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I just noticed a tweet by former Vancouver NPA councillor Jennifer Clarke: "I am thrilled & honoured to be the #CPC candidate for #Vancouver Centre. Stay tuned for info on our campaign office launch #elxn41"

She's running against incumbent Liberal MP Hedy Fry, deputy Green leader Adriane Carr, and the likely New Democratic Party candidate, Karen Shillington.

I'm baffled why Clarke would put her reputation on the line by running on Stephen Harper's team in Vancouver Centre.

During her nine years on council, I always considered Clarke to be more of a progessive conservative than a neocon.

But by lining up with Harper, she is basically endorsing the Conservative government's attack on Insite, which is Vancouver's supervised-injection site.

Harper has backed costly, publicly funded court appeals to try to shut down Insite, even though it has been endorsed by health officials and the Vancouver Police Department.

Clarke is also buffing up a government utterly dominated by politicians who have gone on the record opposing same-sex marriage. The Conservative caucus's steadfast opposition to same-sex marriage in 2005 (James Moore was the only exception in B.C.) speaks volumes about their respect for basic human rights.

Moreover, the Harperites distributed a book explaining how Conservative MPs could disrupt the work of Commons committees. Is this what Clarke will do if she gets to Ottawa as the Conservative MP for Vancouver Centre?

In addition, the Conservative government is appealing an Ontario court ruling striking down Canada's prostitution laws. You would think that after the Pickton trial and the evidence put forth by SFU criminologist John Lowman, Vancouver politicians would recognize that criminalizing the sex trade only increases the vulnerability of women. Clarke apparently doesn't get it.

Moreover, the Harper government is prosecuting the war on drugs as fervently as ever, passing legislation to ensure that marijuana growers spend many years in prison. This hardly seems like a sensible use of tax dollars, and many of those costs will be downloaded to the provinces.

It's fair for Vancouver Centre voters to assume that Clarke endorses this as well. Otherwise, why would she carry the party's flag in the election?

Then there are those CF-35 fighter jets. Harper claims they'll cost no more than $16 billion, including maintenance. Parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page has pegged the price at more than $29 billion.

Clarke used to be considered a bit of a tightwad with taxpayers' dollars when she served on Vancouver city council. How does she square that image with running for a party that wants to spend so much money on military hardware—and not, if you believe Page, tell the public the truth about the cost?

If she's truly "thrilled & honoured", maybe I've misread her for all these years.

Related article: Affordable housing among key issues for Vancouver Centre candidates

Follow Charlie Smith on Twitter at twitter.com/csmithstraight.