The New Challengers

Lewis Cardinal, Ryan Hastman hope to unseat incumbents in Edmonton

A fall election wasn't plan A for Lewis Cardinal. Far from it.

But if the NDP's candidate in Edmonton Centre has to fight an election against Conservative MP Lawrie Hawn in a few weeks' time, he's prepared to do it.

Cardinal would have much preferred to contest the election in the spring of 2010. But with Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff rattling the election sabre and no one willing to cross party lines to keep Canada's minority parliament going, it seems he'll need to be ready.

A 200-vote defeat in a 2007 Edmonton civic election hasn't deterred Cardinal. Even though he would have liked more time, he's been working hard on setting the stage for a victory in Edmonton Centre.

"I'm in for the long haul. This is what I want to do, I want to work at the federal level," said Cardinal.

"If we would have had a few more days, it would have been a different story," Cardinal said about his 2007 defeat. "We captured the imaginations of a lot of people."

But according to Grant MacEwan College political scientist Chaldeans Mensah, Cardinal may be hard-pressed to match Hawn's energy.

"The difficulty for Mr. Cardinal is that riding has an incumbent ... who's going to be difficult to defeat," Mensah explained. "By all accounts, Laurie Hawn is one of these candidates who will go to as many doors as possible, a very tireless campaigner."

Cardinal is certainly looking to replicate the success of Linda Duncan, who defeated Rahim Jaffer and averted the Conservative sweep of Alberta in 2008. But Duncan herself is far from a shoo-in to win.

"She's got the power of incumbency, (and) name recognition," Mensah said, but it may not be enough. "The Tories are going to throw everything at her just to get that seat back."

Duncan herself doesn't consider an election to be plan A -- but if there's going to be one, she's ready to contest it.

"I think people would like Parliament to work," Duncan recently said. "If the government won't co-operate, what are the alternatives?"

Duncan's Conservative challenger, Ryan Hastman, has already been working hard in the riding, and is carrying the Conservative nomination in the riding with confidence.

Like his competitors, Hastman doesn't consider an election to be the best option, but is simply concentrating on being ready.

"Most people are shocked that the opposition is talking about an election," Hastman mused. "Probably the No. 1 thing they ask me is, 'Are we really going to have another election?'"

Looking forward to the campaign, Hastman is expecting that strategic voting could be a factor. "I think that people have all sorts of reasons for voting. Obviously there was a bit of a strategic campaign," he said. "We don't worry too much about last time. ...Rahim still managed to get, I believe, 42 per cent of the vote."

Considering that Duncan's margin of victory was less than 500 votes despite the strategic vote in the riding, a Conservative party surge in the riding may deliver it back into their hands.

Ryan Hastman and Lewis Cardinal are both carrying the hopes of their parties into what very much looks like it will be a November 2008 election. Either can deliver on those hopes, but both will have to fight hard to accomplish that task.

Yes, Minister?

Linda Duncan practically guaranteed cabinet position in Coalition government

If what seems like it could very well be inevitable comes to pass next week, Edmonton-Strathcona MP Linda Duncan will almost certainly be one of the NDP MPs claiming at least 1/4 of the cabinet positions in that government.

As the only non-Tory MP from Alberta, Duncan's appointment is necessary to create an illusion of regional parity in cabinet.

Which portfolio Duncan will acquire, however, is still a matter of question.

As a widely-renowned environmental lawyer and former Assistant Deputy Minister of the Environment, Duncan would make for a natural Environment Minister. However, this may not happen.

Green Party leader Elizabeth May seems set to join the Senate. Speculation suggests that May could be granted a cabinet post as well -- and May indisputably has her heart set on being Minister of the Environment.

Aside from this, Dion may also appoint another Liberal Senator -- possibly Grant Mitchell -- to his cabinet.

Which wouldn't do any wonders for the already-tenuous legitimacy of any coalition government. The involvement of a party pledged to separate Quebec from Canada is clearly the most serious issue clouding the legitimacy of such a coalition. If Dion is forced to appoint an unusual number of Senators to cabinet -- he will also need to figure out a way to bolster his cabinet numbers from Saskatchewan -- serious doubts will be cast on the accountability of his government.

Not that there aren't such doubts already.


Other bloggers writing on this topic:

Terahertz - "Linda Duncan's Debut"

Linda Duncan Emerges Victorious in Edmonton-Strathcona

Rahim Jaffer sent packing

One of Canada's underrated political giants is out of work today, as the NDP's Linda Duncan has managed to unseat Rahim Jaffer in Edmonton-Strathcona.

"Every corner of this community tonight said they wanted a different voice for Alberta and I'm ready to give it," Duncan announced. "There will be a real load on me to speak for the alternative voice in Alberta."

At one point, Jaffer had actually delivered a victory speech while enjoying a 1,000 vote lead. Duncan closed the gap, however, and managed to emerge victorious by 400 votes.

Duncan, an environmental lawyer, will face numerous challenges in the new Parliament.

Perhaps most paramount among them will be finding a way to make the government responsive to her environmental concerns. Not only will she be dealing with a government whose views on environmental regulation her party has utterly dismissed, she'll also have to face what she has acknowledged as a jurisdictional deficit on the part of the federal government.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle is one that all pro-environment federal MPs and candidates share -- that of the Canada-wide Harmonization Accord on the Environment, in which provincial governments have been ceded the bulk of jurisdiction over environmental affairs.

The argument, in essence, is that the provincial governments are best-situated to deal with environmental concerns.

This, naturally, significantly complicates efforts to do things such as living up to Canada's Kyoto obligations.

This confronts many pro-environment candidates, as as Duncan, with a key dilemma: their efforts may bear the most productive fruit at the provincial level, yet the most logical way to institute nation-wide standards for environmental protection is through the federal Parliament.

If Linda Duncan's persuasive voice can find traction within the House of Commons, she may be able to lead the charge in renegotiating the Harmonization accord and reasserting federal leadership and jurisdiction over the environment.

If she can't, Canada's bloc of pro-environment MPs may be fighting an uphill battle.

Michael Byers Shows His Concern for the Working Class

Shut down the oilsands, says NDP candidate

Thank god for the NDP -- Canada's "working-class" political party. Always so full of concern for the working class.

...Or maybe not.

In a debate yesterday at the University of BC's School of Journalism, Byers made what have been described as controversial remarks. More than simply controversial, they make one wonder if the entire NDP isn't suffering from some kind of deeply-rooted identity crisis.

Lamenting that climate change may mean that his sons will never see a polar bear in its natural habitat, Myers remarked on the alleged urgency of the alleged crisis.

"We have to do something to address the climate change crisis, we need to do so now," Byers announced. "We need to go after the big polluters, we need to shut the tarsands down."

And all the working-class men and women whose livelihoods -- their ability to support themselves and their families -- depend on the Fort MacMurray oilsands?

"Yeah, fuck those guys," Byers remarked.

Well, not really. But he may as well have.

For her own part, Liberal incumbent Hedy Fry was truly shocked. "That's a headline," she said afterward. "It's quite a statement."

And it is. It's a statement on the true nature of the NDP.

For decades, the NDP has portrayed itself as the "conscience of the nation", as the party of the working class.

Yet the party remains notoriously weak in rural and suburban ridings where most working-class people actually live. Instead, the party finds the bulk of its strength from urban ridings in Vancouver and throughout Ontario.

Those of its ridings that do represent the abstract working class all come from within Ontario's "golden horseshoe". Meanwhile, the ridings that represent the working class throughout the rest of the country tend to find themselves in the hands of Conservative candidates.

If anything, the NDP is increasingly becoming the party of the urban elite. After all, Michael Byers' appeal to working-class individuals has likely just taken a rather significant dip in the wake of his comments, which demonstrate certainly a lack of concern, if not outright contempt for, working class individuals who happen to work in the "wrong" industry.

When one considers that all of those working class men and women whom Byers would so readily put out of work produce a product that is complementary to, and necessary for, that produced by so many of the NDP's constituents in Ontario, one has to wonder precisely where Byers' head and heart are at in this federal election.

Certainly not in Alberta, where he's just fucked his party royally. Edmonton-Strathcona candidate Linda Duncan, running neck-and-neck with Conservative incumbent Rahim Jaffer, may have just found her campaign complicated significantly by her colleague's unfortunate remarks.

Even what should otherwise be a bastion of strength for her campaign -- the University of Alberta, with its campus located within the riding she seeks -- may turn out to be significantly less so, as Engineering and Business students, counting on continuing prosperity from the tarsands projects Byers so desperately wants to kibosh, turn away from her campaign.

All of this for a policy point that runs contrary to that of his party -- NDP Jack Layton has called for a moritorium on tarsands development, not for a complete shutdown.

In the end, the damage Byers has done to his party may actually turn out to be minimal. The party is in contention for a single seat in Alberta. Not exactly difference-making stuff.

But the damage Byers has done to that working class vineer the party has traditionally spread over its very real inner shell of urban elitism may turn out to be more devastating in time.

At least for once the NDP will be able to be honest -- both with Canadians and with itself -- about from whom the party actually draws its support.

So, in that sense, thank god for the NDP and all the positive things that they've accomplished for this country. (Public health care is a wonderful thing, mr Douglas and we love you for it.)

But thank god for Michael Byers, as well. For shining a little light on the otherwise obscure shadows of the inner party.