Today is polling day (the proper name for "election day") in Ontario. Voters are expected to brave the crappy weather to give Mr Ford and his "Progressive Conservatives" (read: cuckservatives) an unprecedented third majory government.
Walt sez: that's better than the liberal Liberals or the pinko "New Democrats", who are neither new nor democratic. Many good lucks to you, Doug.
Ed. here again. In my earlier post we left Walt and the South Park boys (Walt doesn't appear in the video) somewhere in Canada, after their City Airlines plane, piloted by Tuong Lu Kim, made an unscheduled landing. The boys wanted to see Canada's "new prime minister", Blackie McBlackface. Walt, however, wants to see what will happen to the forces of conservatism in today's general election in the province of Ontario.
Here at WWW we have a policy of not covering or commenting on regional -- state or provincial -- politics, unless there's some national or international issue involved. Walt insists the results of the Ontario election will show whether Ontarians, a pretty middle-of-the-road herd of sheep, are ready for real conservative politics and politicians.
The answer will have implications for the Conservative Party of Canada, which will in Sepotemnber choose yet another leader, from a slate of wannabes ranging from social conservative (Leslyn Lewis) to liberal (Jean Charest), with a pseudo-conservative (Pierre Poilievre) the current front-runner.
Ontarians are funny -- "funny curious", not "funny haha" -- in that they prefer having opposing parties in power federally and provincially. So it is that for the last century or so they send mostly Liberals to Ottawa and mostly Conservatives to the Pink Palace at Queen's Park in Toronto. The party known federallyn as "Conservative" is still called "Progressive Conservative" at the provincial level, and that oxymoron tells you all you need to know about the clever mugwumpery that has kept it in power for so long. As former premier "Brampton Billy" Davis used to say, "Bland works."
In 2017, after sitting on the wrong (read: opposition) side of the Ontario Legislature, the "Ontario PCs", as they now style themselves. to avoid using the dreaded C-word, chose a new leader, Doug Ford, who promised to move the party at least an RCH to the right of centre.
He lied. Elected premier in 2018, he rode out the Covid "crisis" and other problems by the same old mix of big government, deficit financing and handouts to all and sundry, used by Liberal governments in Ottawa and (before Ford) in Toronto.
It worked. Mr Ford is now the odds-on favourite to be re-elected today, perhaps with an increased majority. The hapless Liberals (who lost official party status in 2018) are fighting it out with the socialistic Not-so-new Democrats for second place.
Shown below, left to right are: Mr Ford, Liberal leader Steve DelDuca, the NDP's Andrea Horwath, and Mike Schreiner, leader of the Green Party. Mr Schreiner hopes to double his party's representation in the legislature from one (himself) to two. The other two are likely to lose their jobs and, in the case of Mr DelDuca, his own seat.
This time, however, there are two new, seriously conservative -- socially as well as fiscally -- in the running. They are the Ontario Party, headed by Derek Sloan, and the New Blue Party (no kidding), led by Jim Karahelios.
Both are disgruntled former "Conservative" MPs/MPPs, who feel (with reason) that real conservatives have been shut out of the traditional parties, betrayed by leaders like Mr Ford and former CPC leader Erin O'Tool, who campaigned from the right and governed from the centre-left. Both of the new parties are polling about 2%, just as Max Bernier's People's Party of Canada did on its first outing.
Walt is in London (or somewhere near there), waiting to see if real conservatism has at last taken root in Canada's most populous (if not popular or populist) province.
Well, I seem to have gone around the horn there, as Fred C. Dobbs would say. There's no room left for the True Names story I promised in the headline. I'll put that up later.
Agent 3 is in Toronto this weekend, following the annual convention of the Ontario Progressive Conservative [sic] Party. One of Walt's favourite conservatives, Tanya Granic Allen, is there, making the more mainstream Tories uncomfortable by reminding them that many people who voted them into office last June did so because they expected a PC government to reverse the course set by the previous Liberal government on matters such as "progressive" sex education and gender ideology.
At the convention today, they voted in favour of a resolution to no longer recognize gender identity theory, which the resolution calls "a highly controversial, unscientific liberal ideology. The actual wording of the resolution is: Be it resolved that [the] Ontario PC Party recognizes "gender identity theory" for what it is, namely, a highly controversial, unscientific "liberal ideology"; and, as such, that an Ontario PC Government will remove the teaching and promotion of "gender identity theory" from Ontario schools and [their] curriculum.
Although the resolution was adopted as party policy, it is not binding on Mr Ford's Progressive Conservative government. However, Walt suggests to Mr Ford that he would do well to listen, as his government reconsiders the sex education curriculum, to the voice of the people who elected him. As a former PC prime minister of Canada once said, "It's a long road that has no ashcans!" [What does that actually mean? Ed.]
MEANWHILE, in Australia, which now has laws enshrining a person's right to choose their "gender identity", a conservative senator is taking the heat for comments during a debate on a proposed Day of the Unborn Child, in which he "declared [his] gender" to be female in an attempt to shield himself from criticism over his stance on abortion.
National Party Sen. Barry O'Sullivan made the comments in Parliament on Wednesday, saying he was tired of being attacked for his beliefs.
Senator O'Sullivan’s motion to ban pro-abortion activists from the Day of the Unborn Child failed 32-12.
UPDATE ADDED 20/11/18: Ontario's Premier Doug Ford, elected in June on his promise to respect the wishes of voters who are sick of having gender ideology rammed down their throats (or some other orifice) by "progressive" governments and the lamestream media, wimped out on this one, annouoncing yesterday that he would use every means possible to NOT give effect to the resolution passed by members of his own "Progressive Conservative" [sic] party. Just another politician who says whatever it takes to get elected, and then turns his back on those who put him in office. The deporables -- see "Bernier's People's Party of Canada wows Toronto 'deplorables'", WWW 20/11/18 -- won't forget!
Ed. here. Walt is on assignment, as they say in the meeja, observing what looks like being an interesting election in Ontario (Ontario, Canada, not Ontario, California).
Kathleen Wynne, proud lesbian and Premier of the province until tomorrow night has already thrown in the pink towel, conceding Saturday morning that there's no way she and her Liberal Party can be returned to power. Walt says they will be lucky to hold onto two seats in the 124-seat legislature.
The real contest is between the socialist(ish) New Democratic Party, led by Andrea Horwath and the oxymoronical Progressive Conservative Party, which, under new leader Doug Ford (brother of the late mayor of Toronto) is emphasizing the second half of its name rather than the first. Walt has endorsed Mr Ford, but is more than a little unhappy with his decision to reject the candidacy of Tanya Granic Allen.
The latest polls show the PCs with a thin margin in the popular vote, but a substantial lead in the projected number of seats, enough to form a majority government, after 15 years of Liberal misrule. I expect a report from Walt on Friday, DV. Stay tuned.
Walt is dismayed -- make that pissed off in the extreme -- to have to report that the oxymoronical Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario and its newly-minted leader, Doug Ford, have caved to PC [not "Progressive Conservative" but "political correctness". Ed.] police and won't allow Tanya Granic Allen to run under the PC [not "politically corect" but "Progressive Conservative". Ed.] banner in June's provincial election.
The announcement comes after the Liberal Party of Ontario -- led by proud-to-be-lesbian Kathleen Wynne -- issued a news release Saturday afternoon, citing a 2014 video of Mrs Granic Allen criticizing sex education and gay marriage. Here's the clip from Toronto's CityNews.
If you didn't hear clearly, Mrs Granic said, in a speech at a Croatian-Catholic Youth weekend conference, "You know, now what I hear about Hrvatska (Croatia) trying to push radical sexual education on the young or gay marriage you know I almost vomit in disbelief. Just 20 years ago we were liberated from this communism but now we are embracing these lack of values, these lack of ideals."
In a statement posted to her Twitter page, the only true Christian conservative in the field said she was disappointed that she had been declared no longer a candidate, and will have more to say about the decision and Ontario politics in the near future. Walt will be listening!
For now, I withdraw my endorsement of Doug Ford and his PC ["Progressive Conservative" and now "politically correct" too! Ed.] Party. To get back in my good books, Mr Ford needs to ignore left-wing identity politics and address the wants and needs of the silent majority of Ontarians (outside the GTA). Trying to win over the elites of Toronto could cost him a majority, perhaps the entire election.
For those who don't follow Ontario politics, "PC" stands for Progressive Conservative, the oxymoronical name the province's centrist party chose for itself long before "PC" (Political Correctness) became the bane of true conservatives.
The very photogenic Tanya Granic Allen, last mentioned here in March, is defiantly un-PC, in the latter sense, but is now the official PC candidate for the riding of Mississauga Centre in the June 7th provincial election.
Yesterday she won the party's nomination, defeating three other candidate wannabes (including a Muslim), in the "ethnically diverse" riding. If you look closely, you might spot one of Walt's agents in the crowd of supporters.
A strong social conservative, Mrs Granic Allen is a past president of Parents As First Educators (PAFE), an advocacy group fighting against the Liberal government's pro-queer sex education agenda. She also advises various organizations including the Catholic Civil Rights League of Canada, and Campaign Life Coalition. In 2014, she was invested as Dame of Magistral Grace in The Order of Malta.
She cited an attack on two teenage girls in Zanzibar "yet another reason not to vacation in a Muslim country." And in 2014 she tweeted in 2014 that the Queen should not allow gay marriage in England. The Queen's reply is not a matter of record.
Walt joins Doug Ford in congratulating Tanya Granic Allen on being nominated. But that's just the first step in making her strong voice for Canadian Christian values heard in the Ontario legislature. The second challenge is getting her elected in a riding where white, born-in-Canada Christians are in the minority. If you're a resident of Ontario -- of Mississauga Centre in particular -- and would like to help, visit her website or click here to send an e-mail to the campaign team. Good luck, Tanya!!!
Ontario is right in the centre of Canuckistan -- politically as well as geographically. Radicalism, either to the right or to the left, is for the other provinces. If you look up "moderate" in your dictionary of politics, you'll find, as Example No. 1, Ontario's oxymoronically-named Progressive Conservatives (aka PC party), who governed the province for 40-odd years from the middle of World War II until the mid-80s. The Premier, for much of that time, was a chap named Bill Davis, whose motto was "Bland works."
Since then, except for a brief fit of madness in 1990, when Ontario voters elected an NDP (read: socialist) government by mistake, Ontarians have elected a succession of Progressive Conservative (centre-right) and Liberal (centre-left) governments whose policies vary by no more than two iotas, combining big government, big business and social engineering into a stew of liberal progressive pap.
The present stirrer of the pap, and Chief Social Engineer of the "province of opportunity" is proudly lesbian Premier Kathleen No-Wynne, who has attempted in the last few months to push her Liberal party in a more leftward direction, particularly on "social justice" issues such as public safety (Police bad!) and education reform (Gender ideology good!).
Ms Wynne and her cronies in the Pink Palace at Queen's Park are up for re-election in June. Her approval ratings being as close to zero as to be within the margin of error, she looked certain to be defeated by the Progressive Conservatives, whose leader was a nebbish by the name of Patrick Brown. Having hoodwinked the PC's social conservatives to become leader, Mr Brown promptly flip-flopped on sex education and other social issues, so as to be seen as more "moderate" than Ms Wynne, therefore more acceptable to Ontario voters. He might have pulled it off, too, if he hadn't got caught in the #MeToo foofaraw, as a result of which he resigned on January 25th.
Patrick Brown's resignation threw the PCs into panic mode, since they needed a new leader to take them into the June election muy pronto. Four people their hats into the ring, including Tanya Granic Allen, endorsed by Walt on February 12th, whose goal was always and only to give a voice to Ontario's social conservatives, who hadn't had anyone to speak for them since... well, since forever!
The other three were: Christine Elliott, the widow of a former federal finance minister and darling of the party insiders; Caroline Mulroney, political neophyte but well-connected daughter of Lyin' Brian, a disgraced former prime minister; and Doug Ford, elder brother of Rob Ford, the crack-smoking (etc etc) populist mayor of Toronto until his untimely death in 2016.
Voting for the next PC leader and, probably, next Premier of Ontario was to be done online, all very modern and, errr, progressive. All you had to do was get your party membership by February 16th. Then they would mail you -- by snail-mail -- a "verification code" which you would enter online to send them a scan of your photo ID, after which they would e-mail you a PIN number which you would use to vote, online. The party bureaucrats would then print out your ballot, which would be counted by machine. The votes would then be adjusted -- weighted -- so that all the ridings (electoral districts) had an equal say. What could go wrong?
Yes... what could go wrong? Walt was in Ontario yesterday for the goat rodeo [leadership convention, shurely. Ed.] to find out. Of about 140,000 registered party members, only some 70,000 had received verifications letters. Of those, around 65,000 had actually been able to vote. The result was to be announced at 1500 EST. 1500 came and went. So did 1600, 1700, 1800, 1900 and 2000. Finally, at about 2025, a minion emerged from behind a black curtain at the Hilton Markham Convention Centre to tell the tired and emotional party faithful to go home! Seriously! No result tonight, they said, but we'll let you know "in the short term".
A couple of hours later, while those who hung around were still picking their jaws up off the floor, the party honchos, stung by speculation that the fix was in for Ms Elliott, relented and announced, very quietly, that the winner was... no drum roll... Doug Ford! They did not give any numbers, nor any explanation for the delay. Christine Elliott, who was rumored to have finished a close second, was nowhere in sight, and has refused -- just like Hellery Clinton -- to concede. An "investigation" is under way, and a court challenge is likely. Mr Ford made a short (and less than stirring) acceptance speech.
I've been following politics on both side of the World's Longest Undefended Border for decades and have never seen anything like this, north of that border. It was all so American! Here you had a sexagenarian woman, already a two-time loser running for the same position, who didn't get what she felt entitled to (in spite of the machinations of the party brass) and stormed off into the night. And the winner was a populist social conservative who campaigned openly against the party elites and the (((controlled media))), whom he accused (quite rightly, IMHO) of being out of touch with the needs and sentiments of the Real Ontario.
The lamestream media don't have their hair on fire over the Ford win. Being Canucks, their hair is just smouldering slightly. But already they're saying that Ford can't win, he's too right-wing, wants to turn back the clock, yada yada yada. Where have we heard that before! Doug Ford may not win Rosedale and Forest Hill -- posh parts of the Little Apple -- but Walt predicts he'll do well in "the 905" (the ring of exurbs around Toront) and sweep rural Ontario, just as President Trump swept America's "flyover country". Lifetime pct .989.
Final thought: I was pleased indeed to see Doug Ford give a special shout-out to Tanya Granic Allen, who was standing behind him and to his right (!), and stepped forward with a wave and a smile at about the half-way point of the video. Well done, that lady! Make her Minister of Education, Doug!
Cazart! Even as I was writing "Ontario conservatives! Vote Tanya Granic Allen for PC party leader" earlier today, Ontario Progressive Conservative [sic] leader wannabe Doug Ford was getting up on his hind feet at Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School, on his own turf in northwest Toronto, to call out not just Kathleen Wynne's Liberal government but his own party for the current state of education in the Province of Missed Opportunity.
For those who don't know, Doug Ford is the little brother -- perhaps "younger brother" would be a better phrase -- of the late Rob Ford, the crack-smoking and otherwise controversial mayor of Toronto, 2010-2014. That's Doug on the right, which is where he likes to be. My guess is that the announcement by Tanya Granic Allen that she was throwing her hat in the leadership ring (see previous post) served to warn Mr Ford that he was in danger of losing the social conservative vote -- there's a lot of them out there -- unless he spoke out against his party's liberal policies on matters such as abortion and sex education.
On the latter subject, Mr Ford said both the Liberals and PCs are to blame for the current unsatisfactory state of education in Ontario. "Educating our children is the most important job in the world," he said. "The next generation will inform how our country develops and contributes to issues facing society. Ontario needs to be a leader in the quality of education we give our children. This means that we need to arm our teachers with comprehensive and practical curriculum documents."
"The way the sex-ed curriculum was rolled out was totally unacceptable. Consultations with parents were insufficient. Unlike the Liberals, I know that parents -- not the government -- are our first educators when it comes to our children." Did you catch that play? "First educators"! That's the name of Mrs Granic Allen's group -- Parents As First Educators.
The Liberals' new sex education curriculum was implemented in classrooms in September 2015. In accordance with the pro-queer agenda favoured by Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne (a lesbian herself), they start laying the gender ideology on Grade 3 students -- that's age 8 -- to get the kiddos to "accept differences". Students start learning about puberty in Grade 4, a year earlier than before. In Grade 6, when kids are 11, they are introduced to masturbation, which teachers were urged to describe as a "common practice". Then, in Grades 7 and 8, students are taught about consent, practising abstinence, and... wait for it... anal sex. In Grade 8. Can you imagine?
1000s of Ontario parents took to the streets around the Pink Palace to protest. But it was too late. The new curriculum was presented as a fait accompli. Parents weren't consulted beforehand, and certainly wouldn't be listened to after the curriculum -- the handiwork of a convicted pedophile, (((Dr Benjamin Levin))) -- was rolled out.
It's the kind of deviltry that is hard to undo. And unlike Mrs Granic Allen, Doug Ford didn't flat out promise to scrap it. He said the sex-ed curriculum should be about facts, not teaching "liberal ideology". But would he undo it? Well... errr... what he said was "If I’m elected leader, I will take this issue to the party, to parents and to the voters. I will remain firm on this issue. I will always stand for parents having the first say in what their children learn."
Mr Ford blamed not just the Liberals but his own party. "The Liberals have refused their insight, feedback and expertise by not consulting with families on changes to Ontario's sex-ed curriculum," he said. "But the Liberals have not been the only ones who have turned a blind eye to the concerns of parents. Our own PC party, under Patrick Brown, refused to even consult its own members on what we thought of this curriculum and stonewalled debate of the issue by forbidding discussion of this policy from reaching the membership during our policy development process."
Mr Ford was obviously trying to position himself to the right of the other two "serious candidates" for the PC leadership. Former MPP Christine Elliott said parents were "shut out" during the brief and fraudulent "consultation" held in 2014, but she hasn't said what, if anything, she would do about it. The third candidate, Caroline Mulroney (daughter of Lyin' Brian Himself) has said she will "revisit" the sex education curriculum. Only Tanya Granic Allen has had the courage to say she is against it.
Dear Ontario readers, it's the entry of Mrs Granic Allen into the race that has forced the "serious candidates" to say something. This proves that if right-thinking people are both vociferous and persistent, they can make themselves heard and, please God, put a brake on the runaway liberal freight train. Join the protest! Scroll down to my earlier post, and follow the link to register today for your membership in the Ontario PC party, so you can support Tanya Granic Allen. The membership deadline is February 16th, so do it now!
Walt finds it easy to make fun Canadian Conservatives (with a big "C") because the majority of them are so close to the centre of the political spectrum as to be virtually indistinguishable from the centrist "blue Liberals". They believe in statism, progressivism, secular humanism, and government intervention is just about every aspect of life. Nowhere is this more true than in Ontario, where the alternative to Kathleen Wynne's detestable and detested Liberal government is a party that calls itself "Progressive Conservative" -- an oxymoron if ever there was one.
When the Regressive Convertibles (as the late Dr Foth used to call them) chose a new leader, Patrick Brown, a couple of years ago, there were some social conservatives who hoped that the PCs (as they call themselves) would dare to embrace Christian family values, particularly as regards the Wynne government's pro-queer agenda, particularly their proposed new sex education curriculum, about which Walt has written before. See, for example, "Liberal government of Ontario plans further attack on parental rights", WWW 27/2/17.
It was not to be. Patrick Brown flip-flopped on the sex ed issue like a beached mackerel. During one by-election, a letter was sent out over his name saying he was against the new curriculum. Mere hours later he said he was for it, and the letter had been sent out "by mistake". He then became an enthusiastic supporter of the lesbian premier's agenda, when he said, "I strongly support the updated sex-ed curriculum. I will never support removing LGBT sensitivity or combating homophobia from schools." How's that for "progressive conservatism"?
With Patrick Brown, there was no room for social conservatives -- or sanity -- in the Ontario PC party. But Patrick Brown is gone now, a victim of #MeToo. And the PCs are scrambling to find a new leader. There are three candidates, none of whom has said flatly that he or she (there are two women, one man, running) will listen to social conservatives, let alone be a strong voice for family values and the importance of life.
So... Tanya Granic Allen has stepped forward. Mrs Granic Allen is the President of Parents As First Educators, and, as mentioned in the post referred to above, has been in the forefront of the campaign to stop Kathleen Wynne and all her works. Late last week, Mrs Granic Allen announced that she would enter the contest for the leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives, if she can muster up the votes and the funds needed to do so.
Can Tanya Granic Allen win? Frankly, Walt doesn't think so, but that's not the point. The point is to show the "serious candidates" that there is significant support out there -- by which I mean outside of Toronto, the fons et origio of all that is evil -- for true conservative principles and the Christian values on which Western society was built.
You can help! The first thing you need to do -- by 5 PM EST this coming Friday, February 16th -- is become a member of the party. You need to be: (a) a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, (b) living in Ontario, and (c) 14 years of age or older. That's all. It costs just $10 to join, and you can do it online, at secure.ontariopc.com/Partyjoin. (Please leave the window asking who referred you blank!
If you need help getting your member, leave a phone message at 416-763-7233, and someone will call you back and help you to register. Once you've registered, please e-mail tanya@pafe.ca to let her know you've done so. Very soon, you'll receive more information about how you can vote. You don't need to attend a convention or any party meetings. Voting is going to be online and/or by snail-mail. (How's that for conservative?)
Then there's the money. The entrance fee for the race is $100,000. Until Mrs Granic Allen is officially registered as a candidate, donations aren't tax-deductible, but they are very necessary! If you can help, please say so in your e-mail, and once a campaign account is set up, Tanya's team will let you know.
If you live in Ontario and share the values and ideals that motivate Tanya, Walt urges you to get your membership in the PC party and lend her your support. Remember, the membership deadline is Friday, February 16th, at 5 PM EST! You don't even have to get out of your chair, but please act now!
Still thinking about it? Here's a very short (1:50) video of Dr Jordan Peterson talking with Tanya and one of Walt's favourite conservative activists, Queenie Yu, about gender ideology.
Note from Ed.: The foregoing endorsement was unsolicited and unapproved by Tanya Granic Allen. Walt has received no consideration for posting this... no consideration whatever... damn!
The Canadian province of North Texas [Alberta, surely! Ed.] elected a new legislature on Monday. The result contains a lesson for American Republicans and Canadian Conservatives (big-C and small-c alike), the lesson being: don't go to extremes.
All you need to know about AB is that it's about as conservative a place as you can find north of the 49th parallel. Like TX, it's cattle country, and under the cattle is oil -- lots of it -- when enterprising multinational oilcos will sell to China if Obama holds up construction of the pipeline which should be shipping it south. The province is awash in oil money which it shares only reluctantly with poorer places like Ontario.
As Walt explained in "Campaign bust raises eyebrows in Alberta", Alberta is staunchly conservative, politically and socially. As of this spring, it had been ruled for 41 years, by a centre-right party oxymoronically called the Progressive Conservatives. This time they chose a new leader, Allison Redford, to front for the usual gang of old white men in conservative suits and white stetsons.
But the PCs were a tired lot, bereft of any ideas except to keep the oil flowing out (see above) and never ever have a provincial sales tax. There was a perceived need for change. Unfortunately the other two traditional parties, the Somewhat Liberal Party and the Not-so-new Democrats, didn't have a Chinaman's chance of electing a handful of MLA's, let alone forming a government.
So was born the Wildrose Party, a gang of even older white men in even more conservative suits and white stetsons -- cowboy boots too. They chose as their frontperson a slightly younger and more attractive white woman, Danielle Smith, whose campaign bus wrap drew attention to her assets until lamestream media cries of sexism forced a redesign.
The Wildrose Party's policies were a mixture of populism and conservatism, well to the right of the governing PCs. They promised to share the oil wealth, at least with the common people of Alberta. ("Prosperity certificates" had been tried during the Great Depression by the Social Government -- read "conservative" -- government of Bible Bill Aberhart, and found unconstitutional, but never mind.) There were also hints of a social conservative agenda on such matters as health care, abortion, "gay rights" etc etc.
In the run-up to the election, the pollsters, pundits and national media were loud in their predictions of a Wildrose landslide, followed by the return of Alberta to the dark ages of Social Credit and the Ku Klux Klan. The liberal Globe and Mail went so far as to endorse the PCs, which should have been the kiss of death since no one outside of Toronto and Ottawa pays any attention to the Glob.
True conservatives and libertarians in Alberta and the rest of Canada were peeing in their pants with excitement at the prospect of being freed from the tyranny of "red Tories" -- liberals in conservative suits. The Wildrosers themselves were starting to plan the "On to Ottawa!" campaign to get rid of the faux conservative Steve Harper and put a real right-winger in 24 Sussex Drive.
But... surprise, surprise... the pollsters and other "experts" got it wrong! The Regressive Convertibles (thank you, Allan Fotheringham) won, in a veritable landslide. Later today Walt will tell you why, and what this means for politics in Canada and the USA.
Continuing the theme of what's wrong with the West and when it all started to go pear-shaped...
Some of you [most of you? ed.] may not know who Tony Clement is. He is an Ontario politician -- the pencil-necked, nerdy-looking guy with the big glasses you occasionally see in pictures when he's pulled his head out of Stephen Harpoon's bum long enough to be photographed.
Before taking his ambition to Ottawa, Tony boy was a member of Mike "Slasher" Harris's Progressive Conservative* government, which devastated Ontario in the 90s. In John Ibbitson's book on the Harris years, Promised Land, Clement said this about what made him a conservative:
"What I saw...was the failure of the American democractic impulses. Around us was the fall of Vietnam, the emasculation of American power, Watergate.... What I remember was the frontal assault on American power, and the encroachment by communism all over the world.
"And in Canada, there were the failed experiements of Pierre Trudeau. His economic experiments were a shambles, his anti-Americanism wasn't getting us anywhere, the increasing role of the state in all aspects of our lives was, in my view, creating more problems than it was solving." [My emphasis.]
Unfortunately, Tony was then and is still part of the problem, not part of the solution. But the sentiment of the last sentence is right on the money. Tea party, anyone?
* Note to American and other readers not familiar with Canadian politics: There really is a party with the oxymoronic name of Progressive Conservative. Federally it was subsumed by Harper's Conservative Party of Canada, who like to think of themselves as neo-cons, but it still exists in Ontario, where it wanders in the wilderness under the "leadership" not of a Tony but a Timmy...and I don't mean Tim Horton!
1. On 10 October 2007 the people of the province of Ontario elected a Liberal government, giving the Liberals 71 out of a possible 107 seats in the legislature. A major plank in the platform of the losing Progressive Conservatives was the funding of "faith-based schools", schools operating outside of the public or Roman Catholic systems.
2. In the same election, voters defeated a proposal to change from first-past-the-post to a form of proportional representation. Only 37% of the participating electorate and 5 out of 107 ridings voted for the new system.
3. In June 2009, Tim Hudak was elected leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives, replacing the too-aptly-named John Tory, who failed to win his seat in the 2007 election. One of the things Mr. Hudak proposes to do, if he forms the next government of Ontario, is to overhaul the Ontario Human Rights Code and the Commission which enforces it.
Here is the connection between the first and second items. The Tories accused the winning Liberals of appealing to the meanness of the electorate, of being unduly influenced by racist and anti-minority sentiments of (one presumes) "ordinary Ontarians", i.e. those not members of a visible of other minority.
As to the third item, it would seem that now the Tories want to make that same appeal, by taking away the HRC's power to punish discrimination and incitement to hatred. One of Mr. Hudak's opponents, Frank Klees, came out in favour of the reform of the HRC and was labelled a "dinosaur" by the media. Two other would-be leaders called the policy "toxic" and the Liberals rushed to agree. They are saying, now, that Mr. Hudak and his party are appealing to white, Christian Ontarians to the detriment of non-white, non-Christians. And, they say, "ordinary Ontarians" won't be taken in by this "appeal to racism and hatred".
They are wrong. The results of the 2007 election should be understood as an expression of the frustration of the majority -- white and nominally Christian Ontarians -- of being dictated to by the minority. Outside of parts of the GTA, the anger and sense of helplessness is almost palpable. Worse, the government won’t talk about this problem and won’t do anything about it. We all know (because the Toronto Star and CTV tell us) that it's not politically correct to even suggest that the politicians are pandering to the vizmins and other noisy minority groups. And those who do suggest it risk being hauled in front of the Human Rights Commission!
It's not that Joe Average wants to "keep the fuzzy-wuzzies down". Most people acknowledge that racism and discrimination on the grounds of race, religion and gender are real problems that need to be addressed. But Joe (and Walt) feel that the government only makes these problems worse through incessant and misguided tinkering. Government is falling for the "civil rights industry" propaganda which confuses equality of opportunity with equality of result.
Case in point: the proposed establishment of an "Afrocentric" school in Toronto. What problem does this address? Apparently the feeling is that because blacks are not scoring as well on examinations or staying in school as long as others, it must be because they need their own school! What other reason could there be? So...give them their own school. Excuse me, but wouldn't that be a segregated school -- the kind that the civil rights lobby fought for decades to outlaw in the USA?
Mr. Hudak and his party may be onto something here. Perhaps the Ontario Liberals should take a view of the province as a whole, not just the part that can be seen from the observation deck of the CN Tower.
Today is polling day (the proper name for "election day") in Ontario. Voters are expected to brave the crappy weather to give Mr Ford and his "Progressive Conservatives" (read: cuckservatives) an unprecedented third majory government. 
Agent 3 is in Toronto this weekend, following the annual convention of the Ontario Progressive Conservative [sic] Party. One of Walt's favourite conservatives, Tanya Granic Allen, is there, making the more mainstream Tories uncomfortable by reminding them that many people who voted them into office last June did so because they expected a PC government to reverse the course set by the previous Liberal government on matters such as "progressive" sex education and gender ideology.
At the convention today, they voted in favour of a resolution to no longer recognize gender identity theory, which the resolution calls "a highly controversial, unscientific liberal ideology. The actual wording of the resolution is: 
Ed. here. Walt is on assignment, as they say in the meeja, observing what looks like being an interesting election in Ontario (Ontario, Canada, not Ontario, California). 
For those who don't follow Ontario politics, "PC" stands for Progressive Conservative, the oxymoronical name the province's centrist party chose for itself long before "PC" (Political Correctness) became the bane of true conservatives.
So... Tanya Granic Allen has stepped forward. Mrs Granic Allen is the President of Parents As First Educators, and, as mentioned in the post referred to above, has been in the forefront of the campaign to stop Kathleen Wynne and all her works. Late last week, Mrs Granic Allen announced that she would enter the contest for the leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives, if she can muster up the votes and the funds needed to do so.
So was born the Wildrose Party, a gang of even older white men in even more conservative suits and white stetsons -- cowboy boots too. They chose as their frontperson a slightly younger and more attractive white woman, Danielle Smith, whose campaign bus wrap drew attention to her assets until lamestream media cries of sexism forced a redesign.
