https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/manning-centre-proud-1.5307111

Manning Centre a primary backer for series of anti-Liberal Facebook pages

269 comments







Michael Harris
The Squeaking mouse returns, have not the wheatbillies and oilbillies of this Country yet realized that this guy is a loser..The Reform Party, the Canadian Alliance, The Conservatives ( a name essentially stolen by Peter MacKay and Stephen Harper when the real Progressive Conservatives were down and out) Poor ole Preston, I can imagine on the 22nd of October he'll rue another election where a million bucks wasted on another defeat vaporized from his rec room self named organization... Your Irrelevant and the Con Party is just using you...Retire already!


Dawn MacNeill



















Chris Spiers
Someone has to tell the Canadian Public the truth about the Liberals and Trudeau.
We know we won't find it on this LPC PR site

















Peter Mals
Canada Proud and Canada Strong promote all kinds of racism...


Chris Spiers 

















Douglas Fowler
Scheer will address the horrid practice of BC using the Pacific Ocean as a toilet bowl .


David Raymond Amos 











David Novak
Preston Manning...isn't that the guy whose Reform protest party said their MPs wouldn't take government pensions...and then they did? Isn't Manning the guy who said he wouldn't take the housing benefit as opposition leader....and then did?

Isn't this the politician who whispered about elites in the Liberals...but came from his own family political dynasty.

There isn't a single word in this post that isn't true. Do I need to cite CBC articles to prove this?




Douglas Fowler
The journalist's Union, Unifor, has spent $1,500,000 of union dues on anti Conservative propaganda. Journalists arent biased are they????


David Raymond Amos















Eric Giesbrecht
Awesome , Justin has tried so hard to shut everyone down who doesn't follow his agenda and yet there are those who stand up and still tell the truth unlike the other medias who just sell what they are told to sell


Peter Mals 


David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Peter Mals: Methinks you won't find this so funny N'esy Pas?

https://davidraymondamos3.blogspot.com/2019/10/manning-centre-primary-backer-for.html














Bertrum G.Gruff
skewed Con logic
- cut gun control in the face of rising mass shootings
- expand dirty crude export in the face of warming oceans and melting glaciers


David Raymond Amos 


Al Anderson
Good...Can't get enough anti Trudeau.....





















Douglas Fowler
Good news! About time that some group started to get the truth out! Go Manning!




David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Douglas Fowler: "Proof please! Or is this the usual hot air?"

Methinks we shall know in a few minutes N'esy Pas? 


David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Douglas Fowler: Methinks at least CBC and I know the truth about you N'esy Pas? 














Bertrum G.Gruff
Harper's hidden agenda's were easy to predict- corporate profits
Reformer Scheer's agenda is just chilling - cuts to gun control




David Raymond Amos
Surprise Surprise Surprise


Douglas Fowler 
Reply to @Tom Clarke: Thats not news















Awistoyus Nahasthay
Pretty sl easy, but what else would you expect from pretson manning?


David Raymond Amos 

Richard Arkell
Reply to @Richard Arkell: *what a shame


David Raymond Amos  
















Tom Clarke
Yawn...where is the tides foundation and the Clinton foundation when your ship is sinking liberals?


David Raymond Amos 
















Bertrum G.Gruff
was this a Canadian value?
Harper sold off control of Canada's wheat distribution infrastructure- to the Saudis


David Raymond Amos  

















Robert Morris
Manning and harper are still very much in control of scheer and the reformacons..
.

David Raymond Amos   



















Bertrum G.Gruff
so-
exactly how does Manning Centre (100% political) continue to enjoy "charity" tax exemption?



















Rod Begin
Truth hurts, thank god for social media and outside sources, we’d have never heard about Black Face if it were not for Time Magazine the subsided media was prepared to bury the story.


David Raymond Amos 















Steven Scott
Reformacons are alive and well in the conservative party, preston you are past your due date .....


David Raymond Amos  
















Dave Singh
Preston's back!..... lending and promoting his retrograde, largely irrelevant policies of yesteryear.





















Never voting lib or con again. Its an exercise in futility. Green Machine


Douglas Fowler

















David Magner (YYC)
And just last week Manning was in the news saying he thought that the election would be devisive. Guess he wants to ensure that it is by buying ads that promote his region's interests over those of the nation.


Mark O'Connell 















Ben Smyth
No surprise there. That's where the robocalls voter suppression scheme was concieved, and where semenars by American voter suppression experts were given to instruct the membership how to carry through with the scheme. The Manning center is the conseravative party in all but name. It's a sham to get around election spending rules.


David Raymond Amos 

Manning Centre a primary backer for series of anti-Liberal Facebook pages

Centre funded third-party groups pushing pro-energy sector, anti-Trudeau videos

 

The Manning Centre is a driving financial force behind a network of anti-Liberal Facebook pages pumping out political messaging and memes during the federal election campaign.

The organization, launched in 2005 by Reform Party founder Preston Manning, gave a total of $312,450 to a network of related third-party advertising groups that operate on Facebook and Instagram.

In most cases, the centre was the sole donor listed by those groups in disclosure forms filed with Elections Canada.

The bulk of the Manning Centre's contributions — $240,500 — went to Canada Strong and Proud, the network's national politics-focused page.

That page is affiliated with a series of provincial pages, including New Brunswick Proud, Nova Scotia Proud, NL Strong and Quebec Fier — all of which got Manning Centre funding.

Alberta Proud, BC Strong and Ontario Strong are also part of the family of organizations. The various groups often post and share similar contents and ads.
Confusingly, those groups have no affiliation with Ontario Proud, Canada Proud or B.C. Proud, which are similar but separate anti-Liberal groups set up and run by Jeff Ballingall, a former Conservative political staffer and media figure.

Several of the provincially focused groups have conducted robocall and mass automated text campaigns over the past two years, including the "Sue From Ontario Strong" text campaign from June.

And since late July, Canada Strong and Proud has spent more than $103,000 on Facebook ads, with most of that spending happening before the election campaign began formally on Sept. 11. It reported just $7,441 in campaign-period expenses in its recent disclosure to Elections Canada, with the provincial affiliates also spending up to a few thousand dollars each.

Think tank is 'balancing that message out'

This is the first time Canada Strong and Proud and most of its sister organizations have been required to publish details of their financial backing.

Requests for comment sent to several of the groups were not returned.

Troy Lanigan, president of the Manning Centre, said in an interview Wednesday he was thrilled his organization had the resources to help broadcast a stronger conservative message during the campaign.


A screengrab from one of the anti-Justin Trudeau videos posted to the Facebook page run by Canada Strong and Proud. (Facebook)

Lanigan said the balance in third-party advertising between centre-left and centre-right groups traditionally has been heavily weighted to the former's advantage. Labour unions and environmentalist groups combined are strongly outspending centre-right advocacy groups in this election as well.

Lanigan said part of the Manning Centre's goal for the funding, as a group that supports conservatives, was "balancing that message out."
"The ratios will still be big, I think you will see centre-left groups in the country still vastly outspend centre-right groups in third-party advertising. But what's really encouraging is, I think, centre-right groups are fighting back, they're not just lying down," Lanigan said.

Pro-oil sector videos released

Canada Strong and Proud's first big chunk of spending was on a video encouraging Canadians to be proud of the oil-and-gas sector in the country, though it has recently switched to a more narrow, personalized critique of Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau during the formal campaign period.

"Obviously as a western-based organization, I think some of the pro-energy messages resonate with Manning [Centre] supporters," Lanigan said.

He added the centre had chosen to support the linked Proud groups because of their reach and past success in gaining national attention.
"These are groups that were on the radar, and had our attention, and were looking for support," he said. But the Manning Centre was not looking to micromanage their message, Lanigan added.

The Manning Centre previously supported the network's New Brunswick branch with a $7,000 donation during the 2018 provincial election there.

Canada Strong and Proud and its affiliated groups are among a host of digital advocacy groups that have embraced a new, meme-driven type of political action during this election period, creating messages for others to spread.

Lanigan said he wanted to take advantage of clever advocacy and groups that have been "smart with limited resources."

He said it came back to the imbalance in spending between groups like Unifor — which has spent around $1.3 million so far this election — and right-leaning groups like his own.

"We'll be outgunned, we'll be out-resourced, but we're not lying down. And that's been a huge sea-change from what it was in 2015."