No love for Dion in Vernon

Local Editorial says" No love for Dion in Vernon"
(h/t to VernonBlog)
Scott Neufeld EDITORIAL http://www.dailycourier.ca/ April 17, 2007

Chances are you missed it, but Stephane Dion made a tour stop in Vernon this weekend.The leader of the federal Liberal Party was in town to make promises, shake hands and, as always, to compare Stephen Harper to that ultimate ugly American, George W. Bush. But if you did miss Dion’s visit, you’re not alone. The Vernon Daily Courier estimated roughly 100 people turned up to hear what this potential prime minister had to say, or 0.08 per cent of the North Okanagan’s population. A similarly sparse crowd greeted Dion in Kelowna.

So why was there so little love shown for Stephane Dion in the Okanagan? Perhaps people here have bought in to the idea that Dion is too soft-spoken and has too heavy an accent to be leader. Or maybe people stayed away in droves because Dion was visiting some staunchly Conservative ridings. The attendance number can’t be good news for the Liberal Party. When the person you’ve picked as the next Prime Minister can barely draw enough interest to fill a small room – something is wrong.Just to put the attendance into perspective, they could have fed the entire crowd with just four party subs from Subway.

Of course local MP Colin Mayes’ town hall meeting in Vernon recently drew a crowd small enough to feed with a single party sub, 0.01 per cent of the riding’s population. The core reason no one showed up on Sunday is because people don’t care what Dion has to say. He’s offering nothing new and has little to say other than harsh criticisms of Harper and the Conservatives. Instead of offering a vision of Canada to inspire voters he’s focused on telling us about Harper’s shortcomings. Yawn. There is little separating this latest Liberal incarnation from his predecessors. After more than a decade in power they left behind dozens of empty promises. Now Dion is pumping out the same old assurances on health care, the environment and childcare. The very issues he and previous Liberal governments avoided for so long.

Playing on local irritation with Mayes, Dion seemed to be on a mission to scoop up some support from lapsed Conservatives. And there were some Tories to be found, including former Conservative riding president Wayne McGrath and Conservative executive member Sigrid Ann Thors, who served drinks at the meeting. But while members of both the Liberal and Conservative parties attended, the vast majority of the more than 127,000 people living in the North Okanagan stayed away. Maybe they realized there was no duller way to spend a sunny Sunday.