In what only National Newswatch would ever deem a top-of-the-page national story, great big whacking anti-Conservative, Lib-supporting pollster Frank Graves advises the nation that Canada is heading toward a "great big whacking national unity crisis" that might only be averted by a Liberal party with Justin Trudeau at the helm:
Mr. Trudeau, should he win the federal Liberal leadership, could be the sole national or Quebec political figure who could legitimately champion his devotion to both Quebec and Canada should a unity crisis arrive, argued Mr. Graves.
Yes, the CBC's go-to "neutral" pollster is clearly an impartial, detached non-partisan who doesn't pick sides:
"….the simple fact is if you add to the mix a guy who is young, who appeals to this sort of frustrated younger Canada that’s been sitting on the sidelines, a guy who appeals to women and those with liberal values, who have been frustrated about the choices for some time, a guy who wants to establish the middle and the middle class – and by the way, do you really want Thomas Mulcair, clearly his supporters include a lot of separatists…
i was enjoying my evening until i saw the name turdeau
The NDP are sitting too high in the polls at the moment while the Liberals are sitting too low. We need a Liberal bubblehead like Trudeau to attract more of the naivists from the NDP to the Libs to maintain a nice split among the socialists and an ongoing conservative majority.
I would love Trudeau to become Lib leader of the Libs because that is what is going to happen and its a good thing.
Thanks Frank, for the answer to a question nobody asked.
Graves is missing a key point in his thesis. Most Canadians would not consider Quebec separation a 'crisis'.
The only true crisis here would be the idea if Trudeau or Mulcair became PM..
And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend, legend became myth.
Soccermom, totes magotes.
It can't be! Maclean's said that Mulcair is going to be the next PM because he knows how to handle PM Harper.
"Most Canadians would not consider Quebec separation a crisis." -- Soccermom.
This is increasingly the case, but the Liberals have always had a need to bang the drum and warn about the "threat" of separation, especially when, like now, there realistically isn't one.
Graves told The Hill Times -- presumably with alarm, given the tone of his breathless reference to a "great big whacking national unity crisis" -- that "the percentage of voters in Alberta who would support Quebec separation are roughly equivalent to the percentage of voters in Quebec who want the province to secede."
So? Is that really a problem? People who aren't stumping for a Justin Trudeau-led national government, like "neutral" pollster Frank Graves is, might see those similar numbers in Alberta and Quebec as "mutual agreement." And it's not as if the televised pronouncements of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would convince Albertans to suddenly see the prospect of Quebec separation as "a great big whacking national unity crisis."
First Trudeau must get elected as leader of the party. Then, he has to win an election, and if the trend continues, it would most likley be a minority.
I think we have a lot of time to head him off at the pass.
And by the way, I was 19 when his Dad was first elected. I had never heard the word separatiste until Pierre came to Ottawa.
Temp tonight at Eureka Station, Nunavut is -23C. No icebergs were reported to have melted.
Always remember, Frodo, the Ring is trying to get back to its master. It wants to be found.
The Ring passed to Isildur Harper, who had this one chance to destroy evil forever, but the hearts of men conservatives are easily corrupted.
The html strike-through function seems to be not working tonight.
Justin Trudeau ,the only guy in politics who is more of an amateur than Obama
The only problem for Justin is that Harper is no John McCain surrender monkey. He's such a fake even the press can't pretend either.
Trudeau? Was that the name of the guy whose wife screwed a rock band while he was busy screwing a nation?
Just trying to remember Canadian history as I believe they stopped teaching it a few decades ago.
It's difficult to say at this point what Kim Justin-il's chances are of winning the Liberal leadership. But my chance of voting for them is pretty close to nil.
Who is this Frank Graves? Is he relevant to anything of importance?
Why does Graves bother to poll at all? Clearly he already knows what everyone is thinking.
The only true crisis here would be the idea if Turdoh 2 or Mulch-hair became PM.. (modded)Post by: Soccermom 11:46 PM
Indeed!
Justine Turdeau ,the only guy in politics who is more of an amateur than Obama
(modded)Post by: cal2 at 12:32 AM
LOL!
Can we in the ROC start a Goodbye-Bonvoyage! campaign to speed things up already?
We cannot wait for satan's spawn to start this scam all over again. Time's a waisting!
Why the prime minister insists on providing life giving warmth to a dangerous constrictor
like the marxist CBC by letting it keep coiling around his body passes all understanding.
Privatize the cursed creature which will make it concentrate on its own survival in the
marketplace instead of its present fixation on attempting to destroy its political enemies.
.
Frank Graves... the face behind the saying,"that it is better to keep your mouth shut an let everyone think you are a fool, than to say something and prove them right!". It is my opinion that another Trudeau as PM, paticularly this CBC endorsed, vacuous "done-nothing" would be the worst thing for Canada and while MR. "proven-himself-an-idiot" Graves, may believe its a good thing there are many of us who do not and would be highly motivated to work to prevent it.
but the hearts of men conservatives are easily corrupted.
~LAS
That's because the conservation of power(politics) corrupts.
Now behold the Libertarians, their hearts will always be pure and free from corruption for they shall never know power.
The truth of this is plain: Libertarians will never taste nor know the weight of the responsibility of power because they will never ever be elected, the abstract theoretic purity of their golden Libertarian hearts prevent them from ever being understood by the practical unwashed masses as well as precluding Libertarians from acting responsibly toward anyone deemed less pure than themselves.
Wretched man that I am, I have nothing to comfort me but my faith, family, fortune, and place in the ever growing conservative power structure.
Woe is me, mayhaps I shall weep.
(8^D
p.s. I'd like to see the LPC dissolve.
The Left who used to dwell there have already absconded to the NDP and the remaining Libs, the ones who believed the LPC was 'centrist' and voted it because Mom and Dad did, would find a new home in the CPC and the Libertarians(most of whom are Leftists like LAS) could take a flying "F" at a rolling donut.
Better the Lib's than the NDP.
The NDP would ruin the country.
One thing Frank Graves failed to mention is that Justin Trudeau (aka Fred Hitler west of Ontario) as PM would CAUSE a "great big whacking national unity crisis" in Alberta and maybe even Saskatchewan.
Good old Frank (Gravy) Graves always conjuring up "culture wars" as the Liberals road back to power. Trudeaus kid is going to save us all from the big bad "separatist" threat... unless of course if little Justy decides to join the "separatist cause" because he doesn't like how that oafish PM Harper is governing his "Papa's" imposed country. Yeah, whatever Frankie.
Better the Lib's than the NDP. The NDP would ruin the country.
The NDP has been ruining the country, as the deciding dark horse vote in Liberal minority governments going all the way back to Lester B. Pearson.
All of the socialist legislation that the 'Libs' passed which conservatives despise were NDP ideas that 'Lib' minority governments(from Pearson to Trudeau to Martin) passed with the aid of NDP votes.
Did you ever ponder why marriage was confirmed to only be between 1man + 1woman under Chretien's majority government and then, with a minority, Paul Martin has the same MPs passing SSM with NDP support?
Notice the pattern: Libs never get ground breaking nation changing legislation passed with conservative help, just with NDP help.
To say the Libs are better(than NDP) is to willfully ignore the history of Lib/NDP collaboration.
What Canadians need is a clear cut choice without the confusing false meme of Liberal centrism.
If the Liberals went the way of the PCs the folks who have been voting Liberal this past decade would vote CPC because the others have already gone over to the NDP.
Libertarians(most of whom are Leftists like LAS)
What an ignorant comment. Clearly OZ doesn't have a clue what Libertarians stand for. Libertarianism does not fit into a "right-left" paradigm; it is completely off that plane. You need to think in three dimensions to understand it, which is obviously beyond Oz's capabilities.
If his defintions of Libertarianism are wrong then would it not have been better to correct the definition than to attack the author? I would prefer to read some perspective and not vitriol.
Don't kid yourself, that 'piece of sh1t' Trudeau is a communist cuckoo clock, in his wealthy fluffy airheaded way. Pretty much like a Hollywood stylish far lefty.
His creepy little brother is working for him on this leadership bid. Remember that appalling article he wrote in 2006? Here's some quotes (quickly copied and pasted from some blog Bing searched up for me):
Sasha Trudeau on Fidel
Cuba's Great Leader, we are told, "lives to learn and put his knowledge in the service of the revolution." He is "famous for not sleeping, instead spending the night studying and learning." "His intellect is one of the most broad and complete that can be found." Moreover, Fidel is "a great adventurer," "a great scientific mind," "the most curious man I have ever met," "an expert on genetics, on automobile combustion engines, on stock markets, on everything,"
“I grew up knowing that Fidel Castro had a special place among my family’s friends. We had a picture of him at home: a great big man with a beard who wore military fatigues and held my baby brother Michel in his arms.”
“Combined with a Herculean physique and extraordinary personal courage, monumental intellect makes Fidel the giant that he is.”
“[Fidel] is something of a superman.”
Fidel can skin dive 60 feet without a tank, while “grinning”.
Fidel feasts “on raw sea urchins, seasoned with lime juice.”
Fidel is not a politician. He is more in the vein of a great adventurer or a great scientific mind.”
“Cubans will always feel privileged that they, and they alone, had Fidel.”
Commies/nazis really fall hard for that 'superman' crap, every time.
“Cubans will always feel privileged that they, and they alone, had Fidel.”
Well, except for the dead ones. And the ones in Jail because Fidel said. Oh, and the ones who welded oil drums to a 1952 Chevy dump truck and sailed it 90 miles to Florida. They probably won't.
Retard.
BTW are we all very, very clear that little Justin Trudeau has nothing whatsoever to do with the Draft Justin movement in LPC politics? He's like a muppet, never says or does anything unless somebody has their hand up his @ss making his mouth move. The ultimate empty suit.
There are many things in this world to be concerned about, but this isn't one of them. The chances of this empty-headed pretty boy being elected PM are zero.
Frank Graves is a tool, but he's not a total idiot. He's doing what he's paid to do. And the fact that he's doing it shows just how bankrupt the Liberal Party really is. Everyone knows what the LP needs to do to resurrect itself. Like the Conservatives after 1992 or the Liberals after 1958, the Party needs to sit down at a good long, serious policy conference and decide what it stands for. On everything. Foreign affairs, defence, the economy, Quebec, Asian economic links, the lot.
The Liberal Party is in an existential crisis. The Party has lost seats and public support in every election since 2000. Despite having half its leaders come from Quebec, the Liberals have not had a majority of Quebec seats in nearly 30 years. Since 1984, the Party has been little more than a downtown Montreal rump. For all practical purposes, the Party is non-existent west of Ontario, and it's now non-existent in Ontario outside of downtown Toronto. It has no more claim to be a national party than the Progressive Conservatives did after 1992.
For the past 12 years, the LP has been deluding itself that all it needed was just the right leader to return them to political nirvana. Instead it's led them to one increasingly severe electoral defeat after another. Justin Trudeau is just another symptom of the LP repeating what has already failed time after time.
This means the middle ground is left alone for Harper and the Conservatives. And anyone who imagines that the name "Trudeau" has any political drawing power in La Belle Province" is dreaming in technicolour.
Now if the Liberals were to pick a serious policy wonk and party manager like John Manley, then I might get a bit concerned. Why do you think none of those people are in the Party any more? Because they know a dead skunk when they smell one.
Now Frank comes along with a claim about national unity concerns. It shows just how empty the Liberal gas tank really is. Support for separatism in Quebec has never been lower in the last 50 years, and Frankie knows it. PM Harper has never addressed publicly the issue of national unity because he doesn't have to. This is well and truly a dead parrot.
In a sense, the PCs were lucky in 1992. It was such a total smashup that literally everything was razed to the ground. Everything had to be rebuilt virtually from scratch. For the Liberals however, the past 12 years have been worse. Not a sudden massive collapse, but only a slow bleeding to death. And JT is a sign that they still haven't learned that their current course is doomed.
Now everyone go back to sleep. This piece by Graves signifies Liberal weakness, not a serious threat. Empty-headed pretty boy will go down just as bad as Dion did the instant he sticks his fuzzy head above the ramparts.
Graves is a silly little man.
Nobody cares what Quebec does as long as we don't have to pay for their financial lunacy.
And baby Trudeau is the best political friend Harper has had in a long time because he will bleed Mulcair dry in Quebec.
What CGH said if I could put my thoughts into words as clearly as he did.
If by some miracle Trudeau were to become PM, I would sell my house in Ontario, move west and become active in a western seperatist movement, if only to advocate getting rid of the equalization system. (Which McGuinty has made me a part of to my shame)
cgh said: "Empty-headed pretty boy will go down just as bad as Dion did the instant he sticks his fuzzy head above the ramparts."
Isn't his career high-water mark so far a brief stint as a substitute kindergarten teacher?
Related news that was announced late Friday afternoon. Hubert Lacroix,the cbc head honcho,was given another 5 year term. This means that we will continue to hear only positive news about Omar and Justin for a few more years,and pick up the tab.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/story/2012/10/05/cbc-hubert-lacroix-president-ceo-appointment.html
Francis Graves, fails to point out that since Harper became PM, him and the media have been working overtime to stir up a national unity crisis as a political tool. Then use the crisis as a spring board for their loony ideology.
"...and by the way, do you really want Thomas Mulcair, clearly his supporters include a lot of separatists…" Duh, really Frank?? Is there any segment or region of Canadian society that the Liberals can avoid talking down to with a patronizing tone and treating like a bunch of petulant children? It's like they've been doing it for so long, they can't help themselves anymore. So now they're going to anoint a petulant child as their leader.
The main reason that Tom Mulcair did so well in Quebec is that his party promised to take the demands of Quebec nationalists seriously, and to negotiate with them in good faith should enough of them desire independence. What on earth is wrong with that? Do the Liberals believe that Quebec is the first province in the history of the world to have separatist leanings?
When he mentions Quebec separating I hope Graves doesn't mistake alot of western Canada folks for those who would give a flying you-know-what.
Robins111: Bingo.
And in the category of "the media" you can toss in the execrable National Newswatch.
As a "news" source it's transparently laughable at this point - pretty much a joke, really. They toss in enough 'general interest' crap to make it seem like a news site, but, as evidenced by their typical top stories - in terms of consistent, day-to-day display - it's really just a head-up-the-ass, GTA-centric, running-on-fumes Liberal-era anachronism that has little or nothing to do with what matters to actual Canadians outside of the self-considered, self-referencing proverbial "corridor".
Pollsters are supposed to poll, not editorialize and offer opinions outside the scope of the poll results. Allan Gregg did the same as Graves in a recent speech. What is even more annoying is that the MSM writes about it rather than ignore it.
Mulcair backed by separatists?
Well then, I guess Mulcair's my man!!
Frank Graves describing the Shiny Pony: " ... a guy who wants to establish the middle and the middle class ..."
HUH? What does Justin Trudeau know about the middle class, seeing as his father and his father's London-School-of-Economics-revisionist henchmen almost obliterated the middle class in their rush to redistribute the middle classe's incomes via their social engineering policies that divided Canadians into either victims or predators, while leaving the moneyed elites out of the equation?
In the Librano'$ world, the hard-working, law-abiding middle class was/is part of the problem, preying on the poor victims of society's vagaries -- no personal responsibility required. So, it was/is the middle class's hard-earned dollars that need to be redistributed to the poor victims, while Trudeau and his moneyed ilk live in secluded grandeur, all the while lecturing the rest of us on how we must live.
Trudeau's riding on the Librano elite'$ and the consensus media's coattails. There's no substance there, very reminiscent of the empty chair.
Symbol for Trudeau? 'Empty, phantom coattails blowing in the breeze. Justin's a complete fraud and if it weren't for his name and his personal, unearned fortune he'd be a drama teacher, maybe, in some Canadian backwater.
Pathetic.
Why would any sane English speaking Canadian vote for or support a French Canadian PM at a time of National Crisis over unity involving Quebec. All of the mess Canada has gotten into over the years have always been on French Canadian PM's watches. Any English Canadian in an English Province that ever supports a French Canadian for a PM is an idiot. When Quebec leaves Canada all of the land and water that is now in Quebec must be taken back and let them leave with the small strip of land they had when they were welcomed into Canada by the Great Man who created Canada. General James Wolfe. Viva Wolfe...
Great Big Whacking National News?
Inside the bio-dome that is Ottawa I guess.
Pfff....Trudeau running for the Liberals? He won't win. This is just a complicated Tory fundraising plot.
Mulcair is sitting where he is now because of Quebec support, he will be the biggest loser should Justin Trudeau or even Marc Garneau become leader of the Liberals.
Now behold the Libertarians, their hearts will always be pure and free from corruption for they shall never know power.
We won't have the explicit power of being elected, but the implicit power of influence and the moral high ground. Witness the Ron Paul people's infiltration of the GOP.
Silly me. Here I thought issues of the state of our health care system, an aging demographic, international terrorism, oil pipe lines, where the billions in bail out money for the CBC will come from, beef recalls, robo calls, defence spending, northern developement, international trade agreements, govenment corruption in Quebec and Ontario, foriegn take overs of national resources, and conditions on native reserves, where the burning issues for Canadians.
Nope, not according to a poll company that's run by a liberal strategist.
The biggest issue?
National unity.....which when I input into my BS translator is actually read as, what goodies do we give to Quebec so they will vote liberal again.
Also part and parcel of this "crisis" is that liberals have a pretty face to answer the crisis in the person of one Justin Trudeau....
Well stop the presses, I guess I haven't been paying attention, or I've been distracted.
Then again maybe Frank is just making it up.
He wouldn't do that now would he.
Politically and morally bankrupt for years the Libels will probably successfully divert enough support away from the Dippers to ensure another CPC majority. Great news!
If it ever comes down to another pissing match over Quebec seperation I honestly do not think the West will bend over backwards to keep them. I am also starting to think that a healthy % of Ontarians are realizing their future is with the ROC and not Quebec. Things have changed in this country 'big time' since the '70s.