Blue Like You

Archive for September 9th, 2008

As Kinsella notes, this controversy isn’t exactly the infamous Face ad, but it was still a stupid move.

Now PMSH is issuing an apology at a presser when he would obviously rather be discussing an important announcement.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

How about running your ideas past some Blogging Tories first, guys? Use us as your focus groups.

We try so hard and then you pull these childish pranks.

More at SDA.

*   *   *   *

Afternoon update: I’ve been reflecting on this a bit, and also on the comments from my readers. Reactions range from outrage to a kind of "Ah, get over it" attitude.

Let’s face it - mistakes happen. It’s how you handle them that counts.

Stephen Harper apologized and called the action "Tasteless and inappropriate ".

Exactly. Right as Rain puts things into perspective for us all.

Now it’s time to move on. (But not before you try making your own ad at notaleader.ca !)

And please don’t forget to vote at the poll page! Thanks.

*   *   *   *

Sneak peak at Ivison’s editorial for tomorrow.

And this is an example of something that’s really tasteless. (H/T The Strong Conservative)

*   *   *   *

Wednesday Update: Warren’s Winners & Losers page is interesting. My thoughts on this are that the notaleader site has received a lot more traffic than it likely would have otherwise…

Props to Paulsstuff for this one - Liberal candidate apologizes for Nazi comments - Canada.com

What are your thoughts on Mr. Dion disclosing his ‘hearing disability’ on the campaign trail? Why now?

Did the thought just occur to him out of the blue?  Apparently he first disclosed the condition to Jane Taber on Sunday, and then told the media in general on Monday. (Duff to to Roger Smith on Monday’s MDL ).Why?

Reader May has a great summary of her thoughts on the subject from the previous post:

May Says:
September 8th, 2008 at 10:32 pm

Re: Dion’s claimed hearing problem:

I’m sorry; I find this extremely difficult to believe for the following reasons:

1. If this were true we would have found out long before now: Dion’s English has long been a discussion topic and it would be logical and politically expedient to have given this explanation a year ago. Saying it now makes it seem like he is trying to gain sympathy.

2. If he had a medical condition, he would know its name.

3. People with hearing problems almost have an accent; a “fuzziness” or lack of sharpness in their speech. I do not hear this with Mr. Dion.

4. Dion is not the only one who speaks English in this manner. Maxime Bernier; for example; speaks English poorly in a manner almost identical to Mr. Dion. I find them both almost impossible to understand. To the best of my knowledge Bernier has no hearing problem.

5. There has never been any complaint about Dion’s command of French. If he had a hearing problem he would have speech difficulties in any language.

Finally; hypothetically supposing this is true it doesn’t change the problem: To be Prime Minister you must be able to effectively communicate in both languages.

Exactly. And to flesh out point #1, it’s very strange to me that Jason Cherniak knew about this for ages, but not Michael Ignatieff!

…Asked why he only spoke up about the problem now, during an election campaign, Dion said he doesn’t know why and said he shouldn’t have.

Quoi?

Deputy Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff told CTV’s Canada AM on Monday that he wasn’t aware of the hearing problem but said Dion has made his objectives for the country more than clear to him…

I don’t doubt that Dion has a hearing problem, but I question the timing of the revelation.

And there is a remedy for the cocktail party problem. It is called a hearing aid. Modern ones are amazing. They are fitted with tiny microchips that can be adjusted according to the social setting. I strongly suggest that Mr. Dion look into it.

- Also please see A Step to the Right.