, too.

If the NDP ends up picking up more supports than the CPC come next election, I'll be elated.

This version of the Conservative Party seems hell-bent on alienating Ontario. The treatment of Stronach can be seen as a case in point - she is from an important Ontario family that employs a lot of people. That doesn't mean she is above criticism, but it does mean they should have tried to avoid pointless name calling.

Ontario has elected an NDP government provincially, so there could be a bigger surprise in the works than people think.