Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Mulclair changes tack on oil sands opposition

Mulclair in a suitably unflattering
picture.
From www.stephentaylor.ca
Thomas Mulclair, the leader of the federal NDP, is somewhat changing his tune on the oil sands. Whereas before he criticised them on economic grounds, now he's gone back to tried and true environmental criticism.


It seems Mulclair has figured out what Layton knew all along - economics are the strong suit of the oil sands and picking a fight over money is an inexplicably stupid way to criticise the industry. Not only did he alienate Albertans with his half baked economic blathering, he alienated all Canadians that work in resource extraction industries, which is a lot of them.

Having a platform that says "industries other than manufacturing damage Canada because they drive up the dollar" is a lot less effective than saying "the oil sands are an environmental disaster", even if both statements resort to uninformed populism of the lowest order. NDPers want to hate oil companies, damn it, not making money! 

Perhaps voters will reward him for getting back on message, or perhaps they'll punish him for his inconsistency and pussying out of his original position. Your guess is as good as mine, I won't pretend to know how someone that would ever vote for the NDP thinks. In reality this will probably be long forgotten by the next election, which is likely to be in late 2015.

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