Sorry, there will be no Morning Line from me on the current liberal leadership contest in Ontario. The opinion piece in the Toronto Star by Bob Hepburn last week tended to sum up the situation. The timing of this race is awkward and over extended. And it will not end well with a ranked ballot.
If the liberals had timed the announcement party for some time in September with a single winner-take-all ballot, or even a run-off vote for the top two, in the event nobody had more than 50 per cent of the vote, it would be a happier situation.
But that is water under the bridge. Anyone who has studied ranked ballots knows that the method can result in surprise conclusions, that make few happy. The conservatives had to throw one of their contestants under the bus to break the pattern in their last leadership.
This will be the first really honest liberal leadership in Ontario in 50 years, and I guess I should be satisfied with that. And nobody has an ethnic group ready to be signed up en masse, to tilt the scales.
Since the conclusion that both Bob Hepburn and I have come to is that the real race is between Bonnie Crombie and Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, I would like to see Nate in the driver’s seat to remove Doug Ford from Ontario politics.
Mind you, I still like Bonnie Crombie. She has a lot going for her. If my friend Hazel McCallion liked her, she must be a smart person. The only thing that stopped me was that remark about Kathleen Wynne being too left wing. And I hardly think she was kidding. There are no ‘ifs ands or buts’; Ontario needs a progressive to lead and rebuild our medical capabilities, build homes that people can afford and stand up to those who would profit outrageously from inflation.
I just want to make sure that Nate’s team has the right music to march to in taking over Queen’s Park. I want to help him knit his platform into a single idea. I want to see him with a team of people with big hearts taking over on behalf of every man, woman and child in Ontario. Its their province.
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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry
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