The Bill and Christy Show

Bill Good, CKNW

BC Liberal leadership candidate Christy Clark appeared on the Bill Good Show (CKNW) this morning. Here are some of the highlights from her answers to Good's softball questions. (If Ms. Clark loses the race at the end of February, she has said she'll return to her former radio show on NW, but a better fit would be to liven up Mr. Good's tired, old jalopy. The pair sounded more like co-hosts this morning than a journalist throwing hardballs at a politician.)

Christy Clark at rally announcing her
BC Liberal leadership candidacy

On leadership: Ms. Clark promises a different kind of politcal cultural - one that is inclusive. One that listens to British Columbians, including cabinet and caucus in decision making.

On the NDP: if elected government, would beat-up British Columbia. Ms. Clark conjured the favourite Liberal bogeyman that just isn't scary anymore - of an NDP government. Eeeek! She trotted out the old saying: "Remember the 90s, 50,000 people fled BC because of the NDP." Remember, Ms. Clark, that was a decade and three Liberal mandates ago, and a fact disputed by thetyee.ca's Andrew MacLeod (read; The Hook).

On Education: Ms. Clark served as minister of education and deputy premier in Gordon Campbell's first government (2001). She defended her decisions while education minister, but Mr. Good did not ask if a Clark government would restore sweeping funding to education during the Campell years that begin in her tenure. As a result, her relationship with the BCTF was sour.

But Ms. Clark argues education is not just about the BCTF, it's about parents, about principals, vice-principals and schools. Parents, in her mind, are the primary educators.

She instituted parent councils while education minister for four-and-half years, requiring schools be accountable to parents and parents would be involved in that accountability - a position she stands by.

She also - "absolutely" - believes in her decision to removed public school boundaries and let parents decided where their kids would schooled. The alternative is that the government becomes the parent and decides where kids go to school.

Ms. Clark wants a strong education system for parents. She didn't mention kids involvement in education. Ms. Clark has chosen a faith-based education for her own son, who attends a Catholic school. She believes private schools should continue to receive public funds in BC.

 "(If) All schools will be run by government, then government is the parent while your kids are in school."

"I don't think anyone is served by a public monopoly."

On the Harmonized Sales Tax: Ms. Clark is pro-HST. In responding to the anti-HST petition that has resulted in a fall referendum, Clark said to remember what that public demanded. Those 700,00 who signed-up for former Premier Bill Vander Zalm's revolt demanded an end to the HST, that's only 10% of the population that doesn't want it. Her opponents are unanimously against her position to have another free-vote in the legislature.

"I'm not saying it must go to legislature, but let's talk about this option," said Ms. Clark.

She wants MLAs to go back to their constituencies and listen again. If, by the end of March, the polls are what they are now, put it to a vote and get it over with. Or, change the polls by listening and selling the HST. (Good salesmen always claim they don't want to sell anything, just listen, yet all the while listening for the moment when they can start selling.)

Ms. Clark believes that if you change public opinion or if the anti-HST number stays the same, or close, then the decision can be made in the legislature, and there would be no need to spend $30M to pay for the referendum).

On "familes first": Specific policies on family first, the core principal of her campaign, are still forthcoming. Philosophically, as premier, she would use the family perspective as a lense for all policy. Every piece of Liberal legislation in a Clark government would be prefaced with the question, "Is this good for families?

On Liberals: "BC Liberals stick together," said Ms. Clark, taking a clear and cheap shot at the NDP, and forgetting the two former Liberal cabinet members who are no longer stuck. Would Ms. Clark open the Liberal caucus door for a return of Blair Lekstrom, who quit the Liberal and cabinet over the HST? Yes. She's less certain about Bill Bennett after caucus expelled him for his bombast against Gordon Campbell. She isn't sure if the Liberal caucus would be in favour of welcoming Bennett back.

She's the only leadership candidate to have taken the attack to the NDP over that party's in-fighting.

For the Liberals, who have just begun the delegate selection process that will decide the new leader on February 26th, is Christy Clark good for the party?

Thar blows the poll

British Columbia political tides are shifting and there are unseen sandbars, deadheads and submerged rocks ahead.

New Angus Reid Public Opinion poll charts the latest waters in BC's political sea

Geezer newsrooms and political back rooms have their jibs aflutter about the poll (click here for: Angus Reid Public Opinion poll) showing the BC Liberal and NDP parties are dead-even at 36%, revealing that the west coast prefers its politics leaderless.

The numbers are telling tales of mutinies in the recent headlines.

Reading Desolation Sound; a history, by Heather Harbord, it's surprising how many captains shipwrecked in the early days on the Sunshine Coast.

When captains are left too long and fall asleep at the rudder, the ship oft runs aground. Rats scamper, as was seen when Gordon Campbell's ship started taking on water and almost capsized before he relinquished command; as is happening in the aftermath of the Jenny Kwan-led sedition that scuttled Carole James.

First to summon all hands on deck, and frantically manning the bilge pumps, The Liberals. According to the winds of change that polls track, the first to get shipshape and become seaworthy. The NDP is just now limping into harbour where it will remain in dry dock until the barnacles are scraped from its rusty hull and a new captain emerges to muster unity.

And, most critically, who will be O Captain! My Captain!... From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won...?"

At the Liberal helm, if Angus Reid's cyphering of the sextant readings holds until the convention in 12 weeks? A woman. Bad luck?

It was long considered bad luck to permit women to sail on board naval vessels. To do so would invite a terrible storm that would wreck the ship. The only women that were welcomed on board were figureheads mounted on the prow of the ship. - Wikipedia

Carole James was made to walk the gangplank - actually, more myth than pirate precedent. But tell that Jenny Kwan who, incidentally, polls even with Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson - who Robertson will not be a leadership contender for either party, so forget about it - at 27% behind front-runner Mike Farnworth with 34%.

The Liberal admiralty and officers - all-male opponents who would dismiss Ms. Clarke's seamanship - threaten to gang-up and the front-runner overboard as harbinger of an ill-fated voyage after bringing-about on the HST to set a prior course for a free vote by MLAs. (Read: Ian Bailey's story in The Globe and Mail) But Clark has been ashore for a while. She's listened and learned. There is strategy in her tack.

Aye, the HST, the tax that three-in-five British Columbians are against, is the albatross around both party's necks. But which mariner will shoot the bird dead and which will wear it dead around their neck, is a rime yet written.




  

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.