Kinew effectively fills byelection-blackout silence

Opinion

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This article was published 23/05/2017 (2523 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s Smith for Kinew, and Allan, too.

And for what it’s worth, the lilting allusion to a celebrated 19th-century U.S.-election slogan (“Tippecanoe and Tyler Too”) could be expanded to include McHale and Nedohin and Patterson and Fontaine and Wasylicia-Leis, as well.

NDP leadership candidate Wab Kinew showcased an expanding roster of high-profile supporters at an outdoor press conference Tuesday aimed at trumpeting his commitment to achieving gender balance in future New Democrat caucuses.

On the provincial-politics Richter scale, this would register mostly as a non-event event, given Mr. Kinew’s current status as the sole declared hopeful in the NDP leadership hunt.

Simply put, at present there’s no one else for the NDP faithful to support, at least until — some cynical observers might suggest — perpetual-motion leadership aspirant Steve Ashton declares his intentions regarding the NDP vote in September. The deadline for entry in the leadership race is July 15.

In the meantime, however, there are no alternatives for New Democrats seeking to make a declaration of leadership-candidate support.

So while there was some small element of news to Mr. Kinew’s announcement — that his commitment to building a gender-equal caucus includes transgender and non-binary people, and he has recruited an advisory group to help him reach his goal — Tuesday’s event felt very much like a brand-enhancement exercise.

Its scheduling seemed tailored to take advantage — with, perhaps, an element of mischief in its timing — of the fact the ruling Progressive Conservatives have been rendered temporarily mute, from a public-relations perspective, by the information blackout imposed in the run-up to the Point Douglas byelection on June 13.

Mr. Kinew can promise “a commitment” to gender balance, but realistically the most he or any leader can do is encourage diversity and gender parity in the recruitment and selection of candidates across the province. It’s the public — first at riding-association meetings, and then at the ballot box — that decides who occupies the seats in the legislature.

Still, the announcement effectively filled the void in political newsmaking created by the Tories’ blackout-imposed silence, and offered Mr. Kinew a mostly unchallenged opportunity to continue his long and deliberate exercise of rehabilitating a public image that still, for some, carries the long-ago tarnish of misogynistic and homophobic remarks and song lyrics made during his past life as a hip-hop artist.

The only Tory-inclined response came from party strategist David McLaughlin, who sparked a small-scale Twitter debate by posting “@mbndp identity politics will reach new heights under Mr. Kinew” and, in a subsequent response, “It is how the @mbndp see society: as a collection of groups and interests, i.e. unions. They make public policy in response.”

It didn’t amount to much, but Mr. McLaughlin’s social-media rejoinders confirm that the Pallister government is paying close attention to Mr. Kinew’s campaign, and also suggests the Tories might have liked to add a few more directly aimed choice words in response to the event.

Whether Mr. Kinew can deliver on his gender-parity pledge — indeed, whether he ever becomes NDP leader and has a chance to even try — remains to be seen. But what he demonstrated Tuesday is a level of strategic cunning and capacity for legislative mischief-making that shows he’s beginning to understand the provincial-politics game and might be up for the party leadership challenge — whether unopposed or Ashton-impeded — that lies ahead.