Parties' records in government key in election
When it comes to assessing those political party candidates asking you to hire them to run things for the next four years, think back to when you were applying for jobs — especially, your first ones.
Whether or not you got that job likely came down to your work record and experience at that time... or in some cases, lack thereof.
This is not meant as a slight to Green party Leader Naomi Hunter or Progressive Conservative Leader
Ken Grey or Liberal Leader Robert Rudachyk or whoever is leading the separatist party or independent candidates seeking seats. Given this election has sorely lacked choice or new ideas, such criticism seems especially wrong-headed.
But there are reasons why thin resumes go unread. And there are reasons why politics and running government isn't considered an entry-level job.
Sure, everyone has the right to run for office. You might have a passion for the job and even a few buddies who sincerely think you'd be good at it.
Ultimately, though, it comes down to a boss assessing your capabilities based on what you've actually done. And about the only thing worse than a spotty job record is having no job record at all.
Most would likely agree far too much of this 2020 campaign has been wasted on the NDP and Saskatchewan Party taking shots at each other's record in government.
At the best of times, it's debatable whether the past record of any party in government should be all that relevant to an election campaign that should be focused on future needs. But it would seem even less relevant in the 2020 Saskatchewan campaign where we have a 13-year government that replaced a 16-year government.
In fact, it's especially bizarre the Sask. Party thinks it's relevant to hammer away at quarter-century-old NDP government decisions to close schools and hospitals
— decisions largely based on an ever-depopulating rural Saskatchewan and the fiscal mess left behind by the Grant Devine Progressive Conservative administration. (In fact, one of the great puzzlers of not only this election, but also the entire term of the Sask. Party government, is why criticism of the past NDP government for not building more wasn't automatically met with the reality that this was the last thing the province could afford after the PCS nearly bankrupted this place.)
There again, that previous Roy Romanow NDP administration absolutely feasted for 16 years off both the fiscal and the sometimes criminal incompetence of a former PC administration. It was more than three decades ago but in today's campaign, NDP supporters still have no qualms about tying PC policies of privatization and sell-offs to the Sask. Party that literally started anew in 1997 so as to distance itself from the party and its policy/governance.
One big difference between politics and real life — besides the wonderment of getting to pick our bosses every four years, which is a dream for most us working stiffs — is job applicants in politics get to openly criticize and lobby against their biggest competitor for the job.
So sorting through the noise and nonsense has become especially arduous for those of us who have to make a decision in three days as to who we all will hire. Allow us to help.
If you only read one story between now and Monday's vote, make it today's piece by the Leader-post's Arthur White-crummey objectively assessing and putting into better context the past records of the Sask. Party and NDP while in government.
Far beyond whatever you might have gleaned about this issue in the above, White-crummey takes a deep dive into the key elements in this debate.
As the piece's author puts it: “What do the numbers really say? Which party has the better record on growth, jobs, debt, deficits, cuts and closures?”
Such assessment of a job record has to be part of any hiring.
It's best that they are measured objectively.