It wasn't a fair fight. NDP Leader Carole James showed up at the televised debate prepared, rehearsed, and camera-ready.
More on the B.C. leaders debate
Jane Sterk offers fresh ideas on crime and prohibition
Gordon Campbell, Jane Sterk, and Carole James on the economy
Premier Gordon Campbell, on the other hand, looked stiff, uncomfortable, and evasive a lot of the time. And Green Leader Jane Sterk, while well-briefed on the facts and on policies, sometimes stumbled in her delivery.
The verdict? A knockout victory for the NDP's Carole James. I'll have more on the debate in other posts. But here are Campbell's nonresponses to questions from James on the minimum wage and BC Rail. You'll note that Campbell didn't answer what was asked of him.
Carole James: "Mr. Campbell, I would like you to say to the single mom who is working hard and supporting her family, why you haven't found over the last eight years even a nickel to increase her wage?"
Gordon Campbell: "I'm glad to respond to that. I think this government actually has followed a different strategy than New Democrats. We were very concerned about young people getting employment. We now have 80,000 young people at work than we did before. I think the other thing that's important is we've had a high-employment, high-wage strategy. So the average wage for young people in British Columbia is $13 an hour. The average wage for workers in British Columbia is $22 an hour. And I'm pleased to say as we've moved through the last eight years and created over 350,000 jobs that actually there is more people at work than ever before and it's important for us to continue to follow that strategy. We certainly don't want to follow the strategy of the New Democrats did with high unemployment, losing jobs, and people leaving British Columbia to find opportunities."
Campbell also refused to answer a straightforward question from James on BC Rail.
Carole James: "After five years of a BC Rail corruption scandal with no answers from Mr. Campbell. A question he can answer—now, five years knowing what he knows, would he do things differently?"
Gordon Campbell: "Well, thank you very much, Russ. I think the real question here is how do we make sure British Columbia can move ahead. Leadership requires for people to be up front. Ms. James just said she was going to cut small-business taxes. The fact of the matter is her plan will increase the cost for small business by $450 million across the province. Now, she doesn't have much business experience. In fact, she doesn't have any. But if she talks to small-business people, they would tell her that would cost 50,000 people their jobs..."
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The debate format was very tight and disciplined, which I think benefits the viewers and the three leaders got treated fairly by the moderator. It was a good job I thought in getting a measure of the three leaders.
Carole James is strong, clear, intelligent and focussed on getting our province back on track. She will provide the leadership to help us (all of us including seniors, families, students, workers) through these tough times.
Can Mr. Campbell please tell me where those jobs are that I can recommend to students and other young workers?
Does this mean that under the current system fo the past 8 years, the middle class is disappearing as the poor get poorer, and the rich get richer? Thank you very much Mr. Campbell.
www.gunghaggisfatchoy.com
Thanks for your article Charlie. I agree. Carole gave a spellbinding performance.
Carole got some pretty good jabs at Campbell; Campbell proved his ability to lie yet again. He didnt talk much about what hes going to do. He just repeated some promises that he apparently thinks he followed through on, though seniors, students, etc know its a lie.
James scored a 8 - not stellar, but very good.
Gordo scored a 4 - evasive and patronizing. He did not give a straight answer.
Sterk scored a 2 - not prepared and not able.
Mair's axiom #1: You don't have to be a ten in politics to win, rather you can be a 2, if everyone else is a 1.
James is a 4, while Gordo and Sterk are a 2 and a 1 respectively.
Grumpy is as Grumpy does!
During the debate he came across as condescending, evasive, patronizing and defensive.
Are these leadership qualities? Definitely not the qualities I want in my premier.
Go Carole Go!
Note that James let Campbell get away with mentioning his environmental sellouts Da Gucci Suzuki and Weaver, without whacking him and Sterk with Alexandra's Morton's definitive quote
"I personally don't think the salmon are going to survive another Liberal term"
Lost a great opportunity there.
Finally not a word on BCHydro's 30 billion dollars in IPP
losses buying power it can't use and must sell for an 85% loss on the spot market. And the Campbell promises to double that. This gives Campbell the record for worst economic decision ever made by a Canadian politician and shows the BC Liberals couldn't manage a lemonade stand. Its a conspiracy damn it.
seth
Now is really not the time for the Kumbaya league to take over BC.
Not that the debate format was even remotely acceptable.
The Single Transferrable Vote system will at least shake things up enough to cause problems for the Libtards and New Dumbass-crats.
I look forward to the day when we can actually hold our politicians to account rather than listen to them scream bloody murder at each other during their campaigns only to pull the same shit as the last guy when they're in office..
The Greens are proving that irony has gone well beyond the abilities of the terribly earnest to fathom. Earth to Greens: We don't have the 30-50 years your puny species need to convince us of your worthiness....most of you will never manage to do more than fill the dump with discarded signs of your insatiable lust for power. Stop it now and claim your old life back ( note to self: don't go there) .
Carole James has a pack of monkeys on her back. Some are powerful, muscular, semi conscious monkeys while other diminutive climbing party monkeys whack off a lot and throw handfuls of their own excrement at each other. All their executive dogsbodies are getting pretty long in the tooth and have been making the kind of decisions that are so wrongheaded they could be mistaken for deliberate sabotage. Plus who knows where they've had their wet noses and long floppy tongues. Lots of questionable decisions by a horribly demoralized provincial executive after the '01 massacre.
The answer to the question everybody's asking is: NDP's turn to windbag for 4 years about all the things they think up while having a good suck at the public tit.
SMBs
“When a Nobel prize winner says that the government’s climate action plan is something that he can endorse; when the Suzuki Foundation does…”
Not so Gordo!
While the foundation does support the carbon tax, in its review of the BC 2009 budget, it is highly critical of many environmental aspects of your budget.
The following critique of the budget is found on the David Suzuki Foundation website.
I quote:
“The David Suzuki Foundation is calling the 2009 B.C. budget a “missed opportunity to strongly position the province in the emerging green economy…it falls short by failing to provide adequate funds for public transit, and sends the wrong signal by continuing to heavily subsidize the fossil fuel industry and proposing increased spending on highway expansion" (Ian Bruce, the Foundation’s Climate Change Specialist).
”The absence of funds for closed containment aquaculture in the budget is another missed opportunity to promote green jobs and a green economy. “These funds would have gone a long way towards encouraging sustainable aquaculture in B.C., and protecting wild salmon from the negative environmental impacts of open-net-pen salmon farms,” said Corey Peet, aquaculture scientist with the David Suzuki Foundation.”
Gordo, the above, in no way possible, could be construed as an endorsement and you know it. For once, would you try not to lie!
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