I was directed to this story by Daniel Finkelstein via Andrew Sullivan and his Daily Dish and it almost brought me to tears. Here we are talking about the Republican Party and the British Tories, and ALL it is doing is reminding me of the party I love to be a part of.
For example, these words from Mr. Finkelstein:
The first step towards recovery for the Conservative party was to stop thinking that we were the centre of the universe and that what we thought mattered more than what others thought.
The Republicans are about to go through a period of self absorption and will think it is all that matters. They will only recover when they start to understand that no one is watching and that no one, except them, cares.
While I don't think that the outcome of October 14 was even close to being as dire as the British Conservatives' outcome in 1997 or the trouncing that the GOP is going to take a week from tomorrow, I do think that the attitude is the same.
Here we are barking about our historical relevance in Canada, but what we used to be has a great deal to do with why we are where we are today.
We're not inclusive. We're not transparent. We pander and try to buy voters with their own money and then are never heard from until the next writ period. We have shadowy folks who try to control everything and fail miserably. It's a disappointment, all around.
If we do not, as a party, get our shit together, put together not only a platform - but a plan - and build a long-term strategy to do this from the bottom up, we will be as irrelevant as the Tories of 1993, 1997 and the GOP of 2008.
