The Tories: still in the penalty box

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 15/06/2024 (451 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

“In the suburbs of Winnipeg…the NDP has a commanding lead of 58 per cent, compared to 31 per cent for the Tories” Free Press, June 13.

I will never forget where I was in September of 2023 when the Manitoba Tories blew my mind.

I was on Kenaston Boulevard, driving deep in the suburbs of conservative south Winnipeg when I saw the Manitoba PC billboard, bragging about the decision not to dig. The political voice inside my head shouted, “The Tories have just kissed their asses goodbye.”

It didn’t take a senior political analyst with half a century of media experience to see what I saw and feel what I felt.

Despite seven years of Conservative Arctic Cold on Broadway, there was no statement made in the legislature by any of the lead dogs in government that contained the contempt for the intelligence of Manitobans like that billboard near IKEA. It takes minutes to assemble some of the Swedish furniture sold in that big blue and yellow box on Kenaston. It couldn’t have taken more than 10 minutes to make the dumbest decision in the history of campaign politics, approving the message that Conservatives did not care about the dignity of murdered Indigenous women.

The people driving the PC campaign into the ditch could not have understood that the billboard forced every Conservative voter to make an instant decision on whether the government of the day spoke for them.

In my lifetime, I have never had such a violent political U-turn. Before the billboard, like so many reliable PC voters, I was prepared to vote for them again. It wouldn’t have been an endorsement of the PCs — simply another vote against the NDP. But on that dark day in September of 2023, my mind did not care about rewarding the NDP. I just wanted to open the gate and put the PCs in the penalty box. The political referee in me was giving the Tories a major for roughing, a game misconduct, and a conversation about a long term suspension.

We are on the eve of a byelection in Tuxedo. The most credible pollster in Manitoba, Probe Research, did an extensive survey only days ago. It tells us the Kinew crew is even more popular provincewide than they were in October of last year, when they swept the Conservatives from power. And they are more popular deep in the conservative suburbs of Winnipeg, where the Kenaston billboard gave Conservative voters like me an epiphany. In the biblical epiphany, the Gentiles see Jesus. In the Manitoba epiphany, Conservatives see red, and gave themselves the green light to vote orange.

In the fall of 1999, I was hosting a show on Manitoba’s most-listened-to radio station. Whoever sat in that coveted chair over several decades knew that their voice was not only heard, but actually listened to. Being highly cognizant of the power of that CJOB microphone, I was careful to say what needed to be said after Gary Doer’s NDP replaced Gary Filmon’s Conservatives.

I remember telling the audience, which was predominantly conservative, that while this was an Armageddon election for the Manitoba Tories, it was not the end of the world in Manitoba and that it was OK to like Gary Doer.

He may not have been my choice. But he was not dangerous for Manitoba.

Today on the eve of the byelection in Tuxedo, my message to PC voters is not dissimilar to what it was 25 years ago.

It’s OK to like Wab Kinew. He’s not dangerous. The Manitoba PCs are in a dark place. Their voters have scolded them, punished them and in some cases abandoned them. Voters are not yet prepared to bring them out of the penalty box.

But while it may feel like the end of the world for the Tories, the skies of Manitoba remain blue. The people of Manitoba continue to have jobs and, for the most part, a more affordable life than many Canadians in many other parts of our country.

I will not make a prediction about the outcome on Tuesday. I live in Fort Garry. So I don’t get a vote in Tuexedo.

But if I were casting a ballot in a provincial election right now, it would be to keep the PCs in the penalty box. Three reasons. (1) I’m not ready to return to my old habit of voting PC. (2) I don’t dislike the current NDP government. (3) I like Wab Kinew.

Charles Adler is a longtime political commenter and podcaster. charles@charlesadler.com