I’ve seen this symbol stencilled up around here and there. Can anyone tell me what it signifies?
Updates from June, 2012 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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The Tories are running an attack ad (Youtube link) against Thomas Mulcair and the NDP – as Fagstein says, “Conservative Party says don’t vote for Mulcair’s “dangerous” NDP in that election we’re not having for 3 years.”
When did Canada start having attack ads outside of election campaigns? I don’t remember this being a Canadian thing, but I haven’t had a TV in awhile.
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Josh
It’s less of a Canadian thing than a Tory thing, Kate. Dion (“Not a leader”) and Michael Ignatieff (“Just visiting”) were both hit hard outside of elections. Here’s an article about ads against Ignatieff from January 2011 – five months before the last federal election: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/tories-fire-up-their-attack-ad-machine/article610919/
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Ephraim
Definitely a Tory thing. The last two Tory campaigns didn’t even have platforms. They never bothered telling us why we should vote for them, only why we shouldn’t vote for the other guys.
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Matt
What the hell is happening in this country? How do people swallow all this Conservative bullshit?
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Kate
Matt, I think Ephraim has a point. They don’t campaign in the usual sense, they just warn people off the other guys, and it’s easy to make a bogeyman out of a left-leaning party with a leader from Quebec. You hardly have to say a thing except that he’s dangerous.
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Marc
I would say attack ads began ca. 2004. The Liberals are just as guilty.
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Jack
I know Mulcair will fight fire with fire, thats why on the ground New Democrats voted for him, despite Party apparatchik opposition. He is a mean politician, sadly against Harpers neo-cons what choice do we have?
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Matt
Didn’t we once have rules against this sort of campaign, or am I too naive?
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Jack
One of the reasons Harper plays ethnic and religious wedge politics is money.You can raise a lot of money when you can convince one ethnic group that you will favour them against another.I notice it Jason Kenny’s “outreach” the most.Check out who he speaks to and supports.The Tories will out spend all the parties combined and have to spend most of their fundraising outside of election periods where their are (I believe)no spending caps.They will spend millions “defining” Mulcair , and he will have to hit back.If someone knows more about this issue of spending outside of election writs can you please post so I could know more.
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Kate
Matt: I’d be curious to know if we did. I think we might’ve just had a gentlemanly understanding that you could promote your own party, but that the place to attack the other parties was in a parliamentary setting, not in the PR world of television.
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Matt
Well, I didn’t find anything conclusive, but some interesting background on attack ads in this country (and the United States, of course).
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Kate
Matt, the CBC survey of the tradition is interesting. I especially note this item from their bit on 2007: Dion’s record: “In an unusual move, the Conservatives launched attacks against the Liberals outside of an election campaign.”
I guess what was unusual five years ago is now standard operating procedure.
I pretty much agree with the This Magazine summing up: “Attack ads are bad for democracy. Instead of helping us debate serious issues as a society, it poisons our discourse with character assassination, the politics of fear, and a culture of sound bites over substance.”
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steph
I also suppose some of the ad campaigns are regional, what we see on Quebec TV isn’t what’s being aired in the Prairies…? also if it this type of campaigning was illegal, they might have snuck in a clause in that omnibus bill to help themselves.
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C_Erb
It’s interesting how much different the French ad is from the English one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcF8kdAf-lY&feature=relmfu
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Stefan
i think political ‘culture’ has eroded in many countries over the last 1, 2 decades. the return on investment on any action which is legal, or if not, won’t refute getting your party elected, is gigantic, given how much contracts can be given to supporters or supporting companies once in power. this corresponds with corporations determining a large share of politics, instead of being democratic.
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Jack
“Follow the money”
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qatzelok
People who watch a lot of commercial media (or listen to it) have been primed for ads like this one.
Commercial media consumers/drones have had their opinions altered through the repetitive absorbtion of commercial tropes. So when the TV tells them that “Mulcair’s ideas are dangerous,” what’s really effective is the notion that ANY IDEAS are dangerous. Just be a passive viewer and let the TV take care of everything for you. Mulcair also depends on the brain-dead consumer model to get his “left-wing bankster” messages out there.
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Adam Hooper
The Conservatives have more money than they’re allowed to spend during campaigns, so from their perspective they’d be stupid *not* to spend it–whether or not it’s effective. (Their fundraising machine is incredibly effective, but they have to show they actually spend the money, otherwise who would donate?)
Attack ads are nothing new, but they can backfire. The Conservatives did them right with Ignatieff; we’ll see if they manage the same with Mulcair. This is another advantage of running ads outside of campaigns: low risk. The Conservatives can test a few messages and see what sticks. They need to burn the money anyway, and nobody will remember their attack ads three years from now if they aren’t effective or if they backfire.
Zero cost, high potential. That’s why people have been wondering why the Conservatives waited even this long to attack Mulcair.
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ant6n
@Adam
This attitude strikes me as cynical, but also fairly representative of Canadians’ attitude towards politics (or economy, for that matter). It’s not about what is the right thing to do or the moral thing to do; but merely maximizing some outcome using any means at one’s disposal, legal or not – as long as you can get away with it. And then the choices are rationalized by pointing towards the need to maximize outcomes, and anybody who says that’s bad is just labelled naive, not understanding the rules of the game. -
Adam Hooper
@ant6n: Agreed. I think it all boils down to the attitude of ends justifying means. Voters (and journalists) have a responsibility to define not just our policies, but our principles.
Conservatives basically advertise themselves as the “ends justify means” party. For evidence, look no further than the press releases at http://www.conservative.ca/press/. For instance, its statement after the budget: “… the Harper Government has delivered on its commitments to Canadians, including strengthening the economy and supporting Canadian families.”
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ant6n
It seems to me that for the Conservatives, policy is not the desired outcome, but having majority governments; and changing Canada so that conservative majority governments is perceived as the cultural default.
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qatzelok
While I agree with Adam H, this modern ends-justify-means instrumentalism isn’t confined to the Conservative party. Mulcair got in bed with Zionists in order to get elected. What kind of real socialism can come out of that?
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Jack
@ qatzelok are you saying that because Mulcair’s wife and children are Jewish ( as they are) or is it just a metaphor?
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Luigi Coretti, once owner of security firm BCIA, was arrested Monday morning on various fraud charges. His troubles are linked to those of his bud Tony Tomassi, once a minister in the Charest cabinet, now not even an MNA any more and facing charges himself.
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Le Devoir has an interview this weekend with Jacques Duchesneau in which he recounts that he met with Gérald Tremblay in 2009 at a time when accusations of corruption and collusion were piling up, and told him who in his entourage was not to be trusted – but he says the mayor never acted on his information. Tremblay says the meeting took place but the warning was never given.
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Kristian writes about his years at the Montreal Mirror; Roxane Hudon writes a rather sweary memoir; Brendan Kelly, who started at the Mirror, also looks back.
Also Fagstein has brought together a lot of links and includes a long comment from Mark Slutsky, who wrote for the paper.
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Steamboat Willie
Roxanne Hudon’s article makes a teenager’s text message look like Shakespeare. Is this the kind of article the Mirror was publishing?
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Kate
No.
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The big Fête nationale show at parc Maisonneuve went off well Sunday night with only four arrests in the crowd of 150,000.
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According to his old landlord in the Point, police were looking for Luka Magnotta weeks before the death of Jun Lin – on charges of animal cruelty. (Same CP story in French and English.)
Concordia held a memorial service for Jun Lin on Monday morning.
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Mary
Maybe people will start taking animal cruelty a bit more seriously now.
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Charles Lanteigne 20:18 on 2012/06/25 Permalink
Although I am sure there is no relation, it is surprisingly similar to the “Turkish Dental Association” logo.
Kate 21:41 on 2012/06/25 Permalink
And they’re here to stencil our walls and steal our molars!
Odd. A friend on the net also said it was some kind of Central Asian symbol.
Charles 09:45 on 2012/06/26 Permalink
I uploaded it to Google Images search and it returned photos of mostly asian people on a red background, odd.