Thursday, April 2, 2009

Timing is everything

Two weeks ago Friday, I speculated on which fundraising cycle the Conservatives would follow.  Would they revert to the original pattern I documented which would have seen a fundraising effort being contrived last Thursday.  Or would the Conservatives accept the timing hiccup forced by GritGirl or the helicopter tragedy and roll it out this Thursday.

It appears that maintaining a minimum two week spacing is very important for their strategy.  Because yesterday, Harper reversed course and has taken Garry Breitkreuz's private members  bill to scrap the long gun registry and introduced it in the Senate.  Predictably enough,
Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff last night pledged to defeat efforts by the Conservative government to scrap the controversial long-gun registry
Don't take my word for it.  As Scott Tribe points out:
Furthermore, this is an obvious political ploy by the Conservatives to introduce this in the Senate first, rather then the House. Introducing a bill to the unelected Senate, which they’ve been disparaging, instead of to the elected House of Commons indicates they’re looking to use this bill for partisan political purposes. If it gets defeated in the Senate, they can rage against the Liberal senators who voted it down (despite the fact they’re the ones who introduced it there in the first place). I’m pleased to see Ignatieff not falling for this tactic.
So two weeks after the GritGirl fundraising effort, the Conservatives go back to their favourite artesian well. Their research might indicate that a weekly appeal is too much.  The timing reset might also be related to pay day.  It is possible that they get a better response a couple of days after the suckers get their pay deposited in the bank.  Perhaps the old cycle diverged from pay days by an unacceptably wide margin.

There is substantial circumstantial evidence that this is the new fundraising cycle. If anyone, gets a copy of a fundraising letter tied to this Senate long gun ploy, I would love to get a copy to post in a follow-up (anonymously).  You can send a copy to constant.vigil@gmail.com 
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