The Richard Raleigh Spin/Approval Matrix

Apparently, according to a local political scientist, Tom Rideout's exodus from politics won't hurt Danny Williams politically.

Fascinating.

All the real political scientists at MUN must have been out on summer vacation or writing some esoteric journal articles they could later tout smugly at academic conferences, because Mr. Temelini doesn't really seem to have any deep or poignant insight to offer on the topic.

To anyone who has been paying attention to provincial politics since 2005, this development isn't really a surprise; if the findings of the Cameron Inquiry didn't make the Premier's approval rating falter on its ascension to 90+, then his cartoonishly villainous attempts to discredit the process probably should have. Naturally, of course, this didn't happen, because that would make sense, and this is Newfoundland and Labrador.

This leaves us with only one reasonable thought on the topic: if none of this will hurt the Premier's poll ratings, what will?

Allow me to soothe all your curiousities - in harkening back to the skills I learned as a young, wide-eyed and idealistic political science undergraduate, I have constructed this handy reference list. These conclusions are highly scientific so feel free to cite them in casual or professional conversation, as the knowledge they imparts will make you the envy of your friends and co-workers!

THE RICHARD RALEIGH SPIN/APPROVAL MATRIX

SCANDAL: Danny Williams steals candy from small child and/or infant
EFFECT: Child spun as to be from the mainland and the candy was Purity brand, Premier seen as standing up to the feds and getting 'our fair share', approval rating +2%

SCANDAL: Danny Williams crosses floor at the House of Assembly, punches out Roland Butler
EFFECT: Premier seen across the province as "total badass", young children abandon backyard wrestling to re-enact Question Period thus creating new generation of career politicians, clip appears on YouTube overdubbed with the solo from Metallica's "One"; approval rating goes to 99%

SCANDAL: Danny Williams revealed to worship Satan and perform ritual human sacrifice
EFFECT: Premier uses dark magicks to erase the memories of everyone in the province like an arcane version of the flashing stick in Men In Black, approval rating still goes up 1%

SCANDAL: Danny Williams' Viper runs red light, kills cyclist
EFFECT: Running red light spun as the Premier always working on a go-forward basis for the people of this province, killing a cyclist with luxury car spun as not allowing development of properous oil industry to be hampered by burdensome environmental regulations; approval +6%

SCANDAL: Danny Williams involved in sex scandal with subordinate(s)
EFFECT: Approval ratings increase in accordance to how public ranks the woman in question on a scale of 1-10; an increase of at least 8% is assumed

SCANDAL: John Efford becomes leader of the Liberals
EFFECT: Premier's approval ratings drop drastically as people realise Efford would be a greahahahahahaha I can't even finish this sentence
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Rick Hillier, if you're reading this, yes, I am interested in becoming the new head of Memorial's political science department, thank you for asking!

Riddle Me This

If CBC is to be believed, apparently Danny Williams has renewed confidence in the abilities of his cabinet now that former Premier Tom Rideout has tendered his resignation.

Of course, any true Newfoundlander knows CBC is not to be believed, as the Premier courageously demonstrated recently when he (rightly) pointed out that David Cochrane was unfairly attempting to undermine the mastery of our own domain by doing unnecessarily subversive things like asking questions in media scrums.

But, for the sake of argument, let's take the CBC story at face value and assume that when Yvonne Jones asked the Premier if he had any certainty in the ability of his ministers to do their jobs, he did in fact respond with "I have certainty now that Tom Rideout is gone."

Let that sink in for a moment.

According to Danny Williams, Tom Rideout - a man whose political career stretches back to 1975, who is a former Premier with a cumulative decade of ministerial experience - is incompetent.

On the other hand, Joan Burke's revolutionary "well if the Liberals hadn't screwed everything up during the 1990s, I wouldn't have problems to ignore, now would I?" approach to the Department of Education is positively sublime in its genius.

Kathy Dunderdale's performance in her role as "spokeswoman" of the Natural Resources Department is downright enviable.

And of course, the Honourable Ross Wiseman continues to display stunning prowess in the position of Minister of Health and Community Services, up to and including astonishing four month spurts of illiteracy.

Although, upon further reflection, the question that Jones asked was whether or not the Premier had confidence in his ministers' ability to do their jobs. Which, in his defence, he did answer truthfully: every minister who wasn't Tom Rideout was doing a spectacular job.

This is because in Williams' cabinet, the job isn't managing your portfolio with any degree of competency.

It's towing the Premier's line.