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Peter and the Press Release
Toronto-St. Paul’s Conservative candidate Peter Kent loves his press releases. He sends quite a lot of them out, and a lot of them seem to work. As reported in this week’s eye, Mr Kent, if nothing else, is getting the conservative adgenda out there. By that, he must mean this, his latest press release. Here’s the gist, in case you don’t want to read his opening sentence:
Remarks by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denying the existence of the Holocaust are deeply offensive and totally unacceptable.
Thanks, dude. But what’s the basis? Dr Carolyn Bennett posts Paul Martin’s response on her blog, and Paul Summerville does not mention. What part of this issue really constitutes a press release from a downtown Toronto candidate?
Mr. Kent is active in media because he can. And being this active can’t be good for his career as a broadcaster. By lashing out at perceived media bias, does he not lose credibility as an independent voice? Then he makes a good point about the un-moderateness of his CPC leader Stephen Harper – distancing himself from Harps on the Peter Kent website. This all reiterates Kent’s stance on the current state of the CPC:
My candidacy is endorsed by John Tory and Peter Mackay. They both believe – as I do – that, by returning broad-minded Conservatives to Ottawa, regional imbalances will be overcome and we’ll once again be the “big tent” party that has contributed so much to Canadian society.
Good policy, bad politics? What will Mr Kent do when all the press releases are sent, the election’s over, and (most likely) he doesn’t have a job? Will he return to the bias media he’s spent the last three months speaking out against? Or join the communications department of the leader he hopes to undermine as a ‘broad-minded’ Conservative? Expect a press release.