John Tory -- Redux

Well in the postmortem on the election Mr Tory has come to the realization that the religious schools proposal was not a smart idea -- well who knew. To compound this he now realises that he needed to listen to those amoung his team that were telling him to back off on this earlier in the campaign -- again who knew.

Had a chat with a Tory insider and they revealed that Tory has a hard time letting go of that back room role -- where you can push an issue, only to have it over ruled by a more street savvy politician. I guess he misses the advice, guidance, decision making for lack of a better description, of the Bill Davis's of the world. I think John has learned its a little tougher out there then he expected, and lets face it I don't think he expected the McGuinty liberals to play to the racist anti-muslim undercurrent in Ontario. But all is fair in love and war and the Liberals capitalised on the anti-Muslim vote -- and got themselves a majority with the support of 21% of the eligible voters. Ain't democracy grand.

Congratulations to the Ontario Liberals

In a sweeping victory the Liberals have maintained a 35 seat majority with a 42% of the vote. A very hearty congratulations to the Liberals and their campaign -- not to take anything away from them Tory basically handed them the election with a series of missteps and gaffe's -- the largest being the religious school funding.

It will be interesting to see how the Liberals handle the Catholic School funding issue -- not that they will extend to other faiths in the short run -- but they will probably face increased level of scrutiny on the Catholic School funding -- with every silly religion decision made by Catholic Trustees being put on the front page of the newspapers. I would expect we can expect silence from the Liberals on this issue for now -- not sure that will make the issue go away.

The NDP increased their popular vote -- not sure what that will bring, as the Liberals are able to push through or not do whatever they want. I think the PC's and the NDP are going to take on the oppose everything role in the media for the next four years -- and frankly their ability to hold the Liberals to account will be severely muted.

In the mean time we can expect the Status Quo -- as Ontarion's voted for the liberal platform of change -- which was unremarkable -- and steeped in the Status Quo.

Who did I vote for -- and I did vote, I went with the party that most closely matced my liberal social policy/conservative fiscal beliefs -- let you figure that one out.

Scandal in Sarnia -- yes its true

Apparently a P3 (I know not politically correct to use P3) hospital in Sarnia is going to cost approximately 250% of the original estimated price. The original cost was suppose to be $140 million and now it is hovering around $319 million. Not sure who broke the story NDP or PC's -- came right after Furious George Smitherman had visited the riding and guaranteed this not to be the case.

What is not reported is whether the $319 million price tag is for essentially the same project as the $140 million price tag -- been there seen scope creep like crazy -- but then of course we would not have had the headline -- and some reporter would have had to do some investigating. Sounds like work eh. Now the fact the locals will have to raise an additional $30 million because of this is reprehensible -- who ever approved the new figure should pay the cost -- George sounds like it is yours.

What I do find interesting though on the Toronto Star's on line edition the story played prominently yesterday and attributed the story to the NDP -- the story no longer seems to exist on their servers -- looks like a case of pre-election censorship going on.

Howard -- Its the message stupid!

To Ontario's media representatives present:

Ontario NDP Leader Howard Hampton: "We've become the child poverty capital of Canada -- don't any of you people (reporters) care? Don't you care that there are seniors living in soiled diapers? Don't you care about that? I'm asking you, 'What do you care about?' That's what I know people care about. These are real issues."

Howard, piece of advice, they would report on other issues if everyone had not kept pandering to the bigotry and racial bias in Ontario and if you had something substantive to say.

Liked the quote from a senior (paraphrased) -- he has trouble voting for the liar or the idiot but wants Hampton to tell him what his platform is instead of just attacking people.

MMP -- referendum time for a choice

The whole referendum on the current First Past the Post or Mixed Member Proportional issue has been very poorly dealt with by Elections Ontario -- it has been too little too late with very little public education or debate about it. The whole strategy appears to be to be to not get this initiative approved. That being said the proposed modified system seems to be a political compromise -- and really quite confusing.

The vote needs 60% of Ontarion's to vote (of those who actually vote) in favour of the change for the MMP to be effective for the next election -- four years hence. Just want to make sure everyone understands it is not for this election.

There have been a fair amount of editorials (the Toronto Star in particular)who have railed against this new system -- they feel it is a step backward for democracy and raise the specter of a "Star Chamber" type of government where the will of the public is undercut by non elected party insiders. By the way the Tor Star editorial was factually wrong on a number of counts -- but they are the Star so that would be par for the course.

I really think they need to grow up. The current system of forced compliance to party vote is far more damaging to democracy then MMP would be. Right now a MPP cannot vote against party position in the house without the threat of discipline, the MPP cannot effectively represent their riding -- and from what I have seen the Caucus and decision making is ultimately controlled by a small number of individuals, most of whom are not elected. In addition parties with 5% to 10% of the popular vote and their constituencies are being shut out of the legislature.

I personally think the first past the post system is flawed -- too many seats awarded on a small number of votes. As it is currently designed one seat may be worth 10,000 votes while others are worth 300,000 -- not really fair. In addition being able to have a majority government without the requirement of a majority of the votes is kind of counter intuitive. The current system also marginalizes the smaller parties influence on the government of the day -- NDP, Greens, and the Family Coalition Party come to mind -- a party with 10% of the popular vote may have no seat in the legislature -- that is shutting out a fair amount of the population from the democratic process.

Will I vote for MMP yes -- do I think it will pass no, so why -- well hopefully a large percentage of Ontarion's will vote yes to the referendum -- so in the next election, four years hence, we may actually have another referendum with a properly designed and communicated proposal for electoral reform.

PC's -- Slip Sliding Away

In what appears to be a last desperate attempt to appeal to a larger block of undecided voters Tory has backed away from his moral high ground on the Religious schools issue. Tory as I indicated yesterday is now saying that he will put this policy initiative up to a free vote -- the initiative will be modeled by former premier Bill Davis (the guy who gave public money to to the Catholic Schools. The moral high ground was that of fairness and quelling the terms of the UN criticism of Ontario. Guess the high ground gets pretty lonely sometimes.

McGuinty characterised this strategy as as divisive and that it would take up three years of the legislatures time unnecessarily. Not sure I agree with that, I think any debate where we look at current funding, and the integration of new and existing Canadians into the public school system is of value. The current system is divisive by its very nature, we need to do more to remove barriers to a quality education for all of Ontario's children.

And now for something completely different

Hope you like chocolat :-)

Tory embraces democracy (sort of)

Tory announced that if elected that he would allow a free vote on religious school funding in the legislature -- this is apparently to quell the divisions with in his own party and to appeal to the broader voter base. I would hope they would include the vote on whether to stop funding the Catholic Schools in Ontario in that free vote -- I somehow doubt that.

McGuinty replied to this announcement somewhat cynically, and Hampton wants the issue off the table so we can talk about real stuff.

The continuation of funding of the Catholic Schools at the expense of the other religions is pure unbridled bigotry and racism -- don't want those Madrassas set up in Ontario churning out terrorists. Now if they were to take a look at the policies of the Catholic church they may want to revise their stance on funding it -- institutionalised homophobia, unfettered sexism, protection of peadophiles, centuries of crimes against humanity including the recent native schools debacle .. need I continue.

The only real answer is to stop funding all religious schools in Ontario, politically this may not be palatable but at least I am honest.

High Gear -- for a tricycle

Looks like we are coming into the last critical weeks -- and well not much is happening.

The Liberal's seems to recognise their lead and have McGuinty talking about "Canada" issues. He ventured into the realm of foreign takeovers -- interesting territory -- and over the last couple of days has delivered a couple of good speeches -- good for a person who is about as exciting as dry toast. Though I did take exception to have all those new immigrants into the public school system -- oh yeah the one with funding going to the catholics -- yeah thats right.

Tory -- well why bother, religious school funding, privatise parts of health care, beer and wine in the corner store -- right with you bud.

Hampton -- is he campaigning -- oh yes tax the rich.

Miller -- I know he is not campaigning -- but he could actually speak to the candidates and get some attention for Toronto. Guess not too busy flying from conference to conference -- and talking about raising taxes. Idiot!

Dalton should be cleaning the floor with his opponents

John Tory is still struggling with his extension of funding to faith based schools, beer and wine in the corner store and a parallel private health care (paid for at public rates) service. He is getting slagged by his own party members -- questioned unmercifully at PC events as to why he is following this lose-lose strategy. He still has been unable to reach the undecided voters -- his manner is polished -- but lets face it it just ain't working -- whether he want to stick to his principles or not -- the game here is to form a government -- not to be in opposition.



Howard Hampton -- is rolling out nothing new -- had hopes when he started talking about extending dental coverage to children and the $10 minimum wage, I thought we might actually have some new proposals to talk about -- however we have gone back to the old canards of protecting the auto sector, protecting this and that, rolling back this and rolling back that -- the past is a wonderful place to remember -- you tend to forget the imperfections -- however the past is not a place I want to move Ontario forward to.

Dalton what is happening -- you just are not getting the message out. They are handing you this election on a silver platter and the best you can do is talk about a minority government (Harper is at it as well). Smitherman is running around -- well being Smitherman. Where is the campaign? Guess you just need to want it more.

The new campaign....... Just like the old one

The Globe and Mail's Editorial Board took the Liberals to task for rerunning the 2003 campaign in 2007. The premise was the Liberals are still trying to get voters to remember the "bad old days" of the Harris PC government as a strategy to defeat PC's in this election. This they felt was an ineffective strategy and that the Liberals should run on their record instead -- not so sure on that one.

The PC's seem to be responding to the "Harris legacy" approach however -- their campaign signs and literature don't seem to recognize the PC brand but rather the John Tory brand. The campaign literature I have seen again stresses the the John Tory brand. I am not sure that Tory will win based on the "John Tory" instead of the PC party brand -- and if he doesn't he may actually be harming the party in the future -- one man parties tend to fall out of favour pretty quickly and repositioning the brand back to the party might take more than one subsequent election.

There is also this underlying current of what they did in the past was somehow wrong -- whether you agree the policies and directions of the Harris PC's or not they were elected to two majority governments -- with strong mandates. There are still a large number of Ontarion's who agree with the direction taken, maybe not all of them, but with alot of them. I would marginalize them at your own peril.