Head Tale

[Edit: It's funny that I tell the story of calling someone else an idiot down below and here I was, originally titling this post “#9” when it was actually “#8”.  The big difference is I can laugh at my stupidity and admit when I'm wrong.]

When I watched the US election last year, some of the craziest, most outrageous, completely fabricated attacks would be directed at Obama – he's a Muslim, he illegally registered voters via ACORN, he consorts with terrorists – often by his own competitors in the Democratic leadership race before he was even competing for the big prize. 

Many of his supporters in the blogosphere and elsewhere online would implore Obama to lash out, fight back, do something.  But Obama retained his cool – correcting the record when inaccurate accusations were made – but focusing on his own policies and plans for the future rather than getting bogged down in negativity. 

I keep coming back to the similiarities between Obama and Meili but this is yet another place where the parallels are uncanny.  Like Obama, Meili has been relentlessly positive and focused on his own plans and ideas for the future of this province (even as his supporters sometimes aren't as positive as they should be in the face of every fact and every opinion being labeled “negative” or “a smear”.  I'm on record as calling someone an “idiot” after letting myself get frustrated by these tactics for example.  Not nice and my mother is probably not proud of me for that one – though in my defense, the amount of typos that this person puts forward really does indicate to me that he's…uhm…dyslexically challenged?) 

Anyhow, there are different elements to a positive campaign besides being upbeat and focused on your own message.  For example, it's been a positive campaign in how I've seen volunteers support each other (the anonymous poster who's become posting recipes everytime things threaten to get heated is a perfect example.)  

It's been a positive campaign in how it's spread a growing message of renewal, potential and excitement across the province – starting in Saskatoon, spreading to the cities and increasingly reaching out to rural areas as evidenced by Meili's release of an arts & culture policy for rural Saskatchewan today.  And it's been a positive campaign in that there have been no major scandals, problems or issues showing that Meili is a strong leader with good people around him.  (And I'm sure that someone will yell “that's a back-handed, slanderous, negative attack about Dwain Lingenfelter.  To which I reply with this! )

Accidental Jurist has a very insightful analysis of another way that Ryan doing something in a positive manner.  His most recent releases don't just reiterate policy statements but frequently include statements from outsiders giving strong indication that some of the groundwork for implementing these policies has already begun.

Next: #7 – Ryan's Age