Despite the finest efforts of Premier Christy Clark to wrest control away from British Columbia’s New Democratic Party in Decision BC 2013, polls remain grim for Ms. Clark and her discredited and about-to-be-turfed Liberal party, as Adrian Dix and the BC NDP appear set to take the reins of government in Victoria — in what will likely prove to be a smashing electoral victory on May 14th.
According to the pollsters at Angus-Reid, across British Columbia 45 per cent of decided voters and leaners (unchanged since mid-April) would cast a ballot for the BC NDP candidate in their riding if the provincial election were held today. The B.C. Liberals picked up three percentage points of support since the last poll in April, putting them at 31 per cent, according to the poll which was conducted this past Wednesday and Thursday.
Pollster Mario Canseco says support for BC NDP leader Adrian Dix and British Columbia’s New Democratic Party has not fluctuated since the start of the election campaign on April 16th.

“The NDP keeps comfortable leads in Metro Vancouver and Vancouver Island, and maintains a good retention rate from the last election,” said Canseco. “Across the province, 59 per cent of respondents believe it is time for a change in British Columbia and would like to see a different provincial party elected into power, while 25 per cent would rather have the B.C. Liberals re-elected.”

Barring a major (and extremely unlikely) misstep by Adrian Dix, or the BC New Democrats, in the final two weeks of Decision BC 2013, British Columbians will get what they’re hankering for come May 14th — change.

BC Election 2013: Right-wing pit bulls drag out anti-NDP scare tactics
“NDP government = socialism“, say many pundits and media mavens. Horse puckey, we say.
Despite the BC NDP’s continuing dominance in the polls, there are those in the mainstream media who would seek to temper their pending victory.
Earlier in the week, Global BC’s Jas Johal conducted an interview with the despicable Philip Hochstein, President of the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association of B.C., where Mr. Hochstein accused BC NDP leader Adrian Dix of being a bully, going on to say in the interview that Dix is “trying to bully the business community”, and that an NDP government would set a course to “kill the business climate in British Columbia” should they be elected come May 14th. If anyone believes that hogwash, there’s a bridge that’s going for a great price they might be interested in.
Meanwhile, Vancouver Sun columnist Barbara Yaffe reports that with Adrian Dix and the Dippers in power over in Victoria, “Canada’s Pacific gateway under an NDP government is apt to become the country’s drawbridge,” as she sets about to elucidate just exactly how the NDP will kill business …

• Enbridge’s Northern Gateway Pipeline? Forget it.
• Expansion of Kinder Morgan’s TransMountain Pipeline? No way.
• Tanker traffic off B.C.’s north coast? Never.
• Coal exports out of West Coast ports? An abomination.
• A new Raven coal mine on Vancouver Island, or a Prosperity gold copper mine in the Cariboo-Chilcotin, or BC Hydro’s Site C dam near Fort St. John? No, no and no.

Ms. Yaffe continues in the same vein for 988 words of peerless ‘scare tactic’ prose, as if all that BC New Democrats are intent on is destroying the British Columbia economy, with designs on thrusting tens of thousands more beleaguered British Columbians onto the unemployment rolls.
And, let’s not forget about Business in Vancouver columnist Trevor Lautens, about whom blogger Alex Tsakumis expresses gaseous disdain on his blog. Mr. Lautens refers to Liberal leader Christy Clark as principled and noble, while describing NDP leader Adrian Dix as “a consummate actor who’s been impersonating a moderate. He’s foxed the media. Never doubt: He’s the strategic front man for the big-state, anti-business, neo-Marxist NDP heavies in the back rooms.”
Let’s allow Mr. Tsakumis to reflect on Mr. Lauten’s musings in BiV …

“To describe Lautens’ severely disfigured logic as ultimately flawed is to understate the case by a country mile. Perhaps in his zeal to hail a victory over the socialist hordes at the gate — a tired (and tiresome) canard to which he alludes, Lautens missed the multiplicity of factors that preclude such a result, inclusive - at position one - of the train wreck performance that is the failed, discreditable leader currently infesting the Office of the Premier.”

“In what I can only describe as the single worst column I’ve read in years, Lautens demonstrates that he not only can no longer read the tea leaves, but too, that he’s thoroughly lazy.”

As Mr. Tsakumis writes, “the far right has gone completely sideways.”

BC Election 2013: Report on Issues Raised by the Mainstream Media
Some sources in the tank for the Liberals, some not quite so much

Vancouver Sun legislative columnist Vaughn Palmer apparently finds covering Decision BC 2013 just no fun when the outcome seems such a forgone conclusion. Ssssoooo, why not raise a little hell? Mr. Palmer reports with all of the authorial voice he can muster that not only did Adrian Dix not acquit himself well yesterday morning on CKNW Leaders’ Debate, but that the BC NDP leader is flip-flopping on the Kinder Morgan pipeline (so-called flip-flopping is a big no no in politics, don’tcha know, can’t have that sober second thought / considered opinion thingy happening, no siree). The weight of Palmer’s columns have the potential to influence the discourse on this election, to the benefit of the Liberals and the detriment of the NDP.
Of course, you can watch the video above to determine for yourself whether the questioning of Dix appears to you as just discourse, or whether the media are losing touch with reality, need to get their ears checked, are relying on bad information (“No,” says Globe and Mail legislative reporter Justine Hunter, “Adrian Dix did not enunciate a position on Kinder Morgan when I interviewed him on January 10th”), or are otherwise attempting to generate “an issue” when there is no issue of contention that is readily apparent to you, me and thee.

Well, that’s it for our weekend report, folks. We’ll be back bright and early on Monday morning, with a pre-televised debate humdinger of a posting. Readers will find the latest coverage of the election at Decision BC 2013.
(If, by happenstance, you’ve arrived on VanRamblings looking for coverage of the April 18th Kitsilano Community Centre AGM — it weren’t pretty, folks — VanRamblings’ coverage of the KitsCC AGM is here. The Vancouver Courier’s Sandra Thomas has written about the KitsCC AGM, as well, her coverage of the delirious, anti-community meeting to be found here.)

Click on video to watch full CKNW BC Election 2013 Leaders’ Debate, broadcast earlier today
As per the heading of today’s VanRamblings post, why was Thursday, April 25th, and why will today both prove to be slow days on the campaign trail?
Easy answer that.
This morning, veteran CKNW broadcaster Bill Good hosted an exclusive BC leadership debate on AM980 (see video above). The much-touted Leaders’ Debate included BC NDP leader Adrian Dix, Liberal leader Christy Clark, Green leader Jane Sterk and Conservative leader John Cummins.
Where were the leaders on Thursday, and where will the leaders be over the weekend? In preparation. Thursday was preparation day for the make-it-or-break-it election opportunity that a leaders’ debate provides to the four hopefuls running to become Premier of British Columbia. For any politico out there worth her or his salt, CKNW 980 was the place to be Friday morning. Full video of the CKNW Leaders’ Debate may be found above.
Monday’s April 29th leaders’ debate, to be broadcast both on the three big television networks (CBC, CTV and Global), as well as on radio across the province, is the real make-it-or-break-it pivot for Decision BC 2013. All one has to do is look back at the impact then Liberal leader Gordon Wilson had on the electorate in 1991, and where many decided to park their vote.
The 1991 leaders’ debate was supposed to be a clash between the NDP’s Mike Harcourt and Social Credit’s Rita Johnston. But Liberal leader Gordon Wilson surprised everyone by getting in the best shots, as he scolded the bickering Harcourt and Johnston. “This reminds me of the legislature and here’s a classic example of why nothing ever gets done in the province of British Columbia,” Wilson told the television home viewing audience.
Although the New Democratic Party went on to win an astounding 51 seats in the house, the Socreds were decimated, finished, done like dinner — winning only 7 seats — while the Liberals went from zero to 17 seats in the legislature. Not winning the debate was one of the few flaws in what was considered a great campaign for NDP leader and new premier Mike Harcourt.
Leadership debates can have a profound effect, as they did in 1991 in BC, or on the national stage, when in 1984 Progressive Conservative leader Brian Mulroney confronted a deer-in-headlights, newly-elected Liberal leader John Turner — Mulroney pouncing on Turner’s patronage appointments and thunderously rejecting Turner’s leadership in a heated exchange — devastating Turner in a one-on-one debate, in the process taking the Conservatives to an unprecedented 211 seat victory in Parliament.
Whether it’s this morning’s leaders’ debate on CKNW, or Monday evening’s televised leaders’ debate, how the four leaders perform could very well emerge as a determining factor in who wins government on May 14th.

Although the ad above is a bit dated (it came out in Nov. 2010, prior to newly-elected Liberal leader Christy Clark announcing a rise in the minimum wage, which now sits at $10.25 an hour), the ad nonetheless speaks to a core constituency of the NDP, in a resolutely non-cynical manner.
In a month of Sundays, the provincial Liberals could never hope to achieve a connection with the youth in our province because, let’s face it, the provincial Liberals — even with the bright, relatively young face of Christy Clark at the helm — are the party of the old fuddy duddies, the party of the corporate elite, a provincial political party that believes in stasis over change.
The New Democratic Party speaks to, and for, most youth who reside in British Columbia. Whereas to the provincial Liberal party youth are just kids, kids who don’t get out to vote, and thus whose interests are unworthy of concern or interest, to be roundly ignored while on the campaign trail and, more particularly, while holding the reins of government.
Take a moment to consider the unemployment rate among youth in British Columbia — an astounding and unforgivable 14.5%, the highest youth unemployment rate in Canada. And just what have the Liberals done to address the problem of unemployment among our province’s young people? The answer is a simple one: BC does not have Canada’s highest youth unemployment rate because the Liberals gave a damn about this British Columbia constituency (or their worried parents, for that matter).
If what VanRamblings has observed while volunteering in the offices of Vancouver Point Grey NDP candidate David Eby offers any indication on where the youth vote will go in Decision BC 2013, and how many of our youth will plug in to this year’s provincial election — as we’ve witnessed an unprecedentedly well-organized, daily outreach campaign to youth, and the many thousands of students at UBC — the BC NDP are set to gain an unprecedented portion of the youth vote come election day, May 14th.

C’mon back to VanRamblings over the weekend, when we’ll continue to provide dense coverage of Decision BC 2013, as we link to reports in the mainstream and alternative press, point you in the direction of interest group involvement in the election, and otherwise attempt to provide you with the information you may have missed while leading your very busy life.
(For the latest VanRamblings election coverage, click on Decision BC 2013)
(For those of you who arrived here looking for coverage of last week’s Kitsilano Community Centre AGM — as sorry an example of untoward democratic engagement as you’re ever likely to witness — VanRamblings’ coverage of the KitsCC AGM may be found here. The Vancouver Courier’s Sandra Thomas has written about the KitsCC AGM, as well, her coverage of the delirious, anti-community meeting to be found here.)

Announcements, firings, former Chief of Staff to Gordon Campbell calling it for the NDP, sale of BC Place and maybe the Convention Centre pending a new administration in power post May 14th, Vancouver Point Grey on the verge of sending Premier Christy Clark on a permanent vacation — who says that British Columbia politics is dull?
If you take a look at the UBC Sauder Business School Market prediction to the right, you’ll see that the Liberals are in worse shape than they were last week: the NDP up from 54 to 58 seats, the Liberals down to 19 from 22. Too bad, so sad, the Liberals are going on a long, long vacation, as Vancouver Sun columnist writes that “Adrian Dix’s election strategy is to crush opponents and avoid the one-term blues.”
In other words, “Hello the Right Honourable Adrian Dix, forever more Premier of the lush, thriving Province of British Columbia.”

BC Election 2013: Media Coverage from here, there and everywhere
We are trying for pithy in today’s edition of our always informative Decision BC 2013 coverage, so let’s get right down to it, shall we?

• Vancouver Sun. British Columbia’s daily paper of record has ramped up it’s coverage of the election big time this week. Wednesday kicked off with this story from two of The Sun’s campaign trail reporters, Jonathan Fowlie and Tracy Campbell.
  

  An NDP government would attempt to sell the newly renovated BC Place Stadium, and possibly the Vancouver Convention Centre, to help cover the significant losses at both publicly owned facilities, Adrian Dix announced Wednesday.

  “When the operation of a facility draws tens of millions of dollars in public subsidy every year, and has left taxpayers with a mountain of debt, I believe we have to take a close look at whether that’s a business we should be in,” the NDP leader said while standing in front of BC Place.

  “If the private sector can do a better job running BC Place, freeing taxpayers of millions of dollars in losses and reducing public debt, we’ve got a win-win, and we’ll pursue that.”

  Dix said any sale would have to protect the future of both the B.C. Lions and the Vancouver Whitecaps, who use the stadium as their base of operations.

  Elsewhere in Vancouver Sun coverage of Decision BC 2013, their April 24th editorial strongly urges British Columbians to get out to vote — ”It’s your own future you will be helping to decide. Not voting will only ensure somebody else decides it for you.” Well worth reading the entire, well-crafted editorial.

  The Vancouver Sun’s Gordon Hoekstra, in a Prince George riding profile, writes that Liberal Attorney-General Shirley Bond, and neophyte Liberal candidate Mike Morris, a former RCMP north district commander, are in for the fight of their lives in this bellwether riding.

  Lori Culbert, Chad Skelton and Gordon Hoekstra report that “the NDP raised just under $1 million from corporations in 2012, four times what they collected from the corporate sector in 2011.” Fortis B.C., a natural gas supplier, gave 30 times more money to the Liberals than the NDP from 2005 to 2011, but in 2012 made heftier donations to the NDP ($24,500) than to the Liberals ($18,000). Ah, ain’t that sweet.

  And finally from the Vancouver Sun, the BC Conservative Party dumped their oleaginous Vancouver False Creek candidate, Ian Toothill, with Liberal candidate in the riding, former Mayor Sam Sullivan (an equally oleaginous fellow), and neophyte NDP candidate Matt Toner dancing a metaphorical jig. Vancouver False Creek will be one of the ridings to watch election night. With his name recognition, and a plethora of conservative voters in the riding’s Yaletown precinct, Sullivan could eke out a victory. Toner’s chances are probably somewhat diminished with Toothill out of the race. Still. Guess, we’ll just have to wait and see how much of a nail biter this one’ll be.

• Georgia Straight. Charlie Smith is really feeling his oats these days, and that’s a good thing. In this editorial, the estimable editor of The Straight writes that “the B.C. Liberals will be punished for the disgusting attack ads on Adrian Dix,” arising from soon-to-be Premier Dix’s heroic efforts on the campaign trail despite suffering the rigours of Type 1 diabetes. A very good piece, and well worth reading.

  Talking about estimable people, former Chief of Staff to Gordon Campbell, Martyn Brown, continues to drive nails into Christy Clark’s candidacy for Premier, and the Liberal’s chances for anything akin to a phoenix-like victory come May 14th.

  And finally from The Straight, a commentary from Vancouver Point Grey candidate, David Eby, who writes about “investing in our youth, and improving access to higher education.” Yep, that’s the same Dave Eby who’s running again Christy Clark, our soon-to-be ex-Premier. Yeah, that one. Full disclosure. I’m volunteering on David’s NDP campaign, so maybe I’m just a tad more enthusiastic about David’s candidacy than some, but you would be, too, if you knew him.