The Ontario 2018 election thread

[Norgarth]

In my family, the tradition is, "If you don't vote, you've got no right to bitch about the politicians." If you do vote you can complain that your guy would have done better or that you're guy isn't living up to his election promises, or whatever, but you have to take part in the electorial process first.

That said, for me the polling stations are usually within walking distance from my house. Sometimes it's been at a school (elementary or High) or at one of the churches, or something similar. I'll walk over and cast my vote in a couple of weeks, and hope the results aren't too ridiculous.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, May 26 - "Horwath distances her NDP from the Rae days, Ford promises return of $1 beer"

(Bob Rae was the last NDP Premier of Ontario. His term is widely though of as not particularly good - AFAIK, he's the only leftest leader anywhere to shut down the government on repeated Fridays to save money.)


Final leaders' debate is tomorrow.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, May 27 - It's debate night.

[robkelk]

Blog made during the debate

No bombshells, no obvious gaffes. And still no platform from the PCs.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, May 28 - Liberal candidate crashes NDP event (He later apologized.)

Also, Ford repeatedly calls NDP candidates "radical activists". At no point does he say why that's a bad thing - considering that this election has been fought on change, this is an odd lapse.

Oh, and Wynne would order striking university employees back to work if she's re-elected. She isn't looking at losing votes for taking this stance: (a) their union has already endorsed the NDP, and (b) she's so low in the polls that there aren't many votes left for her to lose.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, May 29 - the NDP promise three weeks of vacation instead of two, the Liberals promise to keep doing what they're doing, and the PCs criticize the NDP.

Polls indicate the PCs and NDP are neck-and-neck in popular opinion, but the riding boundaries are drawn in a way that give the PCs the advantage. (Not gerrymandered, I believe; a federal civil service office draws these boundaries, so the provincial parties have no say in where they're drawn.)

[Labster]

It's not really possible to draw district lines that don't grant one party an advantage, as humans are not normally distributed. For well drawn district lines, they only grant an advantage when the results are close.

What Ford said makes sense to me. No one wants radical activists running things, though everyone wants major change. The same way that no one wants special interests to run things, but instead want candidates who listen on the issues. We also believe strongly in compromise, if it's on the other side.

[robkelk]

Semantics... gotta love 'em.

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Ottawa PC candidate accuses Liberals of following, photographing her

"You may have seen me perhaps be a little testy," Howard told the audience. "I was told not to mention it, but you want straight up. You're going to get straight up from me every time.

"There is a party that is following me, taking photos of me, and taping me. I find that absolutely disgraceful in a democracy. You can trust me to try and treat my colleagues fairly and kindly for the most part. But for that edge you might sense, that's the reason for it."

...

"I made the statement. It's true," Howard told reporters. "If you want to know more about it you might want to ask the Liberal candidate what they're doing."

...

The Liberal candidate for Ottawa South, John Fraser, denied Howard's allegations.

"I don't know what she's talking about. I don't see [during] an election campaign why anyone would do that. You don't have time," Fraser said, adding that he's too busy knocking on doors.

He said his team does opposition research that involves following opponents on social media and in the news, but not physically.

This is a riding that's been solidly Liberal for the last 15 years. Polls indicate it's a three-way race this time around.

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Speaking of three-way races, the fourth party is campaigning as if they have a chance to win even though their stated goal is to win one-to-three seats this election.

Ontario Greens would close nuclear plant this summer

Just the one at Pickering, not all of them, and they'd redevelop the lakefront property. They'd make up the power shortfall by buying from another province. No indication in the story what they'd do with the on-site nuclear waste.

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Haven't seen the Campaigner for today yet.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, May 30 - "Doug Ford may have learned an important lesson in provincial politics on Tuesday: If you're going to speak to seniors, be on time."

Mr. Ford, you should have learned that one in municipal politics. Seniors are (a) impatient and (b) more likely than most to vote. Don't slight them... especially by 45 minutes.

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With eight days to go before voting day, the PCs have finally released a platform... but it isn't costed out.

IMHO, this does not give the PCs an image of being fiscally conscious, let alone fiscally responsible. And they're supposed to be the right-wing party.

[hazard]

Fiscal responsibility isn't a 'left or right' issue. It's a matter of how you look at economies and money. There are times where a government shouldspend more money than it's gaining through taxes, and times it shouldn't. But the most important concerns for a government are 'is this going to pay for itself in extra taxes over the next 20 years, maintenance etc. included' and 'if it doesn't, how much will our future citizens end up coughing up to cover the shortfall.'

A lot of governments, and not just left wing, right wing, centrist or otherwise governments, are really bad at making that estimate. Or rather, they ignore whatever naysayers there are (including those that they hire to tell them whether or not the numbers work out) and just do what they want because it means they get reelected. Trading an ever increasing (by percent GDP) loan burden (and thus also tax burden) for power, until it matters no longer and the economy collapses because either the government stops paying people (because it can't borrow more money) or because of runaway inflation (because by printing more money without actual economic activity to back it up means less valuable money). It's just something of a future problem, especially if an economy is well diversified and thus hardened against price shifts in a single or small group of related commodities.

When that isn't true, well... just ask Venezuela.

[robkelk]

I wouldn't be as annoyed if they were bad at making the estimates. In this case, they aren't bothering to make any estimates at all.

How can they draw up a budget when they have no idea what numbers to put in it, even if those numbers might be wrong?

[hazard]

Let me clarify:

They're not writing numbers because this lets them play silly buggers with the budget after they're elected and do whatever they want. Most likely because if they did write those numbers down it'd be bad news. For them.

[Labster]

Fiscal responsibility isn't a 'left or right' issue. It's a matter of how you look at economies and money. There are times where a government shouldspend more money than it's gaining through taxes, and times it shouldn't. But the most important concerns for a government are 'is this going to pay for itself in extra taxes over the next 20 years, maintenance etc. included' and 'if it doesn't, how much will our future citizens end up coughing up to cover the shortfall.'

Your form of fiscal responsibility sounds dangerously Keynesian.  The Republican party in the U.S. tends to have two modes: economy is down, so cut government spending; economy is up, so cut taxes.  They are generally considered the fiscally responsible party here.  No one talks about what will happen in 20 years, except for retirement entitlements (Social Security), and even then only as a political football.  It must be different to live in a country that will literally sink beneath the waves if infrastructure isn't maintained.

[hazard]

Strangely enough, my appreciation of Keynesian economics comes from the New Deal (a very Keynesian response to the Great Depression of the 1930's), because it worked. Even worse, my philosophy to business economics comes from Ford, the arch-capitalist himself, who said "There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: Make the best quality of goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible." Because it works. And it's surprisingly socialist; Ford didn't say 'paying the workers as little as possible' he said the opposite.

And for good reason. Spending money on the poor is a far more efficient investment in resources than spending it on the rich.


Something which the current cabinet should, perhaps, remember. Not least of which because the current Prime Minister (used to) teach economics. And quite possibly still does.

[robkelk]

The trouble with Keynesian economics is that it doesn't consider the long term. It's already in trouble in the long term, and has been in trouble in the long term ever since the gross worldwide output rose above the amount of raw materials made available in the same time period... but unsustainability isn't a short-term issue, so Keynesianism ignores it.

No, I don't have an alternative.

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The Campaigner, May 31 - one week to election day. And the article leads with one of those photos that newspaper photographers love and political parties hate: the party's bus broke down. (Needless to say, there's not a lot of election news today.)

[hazard]

... In the end raw material availability will determine the size of your economy. Because unless you can produce everything else needed for the economy it doesn't work.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, June 1 - Horwath campaigns in Wynne's riding

(For our friends in the USA: Ontario has a Parliamentary government, where the legislature member best able to command a majority in the legislature is "asked" to become the Premier. In practice, this person is the leader of the party that has a majority of seats in the legislature. Our executive branch is almost completely symbolic.)

I'm old enough to remember when there was a gentlemen's agreement that party leaders simply did not campaign in other party leaders' ridings. Mind you, it's been a long time since politics was a gentlemen's pursuit... but this is still sufficiently newsworthy to lead the daily campaign news report.

Meanwhile, Ford has discovered that there's a lot of Ontario north of Algonquin Park, and is now campaigning there.

[Ankhani]

If you're dissatisfied with the choices you have, there is another way! Kneel Before Zod!

http://nationalpost.com/news/politics/ge...io-premier

[Epsilon]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/wy...-1.4689222

Wynne is throwing in the towel but still wants to shit all over the election.

[robkelk]

Hey, they're the "Natural Governing Party" - just ask them.

This lead off the Campaigner, too: The Campaigner, June 2 - Wynne finally admits she won't remain in power but stays in the race, Ford won't say if he will march in Toronto's Pride parade, Conservatives and NDP are neck-and-neck in popular polls.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, June 3 - "After Wynne concedes, Ford ignores it". And the Liberals rise in the overall polls after Wynne's concession, although that doesn't look like it's translating into actual seats.

The Campaigner, June 4 - "Should she win, Wynne says she's staying on as MPP"
Which is only fair, since it's her name on the ballot in Don Valley West.

Oh, and Ford isn't always telling the media where he's campaigning. I guess he doesn't want questions... or free publicity.

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Ever wonder how often your MPP voted in Legislature? "To ensure a balanced analysis, only members who sat during the entire 41st Legislature of Ontario (July 2, 2014 - May 8, 2018) and are running for reelection were compiled in this analysis." Also, "Those who abstain from voting are not recorded."

Nobody has a 100% "showed up to vote" record. Only two MPPs have a record lower than 50%, although one of those two was on sick leave for a half year. The other ... well, he got kicked out of his party caucus mid-term.

Mind you, showing up to vote is not a representative's only job. A strong case can be made that it is not it his or her most important job, either. But it is an MPP's most visible job.

Premier Wynne showed up for 66% of the votes, which is impressive considering how often she had to be out of the province at First Ministers' conferences (the USA equivalent would be when all 50 Governors get together with the President at the same time) and trade delegations.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, June 5 - Two days before the election, and one of the party leaders is hit with a lawsuit

The latest polls have the PCs slightly in front of the NDP, and are actually showing a chance of the Green Party getting a seat. However, as has often been mentioned, the only poll that matters is the one on election day.

[robkelk]

The Campaigner, June 6 - So the Ontario election is tomorrow

Which means one or two more Campaigners to go.

Regarding the section "The moment" in the article: It appears to me that there's no indication on the sign, even in very small text, that it was authorized by the candidate's campaign. He might get into trouble with elections Ontario because of that.

One last poll report: the PCs and the NDP have been within 2% of each other since May 24, with a 2% margin of error. So it's been neck-and-neck for two weeks.

[Epsilon]

Just a reminder: If you live in Ontario and have access to a car, offer anyone in your district a ride to the voting booths if possible. The turnout was 51% last time around, which is pathetic.

[Pyeknu]

Heading out to vote once I visit a food bank and get some acupuncture