oh oh!! here’s an interesting ethical dilemma…

Last night went to an all-candidates forum to learn just what the candidates might have to say. Generally it was disappointing, because there was no back-and-forth between/among the various candidates, just each one answering a series of mundane and oft-time unfortunately ill-conceived questions from a somewhat disinterested moderator. Moreover they only had 150 seconds, when in many instances the questions would require several minutes at a minimum.

Secondly, for some reason, announced as a family emergency, the CPC candidate was not in attendance (and amazingly the Party didn’t even have a stand-in). This was a double problem since the candidate was not chosen by the Riding, but by someone somewhere else. But more on that in another conversation.

What I want to say is based solely on what I heard.
• The Green Party replacement candidate had obviously not been coached and hadn’t been chosen based on his ability to even read his notes, let alone answer simple questions. I will say no more: this Party is crumbling into a non-relevant mess…
• The PPC is alive and their candidate provided the most poignant answers of anyone but at times there was an arrogance that was a little hard to stomach given that the Party has been all but invisible, and there were too many references to the internet…
• So strike the two men from the option list: they may get votes, but only from the truly disaffected and the obscure (and according to the author Thomas Hardy, that would be anyone with the name, Jude!! – that’s for you Clare!!)
• so the remaining candidates are all women: luckily JT is gone so even the Liberal candidate can be strong. And therein lies the ethical dilemma for me…
• the NDP candidate took credit for everything that the government has done that has run up the deficit but helped provide some social goods and took no responsibility for propping up the most unethical government I have ever seen. She is a hard working campaigner and has already done something the current NDP MP has never done, responded to one of my emails. But even in that email response which I received today, she ducked any responsibility for the Party’s failures and repeated the Party-line on social issues. We have found only one item of common ground: so obviously she does not provoke any ethically uncertainty in me.
• the Liberal candidate was the most forthright person on the stage – often admitting to not having all the answers. Now, she has been parachuted into the Riding, probably because no one wanted the task. And even though the NDP’er tried to claim being the best to represent Aboriginal aspirations, the Liberal lady actually is an Aboriginal; in fact, a former Chief of a Band north of the Okanagan. Moreover she is in her seventies, although she looks at least ten years younger. She never whined about the tough road that Aboriginals have dealt with; she didn’t even make a big pitch on the Residential School theme. But she did come across as the most thoughtful, the most composed, the least negative, and generally respectful of all the other Candidates (even the one who was absent).
• So what’s the dilemma? Well she did have one flaw – her comments about her leader were obviously from canned notes. As you know I have serious doubts that he is anything other than Trudeau 2.0 with better suits. The policies are the same and where there is any difference it’s due to the addition of leftist steroids & momentary plagiarism of Conservative policies. But I will give her credit, she has me thinking and I am going to reach out to see if I can at least have a Starbuck’s moment. She reminds me of what I think my Great Uncle William Sinclair might have been like (although I doubt she is Presbyterian, and I know she wasn’t a friend of MacKenzie King!!)

So stay tuned – I’m going to an oyster festival tomorrow – maybe that will help clear my mind. By the way, my candidate for city council, came second…

In the midst of a dilemma…
g.w.