What did you think? Power Play with Tom Clark

A lot of new segments, not enough of the dirt.

Political gossip was what made Mike Duffy popular, and the new Power Play, with Tom Clark, is long on education and short on the dirt. Noble in its efforts, but the path to bad ratings is lined with good intentions.

Overall a creative effort, and very watchable. Good educational intent, but short on the background details hard-core viewers are looking for.


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update: It seems official: Craig Oliver's over-the-top attack on the Prime Minister has distracted much of the attention away from the admirable effort put forward by new Power Play anchor, Tom Clark.

Several times in the lead up to the Oliver segment, Clark said we'd see, "Craig Oliver like you've never seen him before." Let's hope we never see that side of Craig Oliver again.

Who's the Boss?

Dion added: "Many people told me I was great on radio."

Resign.



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Seperatist says wha?

“But certainly if Mr. Sarkozy was referring to sovereignty as a divisive project, that's not the case,” Ms. Marois said.

Separation seems pretty divisive to me.


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Garth Turner going down to defeat

Couldn't happen to a more deserving narcissistic fella. Shows that the voters can always suss out who is being genuine, and who isn't.


Halton
Last updated: 22:18 ET
Party
Candidate
Votes
% Votes

Conservative
Lisa Raitt
2,111
51.2

Liberal
Garth Turner
1,376
33.4

Total number of valid votes:

4,123


Polls reporting: 20/284
Voter turnout: 4,123 of 114,081 registered electors (3.6%)

All over but the crying..

..and the celebrating..

..and the plotting..

..and the second coming.

And this man wants to be Prime Minister?

Is this a case of Christmas coming early for the Conservatives?

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Garth Turner: Wrong too many times to be believed (Now with G&M article)

Some pray that Canada suffers a debilitating recession, and others preach only doom and gloom.

Well, they have an agenda to pursue, don't they?

The Toronto Star, of all places, puts things in perspective:

Yet the wider economy is doing well. The well-publicized loss of manufacturing jobs, concentrated in Central Canada, amounts to 353,000 jobs since 2002. But in that same six-year period, Canada generated a net increase of 1.5 million new jobs, and not only in relatively low-paying tourism and food service sectors but professional, scientific and technical services as well as the health-care and social-assistance fields. Average hourly wages were $20.41 in 2007, up from $17.66 in 2002. And unemployment figures for Canada and the United States are going in opposite directions. The Canadian jobless rate for last month was 6.1 per cent, down from 7.5 per cent in 2002. The U.S. unemployment rate also is 6.1 per cent, but that's up from the 4 per cent to 5 per cent range earlier in the decade.

So, whenever you hear someone crying out that the sky is falling, just remember, they also may have told you to buy Nortel stock:

In a Canoe "Money" chat room back on Sept. 27, 2000, Turner assured participants that the stock market was undergoing a mini-correction, that the Dow would hit 30,000 by 2006, and that "Nortel [then trading at $96.60] is a wonderful company and, given the recent decline, I think it is a strong 'buy.'" That day, the TSE closed at 10,250.

Real the whole article, it provides special insight into Garth Turner's financial acumen.

Cowboy boots and leather blazers distract you from my shortness

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Dion shoots, he misses, and misses again, and misses again, and again, and again..etc

Damn..I wanted to take the day off from the election, but this is just too damn funny.



Kind of sums up the Liberal campaign, doesn't it?

If ever there was a video to spread around at the start of hockey season, this is it.

h/t Taylor

Shout out to Bad Religion fans, help me finish my playlist!

I'm taking an election time out today (CPAC is becoming burned into my TV), and I'm updating my iPod with my Top-10 best songs by various bands. Not Top-9, or Top-11, always Top-10.

However, I'm having some difficulty with my Bad Religion collection..I'm at 9, and am at a loss as to what number 10 should be.

Any Bad Religion fans want to take some time out of their daily politicking and offer a suggestion? If I get two good song suggestions, I'm willing to drop a current selection..any songs on my list that don't deserve to be there?

Top 9 Bad Religion songs I have so far:
1. Broken
2. New Dark Ages
3. Infected
4. Honest Goodbye
5. Atomic Garden
6. Supersonic
7. Better off Dead
8. Social Suicide
9. Shades of Truth
10. ????????? -update - I want to conquer the world

Broken- bad religion
Uploaded by Skeupon

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The second-best sound byte of the night

The best sound byte was when Dion said he wanted to make Canada more "fun".

If anyone comes across it, please let me know.

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Would you vote for this man? - or - He shoots, he loses!

Enter your praise, critiques, captions in the comments.

h/t Political Picture

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Jack, you may have won, but you screwed up!

Jack Layton needed to kick serious butt tonight in the English language debate if he had any chance to replace Dion and the Liberals as official opposition.

He failed. He had the best one liners, and you could say he won the debate, because he did. But he did not win it in a way that will advantage the NDP.

He spent most of the night attacking Harper, when he should have been all over Dion.

Did Layton dislodge any Conservative voters who will now vote for the NDP? No.

Did his attacks on Harper persuade voters for any of the other hippy parties to vote for the NDP? No. Those leaders were repeating the same attacks.

Layton needed to distinguish himself, and by merely being the best of the left in attacking Harper, he did nothing to increase his vote count. At the end of the day, I don't know if the NDP will end up getting any more seats at all after such a wasted effort.

Opportunity lost. Oh well, you can bet the new NDP leader, Thomas Mulcair, won't make the same mistake.



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This (unofficial?) Conservative ad...is a good one

h/t Janke

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Tomorrow's french debate headlines...today!

May needs to improve french language skills

Harper survives debate onslaught

Layton offers Quebec realistic alternative

Duceppe wraps himself in fleur-de-lis

Dion attends debate, disappoints

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Update: Hey! I was right!

Economic turmoil impacts Liberal Party

Bad News Kids. Looks like we may lose the house.

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Sometimes a photo doesn't need a caption...

...you can make up your own...

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Stephane Dion gets tossed under Dalton McGuinty's bus

One of the things that I think that would be a mistake right now is massive shifts in tax burden at a time when there's uncertainty,” said Ontario's Liberal Finance Minister Dwight Duncan.

Ouch.

Good night, and thanks for all the fish!

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How is the Liberal campaign going? Watch this video.

The Liberal Party is unravelling. They can't even maintain control of their own press conferences. If you can't handle the whole two minutes, skip to 1:45.

At least a Liberal supporter showed enough leadership save Dion from the media.

Liberal supporter: This meeting is being hijacked by these...media people.

Media person: It's a press conference!?

Liberal supporter: Oh, is it? Thank you very much..the people here..

Liberal Dion handler: Another question from the media please..

Anarchy ensues.

The Liberals should make that guy the new leader!

LOL. This Liberal uses the same video above, to show what a GOOD job Dion is doing. And that he is, "the sort of leader we need in Canada."

No thanks!

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Campaign messaging 101

Stephen Harper: The country's economic fundamentals are solid and Canada will emerge from this period of economic uncertainty in good shape.

Stephane Dion: The economic sky is falling, and me I have nothing to offer but to panic!

Who are you going to vote for? Yep, and so are a lot of other people.

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