8 Reasons Why Stilwell Isn’t Really Running To Be Premier


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  1. Moira who?
  2. Rookie.
  3. Moira who?
  4. No real public profile in cabinet, so a leadership run can help her get a higher profile cabinet position.
  5. Gordon Campbell is her mentor means she won’t even attempt to distance herself from that toxic element, which will alienate her from everyone except the party elite that loves Campbell, but can help her as a real loyalist who deserves a better cabinet position with the leader.
  6. Her social media posture is horrible with her Facebook and Twitter presence stalled as of before the May 2009 election still stating that she’s running to be an MLA, with an unmanaged Facebook page filled with snake oil sales ads.
  7. Her social media posture includes an unfinished, yet released, Twitter rebranding attempt: @MoiraMockup that deleted its few tweets by the end of yesterday. Oddly, the focus on Stilwell’s amateur use of social media led to Christy Clark spending yesterday afternoon going on a tear adding hundreds of people she’s following in Twitter, indicating an understanding of human engagement in Twitter. And since she was doing her show at the time, it looks like “her people” filled out her Twitter following list, indicating among other things, that she has people.
  8. Any leadership candidate who “owns” delegates can deliver those delegates to a potential leader/premier, with the accompanying quid pro quo cabinet payoff.

Moira Stilwell: first candidate to declare, first also-ran.

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Stephen Elliott-Buckley

Post-partisan eco-socialist. at Politics, Re-Spun
Stephen Elliott-Buckley is a husband, father, professor, speaker, consultant, former suburban Vancouver high school English and Social Studies teacher who changed careers because the BC Liberal Party has been working hard to ruin public education. He has various English and Political Science degrees and has been writing political, social and economic editorials since November 2002. Stephen is in Twitter, Miro and iTunes, and the email thing, and at his website, dgiVista.org.

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19 thoughts on “8 Reasons Why Stilwell Isn’t Really Running To Be Premier”

  1. I also think this positions other candidates. I’m trying to figure out if this is part of a move by another candidate, by Gordon Campbell, or simply by her.

  2. I do not think someone this successful, with such a stacked resume, would give up an amazing career to sit on the back bench. Moira Stilwell is a fresh face in BC politics and her qualifications and achievements show that she is of a higher calibre than most BC politicians. She genuinely cares about British Columbia AND British Columbians. How do I know? Because a person of her calibre does not just step out of a well paying, high status career, and jump into politics unless they are really passionate about making a difference. The people of British Columbia are lucky to have her and they need to realize this soon.

    1. an amazing medical career is nice. more achievements than a used car salesman is nice too. i have no respect for the things she cares about by voting for policies that hurt vulnerable people.

      first, do no harm…my ass.

      i believe she is passionate about making a difference. what she is passionate about, based on her voting record, repulses me.

      1. Instead of hyperbole, how about we stick to the facts? The fact of the matter is, if you could do a better job than Stilwell (or Campbell for that matter) then why aren’t you stepping up to the plate? If you had any walk behind all that talk, you’d be out trying to fix things yourself instead of pounding your frustration into that poor keyboard. But before you tire yourself out, I have a tip…

        I recommend first listening to what ALL the candidates bring to the table and THEN making a decision on who, in your opinion, is the best candidate (or who is actually running to be leader).

        Looking at your replies, from this post down, you seem to like posturing behind a transparent attempt to sound intelligent when in actual fact, behind your aggressive keystrokes you are obviously hiding a jealousy of those who aim to do what you cannot muster the guts to do yourself.

        Yes, this reply is inflammatory, but the fact of the matter is your responses to the few people who have responded to your post show the automatic contempt you hold for people who have opinions that differ from yours. A simple polite response would have been appropriate initially. Instead I got a cliche excerpt from the Hippocratic Oath.

        1. thanks, bill.

          the fact of the matter of my piece is that moira stilwell has no significant profile or caucus support beyond the kind of thing she said on sean holman’s cfax show sunday, that they support her as a person. which is noble. i get that.

          my point is that she isn’t positioned to lead the party or the province.

          the job of someone who supports her is to bring some reasons not why she might be a brilliant doctor, but why she is qualified to lead a pack of neoliberal privatization zealots, which is what the BC Liberal party is.

          so far, beyond her personal character, which i will grant you in its entirety, the best qualification she has to lead that party is that her husband once owned a small share in a for-profit corporate health care clinic, demonstrating she too is likely a privateer at heart. or at least she married one.

          you can shift the focus to me if you like, but i’ll remind you of a discussion expectation of reasons for why she is great.

          and for me, never in one million hyperbolic years would i join, let alone try to lead such a party of anti-social privateers as the BC Liberal party. so i totally give you that she and even her husband are eminently more qualified than me to run that party.

          my point, originally, is that i don’t think that even she expects to win. she is likely looking for a higher profile cabinet position.

          my frustrations are myriad from a decade of this government working very hard to destroy the social contract. i’m not alone.

          and i have stepped up to a variety of plates in recent years, just not with the BC Liberal party, which i resent profoundly. and i don’t expect you really mean that only people who step up to the plate to run for the leadership of a provincial political party are qualified to judge other candidates.

          i appreciate your tip, but i will not be waiting for all candidates to declare, then introduce their spin before i pass judgement. the role of an engaged citizenry is to engage. always. when moira stilwell announced her campaign with an incomplete social media presence, that’s fair game. no one is obliged to wait until february 26, 2011 before commenting on the state of readiness of a candidate.

          thanks for sharing your speculation about my psyche. the race, though, for Liberal leader is not between me and moira stilwell. and if you explore the last 6.5 years of my website, you’ll see the kind of things i’ve organized and run for. but none of that is relevant because this whole discussion, again, is supposed to be about actual reasons why a person who is running to be the premier of 4.2 million people ought to be such a leader.

          most of my opposition to comments here revolve around the lack of arguments to back up claims and opinions.

          for a person who has been in political life for 18.5 months to presume to be qualified to be premier, i would expect a lot more than appeals to what appears to be some sound character.

          thanks for engaging, but i’m still looking for reasons why she would make a good premier, beyond her character and 18.5 months in office.

  3. Bill, you could make that argument about most politicians. Gary Collins, Colin Hansen, Geoff Plante, etc.

    At this point, though, she has done nothing to show that she has done anything in the best interest of British Columbians while in Victoria, unless you consider the last year and a half of Liberal bullshit caring about . Supported (and still supports) the HST, supported cuts to education, home care, etc…

    With her impressive resume, what has she done in Victoria?

    1. yeah, i’d like to see a political initiative she has made that a.) shows genuine compassion for suffering people and b.) can be considered more significant than every legislative vote she made to support the Liberal party’s regressive, anti-social policies.

      i won’t hold my breath.

  4. I think that the comments posted are short-sighted and the result of a long history of misery at the hands of the current leadership. No-one new to a Cabinet position is going to last long if they come in and try to make a clean sweep and you can’t get anything done without a title. Moira Stilwell didn’t get to where she is in anything by being callous or someone’s pawn. She is calculated yes, but not in the ‘screw the common man’ kind of way you are suggesting. She is committed to the long-term outcome of BC and is more aware than most of the short-term pain that can come with that approach. That’s not rhetoric it’s life and, she knows better than most, that it’s also about death. Moira who? sounds a little like Sarah Who? and I can tell you that Moira has a much tighter handle on the politics and policies of Canadians than she’s being given credit. It’s a big mistake to count her out.

    1. fair warning, bill, liz and others:

      those of you shamelessly transparent cheerleaders for particular leadership candidates risk being gratuitously mocked.

      doubly so if you merely spout insubstantial statements of alleged awesomeness without concrete examples of anything other than being a pathetic party toadie.

      that is all.

    2. ok, liz, a few things:

      1. moira voted for every bit of misery from the current leadership. if she didn’t, please show where she voted against caucus. otherwise, don’t try to say she didn’t support the misery.

      2. please show how moira stilwell was not being callous in voting for the misery we’ve seen in BC in the last 9.5 years. here are 100 examples of Liberal rule that she voted for:
      http://lailayuile.wordpress.com/100-reasons-gordon-campbell-must-go/

      3. i don’t really care if she’s a pawn or not. the party is toxic.

      4. every vote for government policy moira stilwell cast screwed the common man. please show how she opposed all that mean-spirited policy.

      5. i know she is committed to “the long term outcome of bc”: what *is* that outcome, why is it so awesome to justify all this short term pain? failure to provide details leaves your cheerleading in the land of fluffy rhetoric. let the mockery begin. it also leaves everyone with merely her voting record to speak for her vision of bc. that’s an epic fail.

      6. “That’s not rhetoric it’s life” is itself rhetoric because you provided no details to support your argument. people who spew rhetoric but refuse to provide details insult the intelligence of their audience and breed political cynicism and lead to the majority of voters not voting in bc.

      7. “moira who?” means she has done nothing/little to create a public awareness of how awesome she is beyond obediently voting with gordon campbell every step of the way. that’s why you say she needs a title, which is why i think she’s running for a higher stature cabinet position, not premier. and still, not knowing what she stands for that is good for the common man leaves us with her voting record and support for the regressive HST.

      8. please, once again, provide evidence of how she has a “tighter handle on the politics and policies of Canadians than she’s being given credit.” and while you’re at it, show her that keen insight has helped the millions in BC who have suffered under this party for almost a decade. if you can’t do that, you have nothing to stand on.

      seriously, liz, i can tell you like her. i don’t care. if you have no evidence to back up why she’s awesome, you are wasting electrons.

      i’m tired of all that breeds political cynicism and i won’t let it pass without comment around here. if you want to get away with insubstantial arguments, try the corporate media articles’ comment boards.

  5. You make a fair point, Liz. However, it’s a long history of misery that Moira Stillwell chose to join and support. She saw six years of the worst child poverty in Canada and thought, “Now there’s a team I could join, there’s a group I want to be a part of.” As a doctor, is she supportive of Kevin Falcon’s move to charge patients to stay in hospitals? If not, she should say so.

  6. Stephen I can see you don’t like her. I don’t care. I also can’t see where any of the points you make are examples of substantial argument against her as a candidate. They are no less personal than you claim mine to be for her. The link to the voting record doesn’t tell me anything about an individual’s plans or policies. As I am not a toadie, I am not an insider – but yes, Brenton I believe that asking patients to pay to stay in hospitals is not something she is likely to endorse. Wouldn’t the long-term outcome for BC be fiscal security, accessible and first-rate health-care, continued dollars for scientific research and education? All of which she supports. Shamelessly transparent cheerleading is a first for me – thank you, I think. Gratuitous mocking
    neither fears nor shames me – I think perhaps it comes with this territory.

    1. No need for fear or shame, Liz, just reasoned debate.

      I agree with you that time spent in this Liberal cabinet and is no way to judge a person. We’ve seen cabinet ministers in this government leave out of frustration at having limited or non-existent influence on policy. So decisions made by the government should really be seen as decisions made by Campbell and a select few insiders.

      However (and it’s a big however), Stillwell chose to join that cabinet. She must have known how the cabinet was run, and she must have known who was in it and what its record was. That is an endorsement of the decisions made by cabinet before she joined, and she hasn’t done anything significant since she joined that we can judge her by. Other than your cheerleading, earnest as it may be, her record is one of support for Campbell and his policies. Which is a shameful record, to say the least.

    2. my initial argument is that it doesn’t look like she thinks she’s a serious contender for leader of the Liberal party.

      i stated some support for that argument.

      i never intended to evaluate her as a quality candidate or not for a party that has caused such misery in this province.

      it is incumbent on you, someone who supports her, to explain why you think she is good.

      all i need, frankly is her voting record and her desire to run as a Liberal and her support for the HST. that all is in the public record and reflects all i need to show she supports horrible policy.

      if she is secretly some sort of social policy saviour, i wonder why she ran with the Liberals, and it’s up to her to demonstrate that she’s less heartless than her caucus colleagues.

      her voting record tells us everything about policies she chooses to support. Blair Lekstrom has demonstrated what to do if you will not support the party policy. everyone else who votes with the pack cannot later claim they didn’t agree. that’s why we have a voting record.

      however awesome her still unstated awesome plans and policies are, they have to somehow overwhelm every regressive vote she made. i wish her and her supporters the best of luck with that.

      the transparent i can handle in the end. i said insubstantial because you provided no evidence to back up your claims.

      cutting taxes for the rich and making them o% for the first $500,000 of revenue in 13 months, while making poor people pay $29.40/day for medically necessary recovery for procedure guaranteed by the Canada Health Act will not create “fiscal security, accessible and first-rate health-care, continued dollars for scientific research and education.”

      i’m still quite eager to see evidence from moira stilwell that she has any apology for her voting pattern or admirable policy choices beyond what appears to be her posturing herself to be attractive to whoever wins the leadership.

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