Urban Vancouver

COPE and Vision duke it out

By samanthaorwell on January 18, 2008 - 5:27pm

New to local politics (and I mean really new to local politics, I've been digesting both COPE and Visions platforms to decide which party I'd like to officially support. After looking at their respective websites I still couldn't really say for sure. Both have their appeal in completely different ways. In the sure-fire working-class corner there's COPE which champions for the poor and working poor. They appeal to people who know that they are working class, or to those who take Marxist ideals personally. Vision, on the other hand, appeals to the "socially conscious" middle class. In other words (or at least in my opinion), it appeals to those who don't know they are working class or would rather not think about themselves in such a way (myself included). My personal conflict choosing between the two parties involves both my deep intellectual belief in Marxism coupled with my personal dislike of understanding my stance as working-class- factors I'll need to reconcile if I'm to choose either way. But first a little backgrounder-

A little history on the COPE-Vision split care of Wikipedia:

Vision Vancouver is one of three parties represented on Vancouver City Council in Vancouver, Canada. Vision was formed in the months leading up to the 2005 municipal election.
As centre-left civic party, Vision was founded by former COPE members first elected to Vancouver city council in 2002. Following that election, Mayor Larry Campbell and Councillors Jim Green, Raymond Louie and Tim Stevenson were soon dubbed "COPE Lite" by the local media due to their moderate positions on taxation and development, as opposed to the more leftist "COPE Classic" Councillors.
Ongoing disagreements between the two factions led to Campbell and his allies forming an independent COPE caucus in December 2004. At the same time, supporters of Campbell and his allies created a fundraising organization independent of COPE called "Friends of Larry Campbell."
This group and its backers eventually formed a new party called "Vision Vancouver," initially to be led by Campbell. However, when Campbell announced that he would not seek a second term as Mayor, he called on Jim Green to run to succeed him. The party decided in August 2005 to run only five of a possible ten Council candidates and did not contest school board and park board slate elections.
In the election for Vancouver City Council held in November 2005, four Vision Vancouver candidates (Raymond Louie, Tim Stevenson, Heather Deal and George Chow) were elected, but the party's mayoral candidate, Jim Green, was defeated.

(Retrieved from" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Vancouver)

This is no light debate. On one hand, the split demonstrates completely different ideology and platform. From a personal-belief standpoint, both parties are vastly different, not even just slightly. By Vision partitioning they deny the duality of workers versus owners and admit there is a middle-class that needs to be represented in a different manner. Vision has a moderate political stance which definitely won't revolutionize the status quo. COPE represents a more radical personality and has the personality of revolutionary. On the other hand, the vastly different ideology is a minimal difference in political terms. Party politics, democratic seats and (both hated but duely needed) bureaucracy means that the difference between either party lessens and is therefore more about who is more likely to win power against the NPA. I'd have to say that because of Vision's mainstream centre-stance, it has more popularity amongst the general public that is willing and/or wanting to vote against the NPA. COPE lacks the professionalism and its inability to produce a "schmooze" fest will work against its mainstream popularity. Majorities never vote for radical lefts unless everybody is damnpissed off at the other side. There's a certain amount of "face" you have to roduce in politics. It's known as bullshitting. It is no secret- politicians do it. So COPEs inability to bullshit is going to be its demise. I truly believe in that.

Now, the question is, do I vote for COPE because of their true-nonbulshit stance? I do like a party that sticks by its guns and refuses to sell out to gain popularity. You can't truly fight for the working-class if you are willing to sell out even just a bit. But COPE's leftist stance is too left to be tasteful by most and with 3 parties in the race the split left vote will lead to an NPA win. But then do I vote for Vision which has the ability to play the part? But by playing the part the NPA ultimately sells-out in any leftist vision and thus just becomes an absolute centre-platform in between COPE and the NPA. This would not even be a predicament if Vision would agree to electing one mayoral-candidate agreed by equal support of both parties. Last week it was announced that COPE made an appeal to Vision to join forces and agree on one candidate for both parties (See http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=5a0e0a68-476e-4e84...). This scheme would avoid a split left-wing vote which would greatly increase the chances NPA would lose. With a COPE-Vision coalition I'm almost positive that the NPA would be out (there's a little doubt because people may want the same Mayor throughout and beyond the Olympics for continuity). But I think it is unlikely Vision is even having a second thought of snubbing COPE because they know they hold a stronger mainstream base and, really, for all political purposes has a better face and personality to the single and main contender against the NPA. This snub is a poor choice, I believe. It leaves too much room for doubt and personally, I believe a snub is just a greed for power. If Vision whole heartedly cared about the people they would join forces with COPE because even if COPE was "too left" for them they would be moderated by party politics and bureaucracy. Vision seems to want to keep a stronghold because of a real future of COPE being the equivalent of a thrown-away vote for the Green Party. (No offense to the Green Party- I voted for you! But it's clear ridings make it difficult for you to go anywhere).

Beyond those initial feelings about where both parties stand I decided to explore each group further by joining their respective facebook groups (what else did you expect!) I started to steer towards Vision after observing some inappropriate bashing of Vision on COPE's facebook wall. The comments may be true, but I find that kind of bashing unprofessional in politics, even on Facebook. But I'm slowly starting to steer towards COPE after seeing what is looking like a snub from Vision to appeal to COPE's idea of a coalition. Another think I noticed that was quite interesting is that Vision and COPE seem to hold the exact same number of members in their Facebook groups. There is something going awry with that because the membership isn't even constant. Today the membership stands at 105 people per group. Vision lost a member two days ago to become 105. And today COPE loses a member to also become 105. Everytime one group gains or loses a member the other group follows. I swear, something is awry with these numbers. I need to figure out the mystery that is the same memberships of these two groups. It has to be some ploy. I'm serious (I've put that much thought into it). You see, by peopl straddling the support of both groups (like me) they turn to facebook to see which group is more popular and, thus, will likely have the stronger vote against the NPA. By seeing the exact same membership people don't know who to support. Couples with this appeal for both parties agreeing on one mayoral candidate, it only makes sense for both parties, who are split exactly equally to join forces to beat the NPA. Facebook- you are up to something....