ZOLTAN: We put man on the moon, yet BC Conservatives can't share a room

PENTICTON — Kerry-Lynne Findlay resigned as Conservative Party of BC leader Sunday and left her colleagues a sentence they should have lived by since August."The battle for Conservatives should not be with other Conservatives," she wrote. "It must be with the NDP.".The question then becomes: "Is it possible for the right-of-centre political establishment to focus on defeating the NDP versus attacking each other?"Probably not.But it’s a worthwhile call to action anyway, because right-minded British Columbians deserve a viable alternative to the disastrous NDP under Premier David Eby.The right-of-NDP political spectrum map looks like a gypsy flea market in a Gazan refugee camp. Nine sitting Conservatives walked out between August 14 and September 2 — all of them leaving for different reasons.Friday, the Clerk recorded Trevor Halford, Claire Rattée, and John Rustad as no longer affiliated after Findlay had them struck from caucus. None of those three vacated a seat. Sunday morning, Linda Hepner told CBC she had quit the caucus as well..Friday afternoon, the other room stopped pretending it was building a new party from scratch, and began building, with delusional passion, what they probably thought was a political rocket ship to Mars.Saturday is the first live test launch.Abbotsford-Mission is a five-name ballot by-election with Findlay, Pam Alexis for the NDP, Stephen Fowler for the Greens, Lakhwinder Jhaj for CentreBC, and Jeff Monds for the Libertarians. OneBC stood down. The 2024 result in that riding was Reann Gasper 13,523 to Alexis 10,894. That is not a safe Conservative lock if the centre-right vote arrives in two columns.Now Independent MLA Scott McInnis put the longer history on paper when he left September 2. "Since 1956, no party has defeated the NDP unless they welcomed voters from the centre out to the right of the political spectrum," he wrote. "This is a historical fact, one that current BCC [BC Conservatives] leadership refuses to accept."He was writing against Findlay, sure. But he was also offering engineering advice for anyone smart enough to listen to it.The arithmetic does not resign with Findlay. It also does not care that CentreBC would rather be called socially progressive than right-wing, or that OneBC would rather eat glass than share a podium with Milobar. First-past-the-post is a blunt instrument. It adds the people who marked anyone but the NDP, or it does not.A unite-the-right pact in this province would have to marry a party that just spent the summer proving it cannot sit in a room, a party that spent Friday announcing it is the sensible middle, and a party that thinks the first two are the problem. That is three sunsets, even though the sun and moon only allow for one..Findlay is not owed a reunion tour. She won the membership vote May 30, 51% to 49% over Caroline Elliott, then spent the summer firing staff, chasing a legislature seat, and treating a fractured caucus as a loyalty quiz no one could pass. She said Sunday she had "made decisions she would make differently with hindsight."Nobody in this movie is about to sign a merger at last call. The Conservative board still has to name an interim who can speak to the CentreBC room without demanding a blood oath. The CentreBC eight still have to decide whether October 5 is a legislature parking spot or a general-election suicide note. OneBC still has to decide whether Penticton-Summerland is a brand rocket launch or a housewarming gift for Amelia Boultbee. Findlay still has to run Abbotsford-Mission as a candidate who is finished as leader, and who might get turfed from the BC Conservatives almost immediately should she be lucky enough to win.That is not a three-sunset accord. It is addition. The people who spent August proving they could take a caucus apart now get to prove they can stop doing it long enough for Eby to have to win on his own record.British Columbians who want the NDP out do not owe any of these rooms a standing ovation. They owe them a question that fits on one line. If you cannot occupy the same tent long enough to take the keys, what were the last two years for — the speeches, or the letterhead?The NDP will not split itself as a courtesy. It never has. The sky will also not set three times because someone in a war room asked nicely. Someone still has to pick a horizon and walk toward it.

ZOLTAN: We put man on the moon, yet BC Conservatives can't share a room

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