The media and the message!

Voting day is like the Grey Cup or Stanley Cup playoffs, it’s a multi-media driven event, the networks pull out all the stops and bring all the gizmos to make you put down that clicker Yet we sit around watching the tube squinting at the crawler on the bottom of the screen telling you if your candidate has won or lost, clicking from network to network to spot a trend, an insight or if we're lucky a gaffe.

Things started off in an interesting form, the broadcast wasn’t even on the air for ten minutes and the CBC decision desk had announced a Conservative minority government, apparently following the folks at CTV by scant minutes. It’s a good thing that the poll times were brought closer together across the nation, giving us the chance to exercise our right while it still meant something. Why bother counting the vote when Peter has spoken! Ours is truly a first past the post system, first past the electoral post with votes and first past the electronic post with results.

This election, like those in the past had the networks trot out their big stars and prize panels. The CBC had St. Edward of Broadbent to sit back and bask in the glow of the NDP charge. And just to keep his place in book of lore of the NDP, he did not have to watch and see them pass his record haul of seats in decades gone by. The Mother Corp brought in Hugh Segal and John Manley to bookend the panel with the Conservative and Liberal agenda. Peter Mansbridge played ringmaster with a little Rex here, and old flame in Wendy there and inexplicably even Ron McLean and Don Cherry (they really want to get Cherry fired at the CBC don’t they, giving him the chance to really put his foot into it, fortunately for Don his time was short and his words not sharp). The coverage there was good, with lots of reports from the boonies and a fair amount of explanation as to what was going on.

CTV once again counted on Count Floyd Robertson to use those dulcet tones to reassure the nation. They brought together Brian Tobin for the Liberals and tried their darndest to get him to declare himself as a candidate in the soon to come leadership campaign. Joy MacPhail carried the NDP flag, enjoying the ride as socialists more than doubled their seat totals. An annoying guy from the PQ tried to make the best of a rather disappointing situation for the Bloc, however he spoke those famous words that forever identify what the Bloc is all about “If it’s good for Quebec, we’ll take it”, now that’s what consensus is all about bien sur! Campaign co-chair John Reynolds was the Conservative representative on the CTV Panel, he did an admirable job of explaining the Conservative campaign, though you know he had to be mildly disappointed that he wasn’t able to explain what a Conservative majority government was about to provide in the way of governance.

With the benefit of a satellite dish, I was able to surf across the land from coast to coast, stopping in Toronto as Jack Layton and his wife giggled at their good fortune to be able to live in the same city for a couple of years. Over to Quebec where the talking heads discussed the merits of a radio shock jock heading for the halls of parliament. A stop in the Maritimes and the careful ruminations of Bernard Lord, the guy that might have been the next leader had things not gone the Conservatives way. His words were guarded but one can see the wheels turning and the internal clock a ticking. Back to our coast and Victoria’s A channel, which for a small outlet provided some pretty sage advice in the form of Rafe Mair, his comments as usual had a British Columbia bias, but were full of great insight as to the machinations of power and what may lie ahead for Western Canada.

By far the most bizarre bit of television though happened on Global, for some reason Kevin Newman got it into his head that the Liberals may wish to not concede defeat and instead should have approached the NDP to form a coalition government. An idea that just seemed insane to me, I mean I’m sure that it’s hard to give up power, but even the Liberals wouldn’t have seriously considered sending the nation into a constitutional crisis. Imagine the drama of asking the Governor General of the nation, appointed by Martin, to ignore the vote totals and allow him to retain the government. Perhaps it might make a good mini series for Global, but it was never going to fly. Newman should have dismissed the idea within the first ten minutes of bringing it up and gotten back to explaining how a new minority government might work. I tried to stay with Global for a bit, but their weird conspiracy plans sent me away, looking for a bit more solid information and a lot less wild speculation on things that aren’t going to happen.

It was not as dramatic a night as anticipated, the Liberals did not disappear from the electoral scene, the Bloc did not get to declare unilateral independence and the NDP got to dream of some golden years one more time. In the end, there was no real sea change of Canadian opinion, just a cautious nod to the other guy to check things out and see what he can do. It was much the same for the viewers of the coverage; we surf and surf and surf until we find that wave to ride for awhile. I never found that perfect wave on election night, but there were some pretty good rides while I was out there!