Reply #10: Why? Because the Liberal campaign is downright abysmal. [View All]

[Telly Savalas]

Granted, they are straight-jacketed a bit by their record and inability to keep old promises. Just a few thoughts on what they're doing wrong:

-They needed to attack the Conservative "child care plan" hard. They needed to aggressive hammer the point that $23 a week of taxable money doesn't come close to scratching the surface for child care costs. Rather than backing down from the "beer and popcorn" comment with insincere apologies, they should have made it a talking point that $23 taxable dollars a week is a lot closer to the average Canadian's beer and popcorn budget than it is the cost of child care. And most critically, they should be pointing out at every opportunity possible that a Harper government will destroy the nascent child care plan that would actually create new spaces.

-They also needed to do a much better job of driving home the point that cutting the GST to 5% will have what economists call "jack-shit" effect on the finances of people making less than $40K a year. It would have been a lot easier to go on the offensive on the GST issue if they didn't have the baggage of a broken promise to repeal it outright.

-On the accountablty/corruption issue there's a number of things they could do better. With respect to Adscam they needed much tougher rhetoric. They should have conceded that there were problems, but they won't tolerate that sort of shit so they cleaned house and now the Liberal Party has been purged of all elements involved. (Of course this only works if it's true, which is perhaps why they don't take this line.) Too often Liberals defend allegations of corruption by saying "there's no proof." That makes them sound guilty. They'd do better to turn the tables and call their accusers liars. "The Liberal Party is a clean institution and Stephen Harper is a goddamn liar to use unfounded rumours and inneundo to suggest otherwise!"

They also need to point out that there's absolutely zero evidence to suggest that the Conservatives wouldn't fall prey to corruption if they were given the helm. The Conservatives claim they've written up solid policy to increase accountability. Alright. If they're so goddamn concerned about getting such a bill passed, why didn't they introduce it in the last government? Is it perhaps because they don't really care about accountability and are just using this issue as a cheesey way of getting political brownie points? Crybaby Harper can whine about not being able to get his agenda passed because he's in opposition, but Layton got a good deal of NDP plans put in despite having a much smaller caucus. "We would have been more than happy to work with the opposition on creating a better set of rules for government accountability, but they we're too busy playing petty political games to cooperate."

-Finally the Liberals should be calling a lot more attention to the muzzled extremists in the Reform Party caucus. Don't just dig up really old Harper quotes demonstrating his right-wing radicalism. Get fresher quotes from his back-benchers from the last campaign. Do these folks still believe these things they said? If they do, why aren't you letting them speak their minds, Mr. Harper? If they don't, then can we will trust elected officials who do such abrupt political back-flips?

My list could go on, but this post is already too long as is. The tepid "we're Liberals. You always vote for us" campaign strategy has been a dismal failure. The Party needs new blood.