If about a third of the registered voters go to vote and just more than a third of them vote for the winning candidate, what credibility does that person have in office? Follow the figures and you find that the winning candidate was elected by about fifteen per cent of potential voters. Is this our middle finger raised in salute to democracy? It just happened in the Toronto byelection for mayor.
Toronto voters now have three years to regret what they have done. Olivia Chow is no leader. Since I have heard she has no driver’s licence, I expect she thinks she can ride her bicycle to work at Toronto city hall. Chow just means more bike lanes and more congestion on the roads. It makes a regrettable statement. It would also be a very foolish thing to present a target such as that for the invective of Toronto’s pissed off car and truck drivers.
And that will be before Toronto homeowners find out how high their municipal taxes need to increase. That will happen because nobody at Queen’s Park or on Parliament Hill (other than new democrats) really wants to hear from Olivia Chow.
At least no more than most of Toronto council. Our cities are not vested in solutions for inflation. Their problems are very different from provincial and federal regimes.
And don’t forget that municipalities are creatures of their provinces. Premier Ford has hardly finished getting even with some of the people at Toronto’s city hall. Chow will find no welcoming mat at Queen’s Park—unless she comes for the ridicule and denigration.
It is funny, when you think about it; the early countries on this world were built around city states and the early development of democracy. Today, cities are the financial backbone and industrial strength of their countries. That might be hard to explain to someone such as Doug Ford but those with a classical education would understand it. Another thing that Doug Ford does not understand is that Toronto is still in the top ten of the world’s most livable cities. The world is watching and Ford will be taking out his petty feud with Toronto. Every move he makes against Toronto council harms the city’s reputation and livability. He is a fool because his vendetta can do harm to our country and its reputation as a democratic success story.
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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry
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