Susan Delacourt writes that the Conservative Party of Canada has hired the social media firm that helped Boris Johnson rise to power:
As my Star colleagues Stephanie Levitz and Alex Boutilier have reported, O’Toole’s team has hired not one, but two consultancy firms with ties to Johnson’s victories: Topham Guerin for social media and Stack Data Strategies for political analytics.
We can divine two conclusions from these contracts: the Conservatives are serious about the looming data war with the Liberals and they don’t intend to play nice.
How not-nice? Well, let’s put it this way: I had to consult the Star’s taste and language policies to write about Topham Guerin’s claims to fame. It is OK, I learned, to use raw language if it’s in quotation marks, so here is a little snippet from an article on how Topham Guerin wages the social-media war.
“One of the tactics that Topham Guerin has become especially known for are ‘shitposts’ — a meme of obvious and usually ironic bad quality to troll its reader,” according to an interview with the firm’s founders, which appeared last year in an online New Zealand magazine called The Spinoff.
So be prepared. The next election is going to be very nasty:
Here’s Ben Guerin himself in that Spinoff interview: “Instead of having a big bonfire in a campaign, you have lots of little fires.”
There’s your preview of the next election campaign on social media: “lots of little fires.” Well, and don’t forget, s—posts too. (Please note the taste-sensitive spelling.)
This news comes on reports this week about what life is like on HMS Bojo:
Dominic Cummings was unable to vouch for Johnson’s judgment in picking advisers. “It’s just completely crackers that someone like me should have been in there,” said the man who was called Johnson’s Svengali; the second-most-powerful man in Britain.
All of this is deeply unsettling news.
Image: POLITICO. Europe
10 comments:
There does not seem to be anything different from when “Stevie” was runnin, true or not? Anyong
If anything, Anyong, it sounds like the latest version of the party will be nastier than Stephen's Party.
The Cons have been shitposting about Trudeau since the Harper years, so it's hard to see how their new Svengalis are going to miraculously convince Canadians to ditch him. Like him or hate him, Trudeau and his family are well-known to us, warts and all.
O'Toole, OTOH, has still to distinguish himself from the pack. We haven't seen what scandalous details opposition research has dug up on him. And his party's message hasn't much appeal outside the Trump-loving provinces of AB and SK. The Cons lost the last election peddling the same BS. Voters have realized the Cons have nothing positive to offer and are likely to forcefully reject yet another negative campaign.
Doubling down on smears and racism didn't work for Trump and I'd be very surprised if it worked for O'Toole.
Cap
You'd think by now they would have learned that lesson, Cap. What's remarkable is that they haven't.
How about this nugget from Chantal Hebert today, Owen?
"Trumpism may have failed to take hold in this country but it has connected with a solid constituency within the conservative movement. Polls have shown that almost half of those who self-identify as Conservative Party of Canada supporters would have cast a ballot for Trump last November."
It seems clear that the nasty approach covered in your post will work well with that ilk, but I doubt it will find a wider audience amongst the electorate. Of course, on that I could be completely wrong.
If there's one thing that defines Trumpism and Trumpists, Lorne, it's unpredictability. How can you predict what the insane will do?
If the people of Canada vote for the Conservatives to form the next federal government, they get what they deserve. Of course the children in this country don't, but they will grow up knowing who not to vote for as the Conservatives turn this country into a replica of something between Trump world and boorish boris.
of course that will mean the federal Liberals will have to up their game and come up with something the population of Canada wants and fight back. Some will have to consider voting strategically.
I have voted strategically for decades, e.a.f.
These dangerous clowns own the Blue brand. (Thanks Peter McKay)
The Overton window has been shifted way to the right.
Rather than the corporate media pointing out the extremism they validate extreme views via 'both side-ism' which reinforces the tendency for somnolent Canadians to alternate between Blue & Red.
I see lots of scenarios bringing the CONs back to power ....
One of these days they'll be back at the top, PoV. What scares me is what they'll be by the time they get there.
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