Election 2015 Addendum

Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.
  - Bertrand Russell

Government is too big and too important to be left to the politicians.
  - Chester Bowles

Taking up the whole front page of the Ottawa Citizen Newspaper today was an ad from the Conservative Party.  I suspect that this ad showed up in a lot of newspapers across the country today.  It is, of course, the last minute “block buster” that is supposed to make people suddenly change their minds and vote Conservative rather than Liberal.  The beauty of it is that it leaves no time for rebuttal by the Liberals since most places in Canada have no Sunday paper.  It is not a new idea in politics; in fact I have been waiting for something like this all the past week.  It may even be powerful enough to change the outcome of the election on Monday.

But what about the ad’s veracity?  A lot of people will undoubtedly read this the way the Conservatives hope they will, namely without critical analysis.  With analysis, and an understanding of what has previously been said, you can see that the statements rely on misinformation and neglect of actual platforms.  The first statement in the ad states that an average family with two children will lose about $4000 per year to lost benefits.  But according to the Liberal platform, these losses will be made up with a new child benefit that will cover this amount. There is no mention of that in the ad. The second statement talks about a senior couple who will lose the benefits of income splitting.  The “proof” of that is a series of statements given by the Liberals from several years ago.  In fact, in the most recent policy statements by Mr. Trudeau he makes clear that he will NOT cancel income splitting for seniors.

So, two “blockbuster” statements that are, no doubt, to provide the “knockout punch” to the Liberals really don’t stand up to close scrutiny.  This is not a new phenomenon in politics, and it won’t be the last time it is tried.  So the message must be, look closely at all such “revelations”.  Otherwise the truth could be lost.

In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
  - George Orwell