Campbell Could Have Cleaned Up On Tuesday
By Ben Meisner
The provincial opposition parties were on the street Wednesday in British Columbia trying to make fudge out of the federal election results.
In BC there are now 22 Conservatives a gain of 4 , there are 9 NDP a loss of 1, there are two fewer Liberals and how the opposition can claim that is a victory for them is a bit of a stretch and their spinners had to be working to late into the night to come up with the reasons.
Gordon Campbell ,who heads the Liberal Party in BC is anything but Liberal. He inherited the party when the Socreds bit the dust and the Liberals were showing some strong gains, they were at that time a right wing party and they remain that way.
There has been an effort to try and make the carbon tax the falling of the Liberals in BC. Had the opposition parties cared to check they would have quickly found that in the polls conducted on Election Day, people who went to the polls thought the economy was the big item. The environment was down in fifth place.
Had there been a provincial election on Tuesday, Campbell would have cleaned up because on the minds of the people is the matter of what is happening to the economy and first and foremost what is happening to their money. Nothing gets the attention of the voter faster than telling them that their net worth has dropped about 40% in the past few months. Suddenly 2.6 cents a litre on the gas you buy becomes small potatoes.
So where does that leave us? If the economy continues to fall as it has and as all predictions believe it will, Campbell will be viewed as the guy to lead the province during bad economic times. The NDP had their turn at the cash register and the feeling lingers that they did a very poor job.
We may be hearing this and that about how the Federal Liberals did themselves in, the Bloc put a nail in their coffin along with ensuring that the Conservatives would not have a majority. That is the big news, a party bent on breaking up Canada, holding a balance of power in the country.
As for BC, the economy in the rural areas is an item that Campbell will have to address heading into this spring's election. The carbon tax may play a very minor role in all that, the loss of jobs with people losing their homes will play a far more important part.
I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.
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Posted by: Shellshadow on October 16 2008 8:31 AM
I remember that it was Gordon Wilson who "inherited" the Liberal Party when the Socreds went bust. Gordon Campbell got control by mounting a coup d'etat and stabbing Wilson in the back, and then pushed the Liberals to the right, absorbing other right wing parties in the process. Wilson then went on to form the short-lived PDA, what many considered to be the real party for liberalism in BC.
I suspect the NDP is pleased about the national results for the party, increasing the number of seats. Provincially not so much. What that means for a provincial election is not clear, at least to me.
I am tempted to say that the very poor showing of the Liberal party in BC in this election is due to the distaste in BC voters' mouths for the provincial Liberals with association by name. If that is so, then it bodes well for the NDP next year.
As another contributor says ofen, "Time will tell".