We all know what happened to the last Conservative candidate that dared to speak his mind and tell the truth: Gordon Landon was shown the door when he dared speak the truth about shovel-gate scandal. That makes the on the record comments of Brian Jean, the Conservative MP for Fort McMurray-Athabasca, all the more interesting.
In an interview with his local newspaper, the High Prairie South Peace News (not yet online it seems), not only does Jean predict an early election and describe the current Conservative/NDP coalition as unsustainable, he also distances himself from his own party's negative and misleading attack ads against Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff, saying while they seem to work, he doesn't like them. He says he'd rather focus on issues, and so would his constituents.
Someone is going to be getting a call from Senator Finley, methinks. Wonder how long before Jean "gets retired" as well...
MP predicts election; Jean says vote will take place "sooner than later"Recommend this Post on Progressive Bloggers
High Prairie South Peace News
Wed Sep 30 2009
By Joe McWilliams
Fort McMurray-Athabasca MP Brian Jean says a federal election is likely sooner, rather than later.
"I don't think it will be that long," says Jean. "I don't think (Liberal Party leader) Michael Ignatieff can back down, and I don't think the NDP can support us for long."
Igantieff recently announced his party plans to force a vote of non-confidence in the House in October. NDP leader Jack Layton followed by saying the Conservatives could count on his party's support - for a price.
"It's an uncomfortable situation," says Jean, adding the considerable ideological gap between the Conservatives and NDP and predicting any alliance between the two would be short-lived.
Jean admits he doesn't like the current attack ads his party is running on TV which call Igantieff's character and motivations into question.
"But they seem to work," he says. "I don't like them, but that's not my job."
Jean adds he's been hearing from constituents who don't like those sort of tactics either - but the number of complaints is probably not above 10.
Jean says he'd rather focus on issues, such as the work his government is trying to do to benefit the economy. Those include the Green Infrastructure Fund, which offers to support non-polluting energy alternatives such as the Mayo B hydro-electric project in The Yukon which the feds recently spent $71 million on. It will reduce The Yukon's dependence on diesel for power generations.
Another big federally-supported green project is in the works, says Jean, with details to be released later.
Jean says there's a direct benefit to Alberta's oilsands industry by reducing greenhouse gas emissions elsewhere. He noted the Greenpeace action at Shell's Albion Sands project that had developed earlier the day he was interviewed.
"If we don't do something, people won't buy our oil."
The Green Infrastructure Fund is evidently one way the federal government hopes to take the heat of environmental protest off the oilsands.
10 comments:
Way to go Brian. Looks like there might be trouble brewing in Harpers castle. Two men in two weeks speaking out and he most be likely will be given his walking papers. I am quit sure there may be room in the Liberals government. He sounds like a man who will not tolerate the continuous lies and keep drinking the famous Kool Aid. I wonder how many more will follow suit soon.
I was hoping to come post an endorsement for Blake Roberts if Jean were to suddenly step down for personal reasons but the article is too weak to do so.
"Jean admits he doesn't like the current attack ads his party is running on TV which call Igantieff's character and motivations into question.
"But they seem to work," he says. "I don't like them, but that's not my job."
That is a pretty weak statement and one would have to stretch that statement out to come close to that being an MP attacking his own party's ads.
Gordon Landon was shown the door because...
"the great riding of Markham-Unionville,
the city of Markham applied for 14 infrastructure stimulus grants and does anyone know how many were approved?
All 14 were."
He just didn't even know what was going on his own riding...that's why McCallum did not chirp in.
It's funny to me that the Liberals constantly criticize Harper for putting a muzzle on his MPs, but when an MP does something that doesn't exactly jive with the party line, it takes the Liberals about 5 seconds to try to turn into a scandal.
BCer in Toronto, as always, doing his part to ensure that constructive political discourse never takes place in this country.
Geez - Wilson again with the rhetoric notes - not a single thought for her/himself....sad
Jeff,
I agree the political Ads using statements of the Liberal leader in framing the candidate in a negative light is working.
Like the Conservative MP it is also not my job.
As voter I would have hoped the leader had better advisers and judgement than letting Harper "wear the recession" by contributing ZERO to the a budget during a Global Crisis.
Your leader chose to offer ZERO conditions for his support for 10 months. He chose instead to ask questions, ask for Reports, put the PM on prohabition, and win an extra opposition day this week.
Are you suprised Iggy is has polled worse than Dion is half the time?
Did you even read the article you reference? It's mighty thin gruel for your ridiculous partisan torquing. The MP doesn't attack his party's ads at all - all he said was, they aren't his cup of tea. So what!
And regarding the unsustainability of a Conservative government being propped up by the NDP - I don't think you'd get a single Conservative MP to say anything different!
I can't believe NNW linked to this.
You sure got the Reformatory androids going. I see they've all made a comment. My favourite is flaggman, acting like we should take his opinion as authority. Such scolding...
...someone's bitter.
wilson,
Landon seems to have more stories than, I don't know, a reader's digest anthology. You probably did well in dumping him.
cs, you can repeat that NDP spin as many times as you like but it won't make it any more true. we're veering off topic, but, in short, to say LPC got nothing and NDP got something is bs.
The coalition threat led to a January budget that was far, far better than the economic update that triggered it. And while it wasn't perfect, the Liberals decided the billions for stimulus to create jobs and help communities, and the EI changes that were part of the budget implementation as well, were better than nothing and so we decided to keep the government alive, at least until the bulk of those measures could be implemented, and we could see if they were working.
The NDP looked at the Conservative EI proposal and decided, while it wasn't perfect, it was better than nothing and it brought needed help to some, so you'll support the government until its implemented.
Two very similar decisions, frankly, and it's rather hard to argue otherwise.
As to anyone getting concessions, the fact is, when the NDP has made its demands in the past for Harper concessions, and for EI reform specifically, what Harper proposed wasn't near what they were asking for. And there was no negotiation here. Finley held a presser giving a vague outline, them Mulcair popped-out to say they'll keep the government alive until its done. There was no negotiation. There was no back and forth. There was no amendment of the initial proposal, which even NDP MPs admitted when they saw the fine print wasn't what they hoped for. They'll try to amend in committee, but the government has indicated it won't accept amendments.
So, as I said, I think the NDP had to find a way to keep the government alive, so I don't quibble with their decision,l although I do reserve the right to have fun with it. But to try to paint some grand difference between what the LPC did before and the NDP is doing now, to try to say the LPC got nothing and the NDP a lot, that's just silly, and unsupported by the facts.
Jeff the Liberals refused to add anything to January's budget. They repeatedly told the press it was not their budget and they were setting up some kind of 'test'.
The Global Recession picked up steam from Nov-January and the CPC could no longer hold 'wait and see'.
It is not silly to remember the events that actually took place without rewriting history.
The Liberals hoped the CPC would be blamed for the Global recession by calling it the Harper recession and the Harper deficit.
They predicted in a few months, June the Polls would support them replacing the CPC for mishandling the economy.
Why did the Liberal refuse to participate other than asking for Reports, tough questions, prohabation?
I did not suggest the Liberals were broke or financially unprepared in January 2009. I also did not include M.I. comments he made that backed up the anti-coalition talking points that the Bloc were interested in splitting up the country in his decision to NOT pull the plug.
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