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January 4, 2005
PM's PR play
Remember the days after Prime Minister Paul Martin declared he was "mad as hell" about the sponsorship scandal? The government's reputation was suffering as a result of its slow and inadequate response to AdScam. The Prime Minister was getting was personally catching a lot of the flack so the brainiacs he employs decided to send him on a cross-country tour to, well, placate the masses.
Flash forward to yesterday. The government's reputation was once again suffering as a result of its slow and inadequate response to the Asian Tsunami. The Prime Minister was once again personally catching a lot of the flack and, once more, the brainiacs in his office decided to send him on tour.
This page out of Paul Martin's playbook is reserved for times when he knows his government is taking it on the chin. He and his strategists believe that if the PM is seen to be caring and doing something about whatever it that is annoying the great unwashed, their anger will be muted.
The problem is this strategy is transparent. As part of yesterday's tour, the PM met with children at school where a large number of the students had family in the areas effected by the tsunami. He followed that up by a meeting with leaders of the effected communities in Canada. One of the participants in the latter called it what it was: "a photo opportunity."
Sure, the PM has doubled Canada's aid to the region (it now stands at $80-million) and he will be sending DART to Sri Lanka (though it will take more than a week to get it there and running). Sure, he wishes Canada could have been faster off the mark, and he might even be "mad as hell" about it. Still the fact remains that in the immediate aftermath of the disaster, when it was clear to all of us that this was a massive disaster, his government tried to get away with a miniscule aid contribution.
Being seen to care today will not repair the damage done by his government's miserly initial tsunami relief effort just as it did little to take the sting out of AdScam.
Posted by maxthecat on January 4, 2005 at 09:03 AM | Comments (0)
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