Elections, Canada Style Eh? (cont'd)

From the Chronicle of Education and Pointy-Headed Intellectualism:

On Tuesday a new ad featured a puffin pooping on Mr. Dion's shoulder. Uproar over the ad forced Mr. Harper to apologize, saying the caricature was in poor taste. The offending droppings were soon dropped from the ad, although the puffin continues to fly past Mr. Dion. But the news media had already seized on the issue as a campaign goof.

Mr. Dion went on the offensive to counter the "prejudice that an intellectual is not a human being," pointing out that while he liked to read books and enjoyed the outdoors, he wasn't a wealthy man and shared the same concerns as other Canadians, including worrying about paying the bills at the end of the month. (Nice try, Poindexter... we ain't electorating nobody who reads books... Ed.)

"The attempt by the Tories to portray Mr. Dion as elitist ignores the fact that, like Mr. Obama, he comes from modest roots," said Errol P. Mendes, a law professor at the University of Ottawa and a commentator on North American elections. "It's sad that the right wing in both countries is trying to portray well-educated people as elitist."

The portrayal of professors as elite and effete is "as offensive as it is inaccurate," said Henry Mandelbaum, executive director of the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations. Polls have shown that professors are highly respected by Canadians (NERDS! Ed.) and that academics are involved in their communities in every way, he said. "The notion of attacking professors as eggheads played well with Adlai Stevenson, but we've moved on from there."