* The Green Party has run all these kinds of candidates.
One problem has very often been that they aren’t vetting, because they’re trying to fill the ticket in as many ridings as they can, with whoever shows up, on the hopes that they’ll luck out somewhere and get somebody in, so they can pass the threshold for “official party status”. If they get that status, they get federal electoral support, debate-time guarantees, and other perks.
But the other problem is that they were trying to have a party litmus test on a single issue, the environment, and also wanted to convince people they weren’t another left-wing party. So guess who showed up?
I’ve seen four people listed so far with deplorable right-leaning views. I understand that May is desperate for warm bodies to fill in tickets in various districts, but allowing right-wing entryists like that in without proper vetting distracts from the more standard progressive candidates and platform. A lack of discipline and a lack of competence, as I mentioned above, leads to exactly this kind of result, and if they do indeed have the best platform in Canada it won’t change the fact that the party needs to get its act together.
“GOTCHA” stuff has a specific meaning in politics. The term describes a moment when a reporter asks a question about some obscure topic that is ostensibly something the politician should know and the politician doesn’t know the answer. The issue, however, is so obscure and off-point that the politician’s failure is seen as no big deal and the questioner is criticized for having asked a “gotcha” question.
The issue, here, is NOT a gotcha issue. A politician’s staff altering a historical record is a big deal as is demonstrates a willingness to lie.
Someone pointing to the original photo and saying “aha! You used a bad cup” would be gotcha stuff. This, however, is not about the original photo. It’s about the photoshopping.
Or perhaps the focus on individual actions is to instill a nice, crippling load of guilt so people don’t bother to go after the factories, coal-fired powerplants, and so forth.
So you’re saying it’s feel-bad bullshit, not feel-good bullshit. I think it’s both, depending on the context, but it’s still irrelevant crap that distracts people from the actual issues.
The challenge for the Greens is getting people to run when they’ve really no chance in most ridings of winning. More established parties like the Liberals or the Conservatives can often convince folks to run for ridings where they have no hope in hell because it will earn them political credit and in the future that candidate may be allowed to run in a winnable riding.
In my riding the Conservatives are that “no hope in hell” party, and the candidates they offer are invariably nobodies who do not even bother to come to all candidates meetings. By contrast, the Green candidate is a well respected local person who has been politically and socially engaged for decades, and who is running a vigorous campaign. Although he will certainly lose, hopefully by running he can push the other candidates to address some of the key Green platforms – and for almost all the Green candidates that is the goal, one that demands a great deal of hard work and offers little reward (save for hopefully shifting the discourse).
Given this, it is hardly surprising that there are some embarrassing wingnuts running. (I would also add that there are some embarrassing wingnuts already elected in the current ruling provincial party, so let’s not be too hard on the Greens)
I’m sorry, but even understanding the no-hoper situation parties have to deal with in certain districts I don’t buy it. If the Greens are going to be a progressive multi-issue party and want to earn credibility on that basis then they have to do a better job of vetting their candidates and making it clear as to what is not acceptable.
As I said above, I understand the party’s desperation in getting people with a pulse to run on various tickets, but if it doesn’t enforce low-bar standards then people are going to start questioning their judgment.
Again, we’re talking about at least one anti-choicer, an Islamophobe, an ethno-nationalist, and a Holocaust denier. That the Conservatives (and now the Racist Party) will happily admit people with similar rotten views into their ranks at the federal and provincial level is to be expected, but that the Greens have done it just makes them look like an undisciplined and incompetent bunch of clowns.
I understand the importance of supporting progressive parties and candidates, and want them to win. By the same token, though, I am less willing to give them a break and make excuses when they screw up – especially when the screw-ups are of a serial nature (e.g. welcoming in candidates with various horrible views) or are cartoonishly stupid own-goals (e.g. this Photoshop stunt).
[ETA: I’m not singling out the Greens here. The Liberals just had their own monumental screw-up, of course, although on the whole they seem to keep candidates with far-right views out of even no-hoper situations.]
I’m not. It’s more a matter of setting a standard and seeing how everyone measures up. As I said in a different thread: my vote is not absolution for your sins. It doesn’t mean that I will get off your case now. Being least awful doesn’t earn you a pass to continue to be that way.
A political party is not a person in need of accommodations. Nor is May a neophyte. I can forgive someone new to the game for missteps if they learn and do better. May has been doing this long enough, now that she should have learned.
“But what if a Conservative or PPC candidate measures up best?” comes a voice from under the bridge.
Highly unlikely, because that standard includes not being racist or treating people like things.¹ I mean, they can try, but I doubt that they would find themselves at home in those parties. And if – through some miracle – one did, and had a track record of actually being willing to stand up and fight for those ideals, then why not?
¹ This is, of course, the standard view Conservatives have of many people: they are props, they are tools, they are threats… but somehow never people.
They are very left, and they have been scrambling to make sure they have a member running in each of Canada’s 338 ridings, because that is part of the requirement for some of the leadership debates.
Even they say they don’t identify as left or right, but if you look at their platform, it’s mostly left:
Carbon tax
Universal childcare program
Ban fracking
Ban imports of oil
Increase corporate tax 7%
Limit bank fees
Gun bans
Decriminalize all drug possession
Make housing as a human right
More respectful legislature for indigenous people
Raise minimum wage to $15
They have no anti-abortion policy, and although it’s possible they had a couple of members who said things in that regard, it doesn’t mean they now hold those beliefs or plan to act on them.
I was at one point very religious, and raised to believe abortion is evil, that doesn’t mean I feel that way now.
Not really, the examples you give either put them on the global centre-left or are so vague that they could be nearly anywhere on the political spectrum. About the only thing I can say for certain is that they aren’t ayn-caps.
The far left of green politics is split between the deep ecologists, the eco-socialists and the social ecologists.
Yeah, you’re right that Canada’s Green Party is not really any of those.
They are generally left-ish, but you can also say that about a lot of policies of the Bloc Québécois, historically. They both get a little less agreeable and need watching when it comes to general immigration issues.
The NDP are left on most issues, but they’ll stick up for some issues like cars to support the unions. But then again, they’ll still be twice as good on social housing then the Greens would.
