In his passionate defence of a politics of values over tribes, Bob Rae said the most important was an acceptance of the importance of facts. He was being honoured last week by hundreds of Canada’s finest political leaders of all three parties for his contribution to public life. “Facts matter,” he concluded, “Our politics needs to understand and respect this.” A bizarre, even obvious comment, some might observe — but powerfully relevant in this strange election.

This was always going to be a strange election, with a premier a dozen points behind her party in popularity, and an NDP leader with the numbers in reverse: number one in personal approval, number three in partisan intention. Then along came the tawdry tent show known as Ford Nation.

Like travelling medicine shows and revival preachers of old, their caravan booms noise and angry rhetoric but leaves little behind as it heads for the next town. A fact-free campaign of glaring contradiction can work for an established frontrunner with deep party roots and a following wind. That is not Doug Ford, nor this campaign. So far, he has promised nearly $30 billion in slashed taxes and expenditures – and, unacknowledged, thousands of job cuts as a result. Not even remotely clear is how this snake oil will work. Facts, apparently, do not matter.

There are reports of sharp elbows and angry confrontations among members of the cobbled-together Ford machine. It would be surprising if this were not true, given that the team “unites” party hacks from the Davis left to the so-con right under the leadership of some of the most divisive organizers of any party, veterans of the Harper era. These battles will have risen to a crescendo with the allegations of data theft which, if proven, could be the death knell for the campaign.

The Orange team sits between the other two in experience. Seasoned vets from successful provincial campaigns in B.C., Alberta, and Manitoba have joined with some of the best of the Layton generation, but many of them have been flung together only in recent weeks. They are scrambling to run seriously for power for the first time in a generation.

To some political veterans, 2018 feels like 1985 trending to 1990. For the ’85 campaign, the Tories made an unwise leadership selection to defend their 42-year governing record, opening the door to David Peterson and Rae. Then Peterson, spooked for no good reason other than his fear of a tanking economy, called an early election in 1990. Voters were not amused. As much as his own victory, Rae’s triumph was a rejection of the Tories and irritation with Peterson’s presumption.

Today, it appears the Tories would have won safely under either of the two women candidates they rejected in favour of vacuous populism. Having chosen the angry option, they have given credence to the Horwath taunt, “You don’t need to choose between bad and worse, there’s an alternative.” The NDP slate is the most gender-balanced but also the least experienced. Success outside the party’s areas of traditional strength will be almost entirely on Horwath’s coattails.

But leadership coat tails delivered all of the big election victories from Peterson through Rae, Harris and Wynne. The May 27 debate will be pivotal as grumpy voters, deciding what kind of change they really want, will get their last chance to see the leaders do battle. On the strength of the first two debates — one amateurish show in the first week and then the Northern debate — the Ford debate team should be working overtime.

Shifting polls notwithstanding, this is a campaign that may not move deeply unhappy voters to turn out. So far, at least, it appears merely as a campaign of brawling activists, with a frustrated media reduced to playing its traditional role in such contests — attempting to inflate the trivial as dramatic.

Election night will no doubt be long, with nail-biting phone calls until nearly dawn. It remains to be seen whether facts do indeed matter.

Strange days indeed.

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Robin V. Sears, a principal at Earnscliffe Strategy Group, was an NDP strategist for 20 years.

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