Ontario election 2014

[blake 3:17]

stupid fuck -- good timing after so many of us were hating on the NDP


Tory Leader Tim Hudak hit a bit of a sour note Monday when he visited a Mississauga recording studio.

Hudak chose MetalWorks Group to talk about his million job plan but it was quickly noted he voted against the $45 million Ontario Music Fund in the 2013 budget‎.

“I am going to twist his arm and I am going to say come on side with the musicians, Tim,” Gil Moore, founder of MetalWorks and former drummer for Triumph, told reporters.

The Hudak Tories voted against the fund that supports homegrown talent, music companies and special music events.

Hudak would not specifically talk about the fund, only that it was in a budget that was totally unacceptable to the Progressive Conservatives at Queen’s Park.

http://www.thestar.com/news/queenspark/2014/05/05/musician_challenges_tim_hudak_on_rejection_of_onta rio_music_fund.html

[The Intransigent Faction]

Sure, it's stating the obvious, but they're all pretty lousy...

[blake 3:17]

It's a bad bunch. Trying to convince myself to vote NDP. Or spoil my ballot. I always wait til election day in case there's a meaningful shift. Not clear what the lesser evil is.

[The Intransigent Faction]

It's a bad bunch. Trying to convince myself to vote NDP. Or spoil my ballot. I always wait til election day in case there's a meaningful shift. Not clear what the lesser evil is.

Andrea Horwath is a joke to any serious socialist. The lamentations for the squeezing of the middle class and promises to said middle class of tax breaks or tax credits might appeal to my folks in suburbia, but she has zilch to offer workers who oppose capitalist exploitation.

[jake williams]

Nooo didn't you hear, some Trotskyist students in Toronto are juuust about to take the NDP over for the working class and bring it to power on a socialist platform.

Envoyé de mon SGH-I747M en utilisant Tapatalk

[The Intransigent Faction]

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/05/08/andrea_horwaths_rightwing_populism_salutin.html

I don't know what to say about this right now, but it speaks for itself anyway.

[Die Neue Zeit]

It's a bad bunch. Trying to convince myself to vote NDP. Or spoil my ballot. I always wait til election day in case there's a meaningful shift. Not clear what the lesser evil is.

Spoil your ballot.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

No Damn Principles. (http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/05/08/andrea_horwaths_rightwing_populism_salutin.html)

[The Intransigent Faction]

Spoil your ballot.

I've been contemplating this...What exactly is the difference in effect between this and openly refusing to legitimize the bourgeois electoral system? Either way, you don't cast a vote for a bourgeois party, but the ballot-spoiling approach just seems to be a more subtle legitimization of the system, or at some cases an overt campaign for electoral reform (see: Great Canadian Blank-Ballot Project).

If you're not going to "strategically" endorse the "least worst" bourgeois party, it seems to only make sense to go all the way and openly refuse to participate in the farce. After all, if nobody thinks anyone else would be that "extreme", that position will remain relegated to the shadows of alienated individual minds. It's the same problem with casting an actual "strategic vote" because you think (however correctly) that voting for the smaller bourgeois parties won't accomplish anything.

[The Intransigent Faction]

Also, this:

http://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/ontario-green-party-left-out-of-leaders-debate-1.1826550

Holy ****ing **** what the ****ing hell? Are we really repeating this debate all over again at the provincial level? Just another demonstration of how trying to worm our way into "mainstream" political discourse by adopting electoralist tactics is doomed to go nowhere.

[blake 3:17]

I`m voting Socialist Party of Ontario. Anyways... It`s actually a very interesting time in that the NDP are well to the right of the Liberals.


But this time, there was something different. The New Democrats, to whom the disadvantaged have always looked for support, were the least responsive of the three parties. Their leader, Andrea Horwath, is so preoccupied with winning middle-class votes, assuring the business community she would be a responsible economic manager and saving tax dollars that she has scarcely said a word about poverty, homelessness, hunger, low wages or stingy social programs.
She triggered the election by rejecting the most progressive provincial budget in decades, one that would have raised the minimum wage, increased the Ontario Child Benefit, improved welfare rates, and provided more support to people with disabilities. She parted ways with the Ontario Federation of Labour and Unifor, the province’s largest private-sector union. And she left MPPs such Cheri DiNovo, a longtime advocate of the vulnerable and marginalized, without a social justice platform to stand on. (Publicly, the Parkdale-High Park MPP is echoing her leader, saying the Liberals cannot be trusted to deliver on their budgetary commitments.)
This reconfiguring of the political landscape has left groups such as the Social Assistance Reform Coalition disoriented. They had hoped to use the election campaign to seek improvements in the Liberal budget — a $14-per-hour minimum wage (rather than $11); a 5-per-cent increase in social assistance rates (rather than 1 per cent); preventative dental care (not just emergency care) for low-income adults; and sustainable help for the homeless. But they have no champion in this election.
They didn’t expect any help from Conservative leader Tim Hudak, who went into the campaign promising to slash public spending, weaken unions, cut corporate taxes and crack down on crime. His agenda was more draconian than they anticipated, but it did contain a few tidbits for the elderly, children with special needs and families grappling with mental health challenges.
But they thought they could count on Horwath to prod Premier Kathleen Wynne from the left — only to discover that there is no party to the left of the Liberals in this election.

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/05/15/ontario_ndp_sheds_role_as_champion_of_the_poor_goa r.html

[Ele'ill]

why even bother with this?

[blake 3:17]

Another odd turn.


Defying all odds, a clear victor has emerged in Ontario’s wildly unpredictable election campaign.

The big winner is . . . The Beer Store.

You could almost hear the clink of celebratory toasts on Victoria Day as the province’s de facto private beer monopoly cheered its unexpected triumph.

For two years The Beer Store had braced for battle, convinced that if Tory Leader Tim Hudak won power he would free our beer — liberating it from these foreign-owned brewers who control 80 per cent of the retail market (the LCBO gets the rest).
All along, Liberal Leader Kathleen Wynne and the NDP’s Andrea Horwath sided with The Beer Store, insisting it wasn’t a problem worth fixing. Would the Progressive Conservatives finally stand up to this well-connected cartel by allowing beer in corner stores?

Just before the holiday weekend, Hudak’s plan fizzled like a beer gone flat.
It didn’t “make the cut” for his campaign platform because “I have to set priorities — and I have big fish to fry,” he explained. “I’ll save that battle for another day.”
Now, his two-year battle plan has been poured down the drain. Why did The Beer Store suddenly become small beer for Hudak?

http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario_election/2014/05/19/why_the_beer_store_is_toasting_tim_hudaks_tories_c ohn.html

[blake 3:17]

why even bother with this?

I wasn't even bothering with news precisely because of this kind of attitude but whatevs.

We've been protesting the Liberal government. The Conservatives were going to destroy the union movement but have back tracked because of pressure within their own caucus. The social democratic NDP have moved to the right of the Liberals on most issues totally changing the game, and forcing the unions to distance themselves from the NDP. Anyways, shit be fucked up!

It might provide space for new parties of the Left -- not holding my breath, but going to work towards that and be ready for some serious shit storms over the next few years.

[Per Levy]

Spoil your ballot.

that is your answer to anything dnz.


No Damn Principles. (http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2014/05/08/andrea_horwaths_rightwing_populism_salutin.html)

social dems and prinicples? lol.


What exactly is the difference in effect between this and openly refusing to legitimize the bourgeois electoral system?

nothing really, but dnz loves spoiling and makes propaganda for it no matter what the situation.


It might provide space for new parties of the Left -- not holding my breath, but going to work towards that and be ready for some serious shit storms over the next few years.

why the hope for a new left party? so it can go the way of the ndp only way quicker than the ndp did? seen it all before in germany, the left "alternatives" to the spd did go the way of the spd only way way faster.

[SensibleLuxemburgist]

I`m voting Socialist Party of Ontario. Anyways... It`s actually a very interesting time in that the NDP are well to the right of the Liberals.

I agree, despite not being from Ontario or a Canadian I would definitely vote for the Socialist Party of Ontario as well especially since they were formed in opposition to the NDP's rightward shift.

[The Intransigent Faction]

why even bother with this?

Because the outcome will have implications for class struggle in Ontario?

I'm against any form of electoral participation, but that doesn't mean we should ignore it completely, either. Of course I'm biased since I'm from Ontario and know people who's financial ability to attend university, or ability to find a public-sector job in say, teaching, would be impacted if Hudak is elected, so people I know give a shit whether I think they should or not...

Point being, I understand and agree with that attitude, but there has to be some way to engage with people or at least pay attention. What would you suggest (I'm honestly curious)?

[The Intransigent Faction]

I agree, despite not being from Ontario or a Canadian I would definitely vote for the Socialist Party of Ontario as well especially since they were formed in opposition to the NDP's rightward shift.

Just fyi, they're only actually running in two ridings, so statistically speaking you probably wouldn't be able to vote for them.

[blake 3:17]

Thanks Brad. And just to add -- there's been a massive shift in the Ontario economy away from manufacturing and more and more towards resource extraction. And that's a whole new set of economic problems and ecological problems. I'll be curious to see if the CP picks up votes this election. They're running 12 candidates this time. Their platform is quite good but I never really understand their approach to elections. Not sure about the CPC ML, they're pretty weird some places and totally cool other spots.

[Lynx]

Most of the population is in Southern Ontario. Where is the shift to resource extraction occurring, and who benefits?

[The Intransigent Faction]

Most of the population is in Southern Ontario. Where is the shift to resource extraction occurring, and who benefits?

Capitalists, of course. Whether it's mineral extraction in Ontario's "ring of fire", forestry, or fisheries and oil pipelines in other provinces, there's been a big push at the Federal level to gut environmental regulations and a lot of pressure on First Nations communities to allow extraction, sometimes under the guise of supposedly improving their economic situation. Ontario's no exception to the national trend.

[Lynx]

But politically, Southern Ontario capitalists would stand to benefit from the North's resources, which has led to grumbling in the past.
In addition, the loss of manufacturing will impact workers in the south.

[The Intransigent Faction]

But politically, Southern Ontario capitalists would stand to benefit from the North's resources, which has led to grumbling in the past.
In addition, the loss of manufacturing will impact workers in the south.

Yeah.

[blake 3:17]

Published Wednesday, November 28, 2012 12:25PM EST
OTTAWA -- A new Statistics Canada analysis shows Ontario's status as the economic engine of Canada has been declining since 2003, with the manufacturing sector leading the retreat.
The agency says Canada's largest province still has by far the largest share of payroll workers with 5.8 million non-farm employees.
But as a share of the 15.3 million in Canada, Ontario's portion has been trimmed to 38 per cent from 39.2 per cent in 2003.
...

Ontario's biggest losses have come in the battered factory sector, which has shed 255,000 jobs in the past 10 years to 654,200.
Once the top employer in the province, manufacturing was surpassed by the retail sector in 2009, and now faces a challenge for second place from health-care and social assistance employees.
The province's employment decline has been mirrored in the quality of jobs. The agency says average weekly salaries in Ontario rose 2.4 per cent to $908.59, but the increase is below the national average gain of 3.4 per cent.


Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/ontario-s-decade-long-decline-in-employment-led-by-manufacturing-sector-1.1057213#ixzz32THy8Akt

[blake 3:17]

Yes!!! from Raise the Rates:


Liberal Party's Party Disrupted - No Cause for Celebration
This evening, a group of OCAP members found their way into an exclusive Liberal Party event with Kathleen Wynne and Justin Trudeau in attendance. We dropped a banner (pic here:
https://twitter.com/OCAPtoronto/status/469618415083474944/photo/1) and had the following to say with a speech and flyers distributed through the air:
ATTENTION: No Cause for Celebration
Ontario Liberal Party: Making Life Harder for Poor People
As you celebrate the Liberal Party tonight, let us remind you of why poor people are suffering in this Province...
• After elected in 2003, on the heels of the devastating Conservative reign, the Liberals failed to reverse the Harris cuts including the 21.6% slash to welfare rates in 1995
• Since that time, social assistance rates have continued to drop. Token increases of 1% a year do not even match inflation. Today, welfare rates are 55% below where they should be with that initial Harris cut and 19
years of skyrocketing costs to housing, food, and basic necessities of life
• The Ontario Liberals have also slashed vital benefits such as the Special Diet - literally a benefit for food , and the Community Start-Up - a benefit to combat homelessness, and for women to re-locate from situations of domestic violence. These cuts are putting poor people’s health and lives at risk.
• Not one party in this election is even talking about poverty – in fact, all three parties are looking to cut social spending which would see our incomes continue to decline.
Poor people in this Province refuse to be treated like dirt. We have been organizing and fighting back. We will disrupt your fancy parties, your election campaigns, and your public events – we will not be silent or invisible.
We demand:
Raise the Rates of social assistance 55% now!
RaisetheRates.ca
https://www.facebook.com/RaiseTheRates

[Die Neue Zeit]

I've been contemplating this...What exactly is the difference in effect between this and openly refusing to legitimize the bourgeois electoral system?

You have it the wrong way around, Brad. Staying at home legitimizes the electoral system, because "if you don't vote, you shouldn't complain."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/canada-politics/ontario-voters-vote-count-choice-none-above-162236628.html

[blake 3:17]

Someone else is recognizing my organization! Thanks so much DNZ! Still gonna vote but will pass the word!

[The Intransigent Faction]

You have it the wrong way around. Staying at home legitimizes the electoral system, because "if you don't vote, you shouldn't complain."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/canada-politics/ontario-voters-vote-count-choice-none-above-162236628.html

Parroting liberal talking-points, are we? Come on, you can do better than that. If you DO vote, you are legitimizing the system. If you actively refuse to acknowledge its legitimacy, that's the opposite of legitimization. It's a pretty basic concept.

At this point I'm gonna bow out because there's nothing civil to be said.

[blake 3:17]

And the party bureaucrats keep calling it a Liberal plot...

Andrea Horwath campaign leaves prominent NDP supporters 'deeply distressed'
Letter to NDP leader says group is 'seriously considering' not voting for party

A group of 34 high-profile Ontario NDP supporters say they're "deeply distressed" by the direction party leader Andrea Horwath has taken in the election campaign and are seriously considering not voting for the party.

In a letter to Horwath obtained by Evan Solomon for CBC's Power & Politics, the group of longtime supporters, including Michele Landsberg (columnist and wife of former Ontario NDP leader Stephen Lewis) and former federal candidate Winnie Ng, warn she may lose their support "and the support of thousands of others." The email was dated May 23.

"From what we can see you are running to the right of the Liberals in an attempt to win Conservative votes," the letter reads.

"It is not clear whether you have given up on progressive voters or you are taking them for granted."

The letter goes on to say the NDP has risked the election of "the most right wing and vicious leader of the PCs since Mike Harris," referring to Tim Hudak, and that the proposed Liberal budget was the most progressive in recent Ontario history.

The warning comes a day after the NDP platform was released and during a campaign where Horwath's decision to force the election has been criticized by NDP insiders such as Gerry Caplan, along with Liberals.

The NDP issued a statement in response to the letter later Friday night.

Full story: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-votes-2014/andrea-horwath-campaign-leaves-prominent-ndp-supporters-deeply-distressed-1.2652766

[The Intransigent Faction]

Last election's turnout was just below 50%! With any luck it will go down further as the NDP overtly abandons any pretense of representing workers.

Meanwhile, there's this:

http://boycottelections.wordpress.com/about/

I'm not a Maoist but I kinda want to get involved, though I'd probably either be preaching to the choir or yelling at a brick wall.

[blake 3:17]

2014 Ontario Election: a Chance to Choose Between austerity, Austerity and AUSTERITY

Living wages, decent income and affordable housing are not on the ballot in this election. The only differences between the three parties is how much austerity each plans to impose and how quickly they intend to do it. All Parties agree that working class people and poor communities should pay for the crisis while the rich get a free ride. At most, the parties disagree about whether or not to throw a few crumbs at us as we sink deeper into poverty.

Tories; Mike Harris Re-incarnated:
The most extreme champions of austerity are, of course, the Tim Hudak Tories. They want to destroy 100,000 public sector jobs and impose an array of social cuts. Hudak would merge Ontario Works and ODSP into one program and have a set of brutal policies on ‘welfare to work’ at the ready that would pick up where Mike Harris left off.

Not-so ‘Social Justice’ Wynne:
The Wynne Liberals platform is not the blueprint for social justice they claim it to be. They promise to increase the minimum wage to a miserable $11 an hour – which is still a poverty wage. They also promise small increases for people on OW/ODSP, but rates remain far below the poverty line. None of their major cuts to social assistance were reversed. Their platform now promotes their support for the Community Homelessness Prevention Initiative (CHPI) as an anti-poverty initiative, which is merely a cover-up for the elimination of Community Start-up and Maintenance Benefit (CSUMB). The money put into CHPI came only after community protest and it is still only a fraction of what was cut. Similarly, the Liberals cut a promised $200 increase to the Ontario Child Benefit (OCB) in 2013 to a mere $100 increase. Now the Liberal platform boasts about raising the Ontario Child Benefit to $1310/year - the rate it was supposed to be a year ago. The Liberal platform promises more of the same – no reversal of their cuts to Special Diet or CSUMB, no real increases to minimum wage or OW/ODSP rates and no real action on poverty in their ‘second 5-year Poverty Reduction Plan’.

NDP no friend of the poor:
The NDP goes into this election with even the mainstream media wondering if they are still to the left of the Liberals. The NDP’s “Plan that Makes Sense” is silent on OW and ODSP, minimum wage and housing. Most alarming is the NDP’s pledge to appoint a Minister of Financial Accountability to find $600 million a year in austerity measures and cutbacks. In the past they have spoken in favour of a $12/hour minimum wage and ‘inflation’ increases to social assistance, but nothing is even mentioned in this new platform.

None of the mainstream parties running in this election even pretend they would seriously reduce poverty. All of them support the basic direction of the Commission for the Review of Social Assistance in Ontario that seeks to redesign social assistance to make it a more effective means of driving people, including the disabled, into sub poverty employment. Some people may decide to vote in this election on the basis of supporting a ‘lesser evil’ and it is quite true that the Tories stand out as the Party that would launch the most vicious attack of all. However, it is equally true that, whoever forms the Government after June 12, our communities are going to be under attack and fighting back in the face of an escalating agenda of austerity and poverty.

This election will ensure that the poor will get poorer. The only way to secure a 55% raise in social assistance rates, an immediate $14/hour minimum wage and decent, accessible, affordable housing for all is to unite and fight back.

RAISE the RATES 55% NOW!
ONTARIO COALITION AGAINST POVERTY
www.ocap.ca
#RaisetheRates

[blake 3:17]

The TV debate was tonight. Pretty sorry mess.

[Delusional Kid]

The TV debate was tonight. Pretty sorry mess.
Let me guess, it was just one neo-liberal circle jerk, and nothing was actually debated.

[The Intransigent Faction]

;2757029']Let me guess, it was just one neo-liberal circle jerk, and nothing was actually debated.

That's pretty much what I gathered. I had to write something about the campaign recently...but I couldn't get past the first minute or so of the debate where Kathleen Wynne painfully squirms with vague rhetoric when asked about the gas plants. "It was wrong...uh...it shouldn't have been done...uh...I'm taking measures to make sure that won't happen again...yeah."

[The Intransigent Faction]

So there's another campaign being touted as an alternative both to voting and to "spoiling your ballot":

http://metronews.ca/news/canada/1055191/discouraged-by-ontario-election-decline-your-vote-says-activist/

[The Intransigent Faction]

UPDATE: Latest info on the "Decline Your Vote" campaign...excuse the poorly thought out condescension of the redditer.

http://www.reddit.com/r/toronto/comments/27t4cl/the_decline_your_vote_campaign_was_invented_by/

[blake 3:17]

The debates on the Left have been crazy here, but mostly pretty interesting and informed.

Had a freak out yesterday when I learnt I was on the Hudak chopping block -- my 18k a year is definitely in fat cat middle management zone -- fucker.

[The Intransigent Faction]

While I was biking home today, I ran into a couple putting up some "None of the Above" signs. There are several scattered around the riding (and it's a big one). :)

[The Intransigent Faction]

This is pretty cool: http://www.cbc.ca/pointsnorth/episodes/2014/06/09/sudbury-group-calls-for-an-election-boycott/

This guy's even a hell of a lot more well-spoken than Elizabeth Rowley or anyone from the CPC-ML.

[blake 3:17]

--shit Liz Rowley is inarticulate -- The CP had a really good program & totally blew it by bad communication--

Here's a nice video with a union leader focus from an old comrade https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVbYMnMiyfk

[blake 3:17]

& Fred Hahn rocks. So great to have a major union leader who's a socialist, an open fag, a total sweetheart, a militant, a negotiator.

http://raisetherates.ca/

http://cupe.on.ca/d2652/wage-raise-eces-child blah blah who cares, folks here will call me a reformist scum -- I like it better when the ultras pay for my drinks

[voodoojoey]

I'd like to confess right off the back that I'm American, so I can't know too much about Ontarian politics, but I have been following this election closely since the beginning. If I were Ontarian, I would support the anyone-but-Hudak strategic voting or voting for the Greens/other smaller leftist parties. It's bad vs. bad vs. worse in this election, so any choice will be really hard to swallow, but a Hudak government is the worst-case scenario.

[blake 3:17]

We got partial to a best case -- a Liberal majority -- so weird to say as a revolutionary. But the ultra right Conservatives were beat bad, and the right opportunist NDP got a knock. And the coalition is over.

On with the class war!

[The Intransigent Faction]

Hooray! More scandals and corporate handouts!

[Lynx]

*bump*

[Lord Testicles]

You have it the wrong way around, Brad. Staying at home legitimizes the electoral system, because "if you don't vote, you shouldn't complain."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/canada-politics/ontario-voters-vote-count-choice-none-above-162236628.html

I'm pretty sure it's "if you vote, you have no right to complain."

http://youtu.be/qxsQ7jJJcEA?t=2m2s