In 1999, Mike Harris ran in Ontario on an anti-union platform, promising to get tough with union bosses. The backlash was immediate, but Harris wasn’t worried. He had a secret weapon. Deceit. In the run-up to the election he had pulled out all the stops, beginning with advertising at the
Continue readingTag: Tim Hudak
Scott's DiaTribes: Your #voteon narrative for today: not good for opposition parties.
Your one narrative that is going around the media and which Premier Wynne has decided to target extensively today: Tim Hudak’s bungled million jobs plan numbers: ..Based on a backgrounder distributed by the Progressive Conservatives to journalists, but not posted on their website, it is clear that the planners confused
Continue readingEh Types: Is Red the New Orange?
The Ontario election has featured a deeply divided, ideologically intrenched split. Two polarized points of view on how our province should run which will determine who runs it. To be clear, I’m only talking about the NDP here. This election began with NDP leader Andrea Horwath announcing her party would
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: I’m so Damn Sick of Junk Politics and Hopefully Trudeau is Too
There is a good book by Benjamin DeMott Junk Politics: Trashing of the American Mind DeMott laments the loss of intelligent debate in the political arena, being replaced, in part, with “touchy, feely personal testimonials” and “feel your pain” forced empathy. In the current Ontario election campaign we’ve heard party
Continue readingOntario Election: Sloppy Progressive Conservative Web Slip-Ups
Between multiple events involving organizations the Ontario Progressive Conservatives oppose funding and an uncomfortably embarrassing botched presser on board a TTC subway, Tim Hudak can barely catch a break this election season. Indeed, as is apparent from ceaseless mishaps and slip-ups, the PC’s are running by far the sloppiest campaign
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Assorted content to start your week. – Jim Stanford looks into the fine print of the Hudak PCs’ assumptions about corporate tax slashing and finds that even their own numbers show that most of the money gifted to corporations would be thrown away (emphasis added): On second reading there are
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Contempt Of The Electorate?
Tom, a friend of mine, posted the following on Facebook yesterday: Kind of tired of all the polemical posturing in the latest election. However, can anyone provide one instance in history — at least, since the advent of the Industrial Revolution — where, corporate or business tax cuts, the basis
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – Tavis Smiley discusses the need to speak realistically about the causes and effects of poverty, rather than simply dismissing real human costs as somebody else’s fault and problem. And similarly, Tim Stacey comments on the appalling “empathy gap” – which sees upper-class
Continue readingProgressive Proselytizing: The best case view of the NDP platform
NDP candidate Rosario Marchese cuts through a lot of spin to defend a frank and real representation of the NDP’s platform. In my previous post, I was fairly harsh towards the NDP plan – both as a set of policies and the larger strategies. I wanted to share his post
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: Death and Taxes. How Did We Get it So Wrong?
The old adage that nothing is certain but death and taxes, was first used by author Daniel Defoe, but in a different context. In his The Political History of the Devil (1726), Defoe dismisses the popular notion that the Devil has a cloven foot, or any other characteristic bestowed on
Continue readingPolitical Eh-conomy: Political Eh-conomy Radio: Linda McQuaig on Hudak’s imaginary jobs and Canadian inequality
Today, I’m happy to present another extended interview and my guest is Linda McQuaig. Linda is a National Newspaper Award-winning journalist and commentator who has worked for the Globe and Mail, National Post, Toronto Star and many other outlets. She is also a best-selling author of numerous books that have focused on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jared Bernstein discusses how fair and progressive taxes on the rich are a necessary element of any effort to improve the lot of the poor: The rising tide of inequality does more than create great economic distance between income classes. It also produces
Continue readingOPSEU Diablogue: Tory health platform review: Direct promise to scrap LHINs, CCACs missing
Curiously after months of saying they’ll do away with both the Local Health Integration Networks and the Community Care Access Centres, both direct promises are conspicuously absent from the formal Tory election platform. That doesn’t mean they will stay in … Continue reading →
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: And Speaking Of Tale Tales
Here’s a whopper from one of young Tim’s chief disciples, Lisa MacLeod: Recommend this Post
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Political Rhetoric Pierced
Hyperbole is, of course, a mainstay of political campaigns, as those vying for public office offer a blunt message to potential voters. Keep it simple and repetitive seems the overarching strategy, never more apparent than in young Tim Hudak’s 1 million jobs plan. Will people be fooled by his claim
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Elias Isquith interviews Matt Taibbi about the complete lack of morality underlying Wall Street and the regulators who are supposed to protect the public interest from banksters run amok. Paul Buchheit reviews some compelling evidence that poorer people are more ethical than the
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Common Sense Revolution Redux ( A.K.A. Tiny Tim Roars)
H/t Theo Moudakis If you have resided in Ontario for some years, and were of a certain age when Ontario’s Common Sense Revolution was conducted by Mike ‘The Knife’ Harris, you will recall it was a time of great upheaval that, contrary to the mythologizing that the right-wing so much
Continue readingMontreal Simon: The Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia and the Con Bigots
It's International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. A day to remember the millions of LGBT people in the world who are being oppressed, hurt, and even murdered for the "crime" of being who they are.A day to remember that even in Canada, the hatred that kills is still a problem.For
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bill Moyers interviews Richard Wolff about inequality – featuring Wolff’s observation that anybody trying to justify inequality as an inevitable byproduct of unregulated markets manages only to make those markets indefensible: Bill Moyers: When you say that there’s no economic argument that people
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Connecting The Dots
H/t Ruth Blair Recommend this Post
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