Re: “This is not a time for magical thinking,” commentary, April 19.

Former premier Gordon Campbell rises from the ashes of a defunct political party to tell us that anything and everything about the federal Liberal party is bad.

He writes a whole column about why we should not vote for the party that is inspiring Canadian unity and offers real solutions to our challenges.

Campbell focuses on division and fear to try and sway voters toward a party that is relying on a divided and fearful electorate to give them power. Not helpful from Campbell, and not helpful from Preston Manning, another dinosaur of conservative thought.

Campbell offers a single solution. Pipelines! And if any province or First Nation stands in the way we must punish them! Campbell showed us a divisive view of Canada, our interprovincial ties and an appalling, dismissive view of First Nations rights.

It’s time for Canadians to listen carefully to the platforms of each party. Consider the skill set each leader brings to the table.

What are the leaders actually saying about the future of Canadian energy? How will Canada build new trading partnerships? What are the short-, medium- and long-term plans for our economic recovery from the external forces of economic chaos?

Parties focused on blame, division and fear are not going to help pilot Canada into a prosperous future.

Parties that denigrate the press and give us carpetbagging candidates that won’t face the public in all-candidates meetings are not worthy of our votes.

Thanks to Campbell for sharing his view. But doom and division are not Canada’s future.

Doug Wilson

View Royal

Re: “This is not a time for magical thinking,” commentary, April 19.

Unfortunately, true to his politician background, former B.C. Liberal premier Gordon Campbell speaks in half-truths and downright misinformation.

He begins making nonsensical remarks about sound bites taken out of context and continues attacking Mark Carney as being an adviser to the Liberal party, implying that he was a part of Justin Trudeau’s government.

Carney helped Canada successfully navigate the financial crisis of 2008, but he left his post of governor of the Bank of Canada in 2013 to become the governor of the Bank of England.

Trudeau wasn’t elected prime minister until 2015.

Campbell likes to use the term “pragmatic” in an effort to paint Carney as someone who is anything but. The reality is that a person with Carney’s background would need to be nothing but pragmatic in his thinking and judgment.

The rest of Campbell’s missive describes a misleading concept of a leader who intends to sort out the mistakes of the past and repeat them all in an effort to lead our country to ruin.

He talks about our troubled health-care system which is in crisis mode because of leaders like Campbell, who was warned during his tenure as premier that this was going to occur if something wasn’t done to address it.

Obviously it wasn’t.

Some areas of the economy are troubling, but Campbell’s comments are misleading and in some cases just not true.

Campbell’s most outrageous statement, as a former politician, is his claim that Carney “has one priority — to retain power. He will say whatever he can to reach that goal and then he’ll do whatever he wants afterwards.”

As if any politician, especially Pierre Poilievre, is not guilty of such a transgression at one time or another.

We are often guilty of voting for what we wish for but seldom get what we want because it is simply not possible.

We should be judging our candidates by their qualifications for the job and would suspect that a man with........

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