Selling conservatism

The Globe and Mail reports that the federal Conservative party is about to launch a new series of television ads. These spots apparently mock Stéphane Dion and his party's record on the environment. These ads will appear in prime time, and at least one will be broadcast during the Super Bowl.

According to the Globe, the Tories apparently have more money than they are allowed to spend during an election campaign, which is why they're spending it now. They have more cash than any of the other Canadian political parties.

Needless to say, there have been a lot of comments on the Globe's web site about the Tories' decision. One thing that one commenter pointed out was that some of the official Government of Canada web sites have been redesigned to have more Tory blue in them. For example, the Prime Minister's official web site now has quite a lot of blue in it. And it is using the same slogan ("Getting Things Done For All Of Us") as the Conservative Party's web site.

The Government of Canada main page doesn't quite go so far. It has a blue background, but it's a muted blue, and the maple leaf and many of the headings are in official Canadian red. I suppose that you have to sympathize a bit with the Tories on this: it's not their fault that red is both one of the colours of the Canadian flag and the principal colour associated with their political opponents.

But the Tories' on-line web presence illustrates one of the things that bother me about their government: they seem to play dirtier than their opponents, and they spend a great deal of time badmouthing them. For example: their web site currently has the headline "Sponsorship Scandal: Dion Flipflops (Again)", and shows an animated image of Dion switching from facing left to facing right and back again. (Compare this to the Liberal site, whose headline is "Liberal Team Looks To The Future".) As a voter, I want to know what the government is planning on doing, not what they think of the other guys.

Because the Tories seem to be spending all their time attacking their opponents or carefully crafting their own optics, I sometimes get the impression that, deep down, the Tories think that most Canadians don't really want what they're offering. Perhaps one of the following is true:

• The Tories believe that their policies are the legislative equivalent of cod-liver oil: it's good for you, even if you don't like it.
• The Tories are serving the interests of their own political constituencies (choose one or more of the following: Albertans, the oil patch, social conservatives, rural Canadians) at the expense of others.

I don't know whether either of the above is true. All I know is that I'd be happier with the Tories if they were running on their record.

(Edit: Rob Pettapiece, in his blog, points out that the Canadian government's official apology to Maher Arar sneaks in a shot at the former Liberal government. As Rob puts it: was this necessary?)