Geez, I Thought Mulroney Was a Conservative!

[Spade]

From the CBC website:
Quote

MacKay asks Tory boss to clarify Mulroney's status
'The Conservative Party of Canada has no lifetime members'
Last Updated: Thursday, April 9, 2009 | 9:27 PM ET
The Canadian Press

A senior cabinet minister has pleaded with the president of the Conservative party to make peace with former prime minister Brian Mulroney — and been rebuffed, sources say.

Defence Minister Peter MacKay called the party boss last week and asked him to issue a public statement clarifying whether, as a former two-term prime minister, Mulroney could be a Conservative member for life.

That conversation with party president Don Plett was brief and unproductive — the Conservative Party of Canada does not offer lifetime memberships and would not make an exception for Mulroney.

Well, why isn't he?

 

[lone wolf]

They want the dues?

 

[Spade]

No happy returns from the PMO to a former Conservative PM on his birthday? Is this some indication of an Tory excommunication?

 

[bobnoorduyn]

Am I missing something here? Hmmm, the Conservative Party has no lifetime members, they don't offer lifetime memberships; why why should they make an exception for Brian Mulroney? He owes his success to Atlantic politicos and his St. FX alumni, Elmer MacKay, and son Peter, among others in turn owe their success to Mulroney. It appears that the Conservatives, as a whole, don't deify their former PM's in the way that Liberals do, nor do they name airports after them.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Spade, referring to the title of the thread, no Mulroney was not a conservative, at least not in the sense of the present day Conservative Party.

Mulroney belongs to the centre right, he was a Red Tory. He was a supporter of abortion rights, gay rights, minority rights, a supporter of multiculturalism, diversity etc. He was also a strong environmentalist.

The current Conservative party is none of these; it is very much a right wing party, in the mould of the old Reform Party or Alliance. There are very few Red Tories in the party (like Peter McKay) and most of them are on their way out. These days the party is dominated by Randy White look-alikes.

Harper is governing from centre right, because he may be crazy, but he is not stupid. He knows centre right is the only way to govern if he wants to stay in power. But Harper himself belongs to the Alliance wing of the Party. Remember his comment about putting up a firewall around Alberta to keep the gay marriage out?

Anybody with Mulroney’s views (or views of Joe Clark, Kim Campbell, John Charest etc.) will not be welcome in the Conservative party today.

The old PC party was dominated by the Red Tories (mostly from the Quebec wing of the party). Conservative Party is dominated by the Blue Tories, Red Tories, whatever are left are on their way out.

So no, Mulroney was definitely not a conservative, not in today’s sense of the word.

 

[Trex]

Mulroney was indeed a Conservative.
And so is Steven Harper.
Trying to pigeon- hole the whereabouts on the great sliding Conservative scale where each particular leader exists is a waste of time.
PET was far, far to the left of Paul Martin. That was as much a function of time as it was of the leaders. It was a different Liberal party in PET's day than it was in Paul Martin's.
The same can be said of the Conservative party.
The political direction a particular party takes is as much a function of time, place and curcumstance as it is the whims of the leader of the day.

Harper is governing as he feels he must in order to maintain his slim margin.
If the Conservatives had a majority Harper would probably try and influence the party slightly to the right.
Increased law and order funding, enhanced and more responsible justice system,
dumping the long gun registry, probably an attempt to make the senate elected, tax cuts if possible, probably reduced funding for wacky special interest groups and "avante garde" artists.
Harper's main leaning is as a fiscal conservative, after all he is an economist.
On the social agenda, frankly I dont really think he cares much.
Trying to brand Harper as a far right idealogue is pure political spin.

In a minority he is however forced to govern slightly more from polling results and that probably reduces his effectiveness as a PM.

As to Iggy, who knows what the heck his values are.
Granted he is a far better choice of leader than that goofy "Beaker" clone Dion.
Iggy got the "Count" moniker in Great Britian where he was considered a right winger.
His policy papers written while an academic at Harvard supported George Bush. Supported the invasion of Iraq.
Supported torture(water boarding).
And supported the moving of prisioners to Cuba and deprriving them of all legal council.
Iggy's policy papers are available at Chapters and Indigo ( I found them there) however I am not buying them and they seemed pretty obscure and long winded to me.

Iggy has berated Steven Harper for not being friendly enough or showing enough respect to "that great politician Brian Mulroney.
Iggy has also gone on record as having affectionate phone conversations with Brian.
Who the heck knows what is going on with that train of logic.
Perhaps Iggy wants Brian to jump into the Liberal camp and run as a Liberal.
Beats the heck out of me.

Harper is governing from center right.
Iggy is wandering around saying anything to anybody and hoping somthing, anything will stick someplace.
I believe Iggys political compass is, in a word, extremely flexabile.

In other words he would say anything in order to win approval.
His published works tend to bear this characteristic out.


Trex

 

[SirJosephPorter]

On the social agenda, frankly I don’t really think he cares much.
Trying to brand Harper as a far right ideologue is pure political spin.

I disagree with you on this, Trex. Harper does care about social issues. When gay marriage was first legalized by the courts, Harper talked of putting up a firewall around Alberta to keep gay marriage out.

Now, I don’t know if he really meant it, or he was saying that just to appease the religious right (which I understand is very strong in Alberta). But he is on record with the firewall comment (along with Klein).

Then he did dig up the gay marriage right after he became the PM, he held another vote. To be fair, after he lost the vote, he gave up on the issue. As I said before, he may be crazy, but he isn’t stupid. His strong anti-environment stand is of course, well known.

There is certainly evidence to suggest that he is right wing when it comes to social issues.

 

[Colpy]

Spade, referring to the title of the thread, no Mulroney was not a conservative, at least not in the sense of the present day Conservative Party.

Mulroney belongs to the centre right, he was a Red Tory. He was a supporter of abortion rights, gay rights, minority rights, a supporter of multiculturalism, diversity etc. He was also a strong environmentalist.

The current Conservative party is none of these; it is very much a right wing party, in the mould of the old Reform Party or Alliance. There are very few Red Tories in the party (like Peter McKay) and most of them are on their way out. These days the party is dominated by Randy White look-alikes.

Harper is governing from centre right, because he may be crazy, but he is not stupid. He knows centre right is the only way to govern if he wants to stay in power. But Harper himself belongs to the Alliance wing of the Party. Remember his comment about putting up a firewall around Alberta to keep the gay marriage out?

Anybody with Mulroney’s views (or views of Joe Clark, Kim Campbell, John Charest etc.) will not be welcome in the Conservative party today.

The old PC party was dominated by the Red Tories (mostly from the Quebec wing of the party). Conservative Party is dominated by the Blue Tories, Red Tories, whatever are left are on their way out.

So no, Mulroney was definitely not a conservative, not in today’s sense of the word.

Not only bull****, but pure unadulterated Liberal propaganda BS.

And I know: I was a member of Reform and the Canadian Alliance.........I only WISH the new Conservative Party was created and existed in that mold.

Like most Liberals, you ability to ignore the clear facts when engaged in an opportunity to smear is beyond comprehension.....you remind me of the old cries of "racist" in the house, aimed at Reform at the orders of the piece of turd Chretien, when Reform had the most multi-cultural caucus in the House.......

The Conservative Party is solidly in the middle of the road, the right wing dragged there, kicking and screaming, by Harper.....

I absolutely am left in awe at the Liberals' ability to try and paint the new Conservative Party with the sins of the PC Gov't under Mulroney........and then 10 seconds later cry "foul" because the Party is different from the PCs.

The truth is that there was absolutely NO difference between the PCs and the Liberals......none.......Brian Mulroney was a Liberal in a blue suit.....determined to hand the nation over to Quebec, corrupt, a liar of immense proportion, arrogant, elitist., an absolute prick, a boil on the arse of society.......a Liberal in essence, if not in Fact.

The only difference (unfortunately) between the new CPC and the Liberals is that the CPC occassionally behaves in a correct manner on the world stage.....and they are not out to seize every one of my firearms.....that's about it.

Unfortunately.

 

[#juan]

Not only bull****, but pure unadulterated Liberal propaganda BS.

And I know: I was a member of Reform and the Canadian Alliance.........I only WISH the new Conservative Party was created and existed in that mold.

Like most Liberals, you ability to ignore the clear facts when engaged in an opportunity to smear is beyond comprehension.....you remind me of the old cries of "racist" in the house, aimed at Reform at the orders of the piece of turd Chretien, when Reform had the most multi-cultural caucus in the House.......

The Conservative Party is solidly in the middle of the road, the right wing dragged there, kicking and screaming, by Harper.....

I absolutely am left in awe at the Liberals' ability to try and paint the new Conservative Party with the sins of the PC Gov't under Mulroney........and then 10 seconds later cry "foul" because the Party is different from the PCs.

The truth is that there was absolutely NO difference between the PCs and the Liberals......none.......Brian Mulroney was a Liberal in a blue suit.....determined to hand the nation over to Quebec, corrupt, a liar of immense proportion, arrogant, elitist., an absolute prick, a boil on the arse of society.......a Liberal in essence, if not in Fact.

The only difference (unfortunately) between the new CPC and the Liberals is that the CPC occassionally behaves in a correct manner on the world stage.....and they are not out to seize every one of my firearms.....that's about it.

Unfortunately.

Regardless of how you want to change history Colpy, Mulroney was a true, blue Conservative and you were all glad to praise him when he was winning majority governments though I can't understand how you didn't see all those successive deficit budgets. When people woke up and saw what he was doing to the country, the Conservative party was destroyed thank God. For some reason Peter McKay wants to deify Mulroney and make him a permanent member of the new party and he is finding some opposition. apparently not all party members are that happy with a leader who took paper bags full of money for favors.

The worst prime minister the country ever had and I can understand why you would want to sweep him under a rug somewhere or call him a liberal. Colpy that is always the way you've addressed Mulroney. "He wasn't really a Conservative, he must have been a liberal." No thanks.......The Liberals don't want the bastard either.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

The truth is that there was absolutely NO difference between the PCs and the Liberals......none.......Brian Mulroney was a Liberal in a blue suit..

Colpy, there indeed was a difference between the two parties; it is just that the difference was not very pronounced. Liberal party was (still is) slightly to the left of centre, PC was slightly to the right of centre.

Unfortunately that is not the case any longer. Liberal party still remains slightly left of centre, but Conservative party is very much the party of the right (notwithstanding the fact that Harper is governing from center right).

If you look at Harper cabinet (Flaherty, Jason Keeny etc.) many of them belong to the old Reform and Alliance parties, or are well known right wingers (Flaherty was in the Mike Harris cabinet, where he made a royal mess of the Ontario economy, and was knows as a right wing politician).

No doubt there are a few centre right politicians, mostly holdovers from the old PC party, such as Peter McKay. But their days are numbered.

If the next leader after Harper remains a pragmatic like Harper and decides that winning elections is more important than standing on principles, the party will continue to be center right party (which it currently is rather reluctantly, because Harper wants it so, but that is not where its heart is). Otherwise it will revert to being the party of the right.

It does have one definitely right wing stance, that of anti-environment. Harper has bought into the far right propaganda that global warming is a left wing plot (or an Al Qaeda plot, take your pick) to ruin the economy of North America.

Harper remains the strongest opponent of doing anything to reduce the global warming in the developed world, now that we got rid of Bush in USA and Howard in Australia.

So I think at heart it is a right wing party, with a thin veneer of centre right covering it, to make it palatable to people in Ontario and Québec (Québec may be lost now anyway).

 

[SirJosephPorter]

The worst prime minister the country ever had and I can understand why you would want to sweep him under a rug somewhere or call him a liberal. Colpy that is always the way you've addressed Mulroney. "He wasn't really a Conservative; he must have been a liberal." No thanks.......The Liberals don't want the bastard either.

Juan, I agree, Mulroney was a lousy PM. But that was mostly because the way he handled the economy, and the sleaze, corruption associated with him. He indeed was a conservative, but he was a progressive conservative.

The problem I had with him was the profligate spending, huge deficits, general mismanagement of the economy, sleaze, patronage and corruption. But if you look at his policies (other than economy), they were not extreme at all.

Thus the law he proposed to regulate abortion was quite a sensible law. He held one vote on death penalty (I think he voted against bringing it back) and that was it. He was a strong environmentalist.

His policies will not be welcome in today’s conservative party. So I agree Mulroney was a conservative, but he was a progressive conservative, not in the mould of Reform (Preston Manning) or Alliance (Stockwell Day) conservatives.

 

[Spade]

Perhaps some senior Conservatives are Peter Newman fans?
YouTube - Brian Mulroney tells Peter Newman to "Go **** yourself"

 

[Spade]

And Conservative, Brian Mulroney, speaking of his own memoirs.
Brian Mulroney Talks About His Memoirs - Video

 

[Liberalman]

Just when you think the Conservatives are on their way to victory the Prime Minister blunders again.

This happened with the Reforms and with the Liberals when the party can’t or won’t solve a little problem a split will eventually hurt them.

Just for the record Mulroney was never the leader of the Conservative party Mulroney was the leader of the Progressive Conservative party.

The Reform or should I say the Canadian Alliance took the PC party by force and called it their own just to win an election.

Peter MacKay the newly elected Progressive Conservative for some unknown reason gave the party to Stephen Harper as a goodwill gesture and the rest is history.

The PC wing of the Conservative party is insulted by the Prime Ministers action to ban a Conservative icon from the party while a scandal with the formal leader brews.

The Conservatives do not want this to turn into a Gomery commission type scandal where the liberals were handing secret envelopes of cash just like Mulroney is accused of accepting.

I am sure the Liberals are carefully studying the Conservative playbook on how to bring down a government in the Hansard when the Conservatives were grilling them when they were in power.

Lets say Question Period will be more exciting to watch when it resumes later this month.

 

[bobnoorduyn]

The Reform or should I say the Canadian Alliance took the PC party by force and called it their own just to win an election.

Peter MacKay the newly elected Progressive Conservative for some unknown reason gave the party to Stephen Harper as a goodwill gesture and the rest is history.

Gee, seems to me the parties merged when they finally realised they didn't have a snowball's chance of winning an election separately. I also seem to remember a vote on who would lead this new party

The PC wing of the Conservative party is insulted by the Prime Ministers action to ban a Conservative icon from the party while a scandal with the formal leader brews.

Huh? I've heard of no such action to ban Mulroney, his membership lapsed. Party Prez Don Plett said the Conservatives would "absolutely" accept him back as a member provided that he ponies up the princely sum of $35 for a five year membership membership card.

Again, why should Mulroney be granted a lifetime membership when they don't even offer such a thing?

 

[Colpy]

Regardless of how you want to change history Colpy, Mulroney was a true, blue Conservative and you were all glad to praise him when he was winning majority governments though I can't understand how you didn't see all those successive deficit budgets. When people woke up and saw what he was doing to the country, the Conservative party was destroyed thank God. For some reason Peter McKay wants to deify Mulroney and make him a permanent member of the new party and he is finding some opposition. apparently not all party members are that happy with a leader who took paper bags full of money for favors.

The worst prime minister the country ever had and I can understand why you would want to sweep him under a rug somewhere or call him a liberal. Colpy that is always the way you've addressed Mulroney. "He wasn't really a Conservative, he must have been a liberal." No thanks.......The Liberals don't want the bastard either.

You forget, while you try to get me to defend Mulroney's actions, that I was a Reform member from very early on.....I abandoned the PCs because of Mulroney........because he spent most of his time kissing up to Quebec (like a Liberal), because his gov't brought in new gun control (like a Liberal), because he ran massive deficits (like the Liberal Trudeau), etc etc etc....there was Sooooo little difference between the PCs and Liberals......

The thought of Jean (the Don) Chretien gives me nausea, but i give him credit for balancing the budget.

The thought of Lyin Brian Mulroney damn near gives me convulsions, but he gets credit for NAFTA and the GST, which raised gov't revenues to the point that balancing the budget was possible.

Given the choice between the two, I'd choose Mulroney.....then go to the basement and hang myself.

So, I couldn't stand it while he was winning majority gov'ts....I wanted Preston!



I'm not a bit confused, nor am I conflicted, over Brian Mulroney.

 

[Spade]

TheStar.com | Canada | Harper approved plan to leak Mulroney story

Quote:

TONDA MACCHARLES
OTTAWA BUREAU
OTTAWA–Prime Minister Stephen Harper, from overseas, was aware of and agreed with plans to leak stories that would distance him and the current party leadership from former prime minister Brian Mulroney, the Star has learned.

A Conservative party source speaking on background said Harper was in contact with his chief of staff, Guy Giorno, and communications director Kory Teneycke, the officials behind the idea, while he was in Europe last week.

Harper went along with the plan to leak a story that Mulroney had asked to be taken off party lists, the source said. It was later suggested Mulroney's membership lapsed in 2006. But Mulroney, through a spokesperson, said it was not so: he'd be a Conservative till the day he died.

"He (Harper) knew and he agreed to it," said the source, referring to plans to leak the original story. "They thought they could differentiate between old Conservatives and new Conservatives, Progressive Conservatives and the Conservative Party of Canada. And of course it's a ridiculous notion."

 

[#juan]

You forget, while you try to get me to defend Mulroney's actions, that I was a Reform member from very early on.....I abandoned the PCs because of Mulroney........because he spent most of his time kissing up to Quebec (like a Liberal), because his gov't brought in new gun control (like a Liberal), because he ran massive deficits (like the Liberal Trudeau), etc etc etc....there was Sooooo little difference between the PCs and Liberals......

The thought of Jean (the Don) Chretien gives me nausea, but i give him credit for balancing the budget.

The thought of Lyin Brian Mulroney damn near gives me convulsions, but he gets credit for NAFTA and the GST, which raised gov't revenues to the point that balancing the budget was possible.

Given the choice between the two, I'd choose Mulroney.....then go to the basement and hang myself.

So, I couldn't stand it while he was winning majority gov'ts....I wanted Preston!



I'm not a bit confused, nor am I conflicted, over Brian Mulroney.

Though NAFTA happened on his watch, Mulroney had little to do with it. NAFTA was Reagan's idea. Lyin' Brian just went along with it. In many parts of Canada NAFTA is a disaster. The GST was just a last ditch effort to soften all the debt Bulroney left us. And Btw, Trudeau was responsible for a hundred odd billion of our debt. Brian chalked up over four hundred and fifty billion.

 

[Francis2004]

Though NAFTA happened on his watch, Mulroney had little to do with it. NAFTA was Reagan's idea. Lyin' Brian just went along with it. In many parts of Canada NAFTA is a disaster. The GST was just a last ditch effort to soften all the debt Bulroney left us. And Btw, Trudeau was responsible for a hundred odd billion of our debt. Brian chalked up over four hundred and fifty billion.

#juan, everyone praising the GST and bashing the Liberals who had claimed to they would revoke it forget it was a replacement for the MST ( Manufacturers Sales Tax ) and would have had to be replaced by a similar tax again if Chretien had removed it anyway. The favous GST is only hated because it is visible to consumers where as the MST was not. If Chretien had removed it he would have had to hide the tax again much like it's predecessor the MST as anyone knows you cannot totally remove a tax completely..

The Canadian Goods and Services Tax (GST) is a multi-level value-added tax introduced in Canada on January 1, 1991, by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and finance minister Michael Wilson. The GST replaced a hidden 13.5% Manufacturers' Sales Tax (MST); Mulroney claimed the GST was implemented because the MST hurt the manufacturing sector's ability to export. The introduction of the GST was very controversial. As of January 1, 2008, the GST currently stands at 5%.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goods_and_Services_Tax_(Canada)

 

[Colpy]

#juan, everyone praising the GST and bashing the Liberals who had claimed to they would revoke it forget it was a replacement for the MST ( Manufacturers Sales Tax ) and would have had to be replaced by a similar tax again if Chretien had removed it anyway. The favous GST is only hated because it is visible to consumers where as the MST was not. If Chretien had removed it he would have had to hide the tax again much like it's predecessor the MST as anyone knows you cannot totally remove a tax completely..



Goods and Services Tax (Canada) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I don't have a huge problem with the GST.

I do have a huge problem with the Liberals campaigning on dumping both the GST and NAFTA, using them as a cliub to beat the old PCs, ......and doing neither.



Except, of course, using the revenue to balance the budget......