Christy Clark shows guts; leaving one male clubhouse for another

Christy Clark - "This campaign is about offering our province
new leadership - leadership that extends beyond one person
and one way communication." 

Bridgitte Anderson, Gordon Campbell's former press secretary - who always conducted herself politely and professionally - posted on my Facebook Wall after Christy Clark announced that she was entering the race to become leader of the BC Liberals (read: Ian Bailey's report in The Globe and Mail), "... where is the female perspective on (CKNW)??"

We might all ask, where is the female p-o-v on any of the geezer media platforms in British Columbia?

Mike Smyth - CKNW's go-to fill-in host -
is interim replacement for Ms. Clark

None of the major ink-on-dead-trees daily newspapers - Sun, Province or The Globe and Mail - have a regularly read BC woman's opinion on provincial current affairs. None of the talk radio stations - and there is only CKNW - give voice to a female host now that Ms. Clark has taken a leave from her daily show to devote her energies to winning the Liberal leadership. Her replacement? A nice enough guy, I suppose. Mike Smyth - a neo-con right-wing geezer columnist from the Province. Way to mix-up your content, NW.

Ms. Clark was the one host in CKNW's programming mix that a reasonable listener did not, by sheer willpower, have to fight back from verging on radio rage (similar to road rage but much easier to break a radio than the SUV that just cut you off). Charles Adler's conservatism and cheer-leading for the likes of Don Cherry is cold and disconnected from common Canadians. Bill Good is a shill for his friend and neighbour Gordon Campbell. When Mr, Good isn't openly expressing his love and admiration for the former BC  Premier, he is quite simply boring and nap-inducing.

The difference between Ms. Clark and NW's male hosts was her liberal morality versus their entrenched, immovable, white middle-aged and male morals of conservative phobias and -isms.

In-studio on my former radio talk show.

My former producer of the talk show I had on TALK 1410 - before it was silenced by the corporate powers and replaced with a second made-for-men all sports station for Vancouver - as if one broadcasting all Canucks, all the time wasn't enough - Libby Herman, posted an insightful reply to Ms. Anderson's question:

"Bridgette clearly you haven\t gotten the memo that AM (radio) is for men - the ladies get FM - all hits radio and soft rock... not that there's anything wrong with that. And no, I'm not kidding you. Real words spoken by real people in charge."

And, I will add, the "real people in charge" of geezer media are, for the most part, men.

Men are also in-charge of the BC Liberal party. But, Ms. Clark knows the deck is stacked against her having played smoky, back room political poker with the boys. She distinguished herself as former minister of education and deputy premier when Mr. Campbell's Liberals took power in 2001.

She also distinguished herself among her male lesser-thans on CKNW. Advocating on behalf of Pink Shirt Day and anti-bullying, outspoken on issues affecting families, and proving she had the most important skill for a talk show host - a willingness to listen - Ms. Clark exhibited an honest openness to new ideas and solutions. Hopefully, she has the toughness to defend against the close-minded political bullies she will face in the leadership campaign.

She will be off-air until the Liberals choose if she or another candidate will replace Mr. Campbell as leader and Premier. During the campaign, Ms. Clarke's perspective will bring her refreshingly female perspective, ideas and solutions to a much larger audience than ever listened to her, sandwiched as she was in a clubhouse of male blowhards on CKNW.

It is a bonus for the BC public that her return to politics might divert attention from the caterwauling of Jenny Kwan and the Gang of 13 scratching within the BC NDP. I said it, so meow.

The 'Kwan-dary' of NDP unity in BC

Kwan with James - Happier times
or eye-on-the-camera?

Catherine de'Medici left no
permanent legacy

Interviewed by  Evan Solomon on CBC's Power and Politics today (watch: full interview), Jenny Kwan - speaking out of the left-side of her mouth about "values" being what unites the British Columbia NDP - brought to mind Catherine de' Medici. A dowager queen of the NDP, if you will.

Values, indeed. Ms. Kwan's values split the NDP and led to the abdication of the ethical, if not electable, Carole James.

The longest continuous serving New Democrat MLA in BC and decidedly on the left-wing of the party, Ms. Kwan told Solomon that she has no leadership aspirations. How could she? She has shown none of the values of leadership in this ugly mugging. But on which candidate will she place her de' Medici touch?

If the NDP emerges united it would be well advised to exclude Ms. Kwan from important political decisions and dispense with her advice and, so-called, values. She should be left with no permanent legacy.

Nuovi Democratici di British Columbia cosa nostra

British Columbia's New Democrats need a Joseph Valachi to reveal its inner workings after the hit on leader Carole James by the parties Gang of 13. 



For the good of the party, there will be nothing like the "Valachi Papers" coming from Ms. James, Joseph 'Joe Cargo' Valachi's testimony before US Senate committees in the early 60s named names, gave history and structure, revealed that American mafiosi referred to their organization by the term cosa nostra ("our thing" or "this thing of ours").


The public knows only some of the names after the two sides went to the mattresses in the NDP's all-out gang war. The Gang of 13 have been identified, led by longtime, made-NDPers Jenny Kwan, Harry Lali and Leonard Krog, and the likes of hypocritical Laura "The Bag Lady" Popham who accused James of commanding "same old, same old" party politics despite doing the same.      


Whose thing is the NDP in BC? Has the Gang of 13 taken over? Is labour pulling the strings? 


This much is clear after union leaders played middle-man in 11th hour dealings that left James with an offer she could not refuse (read: The Globe and Mail's Gary Mason, A timeline of the downfall of Carole James), the NDP are leaning left from the centre that James had been attempting to drag the party. Whose side was labour on in this turf-war? It is doubtful they wanted James to succeed in making the NDP more legitimate to business. 


Back in the day, back on the prairie where Canadian socialism was bred, we learned quickly that the party was run like the mafia. It still is run as "their thing," But back then loyalty was demanded, unlike this thing of theirs today.

  
  

Desolation Sound: of the BC political toilet flushing

British Columbia - The BC Liberals never anticapted a scenario in which a series of events, both within and beyond their control, would lead to the party's self-destruction.

An unscientific RT poll on globeandmail.com this week asked BC: Do you agree with former energy minister Bill Bennett?

Bennett was fired from cabinet and then fired back with a believable salvo denegrating Premier Gordon Campbell's character. Some of the statements he made in the heat-of-the-moment he has since retracted.

Bennett said: "The (BC Liberal) party is going down the toilet. If we don't have a fresh start, I fear it's going to go the same was as the Social Credit party went." Eight-seven percent agree.

But wait a minute. It is widely known that friends brought Mr. Campbell to power as the leader of a, so-called, Liberal Party. It was his creation - a coalition that folded the Socreds - a party that, if we follow Mr. Bennett's argument, was a political septic tank. Campbell and Co. took that sewage and treated it with their idea of BC-style liberalism.

"It was the biggest dump of my life!"

The effluent didn't start to stink until bad politics and worse politicians - notably Mr. Campbell and his finance minister Colin Hansen - gave rise to a grassroots campaign rebellion, led by odorous and opportunist former Socred Premier Bill Vander Zalm, against the toxic idea of the HST. Campbell's popularity plunged and now the party is decomposing.

The next sound you'll hear is the Liberal caucus flushing Mr. Bennett down the drain.

The big question is, what will rise from the stench of the BC Liberal Party? Likely, more neo-con crap.

Out here, in the country on the BC Sunshine Coast, we say you can never have enough poop for growing in our gardens. Politically, the province is up to its neck in shit, its plugging up the works and, unlike gardening, political poop is not good for growth.

PHOTO CREDITS: www.theglobeandmail.com  

The end of the road

I have changed somewhat, as is evident in this picture. A bit scruffier, seeking more the life of a voluntary peasant, and suited in mind and spirit to small town life at the end-of-the-road.
Many times in the past, I've asked, I'm living at the end of a one-way dead-end street, how did I get here? I'm here. I know how and why. I can see beyond; beyond Major Rock, Hernando Island and the mountains of Vancouver Island.

The road ends, for now, on British Columbia's Sunshine Coast in the harbour village of Lund. Lund is where highway 101 ends; where I have taken residence in a small and delightful single-wide trailer, secluded in the trees above a stream; overlooking the wonder; where I will write and document and report, as I have done throughout my career. But, no more constrained by corporate or commission interests.

This isn't so much about me. I write this only to apprise you that there has been change. I will write about my life, the people and the experiences of Lund, because there are stories to be told here, I assure you. But my continuing duty as a journalist is to make the invisible truth of the news seen.

As always, with reason, respect and common sense.