David Suzuki Extinguishes His Own Credibility

When the Ontario Liberal Party secured the endorsement of David Suzuki, they were so excited they went out and made an ad about it.

In it, Suzuki extinguishes what little remained of his own credibility. Gushing over Premier Dalton McGuinty's environmental record, Suzuki declares how excited he was when McGuinty promised to shut down Ontario's coal-fired power plants. He declares the promise to be "a big step" toward fixing Ontario's relationship with the environment.

The problem is that McGuinty made the promise, then promptly set about breaking it. In 2006, he promised to shut down those power plants by 2009. In 2009, he promised to shut them down by 2014 He might not be around to keep that promise in 2014. Even if he is, he probably won't.

Even McGuinty's vaunted green jobs accomplishments are fading, as green energy firms continue laying workers off. Adding to the comedy is McGuinty staging a photo op at a solar panel factory that had shut down production.

In other words, McGuinty's environmental record is not all rainbows and sunshine. It's actually piss-poor at best. All he's offering in the 2011 election is more of the promises he already broke. He'll never keep them.

It only makes sense that the Liberals would work so hard to establish themselves as good environmentalists. But Ontarians aren't stupid, and can spot a broken promise when someone makes it again. In their effort to brand themselves as the party for the environment, they've managed to counter-brand themselves as promise-breakers.

For himself, Suzuki has done worse. In attempting to brand himself the voice of environmentalism in the 2011 election, he's counter-branded himself as an unprincipled hack who offers the Liberal Party's broken promises up as if they were achievements.

He's definitively turned his back on his own credibility. He'll never be taken seriously again.

A Confusing Brand to Embrace

When going into an election, one would expect that there is an incentive for politicians to be on their best behaviour.

The Saskatchewan NDP, however, has not been on their best behaviour. They've been closer to their worst. The party got itself into hot water in July when it released a radio ad featured a heavily-edited quote. The quote was not merely heavily-edited -- the new favourite defense of the far-left when they are caught red-handed behaving poorly -- it was heavily-edited to the point of sheer dishonesty.

A comment made in response to a question about the tactics used by a public service union during a strike was presented as a comment about how Premier Brad Wall and the Saskatchewan Party feel about helping working families confront higher cost of living.

"I don't really care. We're not going to do it, and they're coming back to work."

When considers the extent of the warping and twisting of context in the presentation of this quote, there's really only one reasonable conclusion: the NDP lied. They made a decision to lie to the people of Saskatchewan, and turned out to be not all that good at it.



In response to the revelation that the NDP took Wall's comments bizarrely out of context and then altered them, the NDP is refusing to budge. They insist that the comments accurately reflect Wall's attitude toward working families.

They have nothing to support those claims, but they make them nonetheless. It's just what they do.

Now the Saskatchewan Party has released an ad highlighting the NDP's blatant attempt to deceive the people of Saskatchewan. The intent of the ad is very clear: they're seeking to brand the NDP as liars.

Bizarrely, the NDP has not only chosen to embrace that brand, they've sought to counter-brand the Saskatchewan party as childish for objecting to the NDP's lies. Naturally, they say nothing at all about their own childishness in lying in the first place.

Polling numbers indicate that the NDP is going to get creamed in the 2011 provincial election. There will be no orange crush. Instead, the orange will be crushed. Considering they have a leader who owes the people of Saskatchewan his resignation for approving this ad in the first place, they deserve much, much worse.

Simple Messages Require Little Flash

While a few "teaser" internet videos have been circulating around -- one emulated by the Harper Conservative Party -- Tim Pawlenty has finally released his first official campaign ad.

Pawlenty's previous releases have been marked by dramatic tones befitting a nation in turmoil. To describe them as "flashy" would likely be considered an understatement.

Entitled "results, not rehtoric", Pawlenty points to what he considers a successful run as Governor of Minnesota, cutting spending, standing up to unions, appointing conservative judges, and passing "proper" health care reform.

Pawlenty is clearly seeking to brand himself as the candidate who will pass the conservative agenda and do it responsibly.

The left's response is actually rather laughable. They seek to counter-brand him as fiscally irresponsible, questioning his deficit-fighting prowess by alluding to a projected deficit after Pawlenty left office. (Someone should get these people a calendar.)

As opposed to his previous outings, which were dramatic and nearly frenetic in their tone, this ad is calm, and exudes the confidence Pawlenty seems to feel as a candidate.

The ad is the tip of the spear on Pawlenty's Iowa campaign, where he'll compete hard with Michele Bachmann for votes. With it's clear, concise and simple messaging, it just may appeal to the sensibilities of Iowa voters.

Who Is The Party of No?

As the United States draws closer and closer to the 2010 midterm elections on November 2, it seems that the mission of Republican campaign advertising is to turn the buzzwords of the Democrat campaign against them.

The most recent effort is an ad entitled "Party of No". In it, a clip of President Barack Obama attempting to defend his failure to implement his policies by accusing the Republican Party of being relentlessly contrarian.

"If I said the sky was blue," Obama crows, "they'd say no."

The ad then responds with clips of campaign ads by Obama's fellow Democrats, all of them staking claim to opposition to Obama's agenda.

This is, of course, a simple matter of reality: with the Democrats enjoying a majority in each house of Congress, there really is no one other than themselves to blame for the failure of their President's agenda.

Judging from the campaign advertising sampled, it's clear that many of them are quite comfortable with that.

Rarely has a political party given their opponents the opportunity to counter-brand them with the very reputation they've attempted to foist upon them.

The Democrats can say whatever they want: Obama's agenda has failed because Democrats failed to support it. The Republicans have quite wisely chosen to remind American voters of that very inconvenient detail.

Someone is Out to Kick Obama's Ass

One of the Democratic Party's favourite themes since the 2008 election of President Barack Obama has been to accuse the Republican Party of being "extreme".

In an ad entitled "Extreme?", the National Republican Senatorial Committee takes that particular theme for a walk -- and then crams it down the Democrat's throat.

The ad begins with a television screen on which the predominant talking heads of the American left -- Rachel Maddow, Howard Dean, and even Obama himself -- discussing how extreme they want Americans to believe the Republican Party is.

The ad then begins to hit back with some polling numbers that are, to say the least, inconvenient for Democrats:

-57$ of likely voters think the Democrat agenda is "extreme".
-60% favour the repeal of Barack Obama's health care reform legislation.
-56% disapprove of Obama's performance.
-61% favour an immigration law similar to Arizona's in their own state.
-68% oppose the Ground Zero mosque (which Obama supports).
-65% are angry at federal government policies.
-65% of polled Americans believed the United States is on the wrong track.

The ad then cuts to polling comparisons of Democrat stalwarts and the so-called "extreme" candidates running against them -- many of which are either leading their Democrat opponent by double digits, or are in a statistical tie with them.

The then cuts again to Howard Dean, declaring that Republican candidates are "way outside the mainstream of what Americans want", and then hit back:

-Suing Arizona
-Siding against 9/11 families
-$3 trillion tax hike
-$1.5 trillion deficit
-$13 trillion debt
-$2.5 trillion healthcare takeover

"Mr President, that's extreme," the ad concludes. "Don't believe us? You'll find out November 2."

The ad brilliantly turns the Democrats' own rhetorical themes against them, and counter-brands them as the extremists in Washington.

After all, if Obama's administration and his policies were really so moderate, really so within the mainstream of American desires and expectations, the polling numbers wouldn't have turned so clearly against him -- and they wouldn't be worsening.

Simply put, the Republican Party has set out to turn Barack Obama's 2008 electoral triumph into the swiftest kick in the ass in American political history -- and with messaging like this, they just might pull it off.

Can Obama Overcome the Deficit of Hope?

Wiith the 2010 midterm elections slowly drawing near, the Republicans have decided to turn up the pressure on what may be the Democrats' greatest weakness: President Barack Obama himself.

The Republicans have targetted Obama with a "Deficit of Hope" campaign, designed to turn his own political stylings against him.

"Deficit of Hope" counter-brands Obama less as the man who plucked the heartstrings of America with The Audacity of Hope and his "yes we can" credo and more as the architect of a continually-climbing government deficit.

The ad features a dark, yet triumphant picture of Barack Obama, reaching for the sky while his name is chanted over and over again. Against this triumphal image, text balloons out to reveal the dispiriting direction the United States has followed under Obama's leadership.

9.5% unemployment.

14.6 million unemployed.

2.5 million jobs lost since the stimulus.

40.8 million on food stamps. (Funding for which the Obama administration may raid to pay for one of Michelle Obama's pet projects.)

At this point, the spot's soundtrack takes a stark turn. The chanting of Obama's name is replaced by the sounds of protest, and citizens objecting to Obama's policies.

$13 trillion national debt.

$43,000 average share of the national debt.

$1.47 trillion record deficit.

The ad then, in rapid succession, makes it clear what its creators believe must be stopped: "Bailouts, takeovers, unemployment, foreclosures, tax hikes, debt."

It concludes with a simple message, contrasted to Timothy Geithner's famous "welcome to the recovery" comment quoted at the beginning of the ad:

"Welcome to the Obama economy."

It concludes with an appeal for funds.

The ad has numerous strengths. It plays to the precise issues that will be on the mind of every American voter come November. It will remind Americans that the euphoria of Obama's victory has since been replaced by the rage of protest.

It also has weaknesses. It doesn't really give voters any reason to trust Republicans -- who have had their share of the role in creating the US' current fiscal mess -- will do any better than the Democrats. Moreover, the ballooning text collapses back in on itself so quickly that the viewer often doesn't have any time to read it.

But in terms of setting the tone for their "Deficit of Hope" campaign, rhe Republicans couldn't have hoped for any better.

Whether the ad helps the Republican Party realize their ballot-box hopes won't be seen until November.

Ben Quayle's Fighting Words

Running for the Republican nomination for the House of Representatives in Arizona's third district, Ben Quayle has produced one of the most straight-forward campaign advertisements in recent history.

There's no dark, forboding music. No clever sloganeering. No computer-generated chariactures of his opponents. Just Quayle staring into the camera, explaining why he thinks Barack Obama is the worst President in the history of United States.

There are plenty of people suggesting that if Obama is not the worst President in US history, he is one of the worst. Many consider Obama to be second only to Jimmy Carter in this particular category.

Yet somehow, when Quayle, the son of former Vice President Dan Quayle, makes these comments, it's somehow controversial:



Aside from its simplicity, there's a very standard "taking on Washington" message at play within the ad, as Quayle promises to go to DC and "knock the hell out of it."

This is typically a tactic adopted by someone trying to run as a beltway outsider -- this will be a difficult feat for the son of a former Vice President to accomplish.

But in alluding to "Drug cartels in Mexico", Quayle makes what seems to be a calculated effort to envoke the border security issue without directly referring to either the border itself, or to the closely-tied topic of immigration.

Likewise, in alluding to "tax cartels in Washington", Quayle appeals to support from the Tea Party movement without making any direct appeal.

Quayle quietly brands himself as a sympathetic ally of the Tea Party movement, and quietly counter-brands Barack Obama as a tax-and-not-secure-the-border Democrat.

The bonus value of Quayle's ad is that it will give his detractors opportunities to indulge, and embarrass, themselves:



It may be wise to point out to Catie Lazarus, TJ Miller, Joel Godard and their puppet friend that avoiding issues like this hasn't helped them, or President Obama, one bit.

With Barack Obama's approval ratings continually plummeting, stating that Obama is a poor President -- and the President who refuses to enforce the law is definitely a poor President -- can't help but attract support from voters growing increasingly fed up with Obama and his cabal; particularly in Arizona.

Rick Barber's Giant Ego Trip Continues

Rick Barber, a candidate for the Republican Party's nomination in Alabama's 2nd district (the fightin' second!), has managed to set the bar high for political narcissism with his now-infamous "gather your armies" ad.

He clearly took the well-deserved criticism he received for that ad as encouragement to continue stroking his ego. Little else really explains his most recent ad.

Entitled "slavery", Barber continues his conversation with George Washington. He counters arguments that Washington would have supported Obama's health care bill by pointing out that Washington's taxation record was largely relegated to key and basic government functions -- for example, the retiring of federal debt from the Revolutionary War.

He then turns to a rather scary-looking actor playing Abraham Lincoln. "Hey Abe," he addresses Lincoln, "when someone's forced to work for months to pay taxes so that a total stranger can get a free meal, medical procedure or a bail-out, what's that called?"

After further similar questioning from Barber, and some deliberation, Lincoln responds:

"Slavery."

Barber then goes on to point out that the United States suffered greatly to rid itself of slavery, then accuses the government of enslaving the American people.

As with Barber's previous ad, the result is actually rather comical. This is a man with the temerity to brand himself as the last, best defender of the legacy of the civil war, and counter-brands Barack Obama and the Democratic Party as its betrayers.

What Barber seems to fail to understand is that no one man won the civil war. The American civil war was won by the sacrifices of an entire nation, and is thus the legacy of that war is common property of all the citizens of the United States. Its legacy could never be defended by one man alone, nor is it meant to be.

That Rick Barber could effectively annoint himself the one to defend that legacy is, once again, deeply revelatory of what his run for congress is really about: his own ego.

Rick Barber Should Not Have Approved This Ad

A campaign ad produced by Republican hopeful Rick Barber -- a Tea Party activist running in a run-off election to become the GOP nominee for the Congressional seat for Alabama's Second District -- is an illustration of why it's unwise to allow one's rhetoric to run away with them.

In the ad, Barber sits himself at a table with George Washington and Samuel Adams. What is imagined to be the original copy of the Constitution of the United States sits atop an American flag draped across the table. Washington's hand pats a single-fire flint lock pistol while he listens to Barber plead his case.

He begins by expressing his desire to impeach US President Barack Obama and then cotninuing by railing against progressive income taxes and the IRS. In the end, he compares Obama's health care reform package to the Tea Tax that helped spark the American Revolution. Clearly believing Obama's health care package to be much worse.

In the end, he asks "are you with me?"

At which point a very bad actor playing George Washington utters, in a nearly Adam West-like scattao, instructs him to "gather your armies".

The ad is being pushed around the internet as evidence that a potentially violent strain may be dominant within the Tea Party movement. This narrative conveniently ignores the detail that Barber is a candidate for office -- if anything, he's planning a revolution in which the weapons used will be ballots in elections, not muskets and bayonettes.

If anything, the ad reinforces the extent of the ego trip that Barber is on -- it isn't a pretty sight.

The ad contains two distinct branding messages. One brands him as a friend of small business, and counter-brands Barack Obama as the enemy of small business. The other brands Barber himself as an heir apparent to the founding fathers of the United States -- as someone who would have stood amongst them if he hadn't been born more than 200 years too late.

Rick Barber never should have approved this ad because, frankly, it is embarrassing. Whatever Rick Barber may imagine he could accomplish as a Congressman, he won't measure up to Washington or Adams. It's unlikely that anyone ever will.

You, Murray Dobbin, Own This

As Canadians continue to wonder precisely what they should make of Frank Graves' recent suggestion that the Liberal Party should provoke a culture war for political gain, one should take some time to remember some of Canada's other erstwhile cultural warriors.

"I told them that they should invoke a culture war. Cosmopolitanism versus parochialism, secularism versus moralism, Obama versus Palin, tolerance versus racism and homophobia, democracy versus autocracy," Graves told Lawrence Martin.

People like Murray Dobbin.

Nexus readers may remember a recent article about Dobbin's objections to a poll commissioned by the Manning Institute that indicated Canadians' political attitudes were becoming more conservative.

As it turned out, Frank Graves featured prominently in Dobbin's original article.

In particular, Dobbin took exception to the Manning Institute poll's conclusions on abortion, which indicated that 60% of Canadians considered it to be immoral. He countered that with results from an EKOS poll that concluded that 52% of Canadians describe themselves as "pro-choice", 27% described themselves as "pro-life", 10% answered "neither", while 33% declined to provide an answer.

Dobbin and Graves seem to suggest that only one of these polls can be correct.

But in order to accept their conclusion on this matter, one would have to overlook that the question of whether or not abortion is immoral and whether or not women should be allowed to choose are actually two very different questions.

If a belief on the part of Canadians that abortion is immoral automatically meant that Canadians believed that Canadian law should not allow women to make this decision for themselves, Canadians would be adopting a strictly moralistic attitude toward the law.

That polls could indicate that the majority of Canadians believe that abortion is immoral while also believing in the right of women to make their own choices about moral behaviour could be argued to indicate that Canadians do not hold a strictly moralistic attitude toward the law.

In other words: that Canadians believe that morality shouldn't dictate legality, and that legality doesn't dictate morality.

Each poll clearly asked different questions about abortion. One asked whether or not Canadians considered abortion to be immoral, and another asked them whether or not Canadians favoured a woman's right to choose. The very different conclusions reached by each study demonstrate how the questions asked shape the answers received.

Dobbin and Graves make it clear that their greatest objection to the Manning Institute study is that they don't approve of the questions that it asked.

Dobbin and Graves must know that by defining what questions may be asked about abortion, they stake out that issue for themselves. This is a hegemonic tactic that forgets the most important element of hegemony as defined by Antonio Gramsci -- the notion that hegemony is not dictated, but rather is negotiated.

Instead of hegemony being a remarkably democratic concept, hegemony instead becomes dictatorial.

What is a culture war if not the exploitation of negotiated hegemonic ideas in order to be able to dictate those ideas in future?

One should direct their attention toward the values that Graves advised the Liberals to divide Canadians over: Cosmopolitanism versus parochialism, secularism versus moralism, tolerance versus racism and homophobia, democracy versus autocracy.

Cosmolpolitanism, secularism, tolerance and democracy are all hegemonic ideals of Canadian society, socially negotiated between Canadians through their day-to-day interactions for decades.

By invoking these values as part of a culture war, Graves has suggested that the Liberal Party identify a group of Canadians they will allege do not share these foundational values. By doing so, the Liberals will brand these individuals as cultural outsiders within Canadian society.

Graves has made it clear who he wants to identify as such outsiders: the Conservative Party of Canada. In time, his strategy will not only counter-brand card-carrying Tories as outsiders, but will in time counter-brand anyone who votes for that party as outsiders.

In the end, that will likely amount to approximately 30% of Canadians. That is a lot of Canadians to attempt to force to the periphery of Canadian culture through a culture war.

But once the Liberal Party have branded themselves as the altar keepers of Canadian values, they will have made a bid not only to make themselves the standard bearer of that culture, but also to empower themselves to define what Canadian values are, without the participation of the so-called "outsiders".

Should the Liberals embrace Frank Graves' potentially destructive advice, their goal will become attaining the power to themselves define -- in effect, dictate -- Canadian values. The same Canadian values that form the hegemonic basis of Canadian culture.

So, judging from the title from this post, one may wonder precisely how Murray Dobbin has to take ownership of this purported culture war.

Dobbin takes Graves' upcoming EKOS poll -- which, as already demonstrated, distorts many of the answers in accordance with the questions it asks, and how -- as triumphal proof that Canadian political values are not, in fact, "blueing".

Dobbin thus infers that if Canadian political attitudes were in fact shifting toward conservatism, it would be a defeat for he and his ideological cohort, and that anything Frank Graves could do to stem perceptions of such a shift would be a good thing.

Dobbin's commentary on Graves' promised forthcoming polling results indicates that he has believed there is a culture war at the centre of Canadian politics for quite a while.

So as Canadians wary of the social damage a culture war would inflict begin to wonder who else is in favour of such a conflict, many Canadians should wonder how badly Murray Dobbin has wanted such a culture war, and for how long.

It may not be unfair to suspect the answer is "very badly", and "very long".

David Cameron More John McCain Than Barack Obama

In the British Conservative party's second TV address, David Cameron seems to emulate US Senator John McCain, famed for his "straight talk" on political issues.

In the second address, entitled "What it Takes to Change a Country", Cameron promises precisely that: straight talk on political issues. He also further explains his "big society" vision.

Cameron proposes the "big society" theoretically as an alternative to big government. The goal is clearly to brand the Conservatives as the party that can still deliver on social policy-related goals while cutting Britain's looming deficit.

This will prove to be an especially important message as talk of a coalition government between Labour and the Liberal Democrats becomes more and more prevalent.

While Cameron's message is a strong conservative message, one challenge for his party will be the presentation. While the Liberal Democrat messaging has proven to be eye-poppingly slick, deeply engrained with symbolism, the Tory addresses have, to date, been (unfortunately) characteristically bland.

While those predisposed to be receptive to the Conservative message will likely pay attention to this ad, others may be more likely than not to tune out.

This was the same challenge that confronted John McCain during the 2008 Presidential Election: convincing Americans to stay tuned to his message, favouring it over the more glamourous message of eventual winner Barack Obama.

Obama reportedly once remarked that Cameron is more sizzle than substance. Now the notion that the sizzle may be gone is becoming utterly unignorable.

This has become the challenge for David Cameron during this election: preventing Britons from simply tuning him out. To date, he hasn't been doing himself many favours.

Leaving Broken Promises Behind

In the Liberal Democratic Party's first (rather long) ad of the 2010 General Election, Nick Clegg makes a stark (and predictable) pledge to British voters: no more broken promises.

The ad itself is actually rather brilliant. In the ad, countless sheets of paper -- each one presumably describing an election promise made by either Labour or the Conservative Party (well, in actually, most of them are probably blank sheets of paper) blow about in the wind while Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg outlines his party's platform for the election.

Clegg insists that there have been too many broken promises not only in the past few years, but in the past 30 years.

The wind blows the sheets of paper all around in the background, as Clegg continually appears in the foreground, walking toward the camera, and away from the broken promises of his competitors.

The goal of the ad is very simple: Clegg and the Lib Dems want to counter-brand Labour and the Tories as the parties of broken promises, and brand his own party as the party for a fresh start -- leaving the broken promises of his opponents in the past by keeping its own promises.

The ad portrays British politics as a realm made by his principal opponents, as Clegg walks through streets littered with the broken promises of his opponents. But this may be an unintended message: the Liberal Democrats, after all, have governed Britain before.

The ad is also hampered by the vagueness of its message: merely promising "fairness" for British citizens. One can expect that the Conservative and Labour parties will also be offering fairness.

The Liberal Democrats may find that there is a premium on being a little more succinct.

Political Photoshop Challenges Done Right

Labour Party pulls off brilliant viral campaign

Many Canadians will remember the unimitgated, humiliating disaster that was the Canadian Liberal Party's "Anywhere but Copenhagen" photoshop challenge.

As the 2010 British General election slowly shifts into gear, the Labour Party has released some of the entries into its own photoshop contest, inviting supporters to mock the "We Can't Go On Like This" poster that David Cameron and the Conservative Party have released as their keystone campaign poster.

Unlike the Liberal Party, which embarrassed itself by publishing submissions that mused about conducting violence against Stephen Harper, the Labour Party has pulled this off splendidly -- in a sense.

Among the better of the submissions is this one, attempting to brand Cameron essentially as a Margaret Thatcher clone:

Naturally, the ad doesn't recognize Cameron's efforts to distance his party from Thatcher's conservative doctrines.

Another submission predictably tries to brand Cameron as a monstrous gargoyle, suggesting he'll harm a kitten if Britons don't vote Conservative:

While it's good for a cheap chuckle, this ad is far less effective as a political message. It merely tries to play off character defects that the creator expects viewers will hold.

It's actually remarkable that this submission, which brands Cameron as another coming of Tony Blair, was published at all:

While Tony Blair is unquestionably a liability to the Labour Party in this election, one would expect the Labour Party to publish anything that would implicitly acknowledge that.

While all of these ads will serve a vital function for the Labour Party -- solidifying its base.

However, with both the Tories and Labour having an opportunity to win this election, Labour can't afford to settle for its base, and these ads will likely have very little impact outside of the most dedicated of its faithful.

Yup, They All Needed a Feinting Couch Over This...

Although some petulant cry-babies would likely beg to differ, Hunter at Climbing Out of the Dark got the Tim Tebow Superbowl ad unequivocally right.

The sheer scope of the whining that preceded the Tim Tebow anti-abortion ad during the Super Bowl would have had a great many people expecting something truly virulent.

Instead, what was delivered was an entirely benign and civil ad in which Tebow's mother Pam recounted the challenges she faced during her pregnancy.

"I can remember so many times when I almost lost him," she said. "It was so hard. You know, with everything our family's been through, you have to be tough."

At which point Pam is suddenly tackled to the ground by her son, whom she admonishes.

"Timmy! I'm trying to tell our story, here."

At which point Tebow apologizes and hugs his mother.

And that is what the pro-abortion movement has been freaking out over all this time.

One can say whatever they wish about Focus on the Family -- and following Pat Robertson's vile comments regarding the earthquake in Haiti, many of them can be justified.

But the Tebow ad is clearly a stroke of genius on their part. For years, the pro-abortion movement have portrayed the anti-abortion movement as virulent and oppressive. Many of the more authoritarian elements of the pro-abortion movement have attempted to deny the anti-abortion movement any opportunity to voice its views (part of the faux-outrage over the Tebow ad).

Focus on the Family seems to have exploited this meme brilliantly. By producing an ad as civil and benign as the Tebow ad, they have effectively counter-branded these hysteric elements of the pro-abortion movement for precisely what they are: authoritarians who can broach no public opposition whatsoever regarding the topic of abortion.

Thanks Again, Ward!

Ward Churchill practically endorses Tom Lucero for Repbulican nominee

A recent campaign ad from Tom Lucero, who is seeking the Repubican party nomination for Colarado's fourth district, envoked the spectre of the firing of Ward Churchill, the plagiarzing and data-forging "academic" fired from the University of Colorado.

There was a certain petulant brilliance in the ad: taking advantage of a popular public branding of Churchill as a loud-mouthed asshole, and branding Lucero has the kind of guy who will stand up to an asshole.

The branding message of the ad is crystal clear: if Lucero can deal with Churchill, he can deal with anything the Democrats may throw his way in Washington.

More recently, Churchill himself lent Lucero a hand in his effor to brand himself as the ideal Republiican to seek the seat in question.

"I can think of no one who better reflects the principles and integrity of Colorado Republicans than Tom Lucero," Churchill quipped. "Who knows? He might even have what it takes to be the next Dick Cheney."

Churchill couldn't possibly intend to help Lucero win the Republican nomination, but he very well may have. In fact, he may have just helped Lucero win the election in November.

“At this point in the campaign, we are thrilled to have such a ringing endorsement of Republican values from Ward Churchill,” Lucero replied. “Churchill's comments help further the message that our campaign is trying to communicate.”

Whether or not Ward Churchill's denunciation of Tom Lucero helps him win a seat in the House of Represenatives will have to wait until November to be seen. But if Lucero does win, one can look forward to Lucero thanking Churchill in his victory speech.

Running Against an Asshole: It's Crazy Enough to Work

Running in a crowded race for the Republican nomination in Colarado's fourth district, Tom Lucero has taken an interesting approach to the race.

Instead of running against his three opponents, Lucero has chosen to run against Ward Churchill, the University of Colorado Professor he successfully fired after he embarrassed the institution one too many times.

The ad even drops the name of Bill Ayers -- the former Weather Underground terrorist who was catapulted into a position of international prominence by his relationship with Barack Obama.

"Remember Bill Ayers? Ward Churchill's friend?" the narrator asks, as words in red bold font appear over images of newspapers and of Churchill himself. "Little Eichmanns? Stated more 9/11s are necessary? Proclaimed 'I don't answer to Tom Lucero'."

"Took care of that mess in Colorado," Lucero then complains, beaming proudly. He then goes on to discuss what he would like to accomplish in Washington as the 4th district's congressman.

In most cases it's considered poor taste to campaign against someone who isn't running in it.

But there's a certain tactical brilliance to Lucero's tactics, especially in the Republiican primary. The glimmer in his eye and the smile on his face demonstrate an unabashedly no-nonsense attitude toward the Churchill affair, reaching out to the viewer and sharing a "yeah, fuck that guy" moment with them.

Moreover, publicly campaigning against Churchill could give Lucero an opportunity to correct the one looming issue remaining from the Churchill firing -- the wrongful termination lawsuit that Churchill inexplicably won after being fired for academic misconduct (although he was denied reinstatement).

If Lucero can successfully draw the Churchill issue back into the public eye, he can remind the public that Churchill was actually fired for his considerable past of academic misconduct -- stemming from cases of plagiarism and forgery of data -- after Churchill had embarrassed his institution one too many times.

In fact, Churchill's firing wasn't the only bone that the crazed dissident had to pick with Lucero. He also didn't approve of Lucero's demands that the University of Colorado's course offerings be vetted at a time that the University was facing a choice between reining in an out-of-control budget amidst incredible wastefulness or having to continually go to the state for increases of funding to the school -- something that would have necessitated ongoing tax increases.

"The larger framing was articulated by one of the regents, Tom Lucero, at the regents meeting the other night: I want a justification for the existence of whole departments. I want to review the tenure system altogether," Churchilll once whined. "I want every course justified to my satisfaction."

"How could Tom Lucero possibly have assimilated the knowledge to pass scholarly judgment on the individual courses and their content and the scholarship that attends them in all these different areas?" he asked.

"This is transparently clear: Anything that he doesn’t like, whether he knows anything about it or not, is to be gone," Churchill pouted. "He has announced—telegraphed—the fact that he doesn’t like anything having to do with cultural studies, ethnic studies, dissident political studies, gay rights. None of that has anything to do with proper scholarship in his mind, not that he knows a goddamned thing about any of it. And it’s not that he’s a particularly malevolent individual. He’s representative of the whole. That’s the mentality that goes into this. This is a book-burning exercise. It’s a stifling of political discourse."

That's awfully rich coming from an individual who once insisted that speech that he doesn't like -- such as Columbus Day celebrations shouldn't be allowed to happen.

In fact, as it turned out, Tom Lucero's desire to vet the course offerings at the U of C had nothing to do with wanting to "stifle political discourse", but rather had everything to do with bringing the institution's budget under control so that it wouldn't have to periodically force tax increases on the citizens of Colorado.

Certainly, these kinds of concerns mean something to an individual like Ward Churchill, who see universities as little more than a platform from which they can force their political views on their students.

(Contrary to popular views individuals like Churchill are actually a minority among university faculties -- often an outspoken and powerful minority, but a minority nonetheless.)

With the exception of a collection of far-left lunatics who seemed to believe that Ward Churchill should have been allowed to forge data, plagiarize and humiliate his insitution at will, most people seem to understand that Ward Churchill is, frankly, an asshole.

For Tom Lucero, campaigning against that asshole might just be crazy enough to work.

At the very least, it's fun.

CUPE Ads a Good Deal (Of Goods)

Few Canadians watching any amount of TV right now can escape the Canadian Union of Public Employee's "Good Deal For Canadians" ads, in which an interviewer (read: actor) asks an assortment of people-on-the-street (read: worse actors) whether or not they think Canada's public services are a "good deal for Canadians".

Unsurprisingly, all of the actors in the ad agree that Canada's public services are a good deal for Canadians.

For the most part, they're right. But the CUPE ads themselves are selling Canadians a deal of goods. (This is a painfully mixed metaphor, but there's a point to be made.)



Many of the services the ads allude to: water treatment, sanitation, libraries and health care, are indeed necessary and valuable services for Canadians.

But not all of Canada's Public Employees provide valuable services for Canadians.

Many of the "services" offered by Canada's Public Employees are little more than the appendages of the embedded state, and that state's embedded ideology. "Services" like the funding of advocacy (read: activism) by groups funded by the Status of Women, for example, provided very little in terms of service to Canadians -- unless they shared the state's embedded ideology.

Predictably, CUPE itself opposed changing the Status of Women's mandate from "advocating equality" to providing actual services of value for Canadians.

"Services" like the Status of Women's advocacy certainly had very little value for Canadians who are indifferent to, or opposed to, what had become the state's embedded ideology. It was difficult to support services like that on a logical basis.

But where CUPE can't appeal to logic, it chooses to appeal to emotion and vanity. The first CUPE ad closes with a subtle bit of branding, when the "interviewee" declares Canadians who support Canada's public services to be "awesome".

If this had come up with a legitimate person-on-the-street interview, that would be one thing. But in an ad that is scripted -- and scripted badly -- it's simply contrived.



In the second ad, CUPE touts the economic value of Canada's public services. Indeed, some of them have a tremendous economic value. The economic value of health care, for example, is obvious. Employers in Canada are compelled to spend far less on health insurance for their employees than employers in the United States.

Libraries help our youth advance their education, and encourage literacy later in life -- both of which are of inestimable economic value.

But then, there is what Brian Lee Crowley deems to be "pseudo-work". In his book Fearful Symmetry, Crowley recounts how the baby boom compelled the government to set up entire social programs in order to absorb baby boomers entering the job market -- worried that the free market would be unable to accomodate them -- and how needs that would otherwise be satisfied by part-time work were expanded into full-time jobs, or how needs that required full-time work were expanded to require an extra multitude of full-time workers.

These public services -- found in crown corporations like CN, Via Rail and HydroQuebec -- aren't merely of limited economic value. They're actually of negative economic value. Not only do they suck the funds necessary to pay these employees out of the economy, but they also suck the skills of these employees out of the free market, where they could be applied much more efficiently.



In the third ad, the interviewer talks to a woman who simply has to be the worst actor in all of these ads, who gushes about Canada's health care.

Canadian public health care is indeed a good deal for Canadians. But not nearly as good as this woman insists as it is.

The woman recounts a (fictional) story about her daughter breaking her ankle at a local arena. The arena staff call 911 (unlikely for a broken ankle) who then sends an ambulance (also unlikely for a broken ankle).

But a visit to a Canadian emergency room would quickly dissuade anyone from believing this woman's story. Seven hour waits don't tend to inspire Canadians with absolute confidence in health care.

Of course, this is not the fault of the employees working in the emergency room. They make do with the resources they are given.

However, a great deal of the resources pumped into Canadian health care are sucked up by a surplus of middle management. Whenever a provincial government in Canada makes a move to divert more resources to front-line services by laying off middle managers, CUPE or one of its provincial equivalents fires up a panicked campaign accusing that government of "attacking health care".

Moreover, some of the limits the unions themselves place upon their employees prevent them from working extra hours in order to serve Canadians. The impact of this on Canadian health care becomes most pronounced when one looks at diagnostic medicine.

Ironically, diagnostic health care in Canada would be of better quality without the unions. But CUPE won't tell you that.



In the final ad, the interviewer talks to an unemployed worker, who appreciates the support unemployment insurance offers to struggling Canadians -- particularly at a time of global recession.

No argument is necessary to this particular ad. Unemployment insurance has a tremendous value to the Canadian economy, particularly local economies. It prevents workers -- who often possess extremely valuable skills -- from leaving local communities, provinces, or even the country to seek work elsewhere, by providing them with aid to get them through tough times.

But aside from this, the CUPE ads go to great lengths to conceal the fact that many of the "services" -- appendages of the embedded state's embedded ideology and pseudo-work -- the ad is intended to defend either provide little value to Canadians, or are actually encumbered by the union itself.

To envoke a far less tortured metaphor, the CUPE ads are trying to sell Canadians a bill of goods. Canadians should continue to buy the ones that offer value, and reject the ones that do not.

Is Michael Ignatieff As Good As His Word?

Ignatieff pledges not to reciprocate personal attacks

If there's any one word that could be used to sum up the recent Conservative ads regarding Michael Ignatieff, it's personal.

Rarely have Canadian politicians taken it upon themselves to attack a political opponent on such personal grounds, but the Conservatives have done this. It's absolutely undeniable.

Speaking on the matter today, however, the Liberal leader has pledged not to attack Stephen Harper on personal grounds -- at least not overtly.

"Let's be clear how we carry the attack, because I will not attack Mr Harper's patriotism," Ignatieff promised. "I will not attack his character. I will not attack his family. I will attack his record, and God knows, there's enough to work on."

"There's enough on the record that we can attack: record unemployment, record bankruptcies, record deficit," Ignatieff announced. "That should give us enough to be getting along with."

And while Ignatieff knows full well that the economic stimulus package -- the stimulus package that he and his fellow members of the opposition demanded -- is responsible for Canada's current deficit, and knows full well that economic mismanagement south of the border is responsible for Canada's current economic condition, it's encouraging to hear Ignatieff pledge to restrict his campaigning against Stephen Harper to substantive matters of policy.

And while it would be both encouraging and wise for the Liberal party to try to brand itself as the party of the high road -- thereby counter-branding the Conservative party as perveyours of low-road politics -- one also has to remember that this would be counter-characteristic of the Liberal party.

After all, it was the Liberal party that dressed Stephen Harper up in fictional policy. It was the Liberal party who insinuated that Harper would summarily declare martial law if elected to office.

Michael Ignatieff may personally be able to scrape together enough credibility to temporarily change the public image of his party. But Canadians will remember the disgusting and shameful lows the Liberals sank to in order to attack Stephen Harper. They'll remember that as disgusting and irresponsible as the Conservatives' current batch of political ads are, previous Liberal ads were even more disgusting and even more irresponsible.

Canadians may also be intrigued to be introduced, once more, to the "tough guy" personae, wherein he indulges himself in blue-collar tough talk, replete with calculatingly devolved language.

"If you mess with me, I will mess with you until I'm done," Ignatieff pronounced.

It's a bold statement, but one has to hope that Ignatieff is as good as his word. Even though the Liberal party has never succeeded electorally against Stephen Harper without resorting to personal -- and often fictionalized -- attacks, one has to hope that at least someone in Canada has the courage to rise above the personal mudslinging that has passed for political campaigning in this country for too long.


Other bloggers writing about this topic:

Ideas Revolutionary - "Attack Ads"

The Inevitable Attack Begins

Ever since the Liberal party started to enjoy surging popularity after the acclamation of Michael Ignatieff as party leader, it was inevitable that the Conservative party was going to air ads against him.

Unlike the "Not a Leader" ads that Stephane Dion continues to complain about, the "Just Visiting" ads really are attack ads. While the "Not a Leader" ads were certainly negative ads, they addressed Dion's legitimate political failings -- his failure to implement his party's own climate change policy, and his petulant refusal to take responsibility for it.

Attack ads, meanwhile, in the analytical parlance, are considered to be ads that single an opponent out for attack on issues which are not politically legitimate. These ads usually attack the personality or character of their opponent, as opposed to their policies -- although the Liberal party has previously made an art form out of combining the two.

The first ad, entitled "Hypocrisy", ironically targets Ignatieff over allegedly running attack ads against the Conservatives.



As ominous music looms over the background, the ad asks "why is Canada back in Canada after 34 years?". It complains that he's offered no ideas on the economy, and complains that Ignatieff is instead running attack ads.

As the sound of a typewriter rattles in the foreground, cut-and-pasted images of Ignatieff float by the screen while a portion of these attack ads plays in the corner.

Yet as it turns out, however, the ad in question wasn't actually produced by the Liberal party in any official fashion, but rather by GritGirl, whose ads are actually of better quality than any the Liberal party has been producing on its own.

And while the ad is entirely out-of-touch with the economic realities at the heart of the current economic crisis, to attribute them to the Liberal party is actually a dishonest act.

The next ad, entitled "Economy", hits a little closer to the mark:



The ad notes that Ignatieff has mused about raising taxes. It also notes that Ignatieff has mused about hiking the GST, and reminds Canadians that the carbon tax that sunk the Liberals in the last election was actually Ignatieff's idea. The ad also notes that Ignatieff had, in 2004, described himself as a "tax and spend" Liberal.

In a particularly clever twist, an image of Ignatieff floating across the screen disappears when the ad notes that the Toronto Star had described Ignatieff as the "invisible man".

The colour scheme of these ads is typical of negative and attack ads -- the colours are dingy and dreary. Even when video of Ignatieff is used at the end of the video, it's darkened and slightly out-of-focus -- the clear intent is to suggest that Ignatieff himself is out-of-focus, with little understanding of his native country.

In the next ad, entitled "Arrogance", the Conservatives attempt to counter-brand Ignatieff as out-of-touch with ordinary Canadians:



With music that is only slightly more upbeat, this ad needles Ignatieff over his GQ cover, his admission to being "cosmopolitan" and "horribly arrogant", and notes that Ignatieff once said that the only thing he missed about Canada was Algonquin Park.

With this spot, these ads have begun to go down a more politically perilous path, as the next ad, entitled "Country" will show a little more fully:



The ad notes that Ignatieff has claimed to be British and American, and notes that Ignatieff has said he would return to Harvard if not elected.

For the Conservative party to invoke shades of anti-Americanism in this ad is more than a little hypocritical -- they've criticized their political opponents for being anti-American for decades.

More importantly than this, however, there is a severe danger when any political party begins to impugn the citizenship of its political opponents -- this is one of the reasons why the Bloc Quebecois and Parti Quebecois are so civically dangerous.

Michael Ignatieff is a Canadian citizen. There is no question about this. He isn't the only Canadian to spend significant portions of time abroad, either. Former Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Kim Cambell spent two years at the London School of Economics -- time abroad supplemented with a tour of the Soviet Union.

Canadian citizenship is not up for debate. Having spent time outside of the country -- even an extended period of 34 years, a time in which Ignatieff completed a vast wealth of extremely valuable journalistic and academic work -- does not undermine any Canadian's qualification to seek office in, or seek to lead, Canada. For any political party to suggest that it does is, frankly, grossly and shamefully irresponsible.

This isn't to say that there aren't politically legitimate questions that could be raised about Ignatieff's time abroad. But his qualification to consider himself a Canadian is not one of them.

As with all the ads, this spot concludes with Michael Ignatieff riding an escalator off of an airplane while he blows kisses to the surrounding media. It's actually a fairly effective finish. It seems to imply that this is just as easily something Ignatieff could be doing in reverse -- blowing good-bye kisses to Canada while he boards an airplane to go abroad again, this time never to return.

These ads are, like all the Conservative ads being produced these days, well-produced. But the conceptual end of these ads is sorely lacking, and the Conservative party may not like that the inevitable "spatter effect" that accompanies such ads may actually tar themselves far more than the damage done to Ignatieff.


Other bloggers writing about this topic:

Quito Maggi - "Conservative Attack Ads... Why Now?"

Luca Manfreti - "Conservative Ads Review"

Unhyphenated Canadian - "They Are Labelled 'Attack Ads'"

Picking A Strange Hill to Die On

In a post on his blog today Warren Kinsella is promoting a strange video suggesting that Stephen Harper doesn't like Brian Mulroney very much.

Not a great secret.

Presented in the form of a storybook, replete with "The Dance of the Sugar Plum fairy" playing in the background, the video chronicles Stephen Harper's turn away from the Mulroney-era Progressive Conservatives. Harper had worked for then-Calgary West MP Jim Hawkes as a Parliamentary aide, but would quit over concerns about Mulroney's fiscal policies.

Harper would run unsuccessfully against Hawkes as a Reform party candidate in the 1988 federal election before defeating him in 1993.

After a falling out with Reform party leader Preston Manning, Harper left the party to become the President of the National Citizens Coalition. The video highlights Harper's criticisms of Mulroney and Harper's suggestion that the then-governing Liberal party not settle Mulroney's libel lawsuit out-of-court so the RCMP could continue investigating the matter.

"Not nice," the video muses, complaining that Harper has rarely been there to help Mulroney.

Yet when Kinsella's Liberal party called for a judicial inquiry into his dealings with Karlheinz Schreiber -- who promised startling revelations regarding the Airbus scandal, but only if he wasn't extradited to Germany -- Harper initially refused.

Not exactly the actions of someone pursuing a grudge against a former political opponent.

The video is an interesting exercise in branding and counter-branding. It seeks to brand Brian Mulroney as largely an innocent victim of Stephen Harper's malice and lack of niceties. Meanwhile, it tries to counter-brand Harper as a vindictive and petulant individual for whom personal hatred of Mulroney is motivating his government's actions vis a vis Mulroney, as opposed to the persistent demands of the opposition parties.

It's unsurprising that Warren Kinsella would be so eager to help promote such a piece of online tripe. The video in question banks on the short memories of its viewers, hoping that they'll separate the Oliphant inquiry from its real-world context -- the demands by then-Liberal leader Stephane Dion that Mulroney be investigated.

This is unsurprising from someone who demands that the sponsorship scandal be separated from its context. He has long railed against holding Jean Chretien responsible for the sponsorship scandal, but refuses to acknowledge the simple fact that the sponsorship program was run out of his office, by his personal staff.

Then again, Warren Kinsella has a history of pcking strange hills to die on. One recalls Kinsella's recent accusation that several conservative bloggers covertly receive paycheques from the Conservative party -- an odd accusation from an individual who has, in the past, accepted paycheques from the Liberals.