Agreed, smarterthanyou, agreed. Perhaps you and I should throw a big Unite-the-Left party! It will be fun. I’ll bring the pot, and you bring the booze.
What is most discouraging about the results of this poll is the fact that it’s very unlikely that most of the 39% of respondents favouring the Wildrose Party actually know anything about them! So far the media has not reported policy positions of the Wildrose. So in order to have any idea, one would have to visit their website and read their policy statements. It’s unlikely that many people have done this. So it’s absurd that they appear to have a lead in public opinion. What does this show about the judgments of Albertan voters? To me, it shows stupidity and irrationality.
(From bloggedarteries)
I don’t think that the Wildrose support will last at quite this level, not unless the Tories screw some big things up, for this reason.
Yeah, it’s weird that people are willing to say they’ll vote for them when they have no idea what they stand for (and the party itself has doesn’t yet know much better—Danielle Smith certainly doesn’t see eye to eye with some of the folks she beat out for the leadership). It’s indicative of an electorate that hasn’t been following politics closely (no big surprise) and hasn’t been interested until something jumped out at them. Smith makes the Wildrose seem appealing to people who have no idea what they are actually about because her presence as an unexpectedly non-old-white-man at the helm implies that they aren’t as bad as they seemed. We’ll see how that turns out though.
There are a few initiatives happening to try to refocus the left in Alberta in the same way that the Wildrose Alliance is remaking the right. They aren’t as far along yet, and I don’t know if they’ll accomplish anything or not—I’m generally quite skeptical about “remaking” political movements, but who knows. It’s nice to see a shakeup either way around.
(via smarterthanyou)
