But of course, he is singing the same tune as always: tax cuts will lead us to prosperity.
What’s next? Did I hear someone say monorail?
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On International Day of the Girl, Tim Hudak can try to put shiny gloss on the PC Party, he can pretend his party is focused on the economy, but this is what the heart of the Hudak PC Party is, with his frontbench MPP’s sponsoring a news conference supporting the defunding of abortion in Ontario. Any claims about the PC focus on jobs and the economy can’t hide that the MPP’s sponsoring this press conference are both of Hudak’s Labour critics, and his deputy whip. You’ll also remember Hudak’s deputy labour critic Rick Nicholls from this blog, talking about how he “would . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: Hudak PC’s support for defunding abortion runs much deeper than a press conference I was browsing through the Ontario Progressive Conservative ‘Party History’ page, and I noticed the amusing contradictions. Before that, let’s start with their more recent leader/Premier, pulled directly from their Party History page, (1995-2002) Premier Michael Harris “[His] achievements included welfare reform, health care restructuring, major reductions in public spending and more efficient government.” I think this needs a bit of clarification. Welfare reform meant a 22% reduction in welfare, and a downloading of costs onto municipal governments. In 1995 “Then-Minister David Tsubouchi issued a welfare diet for a single person that came out to $90 dollars . . . → Read More: An individual with opinions.: Ontario Progressive Conservatives embrace contradictions. I was reading through the Ontario Progressive Conservatives White Paper on unions, and I came across a most interesting part. Page 6, emphasis mine, When the Canadian dollar had a low value relative to the American dollar, many Canadian business were slow to increase productivity. For a time they could afford rigid labour contracts and still compete. That’s no longer possible. Oh my god! The Progressive Conservative party has just implicitly admitted that Dutch Disease is a thing! They just admitted this is a problem, that is driving away manufacturing jobs from Ontario! Somebody call the Toronto Star! (Read more…) If the Tories thought that yesterday’s new health care white paper was likely to change the channel on the byelection defeats, they likely woke up this morning disappointed. Despite health care’s long standing ranking as the number one issue among … Continue reading → The new Ontario Tory plan for health care is simple – eliminate the Local Health Integration Networks and the Community Care Access Centres and let between 30-40 “hub” hospitals run the health care system – or at least the bits … Continue reading → This is young Tim Hudak’s mad face. Damn those union bosses! Recommend this Post There is the Energizer rabbit, brought to you by Everready: Then there is the Never-ready rabbit, brought to you by Ontario’s Conservative Party: Recommend this Post Reiterating one of his favorite themes of late, Tim Hudak, the never-ready-for-prime-time-politcal leader of the Ontario Tories, blamed the ‘union-bosses’ for denying him victory in last night’s Kitchener-Waterloo by-election. Blaming a “tsunami” of public sector union bosses who bought votes in a riding held by his party for two decades, the hapless Hudak proffered the following wisdom for the benighted electorate who thought they were exercising their own discretion in voting the NDP candidate, Catherine Fife, to victory: “I think it’s dangerous and ominous for the province to see that power on display,” an embittered sounding Mr. Hudak said . . . → Read More: Politics and its Discontents: Political Contempt For The Electorate Continues Just 17% of Kitchener-Waterlooians voted NDP provincially last fall – nearly the same number who voted NDP federally last spring, in the midst of the orange wave. They hadn’t won the riding since 1943, when they were known as the CCF. So this isn’t a riding with deep NDP roots. And it’s not like the other parties rolled over – Liberal Eric Davis ran an impressive campaign in 2011 and the PC’s Tracey Weiler is a fine candidate. Yet last night, NDP candidate Catherine Fife not only won – she steamrolled the competition, and more than doubled the NDP . . . → Read More: Calgary Grit: A Reminder of the Unpredictable Nature of By-Elections TweetSurrounded by dozens of Tory MLAs at a late-afternoon press conference, Premier Alison Redford announced plans to make the expense claims of all cabinet ministers, MLAs, and government officials publicly available on the internet. After a summer of scandals and embarrassing revelations, ranging from the overflowing expense accounts of former regional health authority executive Allaudin [...] Kitchener-Waterloo NDP candidate Catherine Fife is running on a slogan of “Leadership that delievers”, but a look at the actions of NDP leader Andrea Horwath and her fellow NDP candidate in Vaughan raises questions about what exactly she wants to deliver. Yesterday, the Ontario Liberals gave new support to the Southwestern Ontario Economic Development Fund, to help create jobs for families across Southwestern Ontario, including Kitchener-Waterloo. And what did Andrea Horwath do? She walked out, not standing up for job creation in Kitchener-Waterloo. Now, we already know that Hudak candidate Tracey Weiler has no qualms about flip-floping on supporting her leader, going from saying . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: Horwath skips vote on Southwestern Ontario Economic Development Fund and runs Rob Ford supporter in Vaughan – what does her NDP stand for? Is that a rooster crowing I hear? Yesterday Tracey Weiler, the “Progressive” Conservative candidate in Kitchener-Waterloo ran as far as she possibly could away from Tea-Party Tim Hudak. First in an interview with CTV Kitchener: Then during the Waterloo Record Debate: It is understandable that Ms. Weiler would run away from Tea-Party* Tim. When they were in government, Tim Hudak’s PCs closed down 500 public schools. Tim Hudak’s Progressive-Conservatives cut $2 Billion out of our public schools and fired 15,000 teachers. Tim Hudak was parliamentary secretary to Minister of Health. His government shut down 28 hospitals and fired 6000 nurses. . . . → Read More: The Equivocator: Tracey Weiler Runs Away From Tim Hudak The NDP and Catherine Fife have already come out against the Putting Students First Act, but will they listen to the students of Ontario themselves or their big union money interests? Here’s what the Ontario Student Trustees’ Association says about the Liberal government moving to make sure students are in class from day one of the school year in Kitchener-Waterloo and across Ontario Hirad Zafari, OSTA-AECO President and Toronto DSB Student Trustee, called upon “provincial leaders and teachers’ unions, specifically those who have not agreed to the OECTA framework, to ensure full-service education for all students this coming year.” Here’s a great piece by Kitchener-Waterloo Liberal candidate Eric Davis answering the most basic question that anyone running for public office has to answer: Why are you running? Eric’s two big reasons are simple but moving: Public service and family. Eric has a long track-record of local leadership in Kitchener-Waterloo, and he’ll be a fighter to build a better future for Kitchener-Waterloo families. I was raised to believe that each of us has a responsibility to contribute to the vibrancy and success of our community. Everyone contributes in their own way. Until now, my way has been through volunteering with . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: Why is Eric Davis running in Kitchener-Waterloo? This isn’t a post defending Dalton McGuinty’s bravado and threats to violate the constitutional right of collective bargaining of the public sector workforces and unions – my opinion on that remains firm. Unions can be a viable political source, just as businesses can – but not nearly as much, naturally, for lack of monies and influence. Unions back political parties, most notably the federal NDP, which largely contests the traditionally business-backed Liberals and now the dominant Conservatives. In Ontario, it gets a bit more complicated; unions still lend support to the provincial NDP, but there’s also particular unions that have (Read more…) We know Tim Hudak’s position on full day kindergarten for Ontario families has gone from this: To this “Tim Hudak…condemned the program, which is to be fully rolled out by 2014″ with Hudak’s double flip-flop backed by Kitchener-Waterloo Progressive Conservative candidate Tracey Weiler: “Weiler said that she “supports the leader’s position” on halting the rollout of full-day kindergarten in the province.” With the Ontario Liberals introducing the Putting Students First Act, here is Tim Hudak saying he would support a wage freeze: “We’ll support a wage freeze legislation” With his flip-flops on full day kindergarten, will Hudak stick . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: With education on the line, will Tim Hudak flip-flop on a wage freeze like he did on full day kindergarten? I wrote yesterday about Tim Hudak doing a double flip-flop on full-day kindergarten, and now let’s take a look at the Tim Hudak candidate in Kitchener-Waterloo, Tracey Weiler and her position on full day kindergarten. While previous Progressive Conservative MPP Elizabeth Witmer stood up for Kitchener–Waterloo families, Tracey Weiler is more interested in taking orders from Hudak’s Queen’s Park backroom boys in Toronto and not listening to the thousands of families in Kitchener-Waterloo depending on full-day kindergarten. On the important issue of FDK and local leadership, Weiler standing behind Hudak, who “condemned the program” is a sharp and disappointing turn away from previous Progressive Conservative MPP, Elizabeth Witmer, who in her . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: Tracey Weiler is no Elizabeth Witmer when it comes to local leadership It’s a little late for the Olympics, but Tim Hudak’s triple flip-flop on Full Day Kindergarten would win a gold medal in showing how out of touch he is with Ontario families. Hudak threw his own flip-flopper Tony Genco under the bus today, after Genco said this in regards to full-day kindergarten: “Mr. Genco not only said he supported the kindergarten program, but added there was no use opposing it because “the ship had sailed” on the issue.” Makes sense for Mr. Genco to say this, after all, this was in the PC platform last year, right on page . . . → Read More: The Liberal Scarf: Tim Hudak flip-flop on full day kindergarten shows Ontario PC’s can’t be trusted with education file Assorted content for your weekend reading. - David Olive comments on the world food crisis, making the point that what we’re lacking is some link between more-than-sufficient productive capacity and the nutritional needs of less wealthy people around the globe: (A) permanently higher price for oil spurred successful innovation to reduce our reliance on petroleum products in realms outside of transportation and energy, along with a determined effort to find new sources of oil in increasingly remote places. The global food crisis, by contrast, has not made us think differently about how we produce and use the fruit of the . . . → Read More: Accidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links AUPE’s powerful viral video on the unappetizing 21-day menu. Below: Former Alberta Health Services CEO Stephen Duckett, Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne. One of the least successful experiments of the short, unhappy reign of Stephen Duckett as CEO of Alberta Health Services was the so-called 21-day menu, the unpalatable tinfoil- and plastic-wrapped meals that were trucked in, reheated and fed to helpless residents. Cooks who once prepared nutritious and more appetizing meals at more than 70 public long-term care facilities around the province were let go or assigned to other duties. The TV dinner-style meals were hauled in by reefer . . . → Read More: Alberta Diary: Some Alberta seniors will soon be eating better meals – they can thank the union for them Assorted content to end your week. - Sid Ryan takes on the Harper/Hudak double-team effort to prevent workers from having any voice in our political direction: (T)here can be little doubt that what really offends Hudak is the fact that union members pool their resources to participate in municipal, provincial and federal elections. When voters pulled the rug out from under Hudak’s 2011 electoral campaign, he blamed Harris-weary union members for campaigning against him and running television ads to expose his agenda. It is no coincidence that Hudak released his 20 page attack on basic workers’ rights immediately after an . . . → Read More: Accidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. - Sid Ryan rightly criticizes Tim Hudak’s anti-labour plans as a push toward poverty rather than prosperity. - Via Climate Progress, Steven Mufson reports on the causes of Enbridge’s Michigan oil spill – with Enbridge’s complete failure to repair known defects over a period of five years included among the reasons: The cost of the spill has reached $800 million and is rising, the NTSB said, making the pipeline rupture the most expensive on-shore oil spill in U.S. history. The pipeline’s contents — heavy crude oil from Canada’s oil sands — have made . . . → Read More: Accidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. - Janet Bagnall neatly dissects the Cons’ plan for dismantling public services: The Harper government is nothing if not predictable in how it goes about dismantling a program or service. It starts by denigrating the program and the program’s beneficiaries, and telling Canadians that they’ve been played for fools by the beneficiaries. Once that message has been drilled home, and the government judges that the moment is right and Canadians’ attitudes changed, it proceeds to get rid of the offending program – no matter how impractical, immoral or ultimately costly the exercise might prove . . . → Read More: Accidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links Never an original or deep thinker, young Tim Hudak, whose recent decision to rely on demagoguery in place of reason by condemning unions as the reason for the poor economy in Ontario, has provoked a spirited response from Star readers, some of whose letters you can peruse here. Recommend this Post |
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