The federal NDP issued a news release this morning with the subject line: “A really impressive opening” – what people are saying about Jagmeet.
The news release included quotes from 11 different “political observers” – mostly media, including TV and print journalists – saying really nice things about the campaign launch on Wednesday by party leader and Burnaby South MP Jagmeet Singh.
I found this interesting for a couple of reasons.
One is that there’s a quote from the National Post’s John Ivison that included this gem: “He’s not dead yet.”
That’s not exactly a rousing endorsement for your campaign. Yes, it is positive and fits the narrative the NDP are spinning in regards to consistent polling showing the NDP mired in third place, or even in fourth place.
I spoke with New Westminster-Burnaby NDP MP Peter Julian this morning about the campaign and he reminded me that in 2011, when the NDP had its big breakthrough, the party started off with low polling numbers.
You’ll hear that narrative a lot in this campaign as NDP supporters push for a repeat of 2011. We’ll see if it actually comes true. The party seems to be off to a good start, if you believe the media folks quoted in the NDP’s news release.
That brings me to the second interesting thing of note in the news release. For months on social media I’ve been reading tweets and Facebook posts claiming the reason why the NDP isn’t polling higher is that a “corporate media” has been ignoring the party’s announcements on Pharmacare, housing and more. This isn’t true, of course, because I’ve read lots of stories about some of these announcements.
But now you have the party bragging about all of these media people from the CBC, CTV, Le Journal de Quebec, and others saying good things about Singh.
The party even included the Ivison quote. Ivison works for Postmedia and NDP supporters love to say how that media company – which deserves much criticism – is staunchly against their party in every way.
“Biggest surprise of the week so far - slick launch by Jagmeet Singh,” Ivison said. “Good visuals, great oppo research linking Liberals with their ‘wealthy friends,’ launch speech talking about Justin Trudeau’s ‘pretty words and empty promises.’ He's not dead yet.”
So much for the media conspiracy.
Follow Chris Campbell on Twitter @shinebox44
