Provincial Politics – Page 41

Leadership is in the eyes of the followers.

March 22, 2020 by Peter Lowry

Bob Hepburn of the Toronto Star wrote an opinion piece last week that commented on Doug Ford of Ontario looking “downright ‘leaderly’.” I rarely argue with Hepburn, but in this case, I sense some wishful thinking. True, Ford is running a notch or two ahead of Trump but nobody ever saw that as a high bar.

I don’t think anyone convinced Ford of anything. I think they simply scared him into acting the way he is. He didn’t need a visit from Marley’s ghost to warn him of the coming visitations. He simply left behind the childish traits of bluster and braggadocio that have been his trademark in politics. It was time to act grown up.

I must have seen some of the same news clips as Mr. Hepburn. I agree that Ford acted as he believed a real leader might. None of the usual bombast was a treat in itself. The guy felt he had to stick with the prepared script. He has no ad libs for a coronavirus.

Let’s face it, Doug Ford is no Donald Trump. He is not rich enough. He is not a good enough con man. He does not have as much ego. He got much of his political training from his late brother Rob. As mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford knew how to pull the mantle over himself for the rough spots. Their mother was watching.

But when he got to Queen’s Park and the corner office, Doug had no idea how to act. His bluster was real. He really did not know what he was doing. He launched a vendetta against anything those liberals had done and got himself in lots of trouble. He fired and hired and made a mess of it. He cut budgets he should not have and missed the low-hanging fruit. He thought he could look like the big-man on campus and made himself look stupid.

And he is probably not any smarter today. He has not learned much but he might not be as easy to catch. We will watch him.

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Caught short in a pandemic.

March 20, 2020 by Peter Lowry

We drove several hundred kilometres the other day. At least the gas was cheaper. My wife and I had to take someone some food. It made me realize how bad the planning is by our politicians. They have no idea of the basic nature of our lives.

Prime minister Justin Trudeau and Ontario premier Doug Ford are people raised in privilege and who live in privilege. When would they ever have to worry about the availability of a toilet?

My wife and I stopped in a town for lunch. Ontario has shut down all food facilities other than take out. We had to settle for McDonald’s. I ordered while my wife went in search of a washroom. No luck! The cashier refused to unlock the washroom for my wife. She said it was not available because they were now just a take-out restaurant. We got the same refusal of the washroom key down the street at an Esso gas station. Luckily, a little further along, a grocery supermarket had a handy unadvertised washroom.

But it told us a lot about the bad planning of our leaders. North America has always been stupid about the availability of public washrooms. Nobody needs to be embarrassed about simple bodily functions. And what parent has not had to assist a youngster in this basic exercise at the side of the road?

But what it shows is the basic elitism of our leaders. How much of that $82 billion offered the other day really goes to the people most in need? If you gave the people helping the homeless a few thousand in $50 bills to hand out every day, it would move through the economy like it was greased.

If there was ever a time in Canada to better understand the need for a guaranteed income plan, it is at this critical juncture. Think of this: give everybody, male, female, over 16 years-old, $400 every week in script. If you have not spent the money by the end of the current month, the script expires. And, if you make more than $600 per week at the same time, the money is taxed back to the government.

It is time for innovative solutions.

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The imperfect timing of Doug Ford.

March 14, 2020 by Peter Lowry

It seems that no matter what he does, Ontario’s premier Doug Ford, finds that it always costs more than he saves when he makes cuts in Ontario’s government budgets. It costs him money to fire people. It costs him money to cancel projects. It costs him friends when he cuts health or education budgets. And when he tries to give friends jobs, he is held up to ridicule by the media. He is beginning to think it is just that he does some things at the wrong time.

Probably the best example of Doug’s bad timing is this Covid-19 pandemic. Why only a year ago, he had decisively dumped some of the costs of public health services on Ontario’s municipalities. Even Mayor John Tory of Toronto dumped all over him for that.

But Doug Ford is not without experience at fixing things for people who are upset. He tells them that his government is restoring funding—maybe not all the funding—but maybe enough of the funding to get him off the hook for being a curmudgeon. He gave the whole thing a grace period and it would be in 2020 that some cuts would still be made. Which everyone grumbled about but figured it could have been worse.

And welcome to 2020. The budget-squeezed public health services had been complaining but are still doing their jobs. Nobody told the public health people that in 2020, they were going to have to face a possible pandemic called a coronavirus or Covid-19.

The only person that Covid-19 has helped is Ontario finance minister Rod Phillips. It means he can blow the lid off his projected $9 billion deficit planned for the coming fiscal year. He has to give the health ministry and others whatever they need to help battle the pandemic.

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Doug Downey doubles down.

March 13, 2020 by Peter Lowry

That nice guy, Bill Davis, one-time Ontario premier, must be having some sleepless nights. Those idiots in his conservative party are busy destroying Bill’s legacy. They spend more money on their dumb ideas than any other Ontario government in the past. And they never get anything right. From the premier who wants to only appoint cronies to any job and personally picks stickers for gas pumps and license plates, to that education minister who acts like a fugitive from the Godfather movies, to an attorney general who ignores a common sense approach to appointments, this is a conservative government from Hell.

Did you hear about the latest dumb stunt by my MPP? Yes, Doug Downey is the member of the legislature from Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte. This guy’s justice ministry has more than 30 committees working to attract, vet and advise on Ontario citizens suitable to serve on all the legal and other appointments by the government of the day.

But what does Downey do? This schmuck appoints a Toronto police officer—a friend of the premier’s—to the Ontario Human Rights Commission. The cop did not even apply for the job. It appears this appointment is by Dougie, for Dougie, to appoint Dougie’s friend.

And, has the independent integrity commissioner ever got his shirt in a knot about this stupidity. I have no idea of the per cent of cases brought before the human rights commission dealing with policing but my guess is the cop would have to recuse himself at some time, at every meeting of the commission. I am sure we could all appreciate the insights that a former cop could bring to the commission’s work but not while still employed at policing.

And one further note: Doug Ford is younger but I remember driving through American states and seeing the Berma-Shave series ads along the highways. Maybe he also might have noticed them. It is no excuse though to be waxing nostalgic for billboard advertising along the 400-series highways of Ontario. He is talking about opening our scenic controlled-access highways to advertising. He must be desperate.

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Bigotry is blooming early in Quebec.

March 10, 2020 by Peter Lowry

It seems to come each year with the spring flowers. Bigotry is the passion of Quebec nationalists. They care less that people recognize them for what they are: small-minded, intolerant, ignorant and ungracious people who want to inflict children and youth with their narrow and harmful parochialism. They want to build Trump-type walls around Quebec.

These are the people who challenge religious symbols. They seem to fear the inanimate objects of devotion such as a cross, a Jewish yarmulke, a Sikh turban or a Bedouin hijab. Just how they are threatened by these objects or dress, we cannot fathom.

But their passion has launched early this year. With the smarmy connivance of premier François Legault and his right-wing pequistes in his coalition avenir Québec party, the national assembly has a new hate bill to pass. The education minister, Jean-François Roberg, is proposing a bill to abolish a program that teaches Quebec students respect and tolerance for people of different faiths.

To their horror, the politicians have found that the program works. Instead of joining the pequistes’ hate movement, the young people in Quebec are becoming more inclined to be tolerant and accepting of others’ views and religions.

This has angered the nationalists in Quebec who want to build walls against multiculturalism as evidenced in the rest of Canada. What they are really going to try to do is change the course to their religion, that is actually secularism. As a religion, secularism denigrates the various religions as pap for the masses. It is closer to an atheistic viewpoint. With the lingering vestiges of the once dominant Roman Catholic church in Quebec, these nationalists see even the weakened Roman church as a threat to their movement.

The nationalists describe the present teaching on ethics and religion as a type of virus that teaches the young to appreciate multiculturalism and pluralistic ideas. The youth of Quebec would certainly also benefit from learning about the European experience in lowering borders and expanding cultures. The nationalists in the national assembly have an evil agenda for them.

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“Most stupid people are conservative.”

March 9, 2020 by Peter Lowry

This will be of small comfort to premier Doug Ford of Ontario. A friend reminded me the other day of the quote from 19^th Century philosopher John Stuart Mill that “Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative.” And the Ford government keeps on proving it.

Mind you, I am concerned that Ontario’s teachers might have not yet recognized that they have won their battle. It is time for them to take a victory lap and get the hell back to work. They have inconvenienced the parents long enough. Goodwill is a fragile commodity.

All teachers should have two side-by-side pictures in their classroom. Both pictures should be of education minister, Stephen Lecce. In the first, you will be able to admire the fine cut of that expensive suit, the positiveness of his demeanour, the toothy smile and the smooth trim of that immature beard. That is the first picture.

The second picture should show him snugged into his straight jacket, the wild look in his eyes, the mussed hair and the craven look of defeat. This should be what victory looks like.

But I warned the friend that despite the general consensus in Ontario that Doug Ford is something of a jerk, about 25 to 30 per cent of the voters are yellow-dog conservatives. And that, no matter what, they still want to vote for Mr. Ford and his conservatives. Short of putting a bounty on them, they are going to the polls and voting that way.

The problem is further befuddled that another 25 to 30 per cent of Ontario voters are yellow-dog liberals. They might have a slightly different attitude. The only real difference between them is that they tend to be city mice. They are also inclined to be a bit more progressive.

It should also be noted that there are those who are of the dying breed of socialists who like to sing Solidarity Forever. These NDP still have about 15 per cent of the voters supporting them. It is more for the sake of nostalgia than any idea that it will take them anywhere.

But this still leaves a bunch of voters who are not really committed. These are the people who vote against something or get behind the voting screen and say, “Eeny, meany, miney, moe,” close their eyes and vote. You would like to think these people really decide the election but they often just go with the flow.

Obviously, it is not just conservatives who can be stupid.

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Well, that was a waste of time.

March 8, 2020 by Peter Lowry

Ontario liberals have a new leader. It was a fairly decent event. I only caught some parts of it that were streamed on the Internet. It was a good technical effort but I think the party brass scrimped on the lighting and technical equipment.

The numbers there were credible for a party that knew who was going to win. Not many of us want to spend our Saturday morning listening to political speeches but some of it was fun. The robot was a bit silly but I liked some of the things Mr. Tedjo was saying.

He was saying something very important about education in Ontario. I made the mistake of saying the same thing as a candidate 50 years ago. The government has to get out of the religion business in schools. We need a single education system that puts the student first. It might not be a good one-size-fits-all approach at first but it allows the scope needed to accommodate. We are wasting money on religion. (Mind you, French language classes should be mandatory from grade one.)

But back to the results of the liberal leadership: It will not be long until Ontario voters wonder what might be the difference between this leader and the last one. All I can say is that the last one was the one with hair and personality.

What was wrong with this event was that it was that it had no excitement, no surprise—if you discount the robot. It was a bit forced.

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Riding the bubble.

March 7, 2020 by Peter Lowry

It helps if you think of the main aspirants for the federal conservative party leadership as Bland, Blander and Who(?) This perception was highlighted the other day. It seems one of them promised—if chosen—that they would immediately try to force an election to rid the country of those despicable liberals. The other two immediately chimed in with a “Me too.”

All three want to ride the bubble. The bubble is something that occurs whenever there is a leadership change in a major party. It is that sudden, and temporary, lift in the opinion polls that the party gets from the publicity surrounding the choice of a new leader.

It works, sometimes. The last time I saw it work well was in 1968. We called it Trudeaumania. Our present prime minister’s father got the impression that he was omnipotent in that election. He later learned that omnipotence has a short shelf-life.

Trudeau Junior thought he was riding the bubble back in 2015, when he had such an easy victory and a majority government. That was no bubble. Justin was cashing in on the voter exhaustion with the machinations of the Harper government and the hope that Trudeau was like his father. It took the voters the next four years to realize they might have bought a pig in a poke.

That is one of the problems with the bubble. You are often getting lots of publicity at the time but it is without substantive content. And sometimes a picture really is more effective than 1000 words.

But the bubble is real. Some people will say that in the 2018 provincial election in Ontario, you could have painted any idiot blue and he would have beat Kathleen Wynne and her liberals. And, they did, and he did.

The bubble worked that time because there was just not enough time. If Ontario voters had time to think about it, more time to understand Doug Ford, there might not have been the landslide that they are now regretting.

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A weekend of infamy.

March 5, 2020 by Peter Lowry

Ontario liberals are wasting their money this weekend as they gather in Mississauga to confirm a new leader. With a new leader, about half a million in the bank and some good media coverage, the party should be ready to roar back at Doug Ford’s hapless Tories.

But it will not be long though until Ontario voters wonder what might be the difference.

It is the same problem as the American democratic party is having with its corrupt system of choosing presidential candidates. If you look at the history of those boring delegated conventions in the U.S., you realize that, in the main, they drill down to the blandest candidates. It is all manipulated anyway.

What happened to the republican party four years ago was that a pompous ass kept threatening to buy the republican convention, so they gave it to him. Donald Trump bought that convention at a fire-sale price.

To nobody’s amusement, New York billionaire Michael Bloomberg tried the Trump technique on the democratic party this time around and nobody bought it. Bloomberg wasted some of his billions.

But, thankfully, the situation is different in Canada. It would be foolish to say it cannot happen here but we are actually seeing variations of that in Ontario in recent leadership contests.

When Patrick Brown bought the Ontario conservative leadership in 2015, it cost in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Where the money came from is only conjectured. Brown hired the organizers from Hindi temples and Muslim mosques. They sponsored parties throughout Ontario to which they invited both citizens and recent immigrants from the Sub-Continent. Of the 100,000 of these people in Ontario, the organizers signed up close to 40,000 as members of the Ontario progressive conservative party. They could pay the $10 membership fee or the organizers would pay it for them.

In Del Duca’s case the membership fee was $20 (for two years) but he only needed to sign up 14,000 to swamp the existing liberal party membership. Back when I worked on the party newspaper in Ontario, the party had 70,000 paying members. That was back when Ontario parties were run with a higher regard for honesty.

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The downhill dance of Doug Downey.

March 4, 2020 by Peter Lowry

It is all Caroline Mulroney’s fault. Nobody wants a member of the legislature who constantly embarrasses the people in his riding. We sure got that in spades in Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte. And if only Caroline Mulroney knew more about Canadian and Ontario legal traditions, she would still be attorney general.

Instead, Ontario has the embarrassing Doug Downey, a small-town lawyer from Severn, Ontario, as attorney general. Ford parachuted him into the Barrie area seat to keep Patrick Brown out. It is not that I think Downey is stupid but he seems to be in dereliction of duty when he does what his boss, Doug Ford tells him to do. Consider Downey’s struggles to change how we appoint judges in Ontario:

Downey’s boss is not a highly educated person. He is a great believer in cronyism. He wants people in positions of power in Ontario to be good conservatives—this includes judges.

But how is Downey going to tell the good guys from the bad guys if he is only sent two recommendations of qualified people, when he asks the independent committee to give him some recommendations?

There might have been more than a couple of formal letters go back and forth here. The upshot was that he finally asked the committee to send him a list of all the applicants. It would appear that Downey was going to put cronyism ahead of having qualified judges.

That might have made sense to Downey but it outraged many of the legal community in Ontario. The province has an envied reputation throughout Canada and the U.S. for its non-partisan judicial appointments.

But what should be obvious to all in Ontario is that this guy Downey does not seem to have read the specifications for his job at Queen’s Park. As chief law officer for the province, he has a responsibility to advise the premier and the various ministers of the crown on how to stay out of legal entanglements. Failure to provide this advice and/or having it ignored is not acceptable for an honourable person. He should resign.

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