Two short months ago, when the provincial election was in full swing, Christy Clark and her B.C. Liberal candidates were calling NDP leader John Horgan "Say Anything" John, insisting he was only telling voters what they wanted to hear in order to win, instead of what he would actually do if he did win.
Funny how an election result has changed Clark's tune.
If she had won 44 or more seats on May 9, it's unlikely that she would have announced plans to ban corporate and union donations to political parties, raise welfare rates or her latest vow Wednesday to spend an extra $1 billion on early childcare. She pledged to do none of these things while out on the campaign trail. With her 43 seats, however, and the real prospect of her government falling after the Legislature hears today's throne speech and then votes on it next week, suddenly "Say Anything" Christy is saying anything to stay in power.
This flip flop by Clark is right up there with her predecessor Gordon Campbell, who made no mention of the HST during the 2009 election campaign and then announced it two months later. Voters took care of the HST and the Liberal caucus took care of Campbell, gently but firmly pushing him out, putting the future of the party ahead of loyalty to the leader.
Sadly, this current B.C. Liberal caucus seems to lack the fortitude to do the same to Clark, who is as much to blame for what happened this spring as she can take credit for the surprise win in 2013.
From a tactical standpoint, Clark and the Liberals look smart, doing everything in their power to make it difficult or impossible for Horgan to govern if Lt.-Gov. Judith Guichon calls on him while eroding the agreement Horgan has with Andrew Weaver and the Greens for voting support.
Forcing another election as early as this fall with a kinder, gentler message, lots of money left over in the bank and a proven winner in Clark sounds like a fabulous plan.
The problem is the messenger is the same.
Clark was the ace in the hole for the B.C. Liberals in 2013. Four years later, she's looking more and more like the joker.
That may be hard to accept for local Liberals to hear but they need to put themselves in the shoes of their political allies down south, who worked hard but couldn't save Peter Fassbender, Suzanne Anton, Amrik Virk and Naomi Yamamoto from defeat. If Mike Morris and/or Shirley Bond had lost on May 9, who would local Liberals have blamed? The answer is obvious.
Yet, for whatever reasons, the B.C. Liberals are standing by Clark as if it's still 2013. That could spell disaster if she is still the leader in the next election.
Along with her tarnished image and her shameful two-faced pandering for votes, the numbers don't add up for the Liberals. They lost just two seats to vote splitting, including the fateful Courtenay-Comox, where a B.C. Conservative candidate siphoned enough votes away from the Liberals to allow the NDP candidate to win the electoral district. On the flip side, the NDP lost seven seats due to votes drained away by the Greens.
As for the argument that those angry B.C. Conservatives will fall in line with Clark at the prospect of an NDP majority, that's a risky proposition. Those folks didn't like Clark before and her raiding of the NDP platform this week to boost spending on welfare and childcare soft and fuzzies just reeks to them of Trudeau Liberal treachery. They've always suspected she was a federal Liberal and now she's proven it. They'll stay home before they vote for her.
Strategically, the smarter course of action would be to lose the battle but win the war. The Liberal caucus should force Clark out after the government falls, announce an interim leader and schedule a leadership convention for late 2017 or early 2018, doing nothing in the Legislature to threaten the viability of the NDP minority government.
In the meantime, a bureaucracy stacked with Liberal loyalists over the past 16 years would leak so bad that it would make the Trump White House look tight as a drum. Those regular leaks and other rookie NDP government embarrassments would add up and if Horgan had the gall to complain in public, the interim Liberal leader could simply compare him to a certain U.S. president who froths at the mouth over leaks that make him look bad.
With a new leader in place by early 2018, the Liberals could then work towards toppling the NDP minority and replacing it with a Liberal majority.
Accepting the short-term pain of NDP minority rule for 12 to 18 months makes more long-term sense then sticking with Clark and her wild promises. She is setting the stage for a long four years with Premier John Horgan at the helm of an NDP majority (and Clark would certainly be gone in that scenario, too).
It's a decision between B.C. Liberals taking their medicine for a short time now or for much longer later.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
