SmearEarly
SmearOftenVille
Who do they really and truly fear the most?
Well, perhaps Mike Smyth has the answer.
After all when Mr. Smyth wrote this morning of David Eby's work helping push back for poor people as a young man did he (Smyth) write about what policies Mr. Eby might persue in this regard if he (Eby) were to become leader of the NDP?
Or.
Did Mr. Smyth write about whether Mr. Eby, the guy who was able to mount, pretty much single-handedly, a ground game good enough to defeat Christy Clark in far-west CremeVille, has the right stuff, in the here and now, to be an effective NDP leader?
Of course not.
Instead, the good Mr. Smyth wondered if Mr. Eby is an anti-cop 'showboater'*.
And who did Mr. Smyth go to for confirmation of said showboatery?
Why none other than the Snooklandian ad-firm principal and deflector-spin generator Mr. Brad Zubyk.
And you think I'm joking right?
Wrong.
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*Hmmmm....Was 'swift' boater already taken?
And Mr Smyth has videos of young Mr. Eby pushing back for poor people?....Imagine that!...Gosh...Wonder who supplied them to him?
Interestingly, back in the last days of Railgate, when the last bombshell went off, Mr. Smyth, while sitting in Ms. Clark's still warm, but vacated chair in the (nolongerso)Giant 98 studio also went to Mr. Zubyk for 'expert' comment.
Look, this is just one more example of how the politics of destruction double-secret probation smear codes are embedded, in bold 72 point font, on just about every single page of the master playbook that is used by this gang of miscreant expedients bent on kicking the crap out of our body politic....And, just to be clear here, I typed that last bit with not one single, solitary nanoparticle of snark clinging to the tips of my fingers.
So, given that Mr. Smyth refused to ask the question, we will....Does Mr. Eby, indeed, have the right stuff?...Personally, I'm not enough of an insider to really know...But I do know this...It was Eby, and only Eby, who had the stuff, in the wake of last May's massacre at the hand of the expedients and their shillophants to write.....This.
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Fridays with Nicole Sandler
22 minutes ago
12 comments:
If Mr. Smyth has a-hankerin' to play a stone throwin' devil's advocate, he outa go after the legions of unrepentant, shameless, and feckless political playas, not someone akin to the Old Testament David...
SH
Mike Smyth as usual smears for the Liberals. The all too predictable play book feeds to low information readers. I am pretty sure it takes him less than two minutes to churn out these puff pieces. Nice work if somehow you can actually look in the mirror and live with yourself.
Truly a shame, if he worked at it he could maybe have been a real (full time) journalist. Definitely a loss in so many ways.
(no snark intended)
Does Ebby got it? He's smart, young, enthusiastic and, top of all, he beat Christy out of her own seat. I think there's something to be made of the facts that he didn't beat her by-election bid but did after she'd been Premier for a couple years---which might indicate he didn't win entirely on his own merit but, to some extent, on her accumulated demerit. Nobody's saying he didn't run a solid campaign, albeit against a rival hindered by the duty of her office to campaign throughout the province whilst he could focus on a single riding. Christy was forced to bump one of her MLAs so's to run in the safest BC Liberal seat in the province. Is that supposed to add some polish to Eby's growing reputation as Premier slayer? I thought it was cute how many opined he should've resigned his Point Grey seat just so's to beat her again in Kelowna. The stuff myths are made of.
's funny how first impressions stick with you: first time I saw Eby was at the NDP leadership convention where he surprised all with a cringingly horrible redition of "We're Halfway There!" ---leaving me with the impression he's something of an imp; the stage managers looked on with horror as he announced he'd be going off script (by attempting to sing the song); apparently there was an agreed upon speech he was supposed to give but but waited until he was on stage to rearrange the set list where nobody could stop him (I've occasionally resorted to this underhanded little trick to shoehorn in a number the rest of the band had shit-canned---they'd never upbraid me in front of our fans; they save it till after).
I'm not sure this kind of behaviour necessarily disqualifies one for leadership. In my opinion more NDP candidates should have gone off the "positive campaign" script sent down to them from on high---might have won the election if more of them had attacked the sorry BC Liberal record with gusto (my own NDP candidate obviously wanted to grapple with some of our local hot button issues
but obediently demurred with stock answers like, "We'll study all sides of the issue before making a decision.") The battle for Point Grey was also exceptional in that Eby's natural pugnacity seemed to have the green light to attack his rival while NDP candidates elsewhere were officially muted. His win earned him a "maverick" accolade instead of condemnation as a "rogue" (if, indeed, he really did win by insubordination).
Thus, I can't very well prejudice Eby as a reckless renegade--- disobedient, not a team player---because he did, after all, win the seat; if he did disobey campaign directives (to be "positive"), that's a thumbs up from me because that campaign strategy was plain stupid and he was smart enough to not to follow the lemmings over the edge. But I just can't erase that damn song from my memory.
What pushes Eby into the favourable zone, for me, is his thoughtful words the morning after, when NDP supporters were still in shock. In addition to his commendable insubordination, his words indicate leadership material. If he does have that ambition, however, he has some formidable challenges ahead, and that's his own NDP.
My worst fear is, if he does become leader, the BC Liberals will play clips of that impromptu mangling of "We're Halfway There!" over and over again. Ouch!
When I first saw the article... I thought....this guy wants to be called a journalist ? Can you imagine how happy Mike would be if Rob Ford lived in Vancouver ?
Guy in Vic
Erm, actually I think the more obvious chain of being for this article is:
Mike Smyth (gets quotes from) Brad Zubyk (is married to) Marcella Munro (runs campaign comms for) Mike Farnworth.
This is a little shot over Eby's bow, a notice that things will be getting nasty.
Anon-Above--
So...It's the local Matalin-Carville power-playas at work?...Does that mean that we are all Snooklandians now?
All snark aside - most interesting the people/groups that Mr. Smyth did NOT talk to that could have given him a true picture of whether or not Mr. Eby has been effective helping the constituency under consideration.
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Ross: I feel sure you'll get something up in memory of Pete Seeger.
Just wanted to say, quietly, that we won't likely see his like pass our way again.
Cheers,
Jim
James King, with apologies to my Christian friends, nobody, once they've passed on, gets seen again. Pete Seeger definitely stood out among us but I suspect he'd be the first to say,"It's always been up to you to stand up for what's right." I'm sure he'd be extra grumpy (as he often was in old age) to be told the movement of which he was a part was in any way diminished by his passing. Pete aimed to encourage others; check out his praise to Tom Paxton for writing the song "Ramblin' Boy".
Encouraging others to carry on was what turned his crank; now we do it in his memory.
Cheers,
Scotty
Scotty, agreed.He was, though, something pretty damned special...and he was, as you've noted, always willing to share the credit...Did you see the piece in the NYTimes today by Andrew Revkin...who mentions, as you do, Pete's songs ringing on...
Cheers.
Jim
Jim and Scotty--
Working on a tune or two.
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Awright!
@ anon 9:46: and then there's this:
http://bcblue.wordpress.com/2012/01/25/cbc-confirms-its-ombudsman-is-a-joke/
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