May 17 2013
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Hey so since the NDP shocked basically everyone by losing an election against the scandal-plagued Liberals at the last BC election, it’s been a foregone conclusion that Adrian Dix is on his way out as NDP leader. So who can replace him?
Here I’ve plotted the leadership attributes of nine possible replacements for NDP leadership: five current MLAs, two current MPs, one mayor, and one provincial living treasure. I’ve excluded candidates like Constance Barnes and Mike Farnworth who would be perfectly good leaders but have already been demonstrated to be incompatible with the NDP’s priorities through previous contests. Click on the radar graphs to see how the candidates line up on five priority areas:
- Name recognition - Do people know who the candidate is? This is a huge deal with minimally-attached voters, particularly since unknown candidates inevitably get defined on the opposition’s terms. I don’t think the NDP considered this when naming Adrian Dix.
- Communication skills - How well do they talk to the media? What’s their history like in terms of delivering statements as necessary?
- Natural base - Does the candidate bring with them a base of voters to whom they particularly appeal, like the teachers’ union or wealthy gays? And how much does this help the party relative to their current standing?
- Political inclinations - How well do the candidates toe the line for the provincial NDP? Because there is probably no demand at all for a serious change of direction among the party officals.
- Diversity - Not going to lie, the tendency of leftist parties in Canada to have my fellow white dudes from wealthy backgrounds running things is pretty unappealing. I’d very much like to see a NDP leader who isn’t a wealthy middle-aged straight white guy.
Anyway, as shown, it seems to me that Jenny Kwan is the party’s best choice. She has the safest NDP seat in the province, she has reasonably high name recognition, and she’s definitely media-savvy. Mable Elmore and Libby Davies would be reasonable choices too, although Elmore is very tight with the public sector union wing of the NDP and Libby Davies doesn’t show any inclination of wanting to leave federal politics.
I’d probably put my money on the party naming Shane Simpson or Spencer Chandra Herbert as their new leader, at this point - but not optimistic about their prospects in the 2017 election.
Note that Gregor Robertson doesn’t really make sense for NDP leadership. His politics don’t align with the party’s all that much, and he seems pretty pleased with his safe position as mayor.
Anyway TL;DR draft Carly Rae Jepsen for Premier in 2017.
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ubermichael replied to your link: B.C. NDP brass publicly support Adrian Dix cbc.ca…
He needs to stay in place for a year, to give the appearance of a stable political party. Then he can step down to spend more time with his family or Jenny Kwan can push him into traffic or something.
Going to respectfully suggest that there’s a pretty long-established tradition in Canadian politics of losing party leaders stepping down immediately. Look at Carole James or Stéphane Dion or Jean Charest, for example. (Or Michael Ignatieff ha ha ha *sob*.) It’s a way for the party to acknowledge that they made mistakes and that they hold their leadership accountable. More practically, it helps with fundraising and high-profile candidate recruitment. If the NDP is serious about competing in 2017, Dix should resign as soon as they’ve figured out how to choose his replacement. (Don’t expect a LPC-style primary, unfortunately.)
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so yeah in case you’re wondering what it’s like to be around me in person
Those last few posts should provide some indication of the all-around insufferability.
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frantic emails and phone calls ensue
Hooray all this is a hilarious misunderstanding and they need to pretend they’re going to kick me out to continue to keep up the pretense of meeting faculty deadlines. I was supposed to pick up on the “wink wink” nature of the whole process and respond with a formal petition. Because if there is anything that economics grad students are amazing at it’s interpreting subtleties of tone.
Anyway I’m deleting those previous posts now.
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oh good because my department’s deadlines are different from my faculty’s I might lose all funding in two weeks
h y p e r v e n t i l a t i n g
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B.C. NDP brass publicly support Adrian Dix
Hey so this is the dude who earlier this week lost an election badly despite leading his party in with a twenty-point polling lead. I’d assumed they’d be gluing his face up over a dartboard at NDP headquarters by now. Not sure what anyone has to gain by continuing to back him at this point, really.
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Harper government withheld documents in indigenous human-rights case
The Harper government withheld tens of thousands of documents that it was obligated to disclose as part of a human-rights case in which it is accused of discriminating against indigenous children. Now, it is using its failure to hand over the files to try to get the proceedings put on hold.
The First Nations Child and Family Caring Society filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal in 2007 saying it is wrong for the federal government to pay 22 per cent less for child welfare on reserves than the provinces pay for non-aboriginal welfare services.
Despite many attempts by the government to have the case dismissed, the hearings before the tribunal finally began in February of this year.
But, next Tuesday, Justice Department lawyers will ask for an adjournment of many months while they gather more than 50,000 documents that were required to have already been handed over to the Caring Society’s lawyers under the human-rights commission rules.
Hey so when the federal government got caught illegally hiding 50,000 documents which it was required to turn over for what could potentially be a very large and expensive human rights case, they responded by insisting that they needed the whole proceeding adjourned for months while they collected all those documents.
That’s it. That’s exactly what happened. That’s just how things are now.
May 16 2013
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Here’s the ratio of gas prices to hourly income. Look how much it’s taken off over the last ten years. If you want to know why people are driving less in the United States, congratulating great urban planning practices is probably not the optimal starting point.
