Category: Uncategorized

The Peaking of Poilievre.

by Peter Lowry

We used to worry in political campaigns about when we peaked. This was a point when you could not get any further up the hill and had started going back down. I think it had something to do with the pollsters. They always wanted to show movement. Who wants to pay for another poll if there is no movement in the figures?

And the best times of all for pollsters is when they show a potential change of government—like now with this theoretical lead over the federal liberals by Poilievre’s conservatives.  We know, of course, with the anomalies of first-past-the-post voting that there is no sure thing. Canada seems to tilt to the whims of the voters. Atlantic Canada makes the most of its votes and spreads them across the two major parties. Quebec makes the liberals look good. Quebecers neither like nor trust Pierre Poilievre.

The decision for Canada used to be made in Ontario but this is a new ball game. The growing distrust and dislike for provincial conservative Doug Ford in Ontario, will hurt Poilievre.

In fact, Poilievre is hanging in the balance in that province.

Poilievre’s sweet spot is west of the Manitoba border. His only stumble across the three Prairie Provinces is Candice Bergen from Manitoba and the damage to the conservative brand by Danielle Smith in Alberta. Bergen, a previous stalwart of the party has resigned. She calls it retiring. If you know a bit about Bergen as an MP, you can understand that she would not be overwhelmed with the prospect of staying on under Poilievre’s version of leadership.

There are a few other conservative MPs we will be watching closely as the country heads towards the inevitable Poilievre vs Trudeau election. Poilievre takes too many cues from Donald Trump in the U.S. And there are some Canadian conservatives who know the difference between political exaggerations and outright lies. It will be interesting to see if Poilievre can get some of his claims closer to the truth.

What Poilievre does not seem to realize is that his insults directed at Mr. Trudeau are also belittling the Canadians who previously put their trust in Justin. Just remember that old line from the Christian Bible: The truth will set you free.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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Leave Mr. Schreiner alone.

by Peter Lowry

We have lots of good people with leadership potential in the liberal party. Why go for the only guy willing to take on the Ontario Green Party? The Green Party has enough problems without our stealing the only guy they can get elected in Ontario.

Give those supposed liberals any encouragement, and they are going to run amok. The next thing, they will be trying to get Elizabeth May to run for the next iteration of conservative party leader. The conservatives have enough trouble already.

Frankly, can you imagine a conservative party membership that includes some 20,000 temporary conservatives from the likes of the ‘Freedom Convoy’?

And what makes anybody think that Mike Schreiner is a closet liberal? Isn’t that some sort of requirement? Or does it matter to these people?

Frankly, I looked at the names the Toronto Star reporters had come up with. The list included quite a few blue liberals. The only name that was missing was former premier David Peterson. These are liberals who think of themselves as social liberals and financial conservatives. They are similar to red Tories—in fact they are interchangeable. Many people like to  think of the larger political parties in Canada as being ‘Big Tent’ parties. This is supposed to mean that the party can encompass a broad range of political views.

I had always supposed that the liberals had given up on the right-left descriptions in the era of Walter L. Gordon and Mitchell Sharp. I was on Mitchell Sharp’s liberal riding executive in Toronto and I think he hated me. I made no bones about how I hated his negative attitude toward Medicare. The joke was we thought Walter Gordon was supporting the left wing.

I remember the last time I saw Mr. Gordon alive was in his office and he tore a strip off of me for being such a dreamer.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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When Hypocrites Fight.

by Peter Lowry

The Ontario government wants Ottawa liberals to back off in criticizing Ontario’s plans to build 50,000 homes in the Ontario Greenbelt. It shows that hypocrites never know when the other guy is bluffing. Why would federal environment minister, Steven Guilbeault, muse about having a legislative responsibility to intervene in Ontario building homes in the Ontario Greenbelt?

Premier Ford just about gave up the entire scam last week when he ridiculed the people who thought the developers had a leak from the Ford government as to where the developers should buy the land. I would suggest to you that Ford was right. It was more logical that the ‘leak’ came from the developers, not the politicians.

And where does Guilbeault get off criticizing Ontario when his government is wasting billions in federal money on the Trans Mountain pipeline? The feds hope to complete the Trans Mountain later this year. It is highly unlikely that they will be bringing out the brass bands for that event.

It never ceases to amaze environmentalists that Alberta politicians can ignore the gift the feds are presenting them with—a $22 billion dual pipeline over the Rockies to Burrard Inlet. This pipeline is specifically designed for the transmission of tar sands bitumen. It heats the bitumen like the milk in a baby’s bottle and puts it under increased pressure to get twice as much tar sands bitumen to the ocean-going tankers in the Inlet.

Premier Danielle Smith of Alberta talks instead about her Alberta legislation that says she can build pipelines anywhere she wants in Canada without interference from Ottawa. It is unlikely that she would get very far testing that idea.

And meanwhile, Doug Ford can stand his ground in Ontario. He is opening up 7400 acres of the Greenbelt that is (maybe) close enough to serviced land to make the servicing costs reasonable. Whether that land is suitable for 50,000 homes, is another matter.

But some questions have to be left for the engineers. All I know is that if you have trunk sewers designed to service 10,000 homes, you would not expect it to have the capacity for another 5000. Mr. Ford should check with the guys and gals who know.

If this B.S. keeps going, we will never get anything built in Ontario.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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Hazel McCallion Dies at 101.

by Peter Lowry

There has been a recall for the Hazel McCallion brand of politician. The former mayor of Streetsville, Ontario and the mayor of Mississauga has passed on. She earned the sobriquet and will always bring back memories of Hurricane Hazel to me.

It was 1954 and I was in full firefighters garb, cowering behind a fire truck as the torrential rain washed over us in sheets. I remember watching a T33 jet trainer that was last to land in Ontario. It literally skated on its wing-tip pods to reach the end of the North Bay runway. All I knew was that I would rather have been at my sister’s wedding in Ottawa that weekend.

It was years later that I met Hazel. The company I was working for was building a plant in Streetsville and meeting Hazel McCallion was a courtesy call to the local politician. I think we both recognized immediately that we were kindred spirits. It was obvious that she was apprehensive about the proposal to amalgamate Streetsville into this new city of Mississauga. I understood the approach she was taking to moving her political career along and I was pleased with how she made it work. It never mattered what job she took on, Hazel always dominated the council.

Her shutting down her city in the face of the Canadian Pacific derailment was one of the gutsiest moves I ever saw a politician take. It became her trademark.

One of my favourite stories about Hazel was when one of that Mississauga company’s division heads came into my office and demanded that I write a speech for him to get Mississauga council to buy his division’s products. (They printed computer cards for municipal utility billing.) I suggested to him that, with his experience, he was far better than I to make the case. I also knew exactly what was going to happen.

It was a chagrined division head who reported to the next executive committee meeting what happened to him at Mississauga council. He got a dressing down from the mayor asking him how his company enjoyed the lower tax rate in Mississauga. She said the company got those lower rates because the council made sure that their city purchases were always at the lowest price. That was our Hazel.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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The Wildest of Wildrose.

by Peter Lowry

She’s backkkkk and the rest of Canada can stand back in shock. Danielle Smith of Wildrose fame is back. And she is running strong. It took Jason Kenney to prepare a place for her. Nothing less than premier Danielle would do. She brings her own brand of libertarian politics with her. Believe me, once you have experienced Danielle Smith, you will wish that staid old Jason had stayed.

Smith’s first piece of business was the Alberta Act. She thinks that the province needs protection from the rapacious liberals of Ottawa. They had already sent Alberta-born and educated Pierre Poilievre to Ottawa to help contain the threat.

Did you also hear that Danielle Smith has appointed Preston Manning of the once-famous Reform Party to chair a committee to investigate the province’s handling of the COVID-19 outbreak. Manning’s committee will have a budget of $2 million. We assume, $253,000 will recompense the 80-year Manning for his time and trouble.

That news was met somewhat unkindly by Opposition leader Rachel Notley of the New Democratic Party. Preston would be wise to get most of his pay up front. That boondoggle is guaranteed to end abruptly if Ms. Notley wins the premier’s job again in the coming provincial election.

The problem for the province is that the comedic value of premier Smith might not be worth it. I am not saying that she is a fruitcake but I can never forget the time she took a bunch of Wildrose MLAs across the floor to join the conservatives, long before they got united again. Her problem after that classic of uninspired political suicide was that she was unable to get a conservative riding to take her to their bosom.

Smith’s continuing problem is that every time, you would think a sensible person would be conciliatory and make peace with reality, she gets all paranoid about Ottawa. She might be her own worst enemy.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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A Retreat to the Core.

by Peter Lowry

The cabinet of Justin Trudeau’s liberals is in retreat to Hamilton, Ontario. They are at the heart of Ontario’s strength and Canada’s weakest point. It is all said by the wisps of smoke from the once mighty steel mills of Hamilton Harbour. It is the old city south of the mills and the new city looking down from the mountain.

Hamilton’s weakness is its lunch pail outlook in a decentralized city. It is the homeless on the streets. It is the lack of rapid transit and just generally bad planning. How can you plan for a lifetime and worry about food for the next week? The city’s hospitals are run by the University without understanding their function for the city’s population. The hospitals discriminate and abuse the destitute. They are run by people who care more for their jobs than the people they are supposed to serve.

The lack of affordable homes in Hamilton is Canada in microcosm. Tell us again why we cannot afford to live here? Tell us again why the grocery stores continue to raise the price of food? Do the company CEOs continue to dictate to our parliamentarians?

Is our liberal government planning to try to get re-elected in due time or are they concerned about the directions we are taking? If they give a damn about the future of our world, why are they fooling around with the sphincter-tensing processes of shipping bitumen through the Straits of Georgia?

When did having your own telephone become a right-of-passage for Canadian children?  When did our government become so servile as to acquiesce to the demands of a spoiled scion of Rogers to become king of the telecoms?

Is anyone in the cabinet asking the questions of where the country is headed. Is it so in lock-step with its neighbour to the south? Who does this cabinet think they serve?

And don’t tell us how great it is to be middle class until you have tried it.

Did Hamilton’s new mayor welcome you? She did little at Queen’s Park over the years she was there. Did she offer you the key to the city? When did they find it?

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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There Came a Dark Rider.

by Peter Lowry

Behold the new, the quiet Pierre Poilievre, the leader of His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. The braggart of Carleton riding is now resident in Stornoway. His next stop is the prime minister’s office. Well, that is the scenario, as he planned it.

This is a man in desperate conflict with his planned progress. He has had too many ‘oops.’ He welcomed the ‘Freedom Convoy’ to Ottawa a year ago. He feted them. He is forever identified with the promise of more freedom to people who could hardly identify the freedoms they already had, in one of the freest countries in the world.

Yet they came. They brought bouncy castles and hot tubs. They brought air horns. It was party time in the old lumbering town on the Ottawa River. They defied advice to leave. The town was descending into chaos. Business was bad. Tourism in Ontario had taken a wrong turn.

The rider sneered at the complaints. His objectives came ahead of all else. He would go on to win the conservative leadership. The ‘Freedom Convoy’ helped him along. What was the cost of a temporary conservative party membership to help Pierre Poilievre on his quest of the leadership?

This is the guy who is going to fire the Bank of Canada’s governor for supposedly aiding Justin Trudeau in handing out money to Canadians, to help get them through the worst of the pandemic. He will tell you that conservatives never do things like that. Conservatives believe in a dog-eat-dog world—every man for himself.

Wasn’t it Pierre Poilievre who wanted the Bank of Canada to issue crypto currencies, just before Bitcoin lost about a third of its value? This guy is no economist.

There is a very long list of what Mr. Poilievre is not. He is not a leader. He seeks to divide people. He feeds on anger. Like any good conservative, he hates the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Radio Canada. He is unaware of the good they have done for our country. He has no experience other than politics.

He talks of an extreme right-wing conservatism. No expenditure unless there is an equal and opposite cost saving. And business makes the rules. He is a mean and cruel little man. He is earning his place in Hell.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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It’s a Political Down Time.

by Peter Lowry

At this time of year, we get a lot of introspective about politics, mainly because there is not much else to write about. Yes, I know that no two snowflakes are alike but they all look alike to me. And there is no question but that prime minister Justin Trudeau has far more to worry about. If he really thought ahead about anything, you would wonder why he destroyed our liberal party.

Liberalism is very much at the heart of what Canada has become to the rest of the world. It is a beacon of progressivism. Canada is helping lead the support in Ukraine against the ugly genocide of Russia’s Putin.  Canada’s women have control of their own bodies. Nobody pays for health care. It is a land of clean, clear waters. Canada is a land that leads in the rights and freedoms of its people.

But, from the first day we met, I had the feeling that Trudeau looked down on the liberal party. There was a sense that he disliked and distrusted the organization. I felt like I was between a hard place and a guy on a mission. He was glib. He said what people wanted to hear. He went along with what I considered demeaning photo ops so that former liberals would have something to remember the event.

It is interesting that I have a clear memory of what he and I discussed and absolutely no memory as to what he said to the audience. The speech was obviously a set piece. There were none of those small grunts you often hear from him—when he has to think and talk at the same time.

It was when I mentioned the constitution that I saw a change in his attitude. It was almost an automatic rejection of what I was going to say. I came away with the impression that he had learned something from his father that maybe his father had not intended. It was as though his father came home day after day to a teenage Justin, with the elder Trudeau swearing under his breath about the constant complications of making changes in Canada’s constitution. It must have made an impression on the younger Trudeau.

And yet, it was the repatriation of the constitution, the separation of Canada from its colonial past and the adoption of the country’s charter of rights and freedoms that Pierre Trudeau left us as his legacy.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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Physician, heal thyself.

by Peter Lowry

It is not my custom to quote the Bible. Yet I have watched closely what has been happening with health care in Ontario. It is a disgrace. The conservative government came into power in 2018 and the downhill slide was there for all to see. The pandemic became the smoke screen for incompetence. The Ontario Medical Association was the bastion of the specialists and the family physicians had to fend for themselves.

The doctors threw the nursing staffs overboard and the conservatives blocked any improvement in wages. There was less for the administrators. Sound, well-run hospitals were spiralling. They were forced to do without volunteers. I spent more than a week trying to contact the patient advocate in one hospital. When I finally caught up with him, I found that he never talked to the patients. People like him had the challenge of protecting their jobs.

My local hospital had a reputation of excellent kitchens and eager-to-please volunteers. The volunteers were shut out and the kitchens closed. The junk that was trucked in at the time was barely edible. I spent a month in that hospital with a fractured ankle and lost more than 25 pounds. They might complain about place-holders but I had a bit of a contest with the staff person who was responsible for getting rid of patients who no longer needed all the facilities. It was far more important to me to get out of there than it was for her to get rid of me. We both pushed the workers in rehab.

But these years of conservative control of budgets in Ontario have taken their toll. My local hospital will be a long time recovering. Our citizens supported that hospital. It was our best-supported charity. Even the volunteers had waiting lists.

Yet, our seniors see the hospital today as a place that does not want them. They fear being shipped off to some far nursing home that lacks any staff or interest in restoring their more pleasant times. Our hospitals are losing the support of the community.

In the meantime, the provinces have ganged up on Ottawa, demanding that the federal government rescue them from their failed efforts at sustaining Medicare. Each level of government has to do its share.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

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Brave, important, responsible?

by Peter Lowry

There was a short item in the Toronto Star yesterday about my old friend Hazel McCallion. I have known Hazel for more than 50 years and I think she just made her first serious political mistake.

Hazel is going to be 102-years old next month but that is no excuse for writing that premier Doug Ford has done something that is “Brave, important, responsible and necessary’ in regards to Ontario’s Greenbelt

When I first met Hazel, she was mayor of Streetsville and she was on a mission then. The province was pushing her Streetsville into this new city of Mississauga and she had no choice but to go along. She always told people that she had no need to campaign  for political jobs. The reality was that she never stopped campaigning. And I was always glad to lend a hand.

I always thought of Hazel as the best real estate sales person in Mississauga. I think she built that city of single-family dwellings by herself. I was there at the time of the Canadian Pacific train wreck that involved evacuating 200,000 people from their homes. My company had to shut down its plant and then make sure that every employee and their dependants that lived in Mississauga had a place to stay.

If I had a chance to advise Hazel before she had to get involved with premier Doug Ford, I could have warned her. Ford is trouble.

She was still the first person to turn down an offer to sit on some advisory panel for him. Her problem was that she did not turn down the offer when Ford offered her the chair of the Greenbelt. That was obviously a new experience for Hazel. She must have jumped at it. What she knows about the needs of a greenbelt might be limited. The only thing she obviously knows to do with a vacant piece of land is to build on it.

But what I do know about Hazel is that she dances with the boy who brought her. If Ford demanded she pay the price for her appointment, she might not have realized that he was getting more than a pound of flesh.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

[email protected]