If you think false news is new news, you are only about 300 years behind the news. Watching the efforts of past politician Patrick Brown to communicate with his constituents during his time in Ottawa, I used to think of his efforts in terms of the penny dreadful publications that
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Babel-on-the-Bay: Do polls prove their point?
Reading a recent newspaper article about the pollsters congratulating themselves on their accuracy in the last provincial election was enough to make me ill. The more serious question on that provincial election was whether the polls followed the voters or did the voters follow the polls? Opinion polls, focus groups
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The Prince of Pot.
Are you looking forward to the Prince of Pot’s coronation on October 17? That will be the day when you can legally buy and use cannabis in Canada for purely recreational purposes. Maybe. It depends on whether your province has got its proprietary pot shops in place. It has taken
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: LDP 03: A favour from Ford.
If a stronger, more democratic political party is to rise from the ashes of the Ontario liberal party, we can thank premier-designate Ford for one bit of help. Ford has refused to fund the liberal MPPs in Queen’s Park as a political party. It means those who want to have
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Checking Chuckles’ Challenges.
Maybe it is just the pundits in Ottawa who are challenged to understand the leader of the conservative party. While some tend to treat him as the Joker character from the Batman comics, Andrew Scheer M.P. has a little more depth than that. At least, his leadership of the federal
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The Ego Has Landed.
Premier designate Doug Ford is in Queen’s Park. His reign of terror in Ontario is moving into gear. Before he has even unpacked, he is terrorizing the civil servants and attacking some of the better programs of his predecessors. Why he is being allowed to do this before being sworn
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: LDP 02: What is in a name?
One of the responses we received about a proposed new liberal democratic party (LDP) was from a reader who thought we could just join the Green party and be done with it. As much as I have admired green leader Elizabeth May’s hard work and leadership of the Green Party,
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Some truths for Jagmeet Singh.
New democratic party leader Jagmeet Singh learned some truths in a federal bye-election this week. It was in Quebec and political truths can be particularly brutal in that province. It was the truth that the Orange Wave in Quebec in 2011 was a one-time thing. It was the truth that
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: “A Little Child Shall Lead Them.”
Yes, that quote from Isaiah in the Christian bible is out of context. It still seems appropriate. It is used in Isaiah to set the scene of the beasts of the forest lying with farmers’ domesticated animals—and a little child shall lead them. In this case it sets the scene
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: LDP 01: A new liberal party.
It appears that we need to start with a new liberal party in Ontario. Creating and launching a new political party does not happen overnight. A new party has to start with the need at the grass roots; platforms and leadership can come later. This series of postings will present
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Chrystia’s Cassandra Complex?
Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, might not be a fortune teller but she had more than a few truths for the Americans last week. Our only concern might be with her timing, discretion and diplomacy. As the expression goes: Rome was not built in a day—and it took a few
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Did Brown lay the table for Ford?
The only newspaper in Ontario that gave a real damn about the lynching of conservative leader Patrick Brown back in January was his hometown Barrie Advance. It is owned by the Toronto Star and while it is just a poor quality shopper in which to wrap grocery flyers, the publication
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: What muted the proportional vote advocates?
It must be the shock of the recent Ontario election has not worn off. You would normally expect a hue and cry by this time for proportional representation in the legislature. It is when you hear about the so-called ‘wasted vote’ and the unfairness of first-past-the-post voting. It is certainly
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: A fleeting fondness for Ford.
Does premier Ford really feel the love? Sorry Dougie, it’s temporary. The same rage as put a Ford in the premier’s office can just as quickly send him to the same scrap heap as Kathleen Wynne. Ford began and ended his campaign for Ontario in his mother’s basement. Both he
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Some thoughts on the liberal rout.
The hardest thing to digest from the recent election in Ontario was the anger that fueled the liberal downfall. It was similar to a situation with a child who feels wronged and in the midst of a tantrum of tears and frustration. They often will strike out at the adult
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Salutations to Samara!
Somebody else cares! There is help on the horizon. Canada’s political parties have been ground down to unimportant collections of non-entities over the past 40 years. And it seems that the non-partisan Samara Centre for Democracy in Ottawa cares. Welcome to the fray folks. Samara got into the action because
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: From Teddy’s ‘Bully Pulpit.’
Trust President Donald Trump to get it wrong. He thinks of President Theodore Roosevelt’s White House ‘bully pulpit’ as a place to bully other world leaders. What Roosevelt saw as a great place from which to show strong leadership, Trump seems to think of it as a safe haven from
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Donald Trump’s play date with Kim Jong Un.
The American president plans to add to his infamy tomorrow as he meets with Kim Jong Un, leader of North Korea. It seems incongruous for Donald Trump to be traveling about the world causing consternation and havoc wherever he goes. Will it take the North Korean dictator to show Trump
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: It was not all about Trump.
The American president flew out of Canada’s Bagotville air base yesterday a disappointed egotist. He stopped by to impress the other world leaders and got the cold shoulder. Not even the stunning spring beauty of the Charlevois region of Quebec could rescue the frosty atmosphere of the G7 meeting. But
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Promises, promises!
Most people are sceptical about political promises. We should certainly be dubious of conservative leader Doug Ford’s recent scattering of promises in the Ontario election. Some, such as paving over the Green Belt around Toronto, had to be withdrawn immediately but he still has a backlog of questionable promises, such
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