Category: New

Gloves Off for Ontario Liberals.

by Peter Lowry

It had to happen sometime and the tensions in the Ontario liberal leadership race are starting to show. The only surprise is that it is Yasir Naqvi’s team that has decided to break the logjam. There have been some weak digs at front-runner Cinderella at some of the debates but Bonnie Crombie proved to be harder to annoy than expected.

But most would expect that Nate Erskine-Smith would be the one to get edgier. He is considered a bit of a maverick in Ottawa and is probably holding the number two spot in the Ontario race. Nate is also the one with the most to lose.

But Yasir Naqvi’s team are no longer the nice guys. It was a well-planned attack. Your first clue that something was changed was that the person ostensibly sending the e-mail was Linda Jeffrey, former member of the Ontario legislature, former provincial cabinet minister and former mayor of Brampton. I would respect what she has to say if she had not practically handed that twerp Patrick Brown the mayoralty of Brampton.

It reminds me of the time when Bob Nixon was challenged in a race for Ontario liberal leader. I thought I was safe and could stay out of one for a change. No, the phone rang and it was my buddy Bob, saying, “Peter, I need your help.” And, it was once more into the breech.

That was hardly like the events of this leadership event. Early in the game, I was thinking of offering Nate Erskine-Smith some help. What I soon found out was that his campaign is not well organized and so is he.

I have really liked Ted Hsu’s approach, and while it is a case of the wrong man at the wrong time, he is one to watch in the future. I think that next chance is the one he is lining up for. Some experience in cabinet is the seasoning he needs.

I took the wife to a meet and greet for Bonnie Crombie and the wife liked her. I was not as impressed with the set speech but Crombie handled it well. I don’t think I know anyone in her organization. They appear to be doing a good job.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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PP: Not While I’m Eating.

by Peter Lowry

There is a video clip doing the rounds of MP Pierre Poilievre eating an apple while being interviewed. He should only hope that the other guy in the clip knows the Heimlich Manoeuvre. Not that I was hoping that he would choke to death but to teach the little twerp not to be so damn arrogant.

He keeps getting more and more pleased with himself every time you see him in action these days. He is certainly taking the arrogant approach to politics to new heights.

It is unusual. The last time we saw that kind of right-wing arrogance was when Donald Trump first won the republican nomination in 2016. I think the Poilievre touch is a bit lighter. His lies are more poetic. He uses a feather duster where Donald Trump uses a meat axe. I think Trump gathers his flocks a little further down intellect from those Poilievre targets.

Mind you, you need to be ‘kinda’ dumb to buy into the BS of either one of these guys. Their basic problem is that they feel they have to lie to make their point. If they were in opposing businesses instead of politics, Trudeau would have dragged Poilievre into court for defamation a long time ago. American politics seems to have no boundaries.

Donald Trump has the singular honour of being the only American president to be impeached twice. I am not sure just what could happen to Poilievre in the Canadian parliament. You can get rid of a prime minister with a simple vote of non-confidence.

And most Canadians seem to understand that the majority of the popular vote does not necessarily win you the government. The Canadian electoral system has its own quirks. The American system of government seems to be built on quirks.

Up here, we blame the errors in our constitution on Queen Victoria and her 19th Century politicians in the United Kingdom of England and Ireland. In the United States of America, it was a bunch of white male landowners who gathered in Philadelphia and left the entire country in a constant state of confusion.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Ontario’s Leadership Quest.

by Peter Lowry

It seems to be a universal quest these days. Whether country, province or municipality, we are desperately in need of effective leadership. I feel embarrassed that I bitched about Jason Kenney as premier in Alberta. Compared to Danielle Smith who replaced him, Kenney was a saint. Even in Ontario, when I complained about Kathleen Wynne, the party gave us a turtle named Stephen Del Duca. He seemed reluctant about getting in the legislature, so the voters re-upped Doug Ford. I might never complain again.

And while I much prefer Marit Stiles to the previous NDP leader, it has become increasingly obvious that Stiles is very nice but definitely out of her league. I can’t imagine the unionists in the new democrats giving her the time of day.

And that brings us, reluctantly, to the current liberal crowning. I have watched grass grow faster than this leadership race. Not only is it a terrible waste of time but we all know who would win if it was a true ‘One supporter/One vote’ proposition.

I was laughing last week when I got an unabashed e-mail pitch from Ted Hsu for my second vote. Ted had obviously done the mathematics and realized that this stupid conservative voting system favours the candidate with the most second votes, if nobody wins on the first vote count. Mind you, there is no logical way to fix the outcome when each electoral district is weighted according to how bad they are at signing up new party members. The idea of considering all ridings equal is likely the stupidest idea anyone has ever dreamed up. Why you would want to have ridings that don’t give a damn about their membership numbers to have extra voting strength is totally illogical.

The one candidate who seemed to recognize the problem of the ridings with the smallest memberships was Bonnie Crombie. One of her all-supporter e-mails made reference to ridings with small memberships. She was looking for help getting more support in those ridings.

Mind you it is obvious that Bonnie Crombie is by far the front runner in the liberal race and the sooner she gets into the legislature, the better.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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How the Game is Played.

by Peter Lowry

In Ontario, the rules are different—especially in Toronto. We play lip service here to freedom of speech. You can say anything you like but do not publicly criticize the State of Israel. I think of it as an open apology for the obnoxious antisemitism I witnessed in this province in my youth. I did not understand it as a child. I consider it despicable as an adult.

But when up-front coverage of the debacle in Ukraine disappeared from the Toronto Star in favour of the new war in the Middle East, I began to wonder. Where is the balance here? Does there have to be exceptions to free speech?

What we need is to be able to discuss the Middle East situation as adults, who understand both sides. I, for one, take a dim view of Hamas and Hezbollah and their ilk. Nor do I particularly like Mr. Netanyahu and his right-wing supporters. Israel has had better leaders in the past.

What I hate to see are bands of Arabic supporters or Israeli supporters demonstrating in Canada for one side or the other. And I don’t think we should all support Israel right or wrong. There is a humanitarian concern in all of this that turns my stomach.

And what I am especially concerned about is blind support from our politicians. I think they need to show more concern for the unarmed innocents in this bloodshed. I am appalled that Hamas would deliberately attack civilians in Israel for the purposes of inflaming and stimulating the hatreds. They are like a cancer and the Israelis need to be more surgical in taking them out.

In the years since the United Nations created the State of Israel there has not been enough effort to establish peace with the Palestinians. We can hardly be proud of the situation that since the time of the Crusades, Europeans have been less than successful in brokering peace in that part of the world.

But what do you expect when university professors in Ontario are criticized by their Queen’s Park minister of colleges and universities for making supposedly antisemitic and pro-Hamas statements. Our universities appear to be the last bastion of free speech in this province. We certainly need better cabinet ministers, who can understand that.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Piss Off Danielle et al.

by Peter Lowry

What’s with all these economic experts in the conservative parties across this country? Their ignorance amazes me. Probably the most dangerous is Pierre Poilievre who is currently spending millions on an advertising campaign telling Canadians what a sweet guy he is. Doug Ford in Ontario is so out of touch with reality that he thinks the Bank of Canada is going to pay attention to his nonsense. And then there is that Looney-Tunes premier in Alberta who goes on about Alberta’s pension plan.

I’ve got news for all these people: Butt Out. None of you know what the hell you are talking about.

Let’s start with the Canada Pension Plan. It does not belong to Alberta nor to Canada. The Canada Pension Plan belongs to me, to my next-door neighbour and Canadians from coast to coast. We put our money in. We get money out. To-date, we have put in billions. It is an excellent example of what a properly funded and managed pension fund should look like. And the clueless statements we hear from the Alberta premier are nothing more than blather that she hopes will convince Albertans to give her more money to mismanage. I wouldn’t trust her with a Canadian Nickel.

And then there is that dumbass premier in Ontario who doesn’t know how to keep himself out of trouble. The other day he was shouting from the roof top at Queen’s Park that the Bank of Canada should not raise interest rates this month. I wouldn’t trust that fool to make sure his wife has enough money for this week’s groceries. He doesn’t seem to understand that even the prime minister in Ottawa would not tell the bank’s governor anything so stupid. The Bank’s board is specifically kept at arm’s length from the politicians in Ottawa. I am not sure that they are even allowed to admit that there are provincial governments.

My sense on the current inflation problems is that, with the segments of the economy currently affected, is that raising interest rates would not help. We’ll see who is right.

And that leaves us with the Ottawa cowboy who so desperately wants to be prime minister of this country. I think he has proved conclusively that he does not understand this country. He has never held a real job. He thinks fictitious Internet money such as Bitcoin is a great idea. He is promising freedom from saving our planet’s ecology and freedom from any regulations. He is just boy wonder!

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Consensus Crombie.

by Peter Lowry

I might have been the first to concede that Mississauga mayor Bonnie Crombie would win the current liberal party leadership contest in Ontario but the idea has been getting a lot of support lately. The other day, Bonnie’s campaign released a letter signed by more than 20 present and past MPPs recommending her candidacy. Their best argument is that she scares Doug Ford and his conservatives. The key is to getting her into the legislature as soon as possible.

What is missing though is a strong and aggressive party to back her. I sure as hell was not impressed when the party trumpeted that this leadership contest had increased party membership—without a fee—to over 70,000. Back when I was editing the liberal party newspaper at the end of the 1960s, the circulation was to 75,000 liberal households in Ontario. To-day, with double the population in Ontario, they seem to have a problem giving away memberships for free.

Because free membership is idiocy. I thought when Justin Trudeau cancelled the membership fees for the federal liberals, he was expressing his dislike for the party. I was watching him closely up to the election in 2015 and the disdain he felt for the party was easy to see.

For the Ontario liberals to also cancel their fees was just plain stupidity. After all, if somebody gives you something for free, how do you treat it? Do you respect it? Do you make an effort to give it support? What’s it worth to you?

We used to send people who joined the party a membership card. They kept them and brought them with them to party functions. They used to turn out for pubic meet and greets with cabinet ministers. In the largest riding in Canada, at one time—York Scarborough. We held a huge annual event at one of the big hotels and monthly public meetings with our liberal MP when the House was in session. We didn’t just send some meaningless drivel to voters, we kept in touch. We had training sessions on door-to-door canvassing. We held policy development meetings, we were active on boards and committees of the party. We were real liberals.

Pierre Trudeau used to joke with me about where we met. It was at a meeting in Peterborough of a group of MPs, party officials and activists. It was called the GOYA Group. It meant ‘Get Off Your Ass.’ We need that group again today.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Confounding the Critics.

by Peter Lowry

The other day, a friend proposed a blog on how Ontario premier Doug Ford is hoping to get even with the critics who don’t want him making his friends rich with Greenbelt land. He suggested that this is with ministerial zoning orders (MZO) and the purpose would be to jam up municipal traffic everywhere in Ontario. The Ontario Tories have tested the idea in Toronto and we know it will work—Toronto has been in gridlock for most of the past year.

I can only address the driving around Barrie, Ontario. Between fixing some of Barrie’s worst streets, the usual new condos and other construction, and the infrastructure repair and replacement as well as with all the highway 400 bridges through the city being rebuilt, Barrie has discovered gridlock.

But I don’t think Doug Ford is mad at anyone in Barrie. We have two conservative members of the legislature who are both in the cabinet. Even the mayor in this town is a conservative embarrassment.

But everyone in Ontario should be concerned about MZOs. The idea for these orders was originally to protect sensitive land, not build on it. With our municipalities being creatures of the province, the MZO was simply a tool to provide help when needed. It was a solution to problems when a municipality needed help straightening out a zoning problem. It was never supposed to be a way for the government of the day to look after its friends with deep pockets. It was never considered a patronage solution.

In the past, MZOs have been used one or twice per year to assist municipalities. One that came to light in the past was when a grocery store in Elliot Lake had its roof collapse and the municipality needed to fast-track a new location. The McGinty government was asked to help and provided a MZO to expedite the process of approvals. It was done publicly, it was needed and it solved a problem for the community. In 15 years as the government in Ontario, the liberals had used MZOs only 16 times.

It was only since the Ford conservative government came into power in 2018, that more than a hundred MZOs have been provided. For some reason, we have not been able to find a list of them.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Betrayal of the Father.

by Peter Lowry

It was the balance that Pierre Trudeau brought to the use of language in Canada that his eldest son betrayed. In Bill C-13’s enactment by parliament in June of this year, Justin Trudeau forgot that his father had declared that the English and French languages were equal. You do not protect one language by downgrading the other. You do not promote one by restricting the other.   

Justin Trudeau panders to those pathetic politicians in Quebec City who have to use the “Not Withstanding” clause to cover off their foolish attempts to force Canadians living in Quebec to use only French in their daily lives. There is no need for an additional federal law that encourages that bigotry.

I always found that for every French-Canadian who wanted me to speak French there were probably five francophones who wanted to practice their English on me. All in all, I am sure that if they had tried, I would be fluent in French. As it is, my French makes francophones cringe.

I always think of the Quebec City legislature as the fools who tried to take all the life out of Montreal and chased a quarter million anglophones out of Quebec during the 30 years from 1970 to 2000.

In the 1960s, my oldest brother had taken his family to Quebec to accept a promotion to Alcan’s head office. He became bilingual in that position but on his retirement twenty years later, he and most of his family moved to Ottawa.

What always seemed indicative was that there was also a smaller but companion emigration of francophones to other parts of Canada. While the politicians tried to offset this emigration with immigration from French-speaking countries, they continue to show their rejection of English. For example, by forcing unnecessarily higher fees for English language students from outside Quebec at the few English-language universities and colleges in Quebec.

Somehow this whole business with language in Quebec reminds me of an old adage about taking a horse to water. You still can’t make him drink.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Bringing It Home.

by Peter Lowry

It is obvious that the federal conservative party has more money than good sense these days. Watching their current $3 million advertising campaign, one can only think of the despair it could bring. What the advertising does not tell Canadians is the type of government Mr. Poilievre would try to institute in Canada.

This is a man who has never experienced a real wage-earning job. It is as though he ticks off the boxes to be acceptable to the average Canadian. Have wife and family: done. Win conservative leadership: done. Ditch glasses: done. Lose tie: done. Try to smile: in process. Muss hair: done.  He is not a warm and fuzzy person.

Mr. Poilievre’s politics are to the right of his mentor Stephen Harper. He is a western Canada conservative from Alberta. His politics are more libertarian than conservative. He offers Canadians a new freedom, from what, nobody knows.

He promises business and industry freedom from regulation. He promises the grocery chains freedom to charge what they want. He will do nothing to curb inflation. He doesn’t care. He wants unfettered capitalism. He wants less regulation.

We should never forget that this is the foolish member of parliament who welcomed the supposed “Freedom Convoy” to Ottawa. He took them donuts. When it became necessary to ask them to leave Ottawa, Mr. Poilievre was not to be found.

Lately Mr. Poilievre has been in parliament in the role of the leader of the opposition. This is a responsibility to make sure that government legislation meets the needs of Canadians. It is not just to oppose and ridicule any and all legislation.

This is a man who promises smaller, less intrusive government. He doesn’t tell Canadians what departments he would do away with. He fails to tell us where he will save money for his cuts in taxes. He seems uninterested in the wildfires that can devastate our logging industry. He seems to consider global warming to be inconsequential. He will cancel liberal attempts to decrease pollution and will give the tar sands exploiters in the west free reign to pollute the environment.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

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Consent of the Governed.

by Peter Lowry

Ontario residents have come to regret the lack of education of their premier. He is obviously not the only conservative politician these days who neither knows nor understands this basic concept of democracy. “Consent of the governed” is a concept that can be dated back to the late 13th century in response to the Divine Right of Kings (and Popes).

Consent is not just in free elections. It is not just at the ballot box. As in the Hippocratic Oath of physicians, it applies to all acts of the politician in office. Which brings us to the obvious ignorance of Premier Ford and his government.

From the time Mr. Ford took office, neither he nor his cabinet seemed aware of even the thought of the needed consent of the governed. As one of his first acts in the premier’s office six years ago, Mr. Ford ordered the city of Toronto to reduce their counselors to half of what they considered adequate to serve their constituents. Did he think to ask Torontonians if they wanted the increase in service by the city?

Services to people are at the core of services provided by our provincial governments. Core services include hospitals and schools. Provincial responsibility includes inspections of equipment such as trucks, industrial machinery, elevators, amusement rides, building materials and municipal services such as providing safe water and safe disposal of waste. It also includes planning and building of highways.

The building of the Bradford bypass to link Highway 400 and Highway 404 has been going on for many years and the final link is in progress. To add a spurious Highway 413 to this building program is an attempt to please developers who have bought up land around the purported future highway 413 intersections. Studies of these highway developments include research into the needs of the people in the area and their travel habits. Those studies are part of the consent to be governed and should be public information.

Provincial governance is not subject to whimsy. What else would you call it when a provincial government takes time and staff resources to re-institute a patronage tool for lawyers, that was done away with over 30 years ago, to give loyal conservative party members a fallacious title such as King’s Counsel. It makes you wonder if these politicians have enough to do?

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

[email protected]