The Tories have ramped up the negative ad campaign, as expected, saying they will expand into TV ads. The question now is, how do the Liberals respond. Yes, we all think the Tory attack ads are crap, with poor and mixed messenges, and that they will be ineffective and Canadians are smart enough to see past them and we are in a new era politics, blah blah blah. We all thought the same thing about the Dion ads, and the party didn't hit back hard enough, and look what underestimating those attack ads cost us.
The renewed Iggy Liberal brand is doing pretty good at the moment, and we cannot for a second allow it to be tarished by the Tories. We need to hit back. Our fundraising numbers are higher, so we should be able to afford at least some sort of commerical response. Doing a pro-Iggy or anti-Harper ad buy sends a few messages, all of which I believe would help build a pro-Liberal narrative.
1. If we actually do buy some hard-hitting ads, it shows we have the financial and organizational resources to do so at any time.
2. By responding quickly and firmly, it helps get some mental blue water between the Ignatieff era and the Dion era, by demonstrating that the Liberal Party won't be shoved around. We've had some success with the "on probation" line, we need to keep it going.
3. While it is tempting to respond to Tory attack ads about attack ads in kind, I think we need to go sober, and serious. I'm thinking an ad that just has a close up of Iggy's face, with him talking soberly about the economy, and how the Liberal Party understands the difficulties faced by Canadians, how we are working for them, etc.
Anyway, we need to step back from being partisan Liberals and understand that we cannot underestimate the ability of these attack ads to lower Ignatieff. Rather than quake in fear, however, we need to stand up and defend ourselves, just like a Liberal government will stand up for Canadians.
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If Harper thinks he's so clever by pulling quotations from articles Ignatieff wrote in 1991(!), then we should be able to ask what DO Canadians think about a "leader" who questions someone's patriotism and dedication to country when HE is the one who said:
"Canada is a Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term, and very proud of it. Canadians make no connection between the fact that they are a Northern European welfare state and the fact that we have very low economic growth, a standard of living substantially lower than yours, a massive brain drain of young professionals to your country, and double the unemployment rate of the United States." - Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank
"[Y]our country [the USA], and particularly your conservative movement, is a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world." - Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank.
"Withdraw from the Canada Pension Plan... Collect our own revenue from personal income tax... Resume provincial responsibility for health-care policy. If Ottawa objects to provincial policy, fight in the courts... [E]ach province should raise its own revenue for health... It is imperative to take the initiative, to build firewalls around Alberta... " - Stephen Harper in an "Open letter to Ralph Klein," January 24th 2001.
"Canada appears content to become a second-tier socialistic country, boasting ever more loudly about its economy and social services to mask its second-rate status, led by a second-world strongman appropriately suited for the task." - Would-be "second-world strongman" Stephen Harper in his article "It is time to seek a new relationship with Canada," December 12th, 2000.
This guy Harper was a proto-separatist in Alberta, has dumped on Canada time and time again, and he has the temerity to question someone else's patriotism????
It would have been better to launch positive ads before these attack ads began, but better late than never.
If someone from the Liberal Party is reading this, you need to fight these ads and now.
I agree with it be wise to tell all about Michael all his jobs everything academic Author, Professor and doctorate.
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