CKNW Editorial
for June 28, 1999

The bash last Friday night for Ken Georgetti was a wonderful send-off and I truly felt honoured to be one of his roasters … and I got a couple of shots off for the show and you, I assure you. But it was a touching scene all the more so because of the eclectic nature of the crowd all the way from the richest to the poorest, the far right to the far left. It showed the affection the community has for one of its boys who has now made it to the big time.

It’s a shame, really, to draw any political connotations but it’s impossible not to. For there was Premier Glen Clark front and center as the cracks came at his expense … and they were not gentle I assure you. Starting with the eerie silence which greeted his every appearance on the video to the cracks taken by Joy McPhail in the “diary” of Ken Georgetti it was a terrible night for the Premier. He was damned if he did and damned if he didn’t. He couldn’t possibly have been a no show yet to show was to suffer. He took it all it apparent good humour but it was horrible to watch and listen to.

Unless Glen Clark is utterly insensitive to what’s going on around him he must know that his caucus members including the most senior of cabinet ministers are wringing their hands and moaning to any who will listen that the Premier shows no sign of leaving and that they are all, therefore, toast.

There was a fine roast last Friday night at the Bayshore but it wasn’t Ken Georgetti who got burnt to a crisp.

On another subject, do I understand that these calamitous moves of Gordon Campbell are scripted by none other than Pat Kinsella whose only claim to backroom fame came 16 years ago when Bill Bennett won a surprise election over Dave Barrett? At that, those in the know will tell you that the credit was really Bud Smith’s and Bill Bennett’s – the latter running by far the best of his three campaigns.

In all events, there was this big fundraiser a few weeks back costing a gillion a plate. Now when you have a fundraiser featuring the leader – are you paying close attention here Pat – the last thing you ever do is have someone upstage your boy. Yet Peter Legge, whose campaign to get an Order of Canada is as intensive as was Grace McCarthy’s but not so successful, was the master of ceremonies. As one with half a brain would know would happen, Legge brought the house down with his stand up comedy so that the time Mr Campbell got to speak, the crowd was exhausted.

A very big part of running a campaign – I know whereof I speak because Bud ran mine – is keeping the candidate’s spirits up and constantly stroking his ego. Anyone in the position of seeking public office will have a fragile ego very early in the game and good managers know that. The last thing you do is have the spotlight taken from him by the masters of ceremonies. Those of you who have attended rallies might have wondered why some guy who can’t form a simple sentence without several “duh”s in it always seems to introduce the candidate – there’s a reason.

But that was only in front of a few of the faithful. Kinsella – I assume until I hear from the contrary that it is he – has got Campbell spending huge bucks, 18 months – two years before an election when the premier’s polling numbers are chicken scratches, pouring out one expensive promise after another, depleting as he goes the money he’s so successfully raising. There is only one thing the people of British Columbia expect of Gordon Campbell – that he cleans up the mess and gives us a frank assessment of how he will do that.

The campaign to come, probably a year this Fall at the earliest but more likely May of 2001 since a battered NDP will hang on until the last possible minute as the Socreds did in 1991, is Campbell’s to lose. But if he’s not careful he’ll sow the seeds of a miraculous loss or a less than enthusiastic victory by screwing it up now.

Mr Campbell, sir, if the decisions being made are yours, you’re a damned fool. If they are someone else’s, fire him and get someone aboard who knows what he’s doing.