Some Friendly Advice

If you want to control the message and spin bad news in a better light, it's probably not a good idea to invite "select" reporters to a private meeting and then scurry around like cockroaches when the rest of the media find out about it. Doing that makes it look like you really do have something to hide. Of course Harper, chess master and control freak, won't probably take this advice, simply because it's unlikely that he or any of his minions read my humble little blog, but really, you'd think it was obvious. The optics of having your party office searched by Mounties is bad enough, adding insult to your own injuries by acting underhanded isn't going to help.

So did the "select" reporters give the Tories a break in their reports? You be the judge. Here's CTV's report on the meeting, CTV being one of the news organizations invited. Nope, pretty much the same story as reported by the uninvited CBC. How about the invited Toronto Star's story on the event? Not bad, it at least puts out some of the Tory position on the topic, but probably not as well as the Conservatives would have liked. Additionally on the Star's web page, the uninvited Canadian Press story was above and more prominent and did just a good job of painting the Tories as sneaky. Even the usually sycophantic Calgary Herald's story, a Canwest Global, uninvited, article was not what the Tories were looking for.

So by basically throwing gasoline on the fire, the Tories have managed to single handedly spin the story in the wrong direction. The opposition couldn't have done better than this, even if they were actually effective. It makes me wonder what Stephen Harper was thinking when he ordered it. Especially given his minions failed to invite Canwest-Global, often seen as Fox News North, to the party. Failing to invite your biggest media supporter was probably not a good way to get the spin you wanted. This all may be pointing to Harper's micro managerial style starting to catch up with him. Like a plate spinner with too many plates, a micro manager eventually hits the point where he just can't keep everything up. Eventually things start to crash down around him. This may be that point with Harper. He can't control everything and thing are starting to get out. He and his party, having created one of the most secretive governments in Canada outside of Alberta while playing lip service to accountability, are apparently doing the things they accused the previous government of doing. Shady party funding, multiple untendered contracts to friends, lying through their teeth and so on. It's no wonder that the party is getting little traction with voters who aren't part of the Tory base support. Why would they, they're no better than the last lot.

With stuff like this starting to leak out, it will be interesting to see how things happen next election, should the Grits grab a spine and call one.