New Ontario poll
The numbers are similar to the last Angus Reid poll I could find (from one year ago):41-27-20. The Ipsos poll from a month ago had it 36-35.
I wish there was a link to the actual tables from Angus Reid. I find the write up very confusing since its not clear if they were asking people which party they support or which leader they support.
neo-Cons in federal government, in Ontario government and very possibly local government. makes me so proud to be Canadian!
It's really all a matter of who adminsters the poison.
neo-Cons in federal government, in Ontario government and very possibly local government. makes me so proud to be Canadian!
There is nothing "neo" about Rob Ford or Tim Hudak (or even Harper for that matter). They are all very old-fashioned classic Canadian rightwingers that are from a mould that has existed for generations. FYI: the term "Neo-con" actually has a very specific meaning. It refers to group of intellectuals (Podhoretz, Midge Decter, Jeanne Kirkpatrick etc...) in the US who used to be Democrats but who switched to the GOP during the Reagan years because they were obsessed with wanting a more hawkish foreign policy and going head to head against the Soviet Union. They typically had little or nothing to say about domestic political issues. The neo-cons of today are again rightwing foreign policy wonks who concern themselves totally with the so-called "war on terror" and tend to be very pro-Likud when it comes to the Middle East.
If there is evidence that Rob Ford or Tim Hudak are adherents to this movement - I'm all ears.
It was noted in the National Post that Mike Harris, former premier of Ontario, attended Rob Ford's speech at the Empire Club of Toronto (lol).
Stockholm - I doubt very much whether anyone here cares about your strictly American definitions.
this is really good news. Horwath and Hudak are mostly unknown quantities. People have obviously given up on the McGunity Cabal. I predict that once we are actually into the election period in 2011 and people get a really good look at Andrea Horwath the NDP numbers are going to jump dramatically.
If anyone embodies the "neocon" label in Canada - it is Peter Kent.
Stockholm - I doubt very much whether anyone here cares about your strictly American definitions.
Well then maybe people should avoid using "strictly American" terminology.
I wish there was a link to the actual tables from Angus Reid.
Abracadabra:
http://www.visioncritical.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/2010.09.28_Onta...
I can't wait for our recession!
Interesting that the actual poll asked people in Ontario which party they would vote for - but the Toronto Star had the leaders names in huge caps with the party names in fine print - as if people were being asked about leadership. I don't think there is any co nspiracy here - just sloppy reporting.
This is the NDP's chance.
Hmmm. York South-Weston would be very much in play in 2011, given the numbers.
This is the NDP's chance.
Dreamer
Yeah, this is seriously frightening to me. I can't see how anyone could interpret this as the NDP's big chance. All I can foresee if this trend continues is the undoing of the steady, if imperfect, progress that was made over the past seven years. Remember the Harris years?
There is nothing "neo" about Rob Ford or Tim Hudak (or even Harper for that matter). They are all very old-fashioned classic Canadian rightwingers that are from a mould that has existed for generations. FYI: the term "Neo-con" actually has a very specific meaning. It refers to group of intellectuals (Podhoretz, Midge Decter, Jeanne Kirkpatrick etc...) in the US who used to be Democrats but who switched to the GOP during the Reagan years because they were obsessed with wanting a more hawkish foreign policy and going head to head against the Soviet Union. They typically had little or nothing to say about domestic political issues. The neo-cons of today are again rightwing foreign policy wonks who concern themselves totally with the so-called "war on terror" and tend to be very pro-Likud when it comes to the Middle East.If there is evidence that Rob Ford or Tim Hudak are adherents to this movement - I'm all ears.
Sometimes "neoconservative" is used in Canada to describe the "Reform/Alliance" as opposed to "PC" tendency in Canadian conservatism.
Here's an Oscar-winning performance from Bob Rae on the supposed Reform/Alliance/GOP takeover of the Conservative Party:
Yeah, this is seriously frightening to me. I can't see how anyone could interpret this as the NDP's big chance. All I can foresee if this trend continues is the undoing of the steady, if imperfect, progress that was made over the past seven years. Remember the Harris years?
If the trend results in a PC majority, then you're right, that doesn't help the NDP. In the event of a minority government, that opens up space for the NDP to really influence policy. The best way for that to happen would be with a PC surge, as it doesn't sound like the NDP on its own could make that big a dent in the Liberal seat count.
Yeah, that is a little interesting to me how people like Bob Rae now talk up Bill Davis and Brian Mulroney.
Yeah, this is seriously frightening to me. I can't see how anyone could interpret this as the NDP's big chance. All I can foresee if this trend continues is the undoing of the steady, if imperfect, progress that was made over the past seven years. Remember the Harris years?
Progress? There was? I thought it was 8 years of Harris lite. Someone defined it as "sticking the knife in but feeling bad about it" as opposed to the conservative "sticking the knife in and enjoying it"
I can't wait for our recession!
Three decades three recessions. It's like Cap'n Barbossa when he said:
"For too long I've been parched of thirst and unable to quench it. Too long I've been starving to death and haven't died. I feel nothing. Not the wind on my face nor the spray of the sea. Nor the warmth of a woman's flesh. [steps into moonlight becoming a skeleton] You best start believing in ghost stories Miss Turner.You're in one."
Neoliberal ideologues, pirates, same thing.
Yeah, this is seriously frightening to me. I can't see how anyone could interpret this as the NDP's big chance. All I can foresee if this trend continues is the undoing of the steady, if imperfect, progress that was made over the past seven years. Remember the Harris years?
Ah the great myth. The McGuinty Liberals really are done if they have nothing to offer but fear of the other. From where I sit in rural Ontario there has been zero difference, besides cozy rhetoric, between the Harris-Eves and McGuinty eras.
What if Bay Street pirates supported Tory and Liberal parties equally and without prejudice? Would it be like playing games of chance except with loaded dice, or like paying the refs before start of a hockey game?
Sometimes "neoconservative" is used in Canada to describe the "Reform/Alliance" as opposed to "PC" tendency in Canadian conservatism.
Mike Harris - PC through and through, Rob Ford - PC through and through, Jim Flaherty - PC through and through, John Baird - PC through and through...people make this case all the time, but it seesm to me that most of the creepiest people in the Harper government are people who never joined the Reform Party or the Alliance and were loyal supposedly progressive Conservatives everty step of the way.
I agree with you. The Reform Party were reactionary populists, but that tradition has existed for a long time. I also agree that Hudak and Ford are pretty old-school reactionaries.
The funny thing is Mulroney was considered a "neoconservative" in the 1980s and his victory over Clark was considered a defeat of the "red Tories." Kim Campbell also ran a very orthodox conservative/Thatcherite platform in 1993, there was nothing "progressive" about it. Yet we hear today about how wonderful, tolerant and respectful of others the old PC's were.
In fact, in the "Laxer Report" of the early 1980s, Jim Laxer warns makes a very similar argument to what he makes today - that maybe at one time it was OK to say there wasn't much difference between the Liberals and Tories, but today the Conservatives have been taken over by dangerous neoconservatives.
Progress? There was? I thought it was 8 years of Harris lite. Someone defined it as "sticking the knife in but feeling bad about it" as opposed to the conservative "sticking the knife in and enjoying it"
I can't speak for rural Ontario but, living in Windsor, I do genuinely think there has been progress: major increases in the minimum wage (that my American friends don't even dream of), ambitious plans for green energy and reforestation, major bans on cosmetic lawn pesticides, a more than doubling of the number of community health clinics (mine is excellent), some reasonable steps in the area of education, a commitment to research funding, needed infrastructure projects in the Windsor area. What other contemporary premier has been doing better? When did Harris do these things?
I just don't see the NDP influencing policy in the event of a PC minority win, unless we get a 1985-style accord again, which seems unlikely to me.
Well I guess those forgive all the massive regressive things he's done like HST and beefing up the bully laws
Like, I can understand thinking McGuinty is not progressive enough. I can't understand thinking that there is no difference between him and Harris.
When it comes to a bully boy mentality and a "we know better than all the little people who better shut up" They are the same
xpost Are you referring to the cyberbullying laws, sorry?
I don't know enough about economics to really judge the HST fairly. Since CCPA did seem to support it and claim that its effects would be progressive, I tended not to oppose it too strongly.
What improvements would you expect from a PC minority?
To be frank none
And by bully laws I mean the ones they polished off for the G20 and no one can claim the HST is progressive, givn from the pain documented by everyone I know as well as small businesses doing less because of it.
OK, yes, the provincial Liberals' handling of G20 security issues was appalling. That alone might have pushed me away from them if there were a strong credible liberal/left-leaning alternative, by which I mean one that has any chance of winning or wielding actual influence over government policy.
Tthe two polls showed a rejection of the MGuinty Liberals and possibly a parking of votes with Hudak, ours to win if we capture the change momentum, significant gains are possibl,. GO Andrea GO!!
What if Bay Street pirates supported Tory and Liberal parties equally and without prejudice? Would it be like playing games of chance except with loaded dice, or like paying the refs before start of a hockey game?
I rather suspect that they do, and that it really wouldn't take that much to make them feel the same way about the NDP. As long as real change is off the menu, isn't electoral politics largely a struggle in the corner between cultural conservatives and liberals, the middle classes and the poor, rural and urban, etc etc to determine how taxes are divvied up and how we should lead our lives?
As long as corporate taxes keep declining, the authority of the market is beyond criticsm, and the very rich pay a lower proportion of their incomes in tax than those on minimum wage do, I imagine the Bay Street pirates will be increasingly indifferent to whether the rest of us order our lives like the inhabitants of North Korea, Celebration FL, Christiania or Terminal Island...
Nobody's commented on the most interesting stat on the poll tables:
416 Area (City of Toronto) - PC 34%, Lib 32%, NDP 24%, Green 10%
Call it the "Rob Ford Effect".
OK, yes, the provincial Liberals' handling of G20 security issues was appalling. That alone might have pushed me away from them if there were a strong credible liberal/left-leaning alternative, by which I mean one that has any chance of winning or wielding actual influence over government policy.
Then you are not paying attention to the very poll you are supposedly commenting on. That poll shows only a 7 point spread between the Liberals and the NDP in decided voters. So a progressive alternative is nipping at the heels of the Liberals. So if you really believed an alternative is needed, and are not just a Liberal partisan, you would get that Horwath (and Hudak) are still mostly unkown and the opportunities for the NDP to rise significantly are there to be seen clearly in the poll. If you really were a progressive voter you would be calling on the rapidly declining Liberals to clear out and make room for the rising NDP. Funny how the Liberal scare factor never does that though eh. It is always vote Liberal, don't worry what we have done or stand for, just vote Liberal because we are supposedly not 'them'. Fool me once shame on me, fool me yet a third time shame on Ontario.
As for you list of so-called progressive actions. Here's what is happening in rural Ontario
-hospitals are closing or reducing emergency services
-cut backs in other areas of hospital care through the un-democratic LHINs
-school closings
-undemocratic imposition of a failed green energy policy
-sweetheart deals with corporations, consultants and insiders
-declining manufacturing base and little to no support for the argicultural drivers of the rural economy
-the HST on heat and hydro
-attacking our local pharmacies
Sounds like the Harris years to me. And that's just the tip of the iceberg
I'm not a Liberal partisan and I've voted NDP in the last four federal elections. (I'm not an NDP partisan either, however. I think both parties have done good and bad things. Thinking that McGuinty has accomplished some good - from my urban perspective, which is also largely coloured by living in the US for three years and having that reference point for comparison - and that he would be preferable to Hudak is not the same as being a partisan.) I'm well to the left of most people, although I'm probably a centrist by the standards of this board. I just try to assess the situation as fairly and pragmatically as I can. Perhaps you are right that the NDP has an opening here and that they would be an improvement.
The best possible result of the next Ontario election would be for the Tories have have the most seats but not a majority and then have the NDP extract maximum concessions from the Liberals in exchange for keeping them in power. It could be 1985 all over again!!
I agree that that would be the best possible result. I suspect that a PC minority like our current federal government might be more likely.
Impossible. Ontario has three parties - there is no BQ to muddy things up. Unless the PCs get a clear majority, the Liberals and NDP ipso-facto have a majority between them. I think there is no way that the Ontario Liberals and NDP would allow a PC minority government under Hudak to be sworn in. Everyone saw what that led to with harper - it won't be allowed to happen again.
Oh, well, I hope you're right then. I also hope the NDP demands a full coalition. It would be nice to see Marchese and Kormos in cabinet!
The best possible result of the next Ontario election would be for the Tories have have the most seats but not a majority and then have the NDP extract maximum concessions from the Liberals in exchange for keeping them in power. It could be 1985 all over again!!
That ended so well.
Actually, it did! The Liberal/NDP accord government of 85-87 did a lot of very good things including banning extra billing by doctors and adding sexual orientation to the Ontario Human Rights Code and lots of other stuff.
and resulted in Bob Rae getting elected so that he could govern for "all Ontarians", which turned out to mean Bay Street, and so he tore up union contracts and failed to impliment public auto insurance and began the Harris austerity program, even before Harris got into power.
I think Dalton is finished. Anyone look at their last hydro Bill ????
Time to go off the grid. http://www.Offgrid-Living.com
They will likely bring in a replacement and say everything has changed. Then the star will try and stampede us into voting for them.
and resulted in Bob Rae getting elected so that he could govern for "all Ontarians", which turned out to mean Bay Street, and so he tore up union contracts and failed to impliment public auto insurance and began the Harris austerity program, even before Harris got into power.
To be pedantic, the Liberal-NDP Accord actually led to a massive Liberal majority win in 1987. They nearly doubled their seats while the NDP lost six. Rae's win came in the next election, after a term of Liberal majority government.