Just off the phone with a Conservative caucus member who's hopping mad about Denise Batters getting the boot.
"For Erin, this is the beginning of the end," this Conservative told me. "It's a position of weakness. A real leader would say, 'Let's have a vote,' and trigger a caucus vote to see just how much support he really has."
This person says the more O'Toole tries to "suppress" dissent, the bigger anti-O'Toole movement will be — comparing O'Toole to Wojciech Jaruzelski, Soviet puppet leader in 1980s Poland who imposed martial law to silence opposition only to be toppled by invigorated anticommunists.
"He's set up the Conservative fund, he's set up the OLO, the party executive, he's got the shadow cabinet and his house executive, he's set up all that to protect himself. But one thing he can't protect himself from is the grassroots," this Conservative said.
"This will only make it grow," this Conservative said of the anti-O'Toole movement after Batters was turfed. There's already 2,700+ signatures on the Batters petition.
This CPC caucus member doesn't like the Reform Act being weaponized by O'Toole loyalists, who are threatening to assemble MPs to vote anyone out of caucus who backs Batters. "The Reform Act was meant to be an empowerment tool for caucus not as an empowerment tool for the leader."
"I hear from people who are pissed off," the Conservative said. "They're pissed off because they don't like Erin for whatever reason because he screwed over the socons, the gun lobby. Obviously it was a surprise to us to see a carbon tax — after we fought against a carbon tax."
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