Mayoral candidate Wai Young, who is running with Coalition Vancouver, officially launching her campaign in June at city hall. Photo Dan Toulgoet
Lyin' Ted, Crooked Hillary, Sleepy Joe and Low Energy Jeb are all nicknames you're familiar with if you followed the rise of Donald Trump in the previous U.S. election. The man-child candidate pulled no punches when it came to bullying political hopefuls both in and outside of the Republican party.
Closer to home, former Harper Conservative MP and now-mayoral candidate Wai Young and her Coalition Vancouver party seem to have taken the nicknames page from Trump's greasy playbook.
Promoting a Postmedia debate yesterday in which four of the mayoral candidates sat down in the Vancouver Sun and Province's newsroom, they issued this tweet below.
NEWS NOW: @WaiYoung at @VancouverSun/@TheProvince debate of 4 top-tier mayoralty candidates.
Just #TruthTeller Wai Young, #SocialistStewart, #SayYesToHiddenCashHector & #DitheringKenSim invited. But only Wai + @Coalition_YVR are 100% FOR THE PEOPLE!#vanpoli #vanRE #vanelxn pic.twitter.com/uiIfCEnFp5
— Coalition Vancouver (@Coalition_YVR) September 26, 2018
The debate was actually one of two that Postmedia conducted, sitting down with a total of seven "top-tier" (as described by Coalition Vancouver) mayoral candidates. They'll be posted online soon and we'll be sure to share them.
The shitty, childish nicknames issued by the party were:
- Dithering Ken Sim
- Socialist [Kennedy] Stewart
- Say Yes To Hidden Cash Hector [Bremner]
As expected, they gave their candidate a flattering one: Truth Teller Wai Young.
Young's right wing platform involves a lot of pro-car policies (ripping out bike lanes etc), and she's more conservative than the other "top-tier" candidates. Her tagline "100% FOR THE PEOPLE, not socialists!" is confusing and contradictory, as parties that are all about people typically have a socialist lean to them. Where's the truth in that?
In a ResearchCo poll released last week only 3% of decided voters said they'd be casting a ballot for her, however I feel she'll take a higher percentage of the vote.
Wai Young is the sleeper candidate. Few are expecting she'll do well but she has a ton of quiet support. Close to 1,000 people packed into a recent fundraiser for her, and her supporters may not be the type who bang the drum in a city full of loud, sometimes self-righteous progressives who have little tolerance for those who oppose their views.
Looking into my (stupid) crystal ball I see the possibility of Young stripping just enough support from Ken Sim (a bit to her left) to allow Kennedy Stewart (wayyyy to her left) to sail into the mayor's seat this October.
This is Vancouver’s Stupidest Politics Column (penned by Stupid Slob Kronbauer), informing voters during the run-up to the 2018 election in Vancouver. Read the archive HERE.
