Paul Dewar's campaign "doing everything right": Pundits' Guide

Paul Dewar's campaign "doing everything right": Pundits' Guide

Posted by Trevor Pritchard on Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Alice Funke of election analysis website Pundits' Guide says that Ottawa Centre MP Paul Dewar is making all the right moves in his bid to become the next leader of the NDP:

Here is a campaign that is doing everything right, even if the candidate's delivery can be inconsistent in more formal settings, or occasionally the spin can get ahead of itself. Satisfied to hold back on big-name endorsements until the new year (and apparently with more in their back pocket), the Dewar camp had planned a big push out of the gate in January, with a show of strength from their ground game, the first campaign video advertisement, a couple of very respectable caucus endorsements, and the promise of an improvement in his french-language skills.

Funke's analysis of Dewar's campaign comes amidst her very in-depth look—as in, more than 3,500 words—at the state of the NDP leadership race. She writes that while not all of Dewar's announcements have gone according to plan—his allegedly world-beating endorsement of Charlie Angus was a bit underwhelming, as we also noted—his ability to connect with people face-to-face is "unmatched among the top four" and his ambitious campaign could be evidence of his potential as the party's next leader.

Funke notes that most of Dewar's support is concentrated in eastern and northern Ontario and Manitoba. But there are pockets of enthusiasm in other parts of the country, including Toronto and possibly Montreal, too.
RELATED: Paul Dewar's call for 70 more NDP seats: can any come from eastern Ontario?

She also excoriates the mainstream media for promoting the idea that the NDP leadership campaign has been uninteresting, urging them, basically, to get off their duffs and cultivate some new contacts:

For the mainstream media who are having trouble finding anything to cover in this race, well first of all you have to show up. You can't cover the NDP Leadership Race from Hy's, nor from Twitter. I'm sorry you have two decades' worth of Liberal sources you've cultivated over the years, but they can't help you cover this either (not that they wouldn't be willing to give it the old college try). But you're not going to develop any new NDP sources if you don't go to the places where you can meet actual New Democrats. Outside Ottawa.

In addition to Dewar, the other "top four," according to Funke and other pundits, are Thomas Mulcair, Peggy Nash, and Brian Topp. The party, which became the country's official opposition for the first time in its history in May 2011, will choose its next leader on March 24.

Photo via Paul Dewar's Facebook page