The 801 Club Revisited: Why I Disagree With Gary Mason's Latest.

AllTheObviousnessThatFits
OnTheSurfaceFilmOfAVeryShallowPondVille


Last night, writing in The Globe, Mr. Mason explained why he thinks the 801 Club is doomed:

...The 801 dreams were born when it looked like voters would assign Ms. Clark to political oblivion – when they thought voters would do the dirty work for them. That is not likely to happen now. There is a good chance Ms. Clark will try to stay on as Opposition Leader even if a Liberal loss includes her own seat. A few 801ers I spoke to in the last few days were still talking bravely about dumping her even if she found a way to get a seat. But much of their earlier bravado has disappeared.

Here is a fact many overlook in this discussion. Yes, Ms. Clark did not enjoy the support of her caucus when she was made leader. Many didn’t like her. But most of those people are gone. Ms. Clark went out and recruited a whole new gang, many of whom, if they get elected, will owe her their loyalty. The anti-Clark crowd in caucus could well be a minority, which would make leading a mutiny that much more difficult...

Now.

It's not that I completely disagree with Mr. Mason's analysis about the changes to Ms. Clark's caucus, especially after all the strong-arming that went down during the 'nomination' process (although there are a couple of wildcards that managed to slip in there, including Smilin' Sammy's stomping of Little Lord Lorne).

Instead, it's Mr. Mason's thesis that it is the caucus that actually matters most that I disagree with.

Because if Mr. Mason had bothered to put on his goggles and look just below the surface, surely he would have realized that absolutely nothing has changed down in the muck and the mire where the real deals get done.

Including at PavCo, where the still secret plans for the Casino-Industrial-Complex will almost certainly  be revealed on May 15th if Ms. Clark wins.

And at BC Ferries, which is being run by a fine bunch of snout-in-troughers who have already, even according to Ms. Clark, run up a billion dollar deficit while they have pushed fares (i.e. those things you and I pay) through the roof.

And at Translink, which is still being run into the ground by the very folks that Gordon Campbell hand-picked to do just that.

And at BC Hydro, where all those IPP contracts will continue to be honoured while we, the suckers, pay the price for the next 100 years or so.

And at the Pacific Carbon Trust, where the board makes sure that cash-strapped schools and hospitals give our hard-earned money to the corporations run by the folks standing just behind the curtain.

And then there are the most excellent folks standing just behind the curtain themselves...You know, the ones that pay-to-play to build the boondoggles, steal the land, rape the rivers, and frack the land for nothing.

And then there are the appartchiks inside the machine who are still there...In fact, the very fine fellow who did not take the Railgate pay-off deal to Cabinet is now pretty much everywhere...And then, of course, there are those that do all that investigating of things like secret plumbing operations inside the Premier's office...

And as for those folks who ran the secret plumbing operations inside the Premier's office, some of whom funnelled government-collected personal information to party databases ...Where are they today?....At this very minute?

And, finally, where will the very fine fellow who, apparently (at least according to Mr. David Basi), could once be counted on to help "get the fluff out of this sh*t" be if Ms. Clark's penchant for serial obfuscation puts her over the top on Tuesday?


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Speaking of pay-to-play...Norm Farrell is on that subject over at his place today.
Where'd Railgate go, you might be asking...Well... I figured I'd give some of the big guns a chance to revisit it in the wake of the release of the pay-off docs, especially the Dean given the fact that it was he who carried the water on the 'contingent' liability thing...

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