WHISTLER, B.C. - Gordon Campbell has a real fight on his hands if he wants to be premier of British Columbia when more than 6,500 athletes arrive for the 2010 winter Olympics.
He knows it -- and judging from a weekend convention of the B.C. Liberals in Whistler -- his party knows it too.
More than 1,000 delegates attended the three-day affair, which began less than 48 hours after the governing party lost two byelections in urban Vancouver ridings, despite running high-profile candidates.
Campbell said party members understand the Liberals have a challenge ahead of them.
"I don't think anyone, certainly I never thought, that this was just going to be a walk in the park to May 12," he said. "This is going to be a real fight, a fight to keep all of the things we've worked the last seven-and-a-half years to build."
The biennial convention was seen by many as a kick off for the real contest, and they were not disappointed.
The opposition New Democrats, who had handily taken the two Vancouver byelections, were the target of sustained political attacks throughout the weekend.
Delegates in one policy session were treated to the spectacle of cabinet minister after cabinet minister trash-talking and dissing the NDP, including one over-the-top remark from Housing Minister Rich Coleman who maintained the New Democrats have an aversion to their fellow human beings!
"They actually don't really care about people," Coleman reflected in a sombre tone. "They just talk that they care about people."
After the session, often-acerbic Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon boasted to reporters that he was "unruffled" by the previous Wednesday's byelection losses.
He then launched into a lecture about the need to put provincial NDP Leader Carole James under the same kind of political microscope being used on the U.S. Republican party's vice-presidential candidate, who is currently the governor of Alaska.
"People are questioning Sarah Palin's experience. She's got a lot more governing experience than Carole James," Falcon said.
Falcon said he's convinced the public will want to know how James would manage British Columbia.
"I'd like people to start asking the same questions about Carole James," he said. "What is her background? What is her record that allows her to operate a $40-billion economy?"
The fact the NDP are firmly in the crosshairs of B.C. Liberal gun sights is no surprise.
Many areas of the province are reeling from a downturn in the once-mighty forest industry. Thousands of families have members who have been thrown out of work.
An aging population continues to put pressure on a health care system that, despite steadily increasing funding, appears to be fighting a losing battle.
Homeless issues are worsening in many B.C. communities, not just the large cities.
And for months, the Opposition New Democrats have been striking a popular chord by denouncing the Liberal's signature carbon tax, which began imposing a surcharge on transportation fuels on Canada Day.
The government provided every British Columbia man, woman and child with a $100 Climate Action Dividend cheque to offset the measure.
The opposition immediately criticized the payment as "cheap electioneering."
Soon, "Axe the gas tax," became a rallying cry for the NDP.
And, it appears to be paying off in terms of rising numbers in recent opinion polls, while Liberal popularity has been sliding.
And so, when the silver-haired, immaculately tailored Premier Gordon Campbell delivered his keynote address Saturday to a hotel ballroom packed with supporters waving hundreds of placards bearing his name and the new party slogan:Keep B.C. Strong, the NDP were front-and-centre as public enemy Number One.
With it being the morning after Halloween Campbell talked easily about how the scariest letters he could think of were -- you guessed it: N, D, and P.
Throughout his 50-minute speech, simulcast on five giant-screen video monitors, the B.C. Liberal leader painted a picture of an opposition intent on "tricking" the electorate.
In Campbell's mind, the New Democrats are intent on going back to the future, taxing B.C. back to "have-not" status once again, destroying all the forward momentum built up over more than seven years of the B.C. Liberal's "New Era."
"We're for moving British Columbia forward into the 21st century, and the NDP wants to take us back," Campbell insisted.
Then, a pensive look came over his face.
"You know, every time I hear a New Democrat speak, in the back of my mind I hear this sound," he explained as technicians cued the extraordinarily loud and distinct sound of a dump truck releasing its air brakes, revving its engine, and going into reverse with the electronic beep, beep, beep of its back-up alarm echoing through the hall.
"That sound has a bunch of messages," Campbell told delegates when the laughter and applause subsided.
"Danger! Watch Out! Someone's going backwards and they probably can't see where they're going. That's the NDP!" Campbell shouted with delight.
While most of the NDP-bashing of the weekend was not particularly appreciated by Opposition House Leader Mike Farnworth, the party's official observer to the convention, even he had to grin at the dump-truck shtick.
Afterward, though, he also noted that Campbell's constant weaving of anti-NDP material throughout the warp and weft of his nearly hour-long speech was a true measure of how worried the government really is about an election campaign that everyone agrees is now in full swing.
"Absolutely it's game on," said the veteran New Democrat MLA from Port Coquitlam.
"Clearly, they're worried about us, clearly they know the gap has closed, because as W.A.C. Bennett once said: You don't shoot at dead ducks."
