WTAF, Tony?

Pea Seas drowning slowly.

Image: VOCM

The hardcore Liberals - 10% of the population - don't like what the Government is doing.

Never would.

Hard core Pea Seas like what's going on. That's five percent of the population.

Soft Libs - 19% - are mildly unhappy. Soft Pea Seas - 23% - are mildly okay with it all.

The largest bunch - 40% - are in the middle wondering what the actual fuck is wrong with ‘en all.

This confirms the political problem I described a few weeks ago as Tony Wakeham looks to sign the Liberal deal to give Churchill Falls to Quebec, something most people are opposed to or very dubious about.

Tony has no political weight to put behind the deal. He has no ability to persuade people to change their minds.If he pushes things, his support numbers are likely to get smaller rather than larger.

Hogan's Heroes are no threat.

Tony’s problems are all internal. Tony could find himself out of a job before too long but that wouldn’t change anything because the problems are in the whole caucus and certainly within the whole cabinet.

The Pea Seas don't have any idea what to do.

No one in there can tell you in a few simple words what's going on and why.

Worse, they aren't organized for success. Good people on the Eighth but all in the wrong jobs. And they are missing two if not three key staff jobs, all about high level, strategic direction. Those people don’t just work for the premier. They have a responsibility to the whole government. That’s something that no one in the Premier’s chair has learned for at least 15 years. They help everyone succeed.

You can see the mess in the latest Innu shag-up. No sense to it at all. None. These are not Mi’gmaw, who were not indigenous to Newfoundland and Labrador. This is the I–N–N-U, one of only two groups in the province to have actual constitutional rights as indigenous people. Whatever is going on it is a capital cockup and all we’ve gotten from the government is meaningless, poorly written nonsense from Tony's office.

The big picture problem is not just a cancelled conference. Pissed-off Innu will cause problems with Churchill on top of any other developments like mines. It will take time and money to settle the disputes caused by the same political mismanagement that has plagued the Newfoundland and Labrador government for decades in this century. Tony Wakeham can’t afford this politically, but the rest of us can’t afford this in every other way.

That's the strategic bit.

You can see the problems too in the latest shag up by the out-of-control health bureaucracy. First there was the needless racket with family doctors. Needless and caused 100 percent by arrogance and bungling.

Now there’s a second problem caused by deciding arbitrarily to make every child over the age of 12 responsible for their own care. The official response lines were all gaslighting. A few ordinary people picked up the same misinformation and spread it around on social media claiming this was an old policy. It isn’t. It also isn’t about the relatively small number of young people who are seeking mental healthcare or other kinds of care that they don’t want their parents to know about in a problem family situation. Bureaucrats and others are using those exceptions that are already well handled to justify a bad decision. It’s basically the same idea we had with the tuition freeze. It benefitted people with money who could afford to go to university, but it was always sold as helping out the poor people. That’s bullshit since the people in those difficult circumstances have already been taken care of by existing practises and policy that put the emphasis on the care of the patient and leaves decisions in the hand of the primary care provider, who is often not working for NLHS. They’ve already got clear rules about patient health information. They’ve had it for decades. There are no disconnect in the law or whatever way the premier put it. This dumb decision comes 100% from NLHS and screws everyone except the bureaucrats who decided this in secret and who don’t really give a rat’s behind about the fallout.

The upside for Tony is that he has time to fix his problems and start running a more effective government. We’ve had enough screwing around. We need grown-ups in charge.

The downside for all of us is it the first step to change is for Tony and the rest of them to understand they’re in a really bad spot and must change. The first step in getting out of a hole is to stop digging. Since 2010, no premier has gotten to that first step.

The odds are against Tony.

Which means they are against all of us.

Which means we must hope, because hope is pretty much all we’ve got left.