SO FAR MORE EVIDENCE WHO NOT TO VOTE FOR

Who knew that having video of yourself on the Internet showing you
behind the wheel while you're high on hallucinogenic drugs and
smoking marijuana, could be a problem if you decide to run for public office?

Apparently not Dana Larsen, now a former federal NDP candidate on the
Sunshine Coast, who gave up his nomination on Thursday, after
attention was drawn to several online videos showing him advocating
drug use and consuming copious quantities of illicit substances, not
to mention driving while blitzed out of his mind.

It turns out Larsen is a co-founder of the B.C. Marijuana Party and
ran for the federal Marijuana Party in 2000.

Which makes you wonder about the NDP's candidate vetting process. A
simple Google search could have prevented a whole ton of embarrassment.

It's the sort of election gaffe that can reinforce preconceived
notions some people have of a party. After all, more than one voter
in this neck of the woods has wondered, just what exactly, is the NDP smoking?

Of course the NDP are hardly alone in being haunted by election missteps.

The Conservatives have been trying to shed their reputations as a
cold and mean-spirited bunch. Witness the television ads of Prime
Minister Stephen Harper being warm and fuzzy in his sweater.

The PM has also been a lot more soft spoken on the campaign trail
than we're used to seeing. But I imagine he must be secretly seething
as he repeatedly has to try and explain away the actions and words of
his party members and campaign workers.

First there was the web ad, showing a puffin pooping on Liberal
leader Stephane Dion's shoulder. Harper quickly apologized for the ad
and blamed it on an overzealous web developer.

Shortly after that Harper suspended party spokesman, Ryan Sparrow,
after Sparrow took on the father of a Canadian soldier who was killed
in Afghanistan. The still grieving father spoke out against Harper's
promise to pull the troops from Afghanistan in 2011 and Sparrow,
showing patriotic sympathy, dismissed the father as a Liberal supporter.

This past week, the Conservatives had to apologize twice in two days.
The first was for callous jokes made a couple of weeks ago by
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz, on a conference call with health officials.

He made light of the listeriosis crisis, including a quip about a
suspected death in PEI (which turned out to be false). "Please tell
me it's Wayne Easter (the Liberal agriculture critic)," he said in jest.

This week Ritz apologized to Easter, who accepted it but then turned
around and demanded Ritz's resignation anyway, demonstrating the kind
of two-faced sincerity voters love.

Far more serious was the aide to Transportation Minister Lawrence
Cannon, who was caught on video telling an aboriginal representative
the conditions for future meetings with the minister.

"If you behave and you're sober and there's no problems," she said,
showing off ingrained stereotyping and prejudice.

True colours it seems, are hard to hide, especially when you're in a
pressure cooker of an election.

I just wish someone would show me something worth voting for, rather
than simply giving me things to vote against.