EARLIER THIS WEEK, on CTV news, I predicted that two political parties would be looking for new leaders if the Ontario Liberals prevailed. Election day had yet to expire when Tim Hudak announced he would be stepping down, fulfilling a… Read More ›
Ontario
Essays on the politics, people and current affairs of Ontario.
Ontario Politics’ Franchise Problem
I CAN SUMMON with clarity the celebration of Fall 1990 that inducted the provincial NDP government of Bob Rae. I’d moved to Kingston a month earlier, at the end of August, and like everyone else was shocked to see that… Read More ›
Dr. Depression’s Bitter Elixir Now Available in Ontario
SOME DAYS AGO I spoke to the former Finance Minister and Prime Minister of Canada, Paul Martin, who in 1995 tabled the federal budget balancing Canada’s books. It’s become an established (and easily falsifiable) political cliché that Liberals tax and… Read More ›
When Toddlers Save the World (or — It Was Dr. Mustard, in the Study, with a Lead Argument)
THOSE OF YOU who know me only through these sometimes-prickly writings of mine — which is to say you don’t know me at all — may be surprised by my claim that I’m as a rule a docile and muted… Read More ›
Ontario Under the Harris Government
WHENEVER THE TOPIC turns to politics I am thoughtful of this aphorism, written by H.L. Mencken: “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” So far as I… Read More ›
