A BIG Fight with a CBC pollster

Polling expert Frank Graves coined a new political acronym last week – COMAs -- “cranky old men from Alberta.”

Graves who is with EKOS Research, appears on the CBC Power Politics show every week with his latest voter preference polls and then comments on the results.

Some weeks he hammers Michael Ignatieff's Liberals as hopeless losers who can’t crack 30 %; other weeks he roasts Stephen Harper for polling nothing better than the Fahrenheit freezing point.It's great television.

This week Graves said in his comments that if the Liberals want first place, they have to wake up and point out the ideological differences between themselves and the Conservatives. Many Canadians would agree with that.

But when Graves listed those differences, the Consaervtives went ballistic.

Graves said the Liberals should highlight “cosmopolitanism versus parochialism, secularism versus moralism, Obama versus Palin, tolerance versus racism and homophobia, democracy versus autocracy.”

And then he added: “If the cranky old men in Alberta don’t like it, too bad. Go South and vote for Palin.”

It was the “cranky old men” remark that enfuriated them. They don't like being comparted to racists and homophobes. Who would?

Graves apologized the next day for his “cranky old men” remark, but he added that he has polling results that show “racists” and “homophobes” vote mostly Conservative.

That really did it. The Conservatives launched a culture war against Graves and the CBC.

Thousands of Conservative Party bloggers flooded the internet with diatribe against Graves and the CBC, a network they love to hate. Some of the Conservative bloggers, such as Stephen Taylor have admitted taking cheques from Conservatives, but most work for free, getting "talkingpoints" from the party and each other.

Conservative Party President John Walsh wrote a letter demanding the CBC fire Graves.

Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro called for a full Parliamentary inquiry. As if the government doesn't have better things to do right now.

Conservative Senator Doug Finley launched a party fund-raising campaign based on Graves’ remarks.

But then Finley too joined the "culture war" by describing Liberals as “vested” interests going “back to higher taxes, a weakened military and to political correctness.” Not how Liberals view themselves.

Showing class Ignatieff and Harper remained silent.The CBC resisted the Conservatives' pressure and has kept Graves on air.

Nor did it mention the CBC National News At Issue show features commentator Allan Gregg, a senior polling expert with Strategic Counsel who used to be Brian Mulroney’s director of communications. Gregg can keep his night job.

The real winner was the public, who for once got to see some possible ideological differences between what the New Democrats call “our two old political parties who are exactly alike.”

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THE FOLLOWING IS THE EXACT STATEMENT OF POLLSTER FRANK GRAVES ON APRIL 23, 2010 THAT MADE CONSERVATIVES SO ANGRY:

”There is a higher incidence of people who are less tolerant to homosexuals and more wary of other races within the Conservative Party. I can demonstrate that empirically.

”That does not mean that Conservatives or Albertans are homophobic or xenophobic but it does mean that many people, and more people statistically that have those points of view, end up in that Party than in other places.

“That may be a statement that people don’t want to hear, but it’s empirically accurate and has been for a long time.”