Tom Long: Dead wrong for PCs, Canada

CCRAP hopeful "Callow, shallow, glib" - Winnipeg Free Press

By: Scott Piatkowski

  The Canadian Alliance Post has apparently abandoned the sinking ship known as Stockwell Day and has now allied itself with Ontario Harrisite backroom boy Tom Long. His every move is chronicled in the paper with the sort of breathless anticipation normally reserved for actual news stories. Nevertheless, there are a multitude of reasons why he is no more likely to be the next Prime Minister than his opponents for the CCRAP leadership.
  Long was President of the Ontario PC Youth around the time that I first became active in politics at the other end of the political spectrum. Having crossed the Canada-U.S. border to campaign for Ronald Reagan in 1976 (when Reagan was treated as a joke, even by most Republicans), Long didn't begin to gain public attention for his extreme right wing views until the early 80s.
 

When Mike Harris talks, reporters generally look to see whether Long's lips are moving

  At the time, Long was one of a number of young PCs who thought and argued publicly that longstanding PC Premier Bill Davis was a dangerous leftist. His faction of the party fought human rights protections for gays and lesbians, government investment in Suncor and other policies that varied from his vision of conservatism. The collapse of the Tory dynasty in 1985 gave Long the opening he needed to take over the party. He was elected President of the party in 1986, and he's never really looked back. When Mike Harris talks, reporters generally look to see whether Long's lips are moving.
 

Canadians haven't seen a politician with this naked a lust for power since Brian Mulroney, for whom Long used to work and who, like Long, had never held elected office before seeking the leadership of his party

  Sixteen years or so later, Long is fighting the same fight at the federal level. Tory leader Joe Clark is "not a real Conservative" and he must be destroyed in order for the right to win control of the keys to 24 Sussex Drive. Much to the chagrin of many PC loyalists, Long appears intent on destroying his former party in order to satisfy his own personal ambition. Canadians haven't seen a politician with this naked a lust for power since Brian Mulroney (for whom Long used to work and who, like Long, had never held elected office before seeking the leadership of his party).
 

As far as the Canadian political spectrum has shifted to the right, Tom Long is still off the map

  Much as Long has impressed with his ability to gain the support of most of the Queen's Park Tories (including every cabinet minister but Diane Cunningham), he is simply not electable. Grassroots Reformers don't want a leader who openly smells of Bay Street, even if he tells them that this is the price of power. Canadians, particularly those east of the Ottawa River, do not want a Prime Minister who holds such extreme right wing views on both social and financial matters (Long opposes public funding for abortions, for example).
  As far as the Canadian political spectrum has shifted to the right, Tom Long is still off the map. He may have gotten Mike Harris elected twice, but only through use of clever code words and media manipulation that have never worked at the national level. Long is the master of divisive, negative campaigning; he doesn't know any other way. Ontarians seemed to buy the notion that Dalton McGuinty "just isn't up to the job" in last year's provincial campaign, but every attempt to apply such tactics to a federal campaign has ended in disaster (e.g. the 1993 withdrawal of the PC ad asking if "this (is) the face a Prime Minister").
  Out of the backrooms, and exposed to the national media, Tom Long is not looking quite as good. The Winnipeg Free Press interviewed him and ran a headline last weekend calling him "callow, shallow and glib". No wonder the Canadian Alliance Post likes him so much.

Scott Piatkowski is a Waterloo, Ontario-based freelance writer.

[ Front Page ]