It seems every time there is someone of note jumping into this or that political race, we get the morning line in the media with the new entries. The other day in the Toronto Star we got a news page headline reading “Crombie leads Liberal pack.” When you read the story, you find that this ‘pack’ is from an on-line panel run by a marketing research firm. The researchers appear to divide the responses of their panel (in this case 1000 respondents) into plus, positive, negative, neutral and unsure categories. In all my years of politics and reading polls, I am obviously out of touch with modern polling. I have no idea what a ‘sure’ panelist means.
But I certainly go along with the boss of the research firm when he said Ms. Crombie was the best-known candidate. I always knew that voters’ familiarity with the name of the candidate was a leg up. I never knew it was the only candidate to which the media would pay attention.
It is a sorry day when voters go to the polls and vote according to which person is better known.
I have no idea where I would end up in that poll. I admire Ms. Crombie. She followed my friend, Hazel McCallion in the role of mayor in Mississauga. If Hazel liked her, so do I. And this lady also has lots of supporters in the city.
But nobody knows for sure that she would be a good leader for the Ontario liberal party. I go back to the days when John Wintermeyer was leader of the Ontario liberals. John was a gentleman of the old school. As a leader he was not quite as effective.
Leadership is not an acquired skill. I feel like that guy with the lamp looking for an honest man. A leader is a person who looks behind and is surprised at the number of people following. A leader is a person who can take an idea, introduce it to others who can share ownership. A leader can be right or a leader can be wrong. There is no simple explanation for a Donald Trump.
Whatever that magic is, it is what you need to lead. So far, there are four candidates for the Ontario liberal leadership. I am going to keep an open mind until I have had a chance to get to know all candidates and to see how they measure up before voting.
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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry
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