John Ibbitson: Conservatives exploiting divisions, Columnists not so much??

John Ibbitson of the Globe and Mail accuses the Prime Minister of exploiting a urban/rural divide in the ongoing gun registry debate. This in and of itself isn't really news, The Liberals created the divide when they exploited the Ecole Polytechnique massacre by creating the long gun registry to garner fearful urbanite's votes.

What I find interesting is Mr. Ibbitson's choice of words and demographic observations regarding this division. The following caught my eye:

Mr. Bagnell, who has opposed the long-gun registry every time he was allowed to vote his conscience, faces an impossible choice. If he breaks with his party, he will humiliate his leader, who will punish him accordingly.

If he respects the whip, the Conservatives will launch an electoral jihad against him in Yukon, where forcing gun owners to register their shotguns and rifles is seen as tantamount to creating a police state.

A jihad? Really? Do you mean an electoral struggle? A holy war? Do the conservatives consider the Liberals dar al harb? Or is jihad just part of the sexy journo lexicon these days?

Of course it gets better/worse.

The gun registry reflects a seemingly unbridgeable divide between rural and urban English Canada. (Support for the registry is higher in Quebec, where all 48 Bloc Québécois MPs support it.) Most urban Canadians can’t understand why hunters and farmers can’t make the effort to register a potentially dangerous weapon. Rural voters, the vast majority of whom are white, don’t understand why people in cities want further restrictions on their way of life and a culture that is under threat as Canada becomes ever more urban and multicultural.

The Conservatives happily exploit that divide, in the North and elsewhere. The Liberals and NDP can only suffer.

So this issue is racial and cultural as well as urban/rural? What no feminist angle?

Syncro

Syncro: Journalists are useless without brains

Linda Mc Quaig of TorStar fame states that Canadian F-35's are useless without war. In a pique of unusual unintentional sanity Ms. McQuaig makes the case for the purchase of the F-35.

Joint strike power is essential in maintaining the current geo-political balance. ...as in no major WAR.

Syncro

Professor Iffy on National Unity, Pumpkins and Salt.

As the Professor Iffy Under the Bus Tour rolls across the nation, regular Mike took the opportunity to announce his National Food Policy initiative. Breathtaking in scope, noble in intent, interventionist by nature and as hollow as a jack-o-lantern.





So. If I understand Mike correctly there is a national unity rift along rural and urban lines. The solution to this crisis is more farmers markets and more Canadian food on Canadian plates, but not too much salt. Of course this will require government leadership.

If past performance is any indication of future actions then I would expect a regular Mike led LPC government to address the above mentioned national unity crisis through some sort of urban/rural educational outreach program. Advertising Sponsorship of selected events that foster national unity ought to do the trick.

As far as the salt issue goes...simple silly...a National Salt Shaker Registry.

Syncro

Iggy Gets Jiggy on Queen Street

I have nothing to add.

Syncro

The Rocking Horse Leader

As Michael Ignatieff sacrifices his elite panache on the alter of populism the first thing that comes to my mind is The Rocking Horse Winner by D.H. Lawrence.

A quote:

And even as he lay dead, his mother heard her brother's voice saying to her, "My God, Hester, you're eighty-odd thousand to the good, and a poor devil of a son to the bad. But, poor devil, poor devil, he's best gone out of a life where he rides his rocking-horse to find a winner."

Syncro

At Least it Wasn't Camp AdscamChaChing

The Liberal Express continues it's cross Canada oddity and thanks to the kind folks in the LPC we have some excellent video.



So is it just me or did anybody else find that to be a tad creepy? Besides the wierdness I wonder at the effectiveness of schlepping for votes at a summer camp for kids unless one is campaigning for the 2020 election. Maybe Iffy is planning on supporting PMSH's budgets until then.

I was also disappointed Iffy wasn't wearing a buckskin jacket but he has been out of the country for a while so he probably isn't up to speed on Primeministerial canoeing protocol.

And finally, were I Iffy, I wouldn't want to get back on the bus either.

Syncro

I Smell Therefore I am.

It's Stampede time here in Calgary so the morning air is replent with the scent of frying bacon, blueberry pancakes and maple syrup. Of course this also means that politicians in cowboy gear are flipping flapjacks and talking smack. Case in point:

Federal Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff says he knows he has lots of work to do to convince Canadians that he is ready to run the country. Decked out in cowboy gear in the heart of Tory country, Ignatieff told supporters at a Stampede breakfast he plans to tour every province and territory to convince voters that it’s time for a change in Ottawa. “We have to earn the confidence of Canadians — door by door, handshake by handshake, baby by baby,” he said. “Starting today we’re going to get on a bus and go to every province and territory between July and September, if it doesn’t kill me first. “We’re going to stop at every legion hall, every barbecue, every Tim Hortons and shake every hand in the house.” The Liberal leader said his party is the only one that owns the centre of Canada’s political spectrum, noting Canadians can “smell the whiff of sulfur coming off” of Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who he said, is on the extreme right.

Wow! Amongst all the pleasing aroma's I associate with Stampede, sulfur is not one of them. So what is Iffy getting at? Is he suggesting Stephen Harper has gastrointestinal difficulties? Too much Old Spice? Chronic halitosis?

The funny thing is we were driving to work up the Deerfoot this morning about the same time Iffy was giving this speech and the only thing I got a whiff of was desperation and pancakes.

Syncro