Ontario PC leadership race

George, in the radio market that you and I both inhabit, try listening to 570News any weekday morning. Jeff Allan is clearly a Limbaugh wannabe.

Hillier is clearly a Reformer - his main planks include abolishing human rights commissions and landowners' rights.  Most of that type of constituency he represents isn't exactly NDP territory.  What kind of NDP vote would he take?  Would he appeal to the Gilles Bisson wing of the party?

St. Paul's Progressive wrote:

Hillier is clearly a Reformer - his main planks include abolishing human rights commissions and landowners' rights.  Most of that type of constituency he represents isn't exactly NDP territory.  What kind of NDP vote would he take?  Would he appeal to the Gilles Bisson wing of the party?

That is a clear misunderstanding of how people vote.  The vast majority of voters are a mish-mash of ideological beliefs.  They are able to move from something very left-wing to something very right-wing from one sentenace to the next without batting an eye.  To give up on any segment of voters is foolish and a recipe for forever being mired in thrid place.  What we have to do is talk to voters about OUR issues in a way that matter to them. 

What Hillier is doing is giving bs solutions to real concerns.  Intrusive regulations with the full burden of the costs on the local landowner makes the ground fertile for landowner rights bs.  The averarge person doesn't think about the corporate rights agenda they are actually supporting, but they are responding to the real economic concerns they have.  What does the left talk to those people about as an alternative - nothing yet.  However, there are alternatives like supporting ecological goods and services - but we remain silent.

By the way WTF is the Bisson wing of the party?  That makes no sense.  I saw unionists, urbanintes, northerners and lots of others in his area at convention.

Interestingly, Hillier also mentions his union membership on his website.

He says he is a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW).

"Intrusive regulations with the full burden of the costs on the local landowner makes the ground fertile for landowner rights bs. "

this is the main issue, combined with in-your-face actions in the local area when individual farmers were in trouble with regulation.  farmers like him for the practical support.  there was a bit of time about half a year ago or so when the message seemed to be getting through that 'property rights' were nothing of the kind, that putting those in the constitution would see farmer's rights eliminated. seems like Hillier went back to that rhetoric, probably at behest of his funders.  Scott Reid connected. 

there is awareness of the corporate ag/finance dimension, but where big ag and finance still rule, some farmers play the casino on the side with money gained from bits of land severances, or mini gravel pits, to try to make ends meet.  obviously with the casino crash now there is opportunity to hit back on what will actually happen to farmer's rights if [corporate] property rights are entrenched.  

like say, "you get pittance now for your produce?  wait till property rights are introduced to the constitution, you'll lose your land.  because the big guys now have more property (including control of laws, trade deals, exchanges, global corporations, banks, etc.) and giving their property rights strength will give them the ability to kick you out of yours.  the more property you have under property rights regimes, the more rights you have.  small farmers get eliminated."  something like that kind of line.

On speaking to Gilles, I find he is very keen to stay onside with the local business people, chambers of commerce, etc., and he speaks to the need for economic reform at the international level to maintain opportunity for small-town Ontario. A Guaranteed Income, in fact, doing away with all of the other social support mechanisms.

I wonder if Hillier is a friend of the C of C and small town politicos - a practical, not to say common sense man - as well (their hankering for a spring bear hunt out on the dumps aside).

Quote:

On realistic farm policy, I tend to agree with BA, naturally. The NDP, and most politically-socially aware people, have this now ingrained ideal - it's organic or else. Free range or nothing.

Gosh, not me. Organic is as industrialized as chemicorn and also contributes to monoculture and food miles. Whoever buys organic from California all packaged in hard plastic is doing diddly for the planet. I buy local. Non-chem first, conventional fruit and vegetables second, and never, ever factory meat or dairy. Yes, I want them chickens running free and being chickens. I don't give a crap about efficiency. I'm not eating eggs from chickens deprived of being chickens.

Isn't he going to have to? (Unless it's all just a ruse to get him more widespread exposure for the farm community. And if he does not campaign in the GTA that would be the only conclusion one could draw.)

My niece's family also does the traditional (non-organic) market garden,rounded out with specialty baking and maple syrup (great year) up on the edge of the Shield. And as long as one's skills include carpentry, electrical wiring, welding and auto mechanics, it's a snap as a way of life, eh?

thanks wrote:

- on Hillier, don't know about the CofC, but doubt it,  haven't been closely in touch there for a while, but i do know there are a few local municipal councillors who quietly or openly support his approach.   These councillors are aligned with the sector of macho loudmouths.  There is a struggle currently in this rural area between different sectors, with the 'traditional toughs' having their values manipulated by the gun and ATV industries, etc. it's really unfortunate.  this value-manipulation and it's outcomes in shoddy development planning is being resisted in communities, but it's not always easy to sort out the threads, given the money and marketing channelled to promoting "country-and-western" appalachia.  and this sector does watch american tv directly.

Given all of this, I wonder what Bill Murdoch's future status relative to the provincial Tories might be--after all, pre-Hillier, he was the MPP most identified with that sector.  (Funny how Hillier makes him look good by comparison.)

Ontario Progressive Conservative leadership hopeful Tim Hudak is trailing two of his rivals in the number of people persuaded to join the party, suggesting he is no longer the front-runner in the race, his opponents say.

Mr. Hudak, 41, is competing against three of his colleagues in the Ontario Progressive Conservative caucus to become leader. But to the surprise of many in the party, Frank Klees signed up the most new members by last Thursday's deadline. He was followed by Christine Elliott, Mr. Hudak and Randy Hillier, party insiders say.

Mr. Hudak had been the declared front-runner since the leadership campaign began in March. But party insiders now expect he will be in a three-way race with Mr. Klees and Ms. Elliott. It is widely assumed that Mr. Hillier will be last on the first ballot at the leadership vote on June 27.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090520.wonttory20ar...

From the NDP's point of view, who would be the best person for the PCs to pick as their new leader. I'm of two minds on this.

On the one hand, the conventional wisdom is that its best for the NDP when the Ontario PC leader is at least perceived to be a relatively moderate unscary dare i say "red Tory" type who will not scare people into voting Liberal to stop them. If that is the case, then we should be rooting for Christine Elliott - who despite being married to Flaherty does seem to be a relatively "mainstream" Tory with an image as an urban woman etc... At the same time, if the Tories pick a woman, then it deprives the ONDP of having the only woman leader in the next election. But then again, one of these days, maybe all three parties will be led by women and it will all cease to be an issue.

On the other hand, if Hudak wins, one the one hand he is just the kind of Reform Party type who wants to scrap the Human Rights Commission and who openly waxes nostalgically for the Harris years who would make a lot of people vote Liberal to stop him. OR, he may be such an unsaleable flop as Ontario PC leader that it could give the NDP an opening as the only sane alternative to McGuinty etc...

What do others think?

Its true that Harris won twice and got the same 45% of the vote in each election, but that was then and this is now. People seem to retrospectively view Harris much more negatively than they did when he was in power. There is a reason why provincial Tories like John Tory and even federal Tories like Harper now avoid harris like the plague - because they know that being associated with him now is a vote loser.

Why do you assume Ontarians to be so stupid?

It was the laissez-faire economics, tax deficits and rampant corruption of the neo-cons that landed us in the 'tank' in the first place.

Of course people tend to blame the federal government more than provincial government for economic conditions, so a year from now people may not be able to decide who they are angrier at - the federal Tories or the provincial Liberals. Last time Ontarians were in that pickle, they reacted by electing the NDP in 1990!

"Whatever people thought of Harris's policies, there seemed to be a grudging respect for him as the guy who "did what he said he'd do." Of course, he was also master of the wedge issue and carving out jsut enough of the electorate to win and saying "screw you" to pretty much everyone else."

That's all the old 90s style Karl Rove/Newt Gingrich/Mike Harris strategy. That stuff is all very passe and you only have to look at how dead the GOP is with that brand of politics to know that one way for the Ontario PCs NOT to regain power is by positioning themselves as some sort of canadian version of Rush Limbaugh.

Star Spangled Canadian wrote:

Well, it was in the tank during the Rae days. It climbed out during Harris and now it's back there during the McGuinty era.

That's not true, of course.

Rae was elected because the economy was tanking, because the people of Ontario trusted him not to gut social programs during hard times. And the economic turnaround actually began under Rae's watch, six months before Harris took office - despite the propaganda in the MSM.

WOW!  Can you give me the lottery numbers for say a month from now? 

I don't need like 40 million or anything.  $250,000 from Lottario would be fine.

Lard Tunderin Jeezus wrote:

Rae was elected because the economy was tanking, because the people of Ontario trusted him not to gut social programs during hard times. And the economic turnaround actually began under Rae's watch, six months before Harris took office - despite the propaganda in the MSM.

You may be right, I don't know. But what's important is the perception, the "narrative" that exists in the public mind. And the "narrative" was that Rae screwed up the economy. It wasn't his fault but he took the hit for it. In the States, George Bush Sr. was cruising in the polls then also went down largely because of the economy. And the narrative Harris built for himself was that he "turned Ontario around", brought it out of the recession, created all these jobs, etc. even though the global economy was also booming during that time and Harris was just around to take credit for it.

Oh, I agree with you LTJ. They spun it that way. it's not actually accurate. But what matters is that it stuck and harris won two elections largely as a result.

"The rank-and-file, I'm sure, are probably thinking to themselves that they've tried the moderate, urban, Red Tory path for two elections and got shellacked, whereas say what you will about Harris and the 'common sense revolutionaries' - they won elections."

I think its debatable whether Ernie Eves was a "moderate Red Tory". To most people he was regarded as Harris's hatchet man who had been Finance Minister during the Common Sense Revolution. John Tory lost more than anything else because he promoted a policy on religious school funding that he promoted in order to placate the rightwing of his own party. There was and is a very powerful Christian right lobby in the PC party that wants religious school funding because for all the talk about Muslim and Jewish schools getting money - it was really all about giving money to evangelical Protestant schools. So Tory lost because of a policy foisted upon him by the Flaherty/Harris wing of the party.

...couldn't just teach creationism, I'll presume you meant.

Klees has ties to Charles McVety and has apparently signed up a lot of social conservatives.   

Tim Hudak is leading the race to replace John Tory as leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives.

The 41-year-old former cabinet minister received 3,511 electoral votes on the first count.

That makes him the front-runner, but he still needs 5,174 electoral votes to take the Conservative crown.

Two-time leadership hopeful Frank Klees is nipping at Mr. Hudak's heels with 3,093 electoral votes, while Christine Elliott is third.

Right-wing rookie Randy Hillier finished last and will be dropped from the ballot.

His 1,013 electoral votes will be re-distributed according to his supporters' second choice, but it won't be enough to tip the scales in either Mr. Klees or Mr. Hudak's favour.

That means Ms. Elliott's votes will likely end up deciding who becomes the next leader.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/hudak-leading-ontario-tory-...