Tag: conservative party

BREAKING NEWS — Khan crosses floor — EXCLUSIVE

I am now reporting that Wajid Khan will join the Conservative ranks tomorrow as a backbench MP. Doing so protects Khan from cynicism of the press and opposition of making such a political move for career advancement, or for monetary considerations. Khan joins the Tories without taking a position in either cabinet or as a Parliamentary secretary.

This move has been a long time coming and I expected to report on this just after the Liberal leadership convention as such a move would have been wise political strategy to deflate the post-convention bounce in the polls that benefitted the Liberal party.

Khan is expected to make a formal announcement tomorrow and will likely describe that he is switching parties because of the “values” that the Prime Minister represents.

UPDATE: Liberals are reportedly doing their best tonight to lobby Khan to keep him from leaving their caucus.

OTHER THOUGHTS: Khan should have to face nomination in his own riding with the local Conservative EDA before he should attain the label of “incumbent” in the next election. Khan switching to the Conservatives nets no discernible gain for Khan (from backbench MP to backbench MP) and it should net no discernible gain for him in the future (such as having his nomination grandfathered, as the Liberals do). Before Belinda Stronach faced the voters in Newmarket-Aurora, were the Liberal members of that riding given the opportunity to challenge her nomination before the next election? Let’s hope that Khan will have to stand for nomination for the party before he faces the voters.

UPDATE Jan 5, 9am: Dion draws a line in the sand. Susan Delacourt reports on the Liberal leader’s new ultimatum for Wajid Khan.

If this story is subsequently reported on television, radio, in a newspaper, or on an MSM website, please give proper citation to this blog.

Leadership web campaign heats up?

Today I noticed a couple interesting things as I was meandering around the Internet. As I was googling on Google, I noticed some rather savvy/sneaky techniques used by Belinda Stronach, Stephen Harper and Tony Clement. It seems that if one searches for Tony Clement on Google, a Belinda Stronach ad is displayed as a Google advertisement off to the side. Similarly, if one searches Stephen Harper the very same thing happens; plainly and emphatically “Belinda Stronach campaign. Join. Recruit. Vote.” I found this little strategy to be a little amusing and to her campaign team’s credit, very clever. Out of the three, Belinda Stronach has the most polished website, with its very own blog and sophisticated recruitment program. Stephen Harper has a website which is decent in comparison while Tony Clement’s website is so very very basic. More interestingly is the backlash by the campaign team of Stephen Harper in response to the Google campaign of Belinda Stronach. When one googles Stephen Harper there’s the Belinda Stronach ad but under it is a much more interesting ad. It’s an ad that seems to point to the fake internet address “Shesabillionairedamnit.ca” with the tagline which says something like “She’s a billionaire damnit. Click. her. ads. waste. her. money”. When you click on the advertisement it redirects you to the campaign website of Stephen Harper.

Interesting indeed.

I wish that I had gotten a screen shot because when I reloaded the Google search in disbelief, the Shesabillionairedamnit ad had disappeared. Maybe my clickthrough on the google ad had capped-off the ad’s daily spending limit? Anyways, is this a sign that Stephen Harper’s team is feeling a little heat from Belinda Stronach? I wish that I had gotten a screen shot because when I reloaded the Google search in disbelief, the Shesabillionairedamnit ad had disappeared. Maybe my clickthrough on the google ad had capped-off the ad’s daily spending limit? So, a google war between Stephen Harper and Belinda Stronach. We’ll just see how much of an effect these internet campaigns will have on the leadership race.

Oh, and Tony: Really! Please do something about your website!

Happy Family

It’s good to see that the first Conservative Party of Canada caucus meeting went very well today. Today’s meeting represented the final step for the merging/reunification of both Canadian Alliance and Progressive Conservative caucuses and the first step of working together as one united front against Paul Martin’s liberals.

It seems as though much of the same had been discussed separately but now we are seeing conservative coordination concerning policy and House strategy.

Glad to see it.