I know plenty of Conservative strategists, campaign workers, donors, MPs and candidates who say that it doesn’t matter if Harper crosses and double crosses social conservatives, which make up a large portion of the Conservative base, because, after all, who else are they going to vote for. Giorno is probably not one of those Conservatives; he’s too smart to make that mistake. If socially conservative voters become upset with the Tories because they capitulate on overseas abortion funding, they can vote for third parties like the Christian Heritage Party, support pro-life Liberals (in the few ridings where this is a possibility), spoil or refuse their ballot in protest, or stay home. Giorno does not need to think any of these alternatives are wise to understand that enough Conservative voters might consider them to hurt the party’s in a future election.Can we look forward for a few more real Conservative initiatives from the government? Or, maybe we should just be thankful that they haven't yet backed down on the abortion funding issue, even though what started as a mere cost-cutting measure ended up igniting a full-scale social policy debate?
There's one thing however that is worth noticing: The article lists 4 options for the Social Conservatives which are no longer willing to support Harper and his party. These options are: vote CHP, support a pro-life candidate from another party or not to vote at all (either by spoiling the ballot or by staying home). How many Social Conservatives choose the latter even if there is a CHP candidate in their riding?
While the official Conservative party is working on its strategy, we need to work on ours. We need to find a way to convince people that if they are not going to support their local Conservative candidate anyway - they better still go out and vote CHP (or support a pro-life, pro-family Independent,) instead of just staying home and contributing to the myth that, as a "silent majority", Social Conservatives are worth ignoring.
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