It's now official we have four candidates in NQW.
The fourth candidate of the usual four was nominated by acclamation this afternoon, in the Citizens' Forum at Victoria Hall. Pat Clark, introduced to the collected New Democrats by Patty Park, spoke for about twenty minutes and was applauded numerous times for hitting the right spots for the members. In an off the cuff discourse Pat spoke about the need to protect what progressives have built in the past - the Social Safety net. "The Social Safety Net is too important to lose!" was one line. Another was "The State should be an instrument for public good." Speaking about the new world, "We need to learn to live with a little less and provide those who can't with enough!" Stirring stuff for Social Democrats. But his speech was not buried in the past as he spoke about the need for Green Jobs and "There's lots of room for local green investment strategies and making linkages with local groups"One of his better lines, for me, was his opening statement where he spoke about the need for change. "We need real change, not like Obama's - that's change that props up a failing system - we need fundamental change!"
Finally if you think that Pat Clark is just another young political groupie, like the other parties have, this guy has earned his chops. Patty Park told of his involvement in a pilot programme - FIVE years ago where he was working with the Help Centre and local migrant workers in Northumberland County where as a part of the job he learned to speak to them in their own language, in just a few weeks. Leaving there he went to Frontier College to mentor migrants in the tomato fields. Yep he has done hard time not just fancy constituency work.
22 comments:
Hi Ben,
I hate to correct you but, there are indeed four candidates in Northumberland-Quinte West.
Rick Norlock - Conservative
Kim Rudd - Liberal
Pat Clark - NDP
Stan Grizzle - Green
Re: Chris Pelletier's comment. correct what???????????
The headline used to be Three... I corrected it
While you are correcting bothersome little errors, have you noticed that on the top left side of your blog's main page it reads "contibuting" not contributing.
Thank you for your diligence - anon
It is early yet. My opinion might still change as the actual election unfolds after it is actually called in the future. However, if today was voting day, Pat Clark would have my vote over Norlock, Rudd or Grizzle. If it looks like she might unseat Norlock, I might be tempted to vote Rudd just to help her do it.
Dear Anon. RE: voting for Rudd to unseat Norlock? BAD MOVE, it's called strategic voting and that gave us two terms of Harris! "Vote Clark"
He maybe a very nice young man but the winner of the next federal election in NQW will either be Norlock or Rudd. To say different based on literally decades of voting is delusion. There can be a torrent of disagreement but it will be fact on election night. It is gauranteed to be the case.
Anon, s/he said: "the winner of the next federal election in NQW will either be Norlock or Rudd."
But one doesn't fight only to win!? In our situation, better perhaps to know that we fight in vain than to move The Man Who Wouldn't Be PM into Sussex Drive.
Pat Clark will not win. Stan Grizzle will not win. Norlock had a significant majority in the last election, so Rudd has her work cut out for it. It is in the realm of possibility though. I am annoyed at Layton for his antics in the last few weeks, but I generally lean towards NDP. I will vote Rudd in the next election because I despise Norlock. I despise (almost) everything the Conservatives stand for. I am casting my vote for change this time around. Will Rudd be better than Norlock? Perhaps. Could she be any worse? Highly unlikely. I'm not going to cast my vote to make a point, I'm going to cast my vote to (hopefully) facilate change.
In the last federal election I engaged in a "vote swap."
I usually vote NDP. I made an agreement with someone who usually votes Liberal in another riding.
There the most likely candidate to defeat the Conservative was from the NDP; the Liberal was going to run 3rd no matter what.
Here the most likely candidate to defeat the Conservative was the Liberal, not the NDP.
So, my wife, my daughter and I all voted Liberal here on the agreement that he and his wife would vote NDP there.
Here, our vote didn't matter much: Norlock got in anyway. There, though, the NDP candidate did get elected.
On the vote swap match-up, many people were directed to make this arrangement for that riding.
I cannot guarantee that all those swapped votes made the difference there but they sure didn't hurt!
"In our situation, better perhaps to know that we fight in vain"
Sounds like the USA in Iraq and Afghanistan. Squandering in the desert.
The oft-stated purpose of strategic voting in the last election was to elect a majority of MPs who would cooperate to form a government more progressive than the Conservatives.
Since Iggy led the Liberals to renege on the agreement intended to effect such a cooperative coalition, what is the point to strategic voting this time 'round?
In this column, Rick Salutin suggests that Iggy may "make a seriously bad candidate" in the coming election.
If so, what an irony: that Liberals dumped a prof from Montreal for a prof from Cambridge, who then spurned a tour as PM just he could fight an election on his own, which he then lost!
William, you assume that only Liberal candidates benefit or might benefit. That is a view coloured by "around here." In other locales, it would be the NDP candidate or the Bloc candidate or maybe even the Green candidate who would benefit.
Anon! S/he said: that I am assuming only Liberal candidates benefit or might benefit [from strategic voting].
Perhaps, though I intended to base my concerns on the assumption that a good result ought be for the common good rather than merely for the good of candidates.
Yet the actions last January of The Fearless Liberal Leader Who Would NOT be PM precludes,in my view, the possibility of any such result--Iggy wants nothing to do with "the socialists and the separatists." Pity--for the common good, I mean.
Strategic voting, which was your initial topic-opener, has nothing to do with pro-Iggy in my mind or pro-Jack Layton or pro-Elizabeth May. It has everything to do with anti-Harper. I want to see Harper and his party out of government.
Politics is close to the nitty-gritty in this country, honed to classic form. The Righteous, promulgators for " the common good ", armed, but disorganized, at the gates against the Horde and the evil ( would-be ) genius, Harper. It reminds me of the situation Caesar dealt with in the Roman incursion into Gaul, and the subjugation of the " independent " Celts
A poster on another blog recently said that our problem is we have bullies on the right and cowards on the left.
Add to that the fact that we long ago opted for managers rather than leaders, it's easy to see why voters are so distraught. Regardless of which party wins, incompetence will result.
Just what makes a 'good' or 'great' or even 'effective' leader, and how does this differ from a manager?
I get this disturbing impression that what one wants to see is a 'leader' that responds to every input (or criticism) by changing direction, one wants a 'leader' to set the course and follow through come hell or high water, one wants a 'leader' who will compromise their principles to accommodate diametrically opposed ones, one wants a 'leader' who goes it alone on the world stage while another one wants one that 'works with' others, and so on and so on.
Just how can we expect any 'leader' to get even half of it right? Well we can't. That's why we change leaders, and their governments, from time to time. Trouble is, we change them after the fact, in response to what has already happened or begun, rather than to meet the challenges that are yet to come. It seems that rarely do we the public have any perception of the challenges we are sure to face in the future; what we do see is where we've been, and if we don't like it we try to fix things by foolishly interrupting the very plans that have been mobilized to deal with the coming challenges. This is what we have been doing time and time again, to governments of every stripe and colour. Lets learn and change our behaviour. Rather than look for one trying to fix the past, let's support a leader that will prepare for the future, regardless of the relatively short term discomfort that this is sure to bring with it.
Leaders have vision; managers have calculators. Both are needed but both represent a very different skill set.
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Maybe we have too much democracy and free speech. Now even morons have their opinions, and sadly, they seem to prevail too often.
Like they say, you can have freedom, or peace, but you can't have both. Which do we want most?
What moron said one cannot have freedom AND peace? And what moron would presume any credibility to such a stupid notion? Likely someone without any imagination whatsoever.
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