It is hard to imagine anything four NDP candidates did to get themselves turfed from the party’s ticket in the provincial election could make them any more unelectable than some other people who routinely get elected and reelected by voters.
Rob Ford, may he rest in peace, immediately comes to mind as the crack-smoking mayor who made Canada’s greatest city into a global laughing stock yet still managed to get back on City Council after dropping out of the mayor’s race due to health concerns that ultimately manifested in his untimely death on Tuesday.
For heaven’s sake, Donald Trump, who never thought a reprehensible thing he wouldn’t say publicly or concocted a lie bald-faced enough that he wouldn’t tell it, is on the verge of winning the Republican nomination for president of the United States.
Back to the Saskatchewan election, there is no question Clayton Wilson’s and Mark Jeworski’s social media posts were crude and insensitive, but they pale in comparison to some of the behaviour that does not seem to make others unelectable. Whatever it was Terry Bell and Cameron Robock said must have been equally egregious to NDP leader Cam Broten to have him pull the plug on them, but again, it is hard to imagine anything they could have said being worse than some of the things successful candidates are getting a pass on.
It is also very interesting to note that making unsavoury comments is cause for dismissal, but apparently having a criminal record is not. Three Sask Party candidates—Scott Moe (Shellbrook-Rosthern), Terry Dennis (Canora Pelly) and Eric Olauson (Saskatoon-University)—have DUI convictions. So do two NDP candidates, Dwayne Lasas (Meadow Lake) and Lyle Whitefish (Saskatchewan Rivers). None of these five have been removed from their parties’ slates.
One could certainly argue that attitudes revealed by candid comments or social media posts speak more to the core fitness of candidates for public office than a one-time lapse of judgment evidenced by a drunk driving conviction. Then again, Dennis and Olauson are repeat DUI offenders with two convictions apiece.
And honestly, have we perhaps become a bit too hypersensitive to comments made in the heat of the moment. After all, candidates are human beings with all the inherent emotional baggage that sometimes boils over, but do not necessarily make them bad people.
Perhaps we should applaud the high standards of leaders who make the tough calls to cut candidates loose in the midst of election campaigns. On the other hand, should it not be up to the voters to decide? Are the candidates not ultimately accountable to us, not their parties?
The answer to those questions seems to be yes when it comes to DUI, but no for some other non-criminal transgressions.
Of course, the disenfranchised candidates are not prevented from running for election, they are merely unwelcome in NDP ranks.
It is a brave new world we live in, one in which scrutiny of politicians is instensive, but unbalanced, and democracy may be poorly served.
On the one hand, the more outrageous and politically incorrect conservative politicians such as The Donald and Mayor McCrack are, the more successful they seem to become. On the other side of the coin, prospective progressive leaders can barely have an impure thought without being castigated into ignominious political oblivion.
That does not bode well for effective and respectful government.
What the electorate appears to be lacking at the moment is perspective. While we nitpick some candidates’ minor foibles and completely ignore others’ glaring defects, we may be obscuring some important underlying issues such as the government’s shady land deals and poor economic foresight and the opposition’s lack of efficacy in holding the ruling party to account.
