NDP leadership race #135

Good article in the Star today about a group called Doctors for Fair Taxation who advocate higher taxes for the wealthy in Canada (which would include the doctors themselves).  Good to see people echoing Topp's and Cullen's call for fair taxation.  Too bad though that the other leadership candidates have shied away from this.

Rakhmetov wrote:

Will be interesting to hear Judy Rebick on The Current when it comes online.  Is there a link yet?  She said she was planning to outline her case why Mulcair can't be trusted.  With tens of thousands of members yet to cast their vote, these sorts of pronouncements can have an impact.  Was thinking more folks would have voted by now.  There could be a significant amount of votes to play around with at convention after all.  Given the margin of victory will probably just be a couple thousand votes, what happens at convention may be critical for the winner.

I don't think it will be interesting at all. More of the establishment protecting their own instead of keeping their eyes on the prize: Beating Harper and the Tories in 2015.

Double post.

Winston wrote:

In any normal leadership race, no party would even consider selecting a candidate that had almost no support in one of the major regions of the country.  The only thing muddying this in our race is that 6 of the 7 candidates have negligible support in one region (5 if you consider Topp's support to be "significant"). 

That is a fact.  And it is also problem.  

Peggy Nash has the endorsements of SIX Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Brian Topp has the endorsements of SIX Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Niki Ashton has the endorsements of THREE Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Paul Dewar has the endorsements of THREE Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

If you want to characterize Nathan Cullen and Martin Singh as having negligible support in Quebec, I'm okay with that.  But to say that the four candidates above have negligible support in Quebec is to be absurdly dismissive of the EIGHTEEN Quebec MPs who have endorsed AGAINST Mulcair.  Certainly there's no excuse for calling the support for either Nash or Topp negligible.

mulcair may not be the only quebecer in the race, but he's the only one of the two who actually made his career there, works and lives in french, and he's been a high profile figure in quebec for 20 years.  brian topp hadn't done more than visit the province for christmas during that time, and has zero quebec support outside of the concordia university set, and a few of the suddenly important quebec section types.  household name and most popular politician in the province (mulcair) or a complete unknown who can make claims being from quebec, but has no credibility earned in the province (topp).  if holding quebec is the top priority, better to go with the guy that everyone already knows and likes, and who also just happens to be the province's most popular active political figure.

oh, and dion/chretien is a false cognate - there's no sense in which we can compare today's political situation with that in the aughts or nineties.

again, if you think it's a good trade-off, that's fine.  but don't kid yourself that topp could keep more than the dozen natural ndp seats in quebec and maybe some in which the mp is personally popular.  or that a nash leadership wouldn't see us fighting to hold onto our montreal core seats.  this is the universal consensus among virtually all observers familiar with quebec politics.

KenS wrote:

There was an announcement that she had become Atlantic Canada "bureau chief". So I thought they had exiled her- keeping her being our contrebution to sanity in Canada.

But apparently not, that was months ago. Nor do I see her name on any stories from here.

That's Jane Taber. She now lives in Halifax and covers Atlantic politics for the Globe. 

flight from kamakura wrote:

mulcair may not be the only quebecer in the race, but he's the only one of the two who actually made his career there, works and lives in french, and he's been a high profile figure in quebec for 20 years.  brian topp hadn't done more than visit the province for christmas during that time, and has zero quebec support outside of the concordia university set, and a few of the suddenly important quebec section types.  household name and most popular politician in the province (mulcair) or a complete unknown who can make claims being from quebec, but has no credibility earned in the province (topp).

I agree that Mulcair is much better known in Quebec than Topp is.  I do think the I'm-more-of-a-Quebecer-than-you-are type rhetoric is a rather ridiculous, though.  Some Mulcair supporters complain about comparisons of which candidate is a better social democrat.  Well, they should stop with the comparisons of which candidate is a better Quebecer.  I happen to think that the philosophical comparison is okay, because being a social democrat is a job requirement for being leader; being a Quebecer is not.

flight from kamakura wrote:

if holding quebec is the top priority, better to go with the guy that everyone already knows and likes, and who also just happens to be the province's most popular active political figure.

I'm glad to see you put an "if" on this statement.  I don't happen to think that "holding Quebec" should be "the top priority" for the NDP.  I think our top priority must be the same as it always has been: to implement our agenda to build the social democratic Canada of which we dream.  I think that if we're going to do that, we have to form a government—and form government under leadership that will implement our agenda.  To form government, we need to win not merely in Quebec but across Canada—and especially in the west.  I don't think Mulcair is the leader to win in the west.  I also don't think he's the leader to implement our agenda.

flight from kamakura wrote:

oh, and dion/chretien is a false cognate - there's no sense in which we can compare today's political situation with that in the aughts or nineties.

I'm not saying that Mulcair will be like Dion or Chretien, but I think it's worth noting that Quebecers haven't always voted for Quebecers—and I don't think that the current political situation will force them to do so now.  I think both Mulcair and Topp would do much better in Quebec than either Dion or Chretien, but I don't think it's a result of them being Quebecers.  There are plenty of New Democrats from outside of Quebec who I also think would do better in Quebec than Dion or Chretien.

flight from kamakura wrote:

again, if you think it's a good trade-off, that's fine.  but don't kid yourself that topp could keep more than the dozen natural ndp seats in quebec and maybe some in which the mp is personally popular.  or that a nash leadership wouldn't see us fighting to hold onto our montreal core seats.  this is the universal consensus among virtually all observers familiar with quebec politics.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I think Alexandre Boulerice, Françoise Boivin and Pierre Ducasse are all observers familiar with Quebec politics.  It's true that many voices in the mainstream press have said claimed that the NDP would suffer in Quebec under Topp or Nash, but I don't think it's fair to call those voices a universal consensus or anything close to one.

I think our Quebec MPs generally want to hold their seats and win reelection in 2015, and, as I've mentioned, eighteen of them have endorsed candidate other than Mulcair—including six for Topp and six for Nash.  If they really believed that their would be doom and gloom for the NDP and they would lose their seats under those leaders, they wouldn't be endosing them.

Will Mulcair disappear if he does not win?  Why would he not be able to continue playing a valuable role representing the interests of Quebec under, say, Peggy Nash's leadership?

p.s. Thanks for the kind comments in the previous threads.

One could make the argument in September that Mulcair's huge lead in Quebec was based on name recognition; however after seven months of campaigning (eight for Brian) none of the other candidates have dented Mulcair's lead. Why does anyone think these other candidates if they became leader would all of a sudden leap in Quebec popularity when they have not done so in more than half a year of constant campaigning? I wouldn't put too much stock in 18 candidates supporting other candidates or as any indication these folk are in tune with quebec and the pollstes/pundits are not. After all, many of them spent zero dollars on their local campaigns and did not visit their ridings prior to May 2 making it difficult for me to see how much in touch they could be at this early stage of their careers. But they can get there in three and a half years if given the chance.

TheArchitect wrote:

Peggy Nash has the endorsements of SIX Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Brian Topp has the endorsements of SIX Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Niki Ashton has the endorsements of THREE Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

Paul Dewar has the endorsements of THREE Quebec MPs.  Negligible support?  I wouldn't say so.

If you want to characterize Nathan Cullen and Martin Singh as having negligible support in Quebec, I'm okay with that.  But to say that the four candidates above have negligible support in Quebec is to be absurdly dismissive of the EIGHTEEN Quebec MPs who have endorsed AGAINST Mulcair.  Certainly there's no excuse for calling the support for either Nash or Topp negligible.

And how will the votes go, hmm...?

In the end, SIX Québec MPs amounts to exactly SIX votes.

When Forum polled QC NDP supporters only, they found that 54% supported Mulcair (90% among decided voters), 5% supported Topp and not a single one they polled supported Nash.

It is interesting to note that many of the QC MPs not supporting Mulcair invited his campaign in to sign up members in their ridings!

So yes, what you described above amounts to negligible support.

Also, some of the 18, including Boivin, have indicated they are supporting Mulcair if their candidate drops out. There is a chance of course that those leadership candidates who have 1 per cent support in Quebec will somehow rise up over three years - but is it worth the risk when by most accounts there are no major policy differences amongst the candidates? The party has enver elected a leader who lives and works in Quebec. If not now, when?

TheArchitect wrote:

If you want to ignore the 18 NDP MPs from Quebec who have endorsed candidates other than Mulcair, that's fine.  But only if you also ignore the MPs from Quebec who have endorsed Mulcair.

Boy, TheArchitect, do you ever obfuscate well!  Are MP endorsements the only measure of support??  Polls (internal or public) don't count?  Individual members' observations on the ground?  Membership sales?

If we could shake on it, I'd wager any amount you'd care to put up that Mulcair gets more than 70% of the first-ballot support in Québec.  I'd actually expect a lot more than that, but hell, even I hedge.  But I doubt you'd put that up.  You are probably far more influentially-placed in the Party than I am, you've seen the internals and you know I am right on that.

TheArchitect wrote:

I think it's worth noting that the 18 Quebec MPs who have endorsed against Mulcair are actually, on average, higher-profile MPs than the Quebec MPs who are backing Mulcair.  Françoise Boivin, Alexandre Boulerice, Hélène Laverdière and Hoang Mai are probably all higher-profile MPs than any Quebec MPs who are backing Mulcair other than maybe Saganash (and Mulcair himself).

Claude Patry is chopped liver now?  He was one of the half-dozen Québec candidates specifically mentioned to the media as being "ministrable" in the last campaign!  But you probably knew that too, but chose not mention it. 

I find Judy's praise of Jack odd since she quit the party when he was federal leader. Her criticism of Mulcair not having enough high profile women supporting him (his 12 MPs and numerous provincial MLAs etc don't seem to count) is eerily similar to the same argument against dave barrett in 1989. Oh well, I strongly suspect Thomas wasn't counting on Judy's support and will just have to win without her non-existent vote.

Michelle wrote:

I'm listening to Judy Rebick's remarks on The Current about Mulcair - and they're bang on!  Good for her for telling it like it is.

I'd be interested to find out who Sharon Carstairs thinks we should select.  Has anyone polled Rahim Jaffer's opinion?  Rob Anders? Lisa Raitt?  Buzz Hargrove?  Any other non-members like Judy Rebick want to weigh in?

Michelle wrote:

She says he's the "anti-Layton" - an attack dog who doesn't work well with people.  And she also mentioned that there aren't very many senior NDP women supporting him either.

Right, because as a non-member of the Party, she's had a lot of opportunities to work with him, to REALLY get to know him.

NorthReport wrote:

Good!

“(The) path (to victory) is the same as always: win B.C., people vote for the candidate they like and who connects,” said Jamey Heath, co-campaign manager for Cullen, adding that his candidate would address the “sad number of personal attacks” in the waning days of the campaign in his speech on Friday afternoon.

Good for Nathan!  My estimation of him has really gone up through this race!

Can't wait until this is over. 

Winston wrote:

TheArchitect wrote:

If you want to ignore the 18 NDP MPs from Quebec who have endorsed candidates other than Mulcair, that's fine.  But only if you also ignore the MPs from Quebec who have endorsed Mulcair.

Boy, TheArchitect, do you ever obfuscate well!  Are MP endorsements the only measure of support??  Polls (internal or public) don't count?  Individual members' observations on the ground?  Membership sales?

Of course those things count.  My point in the above comment is fairly simple: that if you ignore the MP endorsements for non-Mulcair candidates, then you should ignore the MP endorsements for Mulcair as well.  After all, it would be silly to say that if MPs endorse Mulcair, this should be taken seriously, but if they endorse other candidates, it shouldn't.

Winston wrote:

If we could shake on it, I'd wager any amount you'd care to put up that Mulcair gets more than 70% of the first-ballot support in Québec.  I'd actually expect a lot more than that, but hell, even I hedge.  But I doubt you'd put that up.  You are probably far more influentially-placed in the Party than I am, you've seen the internals and you know I am right on that.

I'm not one for gambling, but I'll just point out that Topp's campaign has claimed to have signed up over 2000 members in Quebec "in the last weeks."  Those members would account for over 16% of the Quebec membership.  Thus, I would conjecture that Topp will receive at least that percentage of the first ballot vote in Quebec.  While I don't know exactly what "in the last weeks" means, I would assume that Topp had already, prior to that final period, signed up a fair number of new members in Quebec—not to mention the fact that a certain number of the 1700 people who were members in Quebec prior to the campaign will vote for Topp.  Thus, I'd say that Topp will be receiving a quite significant Quebec vote on the first ballot.

Winston wrote:

TheArchitect wrote:

I think it's worth noting that the 18 Quebec MPs who have endorsed against Mulcair are actually, on average, higher-profile MPs than the Quebec MPs who are backing Mulcair.  Françoise Boivin, Alexandre Boulerice, Hélène Laverdière and Hoang Mai are probably all higher-profile MPs than any Quebec MPs who are backing Mulcair other than maybe Saganash (and Mulcair himself).

Claude Patry is chopped liver now?  He was one of the half-dozen Québec candidates specifically mentioned to the media as being "ministrable" in the last campaign!  But you probably knew that too, but chose not mention it. 

Claude Patry isn't chopped liver!  He's a good endorsement—one of many good endorsements Mulcair has received in Quebec.  I wouldn't say that he's as well-known as any of the four I mentioned.

TheArchitect wrote:

I'm not one for gambling, but I'll just point out that Topp's campaign has claimed to have signed up over 2000 members in Quebec "in the last weeks."  Those members would account for over 16% of the Quebec membership.  Thus, I would conjecture that Topp will receive at least that percentage of the first ballot vote in Quebec.  While I don't know exactly what "in the last weeks" means, I would assume that Topp had already, prior to that final period, signed up a fair number of new members in Quebec—not to mention the fact that a certain number of the 1700 people who were members in Quebec prior to the campaign will vote for Topp.  Thus, I'd say that Topp will be receiving a quite significant Quebec vote on the first ballot.

I would largely tend to agree with you on the point that, after Mulcair, Topp will have the next highest level of Quebec support.  It might be as high as 16%; it could even be higher.  I think we can agree that none of the other 5 will be anywhere close to 10%, let alone 16%.  That was why I left the caveat in my previous that there MAY only be 5 candidates with negligible support in Québec.  It also happens to be why I ranked Topp 2nd when I cast my ballot 2 weeks ago.

Do I think that the NDP members must choose a leader from Quebec?  No, I don't.  However, I will be supporting Thomas Mulcair because I do think that he has run a well organized campaign.  He will the be leader who is most likely to attract voters who have not traditionally supported the NDP.

The other candidates do have good qualities.  However, Mr. Mulcair seems to have their good qualities combined together.  He will be ready to perform as the leader of the NDP on day one.  We will not have to wait for him to win a seat or improve his French.  I do think that he will change the electoral focus of the NDP so that he will be able to gain support from voters who supported other parties.  He won't just be preaching to the converted.  He will be able to make the NDP's perceived weaknesses on economic issues into strengths; he will be able to make Harper's perceived strengths on economic issues into weaknesses.

While I admire the passion, the rhetoric on this and the other 134 pieces of this thread is awful. Everyone claiming to have deep inner knowledge and if not, being able to discern "trends" from MSM polls. Say what?

The only saving grace is that the MSM and the average/ordinary joes/joesephines don't read babble. Thank the deity or non-religious icon you chose to worship.

Winston wrote:

Michelle wrote:

Judy was a member of the party for years, and still has many friends and contacts within the party. 

But she's not now, and her hearsay, second-hand "knowledge", through her friends and contacts in the Party, of Tom's personality is worth no more than mine.

This is actually a point that I've made a number of times on Babble: that the endorsements that should really matter are from the people who have personal knowledge of the candidates—which generally means the senior MPs who have been in caucus with the candidates.

Winston wrote:

Throughout this campaign I haven't shared any of the stories I have heard about some of the other leadership candidates "not getting along with people" and "being difficult to work with".  There's a couple reasons for that: 1) I don't really care for ad hominem attacks (unlike Judy Rebick, apparently) and 2) I never personally experienced these difficulties that OTHER PEOPLE claim to have had with these other candidates, so it would not be fair for me to spread those rumours.

"Ad hominem" is a term meaning "against the person."  It's used to refer to an argument that a particular position should be rejected because of the bad character of somebody who advocates it.  For example, if we were having a debate about cap-and-trade and somebody said, "Thomas Mulcair supports cap-and-trade but Thomas Mulcair is difficult to work with.  Therefore, Thomas Mulcair must be wrong about cap-and trade.  Thus, we should oppose cap-and-trade," that would be a fallacious ad hominem attack.

The thing is, though, that we're not deciding the validity of an impersonal position.  We're choosing a person to be leader.  If there's a problem with the person that would affect the person's ability to be leader, then that problem is absolutely a legitimate topic for discussion.  Raising it is not an "ad hominem" attack.

TheArchitect wrote:

The thing is, though, that we're not deciding the validity of an impersonal position.  We're choosing a person to be leader.  If there's a problem with the person that would affect the person's ability to be leader, then that problem is absolutely a legitimate topic for discussion.  Raising it is not an "ad hominem" attack.

Thank-you for the language lesson, TheArchitect, I defer to your clearly superior intellect!  

The problem with ALL of the attacks on Tom's character throughout this race is that NOBODY with first-hand knowledge has been making them; it has been a whisper campaign throughout.

That is BS.

NorthReport wrote:

Good!

“(The) path (to victory) is the same as always: win B.C., people vote for the candidate they like and who connects,” said Jamey Heath, co-campaign manager for Cullen, adding that his candidate would address the “sad number of personal attacks” in the waning days of the campaign in his speech on Friday afternoon.

I want to make a point about "personal attacks."

When we talk about avoiding "personal attacks," that means avoiding criticisms of a person that have nothing to do with their suitability to be leader.  Examples would include things about a person's family, their personal life, their gender, their sexuality, et cetera.

However, criticisms that relate to a person's suitability to be NDP leader—such as issues relating to their qualifications, records, beliefs, proposals, leadership styles, or language abilities—are not "personal attacks."  They are legimitimate topics of discussion.

If somebody says that Brian Topp is less suitable to be leader because he's never been an MP, that's not a personal attack.  Whether or not the argument is a good one, it's not a personal attack.

If somebody says that Thomas Mulcair is less suitable to be leader because he has trouble getting along with other senior New Democrats, or because he's too much of a centrist, that's not a personal attack.  Whether or not the argument is a good one, it's not a personal attack.

If somebody says that Paul Dewar or Nathan Cullen are less suitable to be leader because they doesn't speak French well enough, that's not a personal attack.  Whether or not the argument is a good one, it's not a personal attack.

I don't actually think there have been that many personal attacks on the candidates in this leadership race—not even on Babble.  There have, on Babble, been quite a few attacks on other Babblers.  These are inappropriate and should always be avoided.

The one candidate who I would say HAS been the victim of serious personal attacks on Babble is Niki Ashton; I remember one comment in particular about her which was highly offensive (and which was rightly condemned not only by moderators but by a large number of Babblers).

The line between what is a personal attack and what isn't, I admit, can be a bit unclear.  For example, saying that Niki Ashton is less suitable to be leader because she's only twenty-nine is probably a personal attack.  But saying that Niki Ashton is less suitable to be leader because voters would perceive her, due to her age, as inexperienced and unready to be Prime Minister is probably fair game, as one of the factors which determines a candidate's suitability to be leader is the candidate's ability to win a general election.