There is a big difference between a manipulator and a planner. Mr. Brown, the current leader of the Ontario Conservative Party, is a manipulator. He uses the system to his advantage. Maybe he does not play chess as that is a challenge that requires you to think ahead of your moves. Watching Patrick Brown in […]
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Babel-on-the-Bay: What’s up with Wynne?
It is certainly easy to forget about Kathleen Wynne’s Ontario Liberals during such a beautiful summer. They hardly do anything worthwhile the rest of the year but then they take the summer off and do less. The only member of the Liberal cabinet who has been putting in some hours has been Health Minister Erik […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Brown tries outrage over Hydro.
It depends where you sit in the Ontario Legislature. The government benches mainly consider Ontario Hydro a golden goose. The opposition benches always consider it the government’s Achilles heel. And it seems the powers that be at all the disparate parts of Hydro think they can charge customers whatever they need to meet the government’s […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The new and few principles of Mr. Brown.
Ontario’s provincial Conservative Party leader should have a clearly lettered sign on his chest saying ‘Help send this boy to the premier’s office.’ That way people would have a clue who he is and know that he will do or say anything to get there. If he thought discarding his long pants and painting his […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: What’s Jason Kenney doing? And who cares?
Yes, the Conservative Party of Canada is having a convention in a year or so to pick a new leader. After all, the party could hardly allow temporary leader Rona Ambrose time to get comfortable at Stornoway. So far, it is a very thin field of applicants. Though what would you expect when the leader […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Fool some people some of the time.
You sometimes wonder what ‘progressive’ means. Babel-on-the-Bay is included in a collection of blogs by progressive Canadian writers. We have come to the conclusion that is a very broad description when you read some of the blogs. With the limited political activity at this time of the year, it is often no surprise that these […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Harper goes “quietly into the night.”
That line from Shakespeare’s Henry V is a haunting phrase that can give deep meaning to a legacy. The only problem for Canada’s failed and former Prime Minister Stephen Harper is his lack of a legacy. He united the right and rode that tiger into power. Yet he could never dismount. He ruled firmly from […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The Tory’s terribly trying times.
It is hardly the best of times for Canada’s Conservatives. Their former leader has gone on to his reward: oblivion. Oh sure, the Hair is still around but he is now a nonentity. His temporary replacement, Rona Ambrose rode her horse out of the west to try to humanize her party but it seems like […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Polls and other time wasters.
A friend in Barrie called and left a message the other day about public opinion polls that said Conservative Leader Patrick Brown was more acceptable as premier than Liberal Kathleen Wynne. He was aghast that a nebbish such as Brown would even be considered as a serious candidate for the job of premier. What he […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Since Ontario Premier Wynne asked…
Never having been reluctant to give Premier Wynne advice before, we can hardly resist the opportunity to give her and her Liberal Party of Ontario advice on fund-raising. The first advice we will give her is to get her and her fellow members of the provincial parliament out of the fund-raising trough. They should not […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Party conventions are always about money.
The first thing learned about political conventions is that it always has to be at a profit. The second is that if there is nothing contentious, create something. You always have to fill the hall. And filling the hall does not seem to be a problem for any of the three political party conventions planned […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: In Ontario there is the Brown Way.
Last weekend Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown was in Barrie to stoke the local loyalties. He reminds us of the busker with the sticks and plates. This is the entertainer who can keep more and more plates spinning on sticks. And if he makes it look too easy, he just adds more sticks and […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Doing Ontario up Brown!
To this long-time political apparatchik, it was an interesting example of the art of remaking a politician. Ontario viewers of Global Television Sunday morning had an opportunity to see the training effort in action. It was almost a before and after—that might have been recorded hours apart. It was new Ontario Conservative Leader Patrick Brown […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Choosing a new leader for Canada’s Tories.
The date has been set: May 27, 2017. That is when the Conservative Party of Canada chooses a replacement for former leader Stephen Harper and Acting Leader Rona Ambrose. Looking for an abbreviation to use on the calendar, we call it ConCon. We have no idea where ConCon will be held or what form it […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Waiting for Minister Monsef.
Canadians have heard from the Conservatives and more recently the New Democrats about electoral reform. Voters are getting the impression that the Conservatives are vigorously opposed and the New Democrats very much in favour. Yet we seem to be hearing more from Liberal House Leader Dominic LeBlanc about this government initiative than the minister responsible. […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Honourable Members All!
A reader brought up what he considers a serious weakness in first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting yesterday. It is the assumption that we elect “honourable members’ to our legislatures and the House of Commons and select the same for our Senate. The member we elect with at least a plurality is assumed capable of representing all voters […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: But what if FPTP isn’t broke?
You almost hate to ask the question. What is wrong with the way Canadians vote? There seems to be an assumption by some people that first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting is a failure. Does that mean you have to dump FPTP and take a flier on some other theoretically improved voting system? And why is it better? […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The perils of political predictions in by-elections
A friend called the other evening. He wanted to know who would win tonight’s provincial by-election in Christine Elliott’s former electoral district of Whitby-Oshawa. Once again we had to patiently explain that it is impossible to predict. The opinion polls that say the Conservatives have the best chance are useless. The big rally the other […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Ontario Premier Wynne wins India.
Patrick Brown MPP eat your heart out. You are no longer India’s darling. Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne has won the media wars in the world’s largest democracy. In homophobic India, a lesbian politician from Canada was a big hit. It never occurred to us Canadians that Kathleen Wynne taking her husband Jane with her was […]
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Patrick Brown where are you?
Patrick Brown MPP needs to decide whether he is his provincial party’s leader or its chief apparatchik. In politics, an apparatchik is a person who usually toils in the background of a party coming up with and implementing strategies and tactics with which to win power. Watching Mr. Brown at work in politics over the […]
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