Senator Brown from Massachusetts - There is plenty of coverage on what the surprise victory of Scott Brown as the Massachusetts Senator to replace the late Ted Kennedy means. The shine has clearly gone off of the Obama image and the challenge of living up to overhyped expectations are coming home to roost. Having been in various campaigns, I know the temptation of going all out to promise what you can but in the long run, it is always better politics to undersell and over-deliver than vice-versa. In the long run, more lasting change will be accomplished and I think this will hold even more true in the decade to come (with the cynicism and lowered expectations of politicians in general) than it even has in the past.
I do note with interest that Senator Brown is a member of a Christian Reformed congregation.
Protesting Progatation - So today is the day for prorogation protests and it would seem that the various local protests attracted hundreds and the Parliament Hill protest about three thousand. While the Conservatives have clearly lost some public shine due to this manourvre, there are two explanations at play that need to be taken into account. First, prorogation while not that big of a deal on its own, plays into the opposition brand of Harper as a dictator and one-man show. This would appear to be the new opposition branding (replacing the secret agenda brand which was the opposition theme in the previous three elections) and it makes sense for the opposition to stretch it for all its worth. Secondly, the sustaining of this campaign for a month indicates an opposition that has managed to figure out how to make some mileage out of an issue. It also indicates the appetite of the media to turn on the government. (Not that they were ever on the government's side, especially after the PMO did not play to the Press Gallery's rules after the election in 2006, but at least during hte 2006 campaign, the Conservatives did benefit from the media's turning on the Liberals during the sponsorship scandal and 2006 campaign.)
At the end of the day, the prorogation controversy of early 2010 will be long forgotten by the time of the next election as a significant issue. However, it may have helped condition the environment for a different approach of negative branding of the Prime Minister to take root.
Four Years In - There are various columns opining on the virtues and vices of the government on this, the fourth anniversary of their election. Much of it is predicable and expected. I thought however, this take by Darrel Bricker cited in David Akin's column to be insightful:
"I think the biggest change since the election of Stephen Harper is that the power base of politics in this country has moved more rural and more west," Darrell Bricker, CEO and president of Ipsos Reid, said. "That's a substantial and significant change from the Liberal days when the power base of the country, for federal politics, was basically Ontario."
Issues or values important to westerners, Bricker said, have become a core part of the national agenda, "in a way they just simply weren't, especially under Jean Chrétien."
In the meantime, the Liberals have, perhaps finally, realized that Harper's tenure is not a Liberal interregnum and they are taking what they hope are some serious, credible steps at becoming Harper's alternative.
"We talk too easily within this party about being the natural party of government," Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff said in Ottawa on Wednesday. "If I can achieve one thing as a leader of this party, it's to get that out of our vocabulary."
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