I went to one of these regional feedback townhalls the PC Party is currently holding yesterday. At that regional feedback townhall was a very high-ranking member of the PC Party. And he said something that I didn't quite grasp the import of at first.
He said that, for the longest time, he'd been trying to get party members to submit their e-mail addresses to the party so that they could be contacted more easily.
Now, for someone like me who spends a good chunk of the day trying to figure out how we're going to take this province back, something like this is obvious, not worthy of a second thought. Of course the party needs my e-mail. Of course the party needs the e-mail of every party member. Why is this an issue?
Then, a few hours later, trying to fall asleep, I asked myself the same question. Why is this an issue?
Then it hit me.
At the moment, people are blaming the central campaign for dropping the ball. They are saying the grassroots were ignored, the campaign gave them nothing to work with, there was too much control, whatever.
But, by and large, the same people who complain the party is ignoring them are the same people who won't submit their e-mails to the party. You know......so the party can contact them???
Then I remembered something else this highly placed individual said yesterday. He said that, by and large, most provincial EDAs were dormant for the majority of the time from 2007 till a few months before the election.
So- I reasoned later that evening- chances are that the same EDAs who complained of having candidates parachuted in are the same EDAs who hadn't done that much between one election and the next.
Then he said that there were unfilled positions on the party executive and there were executive positions that nobody knew existed.
So- continuing on this line of reasoning- despite an abundance of people complaining that the party's priorities are all wrong and that they have the answers, we have vacancies and a general lack of knowledge about who does what within the PC Party of Ontario.
Because, it seems, nobody took it upon themselves to learn about this state of affairs for themselves and do something about it.
So you guys tell me. Is the central campaign solely responsible for what happened?