This is new. The NDP of Manitoba are running scared.
On Tuesday they defiantly threw down their opening card in the next provincial election. A deuce. An "attack ad" that was so bad it deserves to be filed under J for Jump The Shark.
It turns out the NDP's election plan is to attack --- Gary Filmon, a man who left politics almost SEVEN YEARS AGO.
And why not? What else do they have? Their record?
The Crocus Scandal
The latest leaks of internal government documents prove that the Premier, the Finance Minister and, hell, the entire NDP cabinet knew, beginning in the year 2000, that unsuspecting investors were being enticed to put their pension savings in the Crocus Fund which was so broke it was being run as a Ponzi scheme, with the money from new investors going to pay off old investors.
The NDP kept changing laws to disguise the precarious financial position of Crocus, which still had enough money to make a political donation to the NDP. For four years thousands more people got suckered into the Fund. Today, the latest poll shows that almost half of NDP voters want an inquiry into Crocus. If there ever is one, Gary Doer, Greg Selinger, maybe even Gord Macintosh, the Justice Minister who did nothing to stop the Ponzi, could find themselve facing criminal charges.
Health Care
The to-do list:
End Hallway Medicine. Done? No
End the nursing shortage. Done? No
End the doctor shortage Done? No
Keep emergency wards open. Done? No
Reduce waiting lists? Done...? Define waiting list every doctor has his own waiting list some are long and some are small there's no way to measure wait times we're working on it we need more money we need computers we need more nurses who need more doctors we need more time BLAME GARY FILMON.
Anyone who has been to a hospital or knows someone who has been in hospital knows what a disaster the healthcare system has become after six years of NDP rule.
The nursing shortage is double what it was when the NDP was first elected and the "non-partisan" nurses union thinks that's just peachy keen; the shortage was triple a couple of years ago.
People have died waiting for heart surgery, people have died in waiting rooms, and now we learn Manitoba is No. 1 in stillbirths.
The "short-term" solution of bribing doctors to work in understaffed emergency wards in Winnpeg has become permanent. In the rest of the province the emergency wards are just shut down under further notice.
Public Safety
Car theft is out of control. 10,000 stolen cars a years is considered a good year. Now success is measured by the increase in attempted thefts.
Gangs are out of control. The NDP came into office sneering they were going to replace the Tories' punitive attitude to gangs with a holistic approach. Six years later, there's more gangs than ever and they're more brazen than ever before.
Gangs intimidate the Convention Centre into cancelling a music act. A man is shot to death in his car in broad daylight on Magnus Avenue. A gang armed with knives tries to fight its way into the home of a Crown Attorney they want to intimidate; the association representing Manitoba prosecutors says theyve warned the government for years of the threats they've been getting "but they haven't been receptive."
The Economy
Manitoba has become the Newfoundland of the Prairies. The NDP have turned it into a welfare province; it survives on federal government handouts. The NDP routinely overspends the annual budget by a couple of hundred million dollars, making a mockery of the budget process in the Legislature. Public debt is so high we're one recession away from runaway deficits.
The NDP has put all its hopes into an east-west energy grid that will justify building the $10 billion Conawapa dam and $1.5 billion transmission line to Ontario. The Globe and Mail yesterday reported how "Natives hold the key to Ontario power" because the transmission lines would pass through their territory.
That means the future of the east-west energy grid can be summed up in two words: ki-bosh. Can anyone remember the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline? They've been negotiating that one with the natives of B.C. for 30 years now.
Is it any wonder then that the NDP wants to turn the next election into a personality contest? They're hoping Gary Doer still has enough one-liners in him to defeat Stone Cold Hugh McFadyen. Our guy against their guy. Mano a mano. Except that it's going to be Doer vs. McFadyen and Gary Filmon, of course.
The new leader of the Progressive Conservatives should be in the catbird seat, the operative word being "should."
Except he can't decide what issue to base his campaign on.
Crocus? No.
Health Care? Yes. Wait, no.
Infrastructure? Yes. Oh, waitaminit.
Youth? Yes, that's it. Unless...
Crocus? Maybe. What do the polls say?
The Liberal Party, as usual, is on another planet. They've decided to stake out the environment as their issue. They plan to run a totally Green carbon-neutral campaign. One unknown candidate has decided to forego lawn signs, ensuring she will remain unknown to voters. Leader Jon Gerrard will plant a tree in Brazil or Ecuador or some tropical island for every mile he drives during the campaign. Cockamamie doesn't begin to describe this.
The real Green Party has 100 percent of the Moonbat vote. And a 100 percent of zero chance of winning a single seat in the Legislature.
With opposition like this, the NDP should be on cruise control. Instead, they're scared. They've written off the 34,000 Crocus investors; just look at how cavalierly they dismiss anyone who calls for a full inquiry. They're hoping ads attacking Gary Filmon will turn the trick with diehard NDP voters.
Any day now they'll be promising to end car theft in six months.
It may sound cockamamie, but it worked once, didn't it?
On Tuesday they defiantly threw down their opening card in the next provincial election. A deuce. An "attack ad" that was so bad it deserves to be filed under J for Jump The Shark.
It turns out the NDP's election plan is to attack --- Gary Filmon, a man who left politics almost SEVEN YEARS AGO.
And why not? What else do they have? Their record?
The Crocus Scandal
The latest leaks of internal government documents prove that the Premier, the Finance Minister and, hell, the entire NDP cabinet knew, beginning in the year 2000, that unsuspecting investors were being enticed to put their pension savings in the Crocus Fund which was so broke it was being run as a Ponzi scheme, with the money from new investors going to pay off old investors.
The NDP kept changing laws to disguise the precarious financial position of Crocus, which still had enough money to make a political donation to the NDP. For four years thousands more people got suckered into the Fund. Today, the latest poll shows that almost half of NDP voters want an inquiry into Crocus. If there ever is one, Gary Doer, Greg Selinger, maybe even Gord Macintosh, the Justice Minister who did nothing to stop the Ponzi, could find themselve facing criminal charges.
Health Care
The to-do list:
End Hallway Medicine. Done? No
End the nursing shortage. Done? No
End the doctor shortage Done? No
Keep emergency wards open. Done? No
Reduce waiting lists? Done...? Define waiting list every doctor has his own waiting list some are long and some are small there's no way to measure wait times we're working on it we need more money we need computers we need more nurses who need more doctors we need more time BLAME GARY FILMON.
Anyone who has been to a hospital or knows someone who has been in hospital knows what a disaster the healthcare system has become after six years of NDP rule.
The nursing shortage is double what it was when the NDP was first elected and the "non-partisan" nurses union thinks that's just peachy keen; the shortage was triple a couple of years ago.
People have died waiting for heart surgery, people have died in waiting rooms, and now we learn Manitoba is No. 1 in stillbirths.
The "short-term" solution of bribing doctors to work in understaffed emergency wards in Winnpeg has become permanent. In the rest of the province the emergency wards are just shut down under further notice.
Public Safety
Car theft is out of control. 10,000 stolen cars a years is considered a good year. Now success is measured by the increase in attempted thefts.
Gangs are out of control. The NDP came into office sneering they were going to replace the Tories' punitive attitude to gangs with a holistic approach. Six years later, there's more gangs than ever and they're more brazen than ever before.
Gangs intimidate the Convention Centre into cancelling a music act. A man is shot to death in his car in broad daylight on Magnus Avenue. A gang armed with knives tries to fight its way into the home of a Crown Attorney they want to intimidate; the association representing Manitoba prosecutors says theyve warned the government for years of the threats they've been getting "but they haven't been receptive."
The Economy
Manitoba has become the Newfoundland of the Prairies. The NDP have turned it into a welfare province; it survives on federal government handouts. The NDP routinely overspends the annual budget by a couple of hundred million dollars, making a mockery of the budget process in the Legislature. Public debt is so high we're one recession away from runaway deficits.
The NDP has put all its hopes into an east-west energy grid that will justify building the $10 billion Conawapa dam and $1.5 billion transmission line to Ontario. The Globe and Mail yesterday reported how "Natives hold the key to Ontario power" because the transmission lines would pass through their territory.
That means the future of the east-west energy grid can be summed up in two words: ki-bosh. Can anyone remember the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline? They've been negotiating that one with the natives of B.C. for 30 years now.
Is it any wonder then that the NDP wants to turn the next election into a personality contest? They're hoping Gary Doer still has enough one-liners in him to defeat Stone Cold Hugh McFadyen. Our guy against their guy. Mano a mano. Except that it's going to be Doer vs. McFadyen and Gary Filmon, of course.
The new leader of the Progressive Conservatives should be in the catbird seat, the operative word being "should."
Except he can't decide what issue to base his campaign on.
Crocus? No.
Health Care? Yes. Wait, no.
Infrastructure? Yes. Oh, waitaminit.
Youth? Yes, that's it. Unless...
Crocus? Maybe. What do the polls say?
The Liberal Party, as usual, is on another planet. They've decided to stake out the environment as their issue. They plan to run a totally Green carbon-neutral campaign. One unknown candidate has decided to forego lawn signs, ensuring she will remain unknown to voters. Leader Jon Gerrard will plant a tree in Brazil or Ecuador or some tropical island for every mile he drives during the campaign. Cockamamie doesn't begin to describe this.
The real Green Party has 100 percent of the Moonbat vote. And a 100 percent of zero chance of winning a single seat in the Legislature.
With opposition like this, the NDP should be on cruise control. Instead, they're scared. They've written off the 34,000 Crocus investors; just look at how cavalierly they dismiss anyone who calls for a full inquiry. They're hoping ads attacking Gary Filmon will turn the trick with diehard NDP voters.
Any day now they'll be promising to end car theft in six months.
It may sound cockamamie, but it worked once, didn't it?