Reform/Progressive Conservative crack forms

[hobbyguy]

https://cfjctoday.com/2021/11/09/otoole ... -included/

The embattled CPC leader, Mr O'Toole, has announced his Opposition shadow cabinet. Significant omissions are Lewis and Gladu . . .

My guess is O'Toole needs Lewis and Gladu to continue to share core CPC messages with Facebook groups.

But looking at O'Toole's shadow cabinet of 49 (to shadow 39 REAL ministers!) it doesn't look like there's a lot of talent or intelligence there.

In fact, the only difference I can see between O'Toole's cabinet and an IKEA cabinet is the IKEA cabinet isn't full of loose screws.

I would not be so fast make a judgements about "intelligence" when it comes to any political party. Intelligence comes in many forms, many of which are not classically recognized but are very real.

It is however, easier to assess things like the likelihood of intellectual agility and likelihood of having major blind-spots due to dogmatic approaches to thinking. On that one, I would suggest that CPC has a deficit there, in part because the Campaign Life Coalition bunch have pushed many otherwise marginal candidates into being candidates purely to support their fanatically dogmatic positions.

That dogmatic approach to thinking is always a deficit to intellectual agility (which is different from "intelligence") and is reflected in the way that the CPC policy outcomes have glaring blind-spots of intolerance. It is at the root of the factional nature of the CPC. In many ways that dogmatic approach has led the CPC to almost OCD like behaviors in terms of policy and positions - and is a partial explanation for the propensity of CPC MPs to go down conspiracy theory rabbit holes - which leads to the party taking positions that are out of touch with Canadians writ large.

I have not gone through the entire list of the CPC Shadow Cabinet, but one thing is very, very clear - O'Toole's appointments are based on what is good for O'Toole in the short term, and far less on competency.

In fact, if one were to convert the O'Toole Shadow Cabinet to actual governance - it becomes very questionable in terms of the ability to actually head up the large entities that government departments represent. Within it are many people who little or no relevant experience/education in running any large organization and seem to have only the qualification of being O'Toole supporters during the leadership race. Someone who ran a coffee shop that failed and has no post secondary education as a "candidate" for a cabinet position to run a large government department? Not impossible that they would succeed - but pretty darn unlikely - and seems only to have gotten the position by publicly supporting O'Toole.

The nature of O'Toole's shadow cabinet appears very factional - and especially so when one looks at who is left out. One CPC MP I have been watching is Michael Kram - initially because the guy had the chops to defeat Ralph Goodale, but also because he has a pretty good CV. Nowhere to be seen in the O'Toole shadow cabinet. His omission raises an eyebrow when a former owner of a failed coffee shop with no post secondary education is "in". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Kram
I would have thought that an MP who was able to increase his vote tally in a former Liberal stronghold, even with the PPC nibbling away, and in an urban setting (where the CPC struggles) would have been ideal appointment to shadow cabinet for the CPC.

It really looks like O'Toole is more concerned with building up his "faction" rather than crafting a shadow cabinet that can really assume the mantle of "government in waiting" - and that's a mistake for the future of CPC electoral success.

[hobbyguy]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conser ... -1.6249440

"Conservative senator launches petition to oust Erin O'Toole as leader"

Conservative Saskatchewan Sen. Denise Batters has launched a petition to oust Erin O'Toole as party leader — a high-profile effort by a caucus member who said she lost faith in O'Toole after the Conservative Party suffered "significant losses" in the last campaign.

In announcing her petition, Batters said that on O'Toole's watch, the party has flip-flopped on major issues such as carbon pricing, firearms and conscience rights and has lost once-Conservative seats in urban and suburban ridings in Alberta, B.C. and the Greater Toronto Area.

While O'Toole campaigned as a "true blue" Conservative in the party's leadership race, Batters said he subsequently ran a federal election campaign "nearly indistinguishable from Trudeau's Liberals."

SNIP

"Mr. O'Toole flip-flopped on policies core to our party within the same week, the same day, and even within the same sentence. The members didn't have a say on that, but we must have one on his leadership," Batters said in a media statement."

[erinmore3775]

Saskatchewan Senator Denise Batters has launched a petition for an immediate review of the leadership of Erin O'Toole and his policies during the recent election.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RRtggAb8fbY

As usual for the CPC party over the last ten years, if they did not get what they wanted, they took out the knives and prepared for self amputation. This is not the time for the Party to gut itself. It is a time to group together. It is a time to put internal squabbles aside and develop policies and criticisms that will hold the current government to good governance.

If the Party continues to rely on finding scandals, assigning blame, and continuing with their name calling and bullying tactics they will assign their Party to irrevelance on the Canadian political scene. Continuing to play on the self-immolation playground means that centralist social conservatives will loose a political voice. The current government continues to outflank them especially on the child care front with the signing of the new Alberta child care agreement.

The CPC now find themselves in a predicament. If they follow the chant GO ERIN GO, and he GOES, the Party will disintegrate. If ERIN STAYS it means they must drop the knives and work together. Kenny and Alberta has seen it can accomplish more and provide better service to its citizens when it decides to co-operate and collaborate. That does not mean that they have abandoned positions, it just means they have seen the benefits of lowering the volatile rhetoric, ceasing the blame game, working together. It is time that senior members of the CPC and the Parliamentary Caucus to get the co-operative message.

[bob vernon]

Erin is from back east and is a wishy-washy, middle of the spectrum PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, whatever that means. Senator Batters is from Saskatchewan and is from the REFORM branch of the spectrum and those western Reformers just can't stand for O'Toole trying to drag the party to the middle. O'Toole even wanted a carbon tax. What's this party coming to? Turning Green?

Peter McKay? He's another soft eastern Progressive Conservative who inherited his seat in the Commons and then sold out the party to Steve and the Reformers. The westerners had their leader in Scheer. How did that work out? Then the easterners had O'Toole and that was about the same. Is it time for the two parties to leave each other behind? There's a term for parties who split and leave each other. They are a "rump" and that term applies here.

[Pappywinkle]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conser ... -1.6249440

"Conservative senator launches petition to oust Erin O'Toole as leader"

Conservative Saskatchewan Sen. Denise Batters has launched a petition to oust Erin O'Toole as party leader — a high-profile effort by a caucus member who said she lost faith in O'Toole after the Conservative Party suffered "significant losses" in the last campaign.

In announcing her petition, Batters said that on O'Toole's watch, the party has flip-flopped on major issues such as carbon pricing, firearms and conscience rights and has lost once-Conservative seats in urban and suburban ridings in Alberta, B.C. and the Greater Toronto Area.

While O'Toole campaigned as a "true blue" Conservative in the party's leadership race, Batters said he subsequently ran a federal election campaign "nearly indistinguishable from Trudeau's Liberals."

SNIP

"Mr. O'Toole flip-flopped on policies core to our party within the same week, the same day, and even within the same sentence. The members didn't have a say on that, but we must have one on his leadership," Batters said in a media statement."

Wow. Even people within the CPC acknowledge that O'Toole's many embarrassing flip flops are disastrous for the party, and rightly so! How embarrassing for anyone who propped up O'Toole. And what an embarrassing time to be a conservative!

[featfan]

Yes Denise Batters.
Go hard and fast to get the tool to retire.
And coming from a Senator that he can't fire.
Priceless.

[crookedmember]

Thank God the horrid CPC PM who gave these nuts near-lifetime jobs is gone.



A Haiku for He Who Shall Not Be Named

Steve picked lotsa kooks
Like crazy Denise Batters
Mad as a hatters

[featfan]

How scared is the tool of Leslyn Lewis?

[hobbyguy]

Thank God the horrid CPC PM who gave these nuts near-lifetime jobs is gone.



A Haiku for He Who Shall Not Be Named

Steve picked lotsa kooks
Like crazy Denise Batters
Mad as a hatters

Don't think I would characterize Denis Batters that way. The fact that I haven't noticed her as being controversial plays into that. She also has a pretty solid CV. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_Batters

I actually happen to agree with Senator Batters that a party leader should represent what the grass roots of the party has voted on, and selected as policy - not make it up on the fly and contradict what the party membership wants.

O'Toole clearly did not follow what the party grassroots selected and voted for as policy positions. Nor did O'Toole follow the precepts he laid out in his own leadership campaign. And that, in a nutshell, has made it inevitable that there would be some very unhappy grassroots segments within the CPC.

I do not agree with many of the positions taken by the CPC grassroots, which is why I am not a member of that party. O'Toole needs to think about the same thing - if the CPC party grassroots wants "x", and he disagrees with "x", then perhaps he ought to choose another party, or do what Max Bernier did.

[nucksRnum1]

So I have a question about the Conservative party. Are they in a rebuild? Or do they think they will win an election with a western grassroots status quo?

[nucksRnum1]

This shows how little conservatives regard democracy. Many conservatives want a redo after a leader was elected fair and square.

[hobbyguy]

nucks - I certainly don't see it that way. If you listen to senator Batters, what she is doing is pushing back against the nonsense of a party leader going against the wishes of the party grassroots. It isn't democratic when a leader of a party ignores the democratic votes of a party.

As an example: I sincerely doubt that the CPC party membership would vote for a carbon tax. Yup, the CPC memebrship voted not to accept that climate change is real. What does O'Toole do? - a carbon tax and climate change GHG reduction plan (sort of).

Nor do I think that the process by which O'Toole was "elected" leader was democratic. It is documented that Leslyn Lewis got substantially more votes than O'Toole, yet was dropped out of the vote tally. It is documented that O'Toole packed and stacked the twisted process by signing up gun advocate "members" in moribund Quebec ridings. It is documented that the CPC made the leadership campaign by setting impossibly high entry requirements. In a purely democratic system any member should be free to run, and the candidate with the most votes ought to win. That is clearly NOT what happened with O'Toole.

It is also fundamentally dishonest for O'Toole to have run as a "true blue" Conservative and then immediately switched to "Trudeau lite". O'Toole flat out deceived the membership, and it is only just that he should be held to account.

IF O'Toole wanted a carbon tax and wanted to go after man made climate change, then the correct thing to do would have been to introduce a resolution at the party convention and have the members vote on it. Clearly those resolutions would NOT have passed, and so O'Toole chose to simply ignore the party membership. THAT is the real source of the issues and the split in the CPC at the moment.

If I were a CPC member, I would be asking myself "what's the point in being a member if the party brass and the "leader" just ignore the democratic votes of the membership??". That, I believe, is what Senator Batters is addressing.

After all, if O'Toole had run for the leadership as "Trudeau-lite", I doubt very much that he would have even beat Derek Sloan in the first round of vote count. "Trudeau-lite" is NOT what the CPC membership wants, and not what they voted for!

[crookedmember]

It looks like the whole conservative movement in Canada is cracking up.

In Manitoba, Lurch bolted for Costa Rica and the PC leadership race is in court, with a crazy lady claiming she won when she really lost.

In Alberta 22 constituency associations want Jason Kenney gone NOW, and Jason responds by really packing on the pounds and blaming the Feds for his ill-fitting trousers.

The Harpercon wing is plotting to forcibly exile o'toole after he lost an election to the same guy Harper lost an election to, and they still have a hopper full of choices even more unattractive than erin.

Moe and Higgs are imploding after both are caught governing like Moe drives (drunk).

What a time to be alive.

[Pappywinkle]

Crack forming has been part of conservative parties ever since Rob Ford.

At least he admitted to it...

[hobbyguy]

It looks like the whole conservative movement in Canada is cracking up.

In Manitoba, Lurch bolted for Costa Rica and the PC leadership race is in court, with a crazy lady claiming she won when she really lost.

In Alberta 22 constituency associations want Jason Kenney gone NOW, and Jason responds by really packing on the pounds and blaming the Feds for his ill-fitting trousers.

The Harpercon wing is plotting to forcibly exile o'toole after he lost an election to the same guy Harper lost an election to, and they still have a hopper full of choices even more unattractive than erin.

Moe and Higgs are imploding after both are caught governing like Moe drives (drunk).

What a time to be alive.

They are running out of Harpercon choices. Ed Fast hasn't run yet. I think he is the last of that bunch -except of course Skippy P. Michael Chong won't run.

If they do run another leadership campaign, odds on favorite has to be Leslyn Lewis. Or maybe they can get Glover to run