Trudeau clear front-runner in Liberal leadership campaign, but Murray’s got momentum
PARLIAMENT HILL—The $1-million that Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau has raised for his campaign since last October and a formidable list of establishment Liberals whose names are sprinkled through his list of more than 7,000 donors have not intimidated challenger and Liberal MP Joyce Murray, the only other candidate to show momentum since December. Mr. […]
Grit Party president Crawley says he has ‘full confidence’ in integrity of Lib leadership voters’ list
PARLIAMENT HILL—Liberal Party President Mike Crawley says he has “full confidence” in the integrity of the voter list being established for the party’s leadership election next month, in the face of complaints from one of the candidate campaigns about irregularities that scrutineers have discovered as they head into a registration challenge period before the […]
Irregularities in Liberal leadership voter registrations being challenged by scrutineers
PARLIAMENT HILL—Irregularities in voter registrations for the upcoming federal Liberal Party leadership election are being challenged “big time” as scrutineers for the seven remaining candidates are poring through the qualifications of tens of thousands of potential voters prior to a Thursday final day for registration, an official with one of the campaigns says. The […]
It ain’t over till it’s over, Trudeau hasn’t won Liberal leadership yet, say Murray and Hall Findlay
PARLIAMENT HILL—Two Liberal leadership candidates whose profiles have grown significantly over the past week are challenging the media and punditry wisdom that Montreal MP Justin Trudeau has sealed a victory with four weeks remaining in the contest, and citing the Trudeau campaign’s last-minute appeal for an extension of the deadline for voter registration as […]
Real action happening behind scenes in Liberal leadership
Marc Garneau said his decision to drop out of the Liberal race was based on pure mathematics. He didn’t have the numbers to win so, arguably, it made more sense for him to drop out and rally behind the frontrunner. Garneau’s move mitigated earlier self-inflicted damage caused when he attacked Justin Trudeau as […]
To beat Trudeau, laughter is best strategy
OAKVILLE, ONT.—If you believe all the Trudeaumania hype, Liberal-leader-in-waiting Justin Trudeau is like an irresistible force of nature. He just can’t be stopped. Indeed, a narrative is emerging in the media which casts him as an archetypical hero: the handsome, young, charismatic, son of a demi-god who, like some sort of latter day Alexander […]
Liberal Party luring tentative converts to a defining Grit cult
MONTREAL—On a stopover at Pearson airport on the way back from a vacation a few weeks ago, I spent half an hour sitting a few feet from Marc Garneau as we both waited for a flight. It was late on a Saturday night and he was absorbed with his BlackBerry. I did not want […]
Garneau’s campaign admits phone survey didn’t comply with CRTC rules on political polling
PARLIAMENT HILL—Former Liberal leadership contender Marc Garneau’s campaign has admitted a contentious robocall telephone survey it conducted last week did not comply with federal caller identification rules for political polling. But a spokesperson for the campaign told The Hill Times the infraction, which prompted involvement by Liberal Party headquarters, was not related to Mr. Garneau’s […]
Justin Trudeau: bright new thing or same-old same-old?
GATINEAU, QUE.—Propelled by a potent combination of nostalgia and charisma, Justin Trudeau is looking more inevitable than ever— certainly as the next Liberal leader, perhaps as the next prime minister. But it is less inevitable that a Justin Trudeau government would look very different from any other in recent memory—including the one we have […]
Onward online soldiers
OAKVILLE, ONT.—Don’t tell anyone, but I am secretly amassing an online activist army. Already I have thousands of Facebook “friends” and Twitter “followers” and LinkedIn “contacts” ready to do my bidding. With a single click of a mouse, I will one day unleash these online legions to smite my political enemies. Sound crazy? Maybe […]
