Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Harper's Leadership Problem

If I was an opposition party researcher, I would hang on to this story. If the next election is to be run on "leadership", how could one do better than to use the following line:
"Harper runs into trouble when Harper runs out of script."
If I was in an opposition party's communications shop, I think I would be pushing that line as often as possible, until the writ is dropped. It seems to me, a case may be made that Harper is in fact a control freak for a reason. If Harper is not in total control of events, he quickly loses control of the issue. True leadership requires someone who can improvise when they are not in total control. Harper is just not up to the job.

Update: Thanks to the eagle eyed readers for the edit. :)
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3 comments:

  1. "Harper is just up to the job."

    Just or just not?

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  2. Well, I'm sure Greg meant "just not" though it could be argued that he's just barely up to it - assuming he never faces a crisis or other difficult event or issue.

    The Liberals were defeated because a not so insigificant portion of Canadians were tired of them - I don't think it will take very much longer for them to get sick of the Harper government.

    Concerning this article, I'd love to see the Liberals rise to say to Harper, "you had an option" when it comes to making nakedly partisan patronage appointments.

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  3. I recognize that scripting line from Right Side Up -- it was Wells' analysis of Stephen Harper on the campaign trail in '04 and in '06. (And it's dead on.)

    I say take your best shot -- Parliament dissolved in mid-February means an early April election, no?

    ***

    That said, this sort of thing is what happened last session, which led to the prorogation, the Throne Speech, and all that fun in October.

    It's fun to watch as a sporting event...

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