B.C. NDP axe Dayleen Van Ryswyk for remarks targeting aboriginals

Well, that didn't take long.

The campaign for the May 14 B.C. election wasn't even officially underway Tuesday when the front-running New Democrats registered the first gaffe. They were forced to jettison one of their candidates for some intemperate Internet musings.

Premier Christy Clark, facing a long climb to try and take her Liberal party to a fourth term in power, went to see Lieut.-Gov. Judith Guichon in the morning to dissolve the legislature.

But by then, NDP leader Adrian Dix had accepted the resignation of businesswoman Dayleen Van Ryswyk, the party's standard-bearer in the Okanagan riding of Kelowna-Mission.

According to The Canadian Press, Van Ryswyk became political poison after it was disclosed she'd made derogatory remarks about aboriginal people.

CP reported that Van Ryswyk posted a comment on a 2009 discussion forum thread entitled "Strip Them of the Status Card," referring to the document that officially recognizes the status of First Nations people.

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"OMG status cards ... don't even get me started," a user named Dayleen from Kelowna says in one post.

"It's not the status cards, it's the fact that we have been paying out of the nose for generations for something that isn't our doing. If their ancestors sold out too cheap it's not my fault and I shouldn't have to be paying for any mistake or whatever you want to call it from MY hard earned money."

"Dayleen" goes on to say her husband's parents, who lived in Holland during the Second World War, lost everything during the Nazi occupation of their country.

"Are they getting a paycheck every month or a huge lump sum every year tax free...no... they got nothing but work in a concentration camp. It's time our generation stopped paying for the mistakes of the past..."

Van Ryswyk, whose campaign web page was still up on Tuesday afternoon, was probably a long shot anyway in a region that historically votes for centre-right candidates from the Liberal and, before that, Social Credit parties. Liberal Forests Minister Steve Thomson won easily in the 2009 election, CP noted.

The embarrassing incident this early in the campaign may end up as no more than a hiccup for the New Democrats, who some polls suggest have a lead of more than 20 per cent, though critics might want to point fingers at the party's vetting process.

Barring some unforeseen blunders or revelations, the campaign seems likely to be fought on the questions of leadership and economic stewardship.

Clark, a former cabinet minister and one-time popular call-in radio host, replaced longtime premier Gordon Campbell (now Canada's high commissioner in London) two years ago with hopes of renewing the Liberals' waning popularity.

But while possessing undeniable personal sparkle, Clark's performance as premier has been disappointing, judging from the polls. Failing a heroic comeback, the Liberals could be all but wiped out, which is what happened to Social Credit in 1992 and the NDP in 2001, when the Liberals won 77 out of 79 seats. Some observers think Clark could lose her Vancouver seat.

Former NDP strategist Bill Tieleman says the plunge in Clark's popularity is no mystery.

"Clark has proven to be a political chameleon who will say and do anything to get votes, with breathtaking arrogance," Tieleman said in a column posted on The Tyee online news site.

The Liberals ran 30-minute prime-time infomercial Sunday on Global TV that reportedly drew a large viewership, telling voters they should favour the Liberals' long-term plan for the economy over the New Democrats, who Clark said helped tank the B.C. economy when they governed in the 1990s.

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Clark promised the Liberals would make the province debt-free. But respected Vancouver Sun political columnist Vaughn Palmer pointed out Monday that the provincial debt grew by $11 billion since she became premier "the biggest jump in dollar terms in provincial history."

Furthermore, Palmer noted, the new Liberal economic plan calls for the debt to rise another $13 billion over three years before hoped-for resource revenues begin to reverse trend in 2017.

"Therefore, Clark is running this year on the promise of a windfall that won’t come to fruition until the election after this one, if then," he wrote.

The NDP under the charisma-challenged Dix are not taking their lead for granted, campaigning to convince voters the ghosts of their last stint in power have been banished.

CBC News reports the party has asked its candidates to temporarily shut down their personal Facebook and other social media accounts to minimize the potential for damaging disclosures.

Too late, maybe, at least as far as Dayleen Van Ryswyk is concerned.