Tim Hudak’s spin appears to make him ignorant to the political process…

Posted on 19 January 2010

First off, Cabinet shuffles are routine in the Canadian system.  And no, not Harper’s version of “routine” which has led to other angry rants lately, but legitimately routine.  Both Harper and McGuinty have shuffled their respective Cabinets this week, and I have no problem with either.  Sometimes these things just need to happen.

That said, today I noticed this brilliant tweet from the Ontario Leader of the Opposition Tim Hudak (@timhudak): “About to go on 610 AM CKTB re: McGuinty Cabinet Shuffle that resulted in now six Lib Cabinet Ministers abandoning ship within a year #pcpo”

Here is where I don’t get his spin – no one has “abandoned ship” as he is trying to play off.  Yes, one instance, David Caplan, stepped down because of his mismanagement of his ministry.  We all know that.  But the remaining five?  Not even close.  Both George Smitherman and Jim Watson are pursuing other interests outside of provincial politics by running for Mayor of their respective cities.  The three ministers who left the Cabinet yesterday – Donna Cansfield, Ted McMeekin, and Aileen Carroll are all on their way out it looks, and not seeking reelection after long public careers.  What would be the point of keeping them in Cabinet when there is an opportunity to elevate some backbench MP’s to a strong leadership position in Cabinet to show what they can do?  From an electoral success prospective, looking to prove you have many strong leaders in your caucusmis a very smart move.

Clearly Hudak is grasping at straws to make McGuinty look like an idiot, and for some reason it is working.  I have definitely addressed the danger of Hudak’s misleading spin before and this is just another example of the same.

See, I have no problems with Harper doing a Cabinet shuffle.  Admittedly, I would have put different people in different positions, but that is not the point.  The simple point is there is really little reason for Hudak to be spinning this beyond selfish partisan reasons.  And of course it is in his typical vein, incredibly misleading to the public, on the verge of lies.  I honestly don’t understand why the people of Ontario seem to be resonating with his spin – it is almost completely baseless.

This just reminds me that the Ontario Liberals really need to step up in their message communication.  This is their major problem right now.  Their policies and moves haven’t been bad ones, but the spin machine of Tim Hudak is strong and misleading to the public… and worst of all much stronger than the Liberal communications department.  The Ontario Liberals need to step up their communication, and quickly, or Hudak is going to get what he wants.  The current polls show it is working, and that scares me, because there is no legitimate reason it should be.  He has zero legitimate talking points.