Okay, I do get that most of my audience would publicly declare that they wouldn’t give Warren Kinsella’s blog the time of day. Not surprising, given his normal anti-Tory stance.

However, one of Mr. Kinsella’s virtues is that, when he does become disillusioned with the way the Liberal Party of Canada conducts business, he has no qualms about posting his opinion, as well as an easy-to-comprehend analysis of why they’re wrong to be doing what they’re doing.

And so, of course, we come to one of his latest: an explanation of why his page has an ad linking to one of the sites the Tories have taken out to target Justin Trudeau on the “he’s just not ready” theme.

Yes, I do buy his explanation. I still don’t seriously expect Mr. Kinsella, come October, to X in the circle on the election ballot for the Conservative candidate in his riding. However, a few things to bear in mind:

• Civility and politeness still count, especially in political practice. In today’s Internet age where silence and delay are routinely interpreted as rudeness, a professional (i.e. disinterested, clearly expressed) attitude counts for a lot in getting a message across. And you do get the impression from Mr. Kinsella that the Conservative agent had more of a professional attitude in dealing with this than the agents of the other two parties.
• The Tories are reaching the right target audience with this ad and its placement. The LPC may not be willing to admit it, but there are people who’ve leaned towards them in past elections whose skepticism about Justin Trudeau is on the increase, especially given his public performance so far this past year. And you can also count among them the voters who went for the Conservatives in 2011 but are having some thoughts about not staying blue this time out. That’s the segment the Tories want to reach, and Mr. Kinsella’s site is one of those that said segment pays attention to.
• It’s still a long way towards election day. I wouldn’t be surprised if either the LPC or the NDP manage to place an ad on Mr. Kinsella’s page too, now that they’ve seen the Tories take the initiative here. Mr. Kinsella may be partisan, but he still considers himself fair. The only fallout will be that the more extreme Tory partisan bloggers will say that the other two parties were essentially shamed into taking out ads on Mr. Kinsella’s blog. That is, if they were willing to admit that they paid attention to Mr. Kinsella’s site at all.

Sure, some of the more partisan Grits can yell (rhetorically speaking) at Mr. Kinsella for enabling this sort of exposure. But if they do … well, that would tell us some more about whether the Liberals have genuinely renewed themselves.