Thread by @sunnshiiny

I will never forget how much this election costs since it’s repeated ad nauseam several times daily by opposition leaders as a dig against PMJT.

I’ll gladly contribute my taxes to pay for an election that gains LPC a majority. I’d even pay extra.

I’m so tired of O’Toole’s coded language saying he would never interfere in provinces decisions regarding covid.

If we didn’t have an election called and federal intervention in Alberta, we would be in much more severe conditions. It’s plenty bad enough already.

That is what O’Toole is saying. “Respecting provinces jurisdiction” is code for “laissez faire” or leave them alone. If Kenney implemented policy that killed people in large numbers, O’Toole is saying clearly he would not intervene on Albertans behalf, or any other province.

People need to pay attention to what politicians say.

Connotation, denotation & comprehension skills are paramount.

The content of O’Toole’s narrative is abundantly clear. His focus on a pandemic election is a distraction. He throws red meat, then delivers his narrative.

PMJT has not been overly aggressive with premiers publicly. What he does behind closed doors we don’t know.

But we know his style is not manipulative power mongering macho man. But Kenney is a control freak. He doesn’t like being challenged. He’s incapable of admitting fault.

So any question of his decision making will be perceived as interference in provincial purview. Kenney blames PMJT for every failure he’s made, or Notley. He has never taken responsibility for his decisions. Including the current covid disaster.

His “sorry, not sorry” apology followed up with a 1919 Calgary Stampede pendant featured prominently in his follow up Facebook chat displays his contempt for dying and sick Albertans and reveals his sadistic personality.

Kenney is a danger to Albertans and all Canadians. His intent is to make covid a permanent scourge. And covid doesn’t observe provincial boundaries. So Kenney and the UCP approved policy to infect everybody and let the chips fall where they may is a threat to national security.

O’Toole is saying he would permit Kenney to put Albertans and all Canadians at risk.

Why people don’t understand that is curious?

It’s not like any communication made by cons can be accepted at face value.

But if you lack the cynicism I’ve developed for conservatives, the content of the statement is clear. O’Toole will not intervene or question the decisions of premiers (no matter how heinous or threatening in nature they are). The part in parentheses is implied.

Which is why learning how to interpret coded language is crucial to understanding politics. All politicians use it. Not just conservatives. Tone of voice, body language, implicit narratives, hidden meanings are all speaking styles used by politicians.

It’s why many believe politicians lie. They do, but far less often than people perceive.

They use communication techniques that keep them from over committing or offending smaller factions of the population.

Misinterpretation is often confused with falsehoods.

And if you don’t like that feature of politics, it’s inherent in pluralist diverse societies. Because people with polarized opinions are asked to support one policy even if it isn’t their preference so we all live in peace & maintain social cohesiveness.

A more homogenous society may not have politicians who use these communication techniques so frequently, but they also don’t value diversity and pluralism (multiple centres of power within a society).

The point is, you need to be proficient in understanding this communication style or risk misunderstanding what politicians are actually saying.

It’s not that hard, but requires a bit of effort to determine who the intended audience is when a politician is speaking.

How many understood immediately that O’Toole was using a less direct method of communication to inform the far right that he won’t intervene when policies that alter culture, human rights and right to life are enacted and implemented?

A constitutional purist may appreciate O’Toole’s commitment, but it’s unlikely to reassure the moderate centrist who isn’t a big risk taker and is guaranteed to horrify the left progressives who value human rights and believe govts should protect the people, not try to harm them.

The trick in understanding “politico speak” is to understand the goal of communication prior to listening to the content.

Why is the politician speaking? Who are they speaking to? Who is the intended audience?

When you know these before it’s easy to decode the narrative.

Campaigns are easy. Politicians are speaking to their base supporters and to the fringes of their support to gather as many voters as possible. That’s one group of listeners for LPC and 2 for CPC and NDP.

Why 1 for LPC? Because they ask for political support from moderates (centre right, left progressives as well as the centre left).

CPC speaks to centre right moderates and to hardcore far right libertarians and now openly courts fascist white supremacists and religious zealots.

That’s a big tent and requires hiding their true agenda from either centrist moderates, radical extremists, or using coded language to satisfy both political ideology bases (moderates & extremists).

Once you know that, decoding their narrative becomes significantly easier.

It’s the same with NDP. They have moderates and extremists as well. Social Democrats, democratic socialists, left libertarians, anarchists, Marxist socialists and communists.

Anarchists want to remove central authority, Marxists want to impose a socialist economy.

NDP’s moderate base is much smaller than the more radically left ideologues. Their narrative is aimed to appeal to moderate left progressives to support their more radical agenda. They speak to people who don’t feel LPC is working fast enough. They promise immediate big outcomes.

Anyone who has worked on a large social issue can tell you that it’s not possible to achieve it immediately in a diverse and pluralist society, except by autocratic methods. That’s the part NDP fail to spell out. Their ideology is based on authoritarian rule or mob rule.

But the more militant & radical support base reveals that daily on Twitter interactions by mobbing and using intimidation to gain compliance or silence dissent.

I’ve been mobbed a few times. It’s not fun. It’s exhausting. It’s meant to be.

Basically, there’s one political party that isn’t using coded language. That’s LPC. They spell out the issues and their plans to address it.

They aren’t trying to appease extremists. They aren’t looking for support from radical activists.

They hear them and respond to their demands as best as they can, but those extremist demands don’t shape LPC policy. Nor should they.

Extremists shouldn’t run the nation.

It’s those extremists demanding accommodation of their decision not to be vaccinated.

It’s those extremists using authoritarian demonstrations in front of hospitals and entering schools offering vaccination clinics. It’s those extremists demanding UBI immediately, adoption of socialist economic structures and removal of FPTP to give them a guaranteed platform.

It’s those extremists convincing moderates that a minority govt is preferable to a majority, because it gives extremists the balance of power.

In a democracy, the majority is supposed to have more influence on policy. Ochlocrats prefer that a small loud mob has all the power.

The September 20, 2021 federal election will determine whether Canada remains a social democracy or if we make the leap into more authoritarian forms of governance.

The narratives offered by opposition make it extremely clear unseating a strong leader is the objective.

Even in a minority position, PMJT has managed the pandemic well. Developed a transformational budget and inspired hope for multiple special interest groups for systemic and transformative change. Not as fast as some would like, but the commitment is there.

He’s also promised to protect Canadians from the extremist ideologues using fascistic civil disobedience and intimidation to hold the rest of the nation hostage. And he’s adamant that Zero Covid be the national strategy and the attempt to achieve natural herd immunity cease.

PMJT is not a tyrant. He’s a liberalist moderate addressing individualist tyrants on both ends of the political spectrum.

When you fight extremism it requires a firmer stance than normal.

Journalists have criticized PMJT for using firmer language and calling out threats.

It seriously makes me wonder if the media knows anything about power dynamics. Democratic principles are used when all parties agree to use peaceful respectful communication. Not when fascist demonstrations, threats and intimidation are being used to shape policy.

Which is why it unnerves me when the MSM frame these increasingly violent demonstrations of civil disobedience as protests.

Peaceful protests don’t use intimidation, they are peaceful groups of people to communicate displeasure with a decision or to request action.

Civil disobedience uses harassment and sometimes force to coerce change.

And when a small faction of the population holds the majority hostage to their demands, that’s called mob rule, not democracy and not a simple protest.

Words are important. And the way we frame political action is extremely important.

It is not a peaceful demonstration when hostile protesters enter a school offering a vaccination clinic. It’s not a peaceful protest when mobs of people intimidate HCWs and patients.

Where are the police and why are they allowing for this type of mob intimidation and terrorizing of the public?

A mask is not 100% guarantee to protect from contracting covid. When people spit at you and grab a mask off your face that’s physical assault.

In a pandemic, it’s aggravated assault. So why are police not doing their job? Do they agree with the actions of the mob? Then they should be fired and replaced.

Why aren’t people writing their police chiefs and regional directors to demand the rule of law be upheld?

It doesn’t matter that these are minor crimes and harassment. Letting them continue only gives them more courage to escalate their intimidation and provocation.

These hostile mobs believe their reliving some civil rights replay and are justified in their behaviour.

They aren’t justified, they’re hooligans.

Taking responsibility for the health of the other people in your community is a small price to pay for the benefits of living in a society.

No freedom has been compromised, no liberty at stake. People are free to refuse vaccines.

They are NOT free to put others lives at risk without consequences. The consequences are restrictions on their ability to move about publicly and difficulty gaining employment. No one is holding a gun to anyone’s head. But this mob is holding up any return to normal for all.

Extremists don’t get to force their values on the rest of society. They’re welcome to hold whatever beliefs they want. But there are rules, regulations and laws that make society safe for everyone. Not just angry fascist mobs with severe extremist entitlement issues.

My son refused to eat dinner one night. He demanded candy instead of the healthy food on his plate. He screamed and hollered. Three his fork on the floor. Spit at me and started throwing whatever was within reach trying to force me to cave to his demands.

That’s what these mobs of fascists are doing at hospitals, political campaigns and now schools. Disrupting and endangering others in an attempt to force their will on the rest of us.

My son was scooped up and restrained from throwing random items that could hurt him or me.

He spent some time in his room and received a stern talking to from his mother that this was not acceptable dinner time behaviour. He learned quickly that acting out wasn’t going to get him what he wanted.

Law enforcement has done the complete opposite with these mobs.

They’ve allowed increasing level of violence. Throwing rocks, spitting, grabbing masks off people’s faces, blocking ambulances, using intimidation.

They’ve allowed these to continue like it’s a normal protest. It’s not. It’s escalating in intensity and violence.

Put an end to mob intimidation and harassment. No where does it say that assault and blocking people from healthcare is a right or freedom in the constitution.

Law enforcement needs to do their jobs or look for alternate employment.

Send these numnuts home or arrest them for being a public nuisance. Set some limits on acceptable protest behaviour. Peaceful, non threatening and absent of violence or it’s shut down and people are arrested. And yes, that includes the bone heads tearing down statues.

Peaceful protests are a guaranteed right. Not destruction of offending statues, not physically assaulting someone wearing a mask or a politician speaking to people gathered to hear him. Grow up. My kid was 2 years old when he had his melt down. These people are adults.

So treat them like adults and put their butts in jail overnight to think over their choices. And hand them a hefty fine so they think twice about doing it again.

And if they don’t learn, keep extending their jail time and increasing their fines. Mobbing is not a freedom.

@threadreaderapp please compile