If Bob Hepburn of the Toronto Star had not advised us, would we have known a crowning was coming? The coronation could have come and gone and many of us would have cared less. It always puzzled me in high school just why we were being steeped in the lore
Continue readingAuthor: Peter Lowry
Babel-on-the-Bay : The Plaint of the Pedant.
It might have given a false impression the other day when I was complaining about the stupidity of certain conservatives. I hardly have the right to be pedantic. Despite his deplorable lack of respect for education, Doug Ford actually has more formal education than I. Neither of us has a
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Dumbing Down with Ford.
Premier Doug Ford of Ontario is dumbing down the province. He keeps taking us down rabbit holes for the less literate, the less learned. Today’s lesson from the fount of all ignorance is that new police people do not need to complete high school. We are sliding down a snake
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Journeying With Journalists.
It is very rare that I read other blogs. That is not being snooty, it is practical. I would just want to correct some of the writers and commiserate with a few others. I find getting a blog done every day is a challenge. Despite a career in public relations,
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : The Dark Side of the Elite.
It is good to see that a real grocery person is slated to take the reins at Canada’s largest chain of grocery stores. It hardly means that the time of the galloping inflation in groceries is over, but we will not have it rubbed in by the scion of the
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Flying False Flags.
With 50 people running for many different reasons for the mayoralty in Toronto, one of the problems is finding out which political party each represents. I know there are not supposed to be political parties at city hall but if you barred all members of political parties from the chamber
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Leaning on Labour?
It has always amused me that the news media, depending on their leanings, are always reporting what labour groups are supporting what parties or candidates in elections. The assumption that the labour movement only supported the CCF and then the NDP always was fiction. The only way the labour vote
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Trump’s Stand in Dixieland.
I always thought Dixieland was just a form of jazz. After the years of Donald Trump, today’s Dixie is just a place of darkness. It is a place of closed minds wrapped in ignorance. It is a place of small steps towards the light. It has chosen Donald Trump and
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Well, That Was Wrong.
The one thing to remember about political forecasting is that sometimes, you get it wrong. The other day I wrote that Olivia Chow must be older and smarter and was staying out of the mayoralty race in Toronto. I was wrong. She is just older. She obviously has learned little
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : The Egress of the Elite.
For conservative supporters who read this: An ‘Egress’ means a way out and an ‘Elite’ is a class of person who are considered as above others in their society. Some of these elites just have money, others have accomplished something that makes them stand out among their fellows in academics,
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : The Way of the Weasel.
It is hard to complain about the wife spending time with Facebook when she shows me cute pictures of newcomers to our wide-spread family. I have to admit that is useful, where most of the puerile content in social media is not. It is even more obviously juvenile when supposed
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Got an Extra $100K?
The good news is that for that $100,000 you can run for the leadership of the Ontario liberals. There is another $25,000 that is refundable but I am not sure why. And you can only spend $900,000 on your campaign. All of these rules have been announced by the Ontario
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : The Cowbird’s Quest.
The ornithologist might study some strange birds in a lifetime, but there are also some strange birds in politics. There is that breed of cowbird, for example, that prefers to lay its eggs in other bird’s nests. That seems to be happening in the current mayoralty by-election in Toronto. It
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : What’s the Big Idea?
It would be a shame to tell all those people running to be mayor of Toronto that they are doing it all wrong. This is not a long campaign. It is unlikely that voters are going to chase candidates down the street to see where they stand on the issues.
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Mr. Ponzi would be so Proud.
It is getting harder every day to support the unedited freedom of the Internet. Do we have to get used to faux sites, false advertising, scurrilous accusations and outright thievery? I just ran into an ersatz version of the CBC news site that purported to show a segment from Global
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Poilievre’s Poison.
If you are wondering who is poisoning the political air in Canada, it is that smarmy little man who leads the unfortunate conservatives in parliament. Pierre Poilievre has little time for civility, decency or truth. He is a little man in a hurry and hardly cares about those things that
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Ford versus Smith.
It appears to be a race to the bottom. It is amateur Ontario premier Doug Ford against amateur Alberta premier Danielle Smith. Neither has the experience or competence to be premier. As an Ontario resident, I would gladly trade Ford for Smith any day. Alberta voters might not know what
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Trusting Doug Ford?
It’s an old maxim: Never trust anyone who says “Trust me.” And when it comes to Ontario premier Doug Ford, you should tell him to sell that worn-out jalopy to someone else. He thinks he is a great salesman. He is having trouble selling Highway 413. Nobody believes him. He
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Passing a Party in Purgatory.
We might have to ask the Roman Church for help on this. It seems the liberal party in Ontario is stalled in some phase of existence that might take strong prayers to bring it through. But just where it will end up is a good question. What the party leaders
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Lament for Losing Liberals.
Canada has now had ten years of Justin Trudeau and his version of liberalism. It is ten years since he assumed the leadership of the liberal party of Canada and set about changing the party to suit his purposes. It is now but a fraction of its former self and
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