Dirty Pool Loses
Marilyn Churley's attacks on Bob Hunter were sick and desperate, and they were an abuse of the public trust - the attack was evil, and the voters should have turned on her for being such an ass.
The posse of privileged party operatives trying to run-down Cheri DiNovo were just as sick and motivated by malicious ambition. Wrong is wrong, and these guys were all wrong. Parkdale-High Park was a bit too smart for their kiddie games.
My personal volunteer time for Cheri DiNovo is dedicated to environmentalist Bob Hunter - who in a better world would have beat Churley's sick ass.
I normally work for the Election, this was a big change for me. Random things:
- there is an unusually high ratio of transsexuals in Parkdale, and I met a lot more of them today.
- the Liberal scrutineer at my poll and I got along really famously, we had a fantastic time together.
- our supervising DRO said there were very few Arabic voters because they were "planning the next terrorist attack"
- again, why even HAVE a by-election? Why not just keep Kennedy as a non-Minister MPP?
- I refused to clap for Hampton or Nash at the victory party, and left before DiNovo arrived. Would've cheered for her, though.
- everyone thought I was lying about my middle name, and I had no ID.
- not one of the Liberal staffers (8) I hung out with had ever heard of even the BIGGEST Liberal bloggers.
- one ballot was spoiled to say, "I would have voted Liberal but not after your shitty campaign".
- again, why Watson, when there are so many terrific alternatives for the Liberals?
- Gerard Kennedy, we miss you, big guy. Maybe you're next for Premier, who knows.
- what is "the Freedom Party"? People kept asking me - I don't know. :(
- you can take it from me on the scene - the negative campaign played a factor. Watson could have carried it, I believe.
Well, back to real life.
The posse of privileged party operatives trying to run-down Cheri DiNovo were just as sick and motivated by malicious ambition. Wrong is wrong, and these guys were all wrong. Parkdale-High Park was a bit too smart for their kiddie games.
My personal volunteer time for Cheri DiNovo is dedicated to environmentalist Bob Hunter - who in a better world would have beat Churley's sick ass.
I normally work for the Election, this was a big change for me. Random things:
- there is an unusually high ratio of transsexuals in Parkdale, and I met a lot more of them today.
- the Liberal scrutineer at my poll and I got along really famously, we had a fantastic time together.
- our supervising DRO said there were very few Arabic voters because they were "planning the next terrorist attack"
- again, why even HAVE a by-election? Why not just keep Kennedy as a non-Minister MPP?
- I refused to clap for Hampton or Nash at the victory party, and left before DiNovo arrived. Would've cheered for her, though.
- everyone thought I was lying about my middle name, and I had no ID.
- not one of the Liberal staffers (8) I hung out with had ever heard of even the BIGGEST Liberal bloggers.
- one ballot was spoiled to say, "I would have voted Liberal but not after your shitty campaign".
- again, why Watson, when there are so many terrific alternatives for the Liberals?
- Gerard Kennedy, we miss you, big guy. Maybe you're next for Premier, who knows.
- what is "the Freedom Party"? People kept asking me - I don't know. :(
- you can take it from me on the scene - the negative campaign played a factor. Watson could have carried it, I believe.
Well, back to real life.
posted by Jacques Beau Vert at 7:26 PM
16 Comments:
"there is an unusually high ratio of transsexuals in Parkdale, and I met a lot more of them today."
Thanks, spat out some perfectly good beer onto my monitor reading that.
Anyways, sounds like a good time, glad your candidate won. And hopefully the Liberals (and politicians and their operatives) learn that smear campaigns only turn voters off.
I wonder if there is a double standard here. Churley's attack on Hunter (and I've only read about it since I didn't live in the province back then) sounds as sleazy as the Liberal attack on DiNovo. Both are dispicable, but that didn't stop NDP voters from electing Churley. Maybe Liberal supporters have higher expectations of their candidates.
That Arab comment is sickening. Actually, there absence from the polls more likely reflects the fact that their are not that many of them in the riding. I checked the demographics of the federal Parkdale-High Park riding when Peggy Nash was making all those comments in support of Hesbollah, thinking she might be trying to appeal to that segment. But it seems Muslims comprise less than 3% of the electorate.
Even though I am not an NDP supporter, I am relieved that decency did prevail in this election. Kudos to Parkdale-High Park voters for that.
I don't know about a double standard. We could just have a smarter riding.
But, Steve, I really think that there's a certain factor here at play: I am NOT an NDPer or OCAP kind of person, but the image of a pack of well-off white guys with law degrees ganging up on a 56 year old woman with a troubled history now made good was really, really poor 'optics', as they say.
Mind you, the NDP lacks "higher expectations" for Hampton and Layton, so - maybe you're onto something.
Anyway, James Bow said what I feel the best: you never know how a "party" will react to surprises, your best shot is trying to grasp how individuals react. Watson had zero integrity, DiNovo and DeJong and Hutcheon all did.
I hope Hutcheon and DeJong all run again next time.
Freedom Party: Essentially, they look like a type of libertarian-ish party.
Don't ask me why they're splitting that valued 1% of the small-l libertarian vote with the big-L Libertarian Party of Ontario, because I haven't a clue. Of course, Canada has two national communist parties, so I guess Ontario can squeeze in a couple of libertarian-type parties!
Anyway, in case anyone's interested, here's their website.
I think the negative campaign did play a big part. When politicians talk about each other they are not talking about the issues or the people and the people get turned off. In this case, the Liberal voters stayed away while the NDP vote was energized by the polls and the attacks.
We could just have a smarter riding.
I don't know about that. We did, after all, just elect an NDP MPP. ;-)
Jason H.,
I found that odd too. The Freedom and Libertarian parties are almost indistinguishable. At the debate I attended, one candidate even said "ditto" after the other candidate answered.
They are missing a big opportunity to solidify the libertarian vote by not merging.
Its the same way with the Marxist Leninist and the Communist parties IMHO.
But it could be that the parties have differing ideologies on some minor point that have been trumped up over the years.
Jason, I think that many hard-core supporters of any party have skewed viewpoints of their candidates/leaders. Its the ~30% of the population that bounces back and forth between one party and another that really makes the difference.
In this case, most of that ~30% seems to have swung away from the Liberals and to the NDP. Although it could also be Liberal voters staying home.
I think a BIG part of it was Liberals staying home - the polls were really, really slow - never a line-up.
Prue, that's right!! I thought he joined her attacking Hunter, but yes, you are right - she joined him. Thanks.
Sorry "liberal fortunes" the Liberals have gone limp.
JBG keep up the good work.
http://actsofcitizenship.blogspot.com/
Jason, I was hanging out on Roncie yesterday during the "Not Very Polish" festival and saw Cheri & Peggy walk by the crowds waving. She looked pretty hot, actually. Though a few of us wondered why she was wearing a Liberal Red suit.
A special thanks has to be given the Parkdale Community Legal Services for their work exposing how so to be ex city councillor Sylvia Watson wanted to give away a public beach to private interests and how most of her previous campaign contributions were from Parkdale's worst slum landlords many of whose illegal properties Watson made legal as a lawyer for the city.
Let's hope the clinic does a campaign like their's against the Harris government against McGuinty's Liberals leading up to the October 2007 Ontario provincial election.
They have already been attacking the Fiberals health tax and new tenant law.
"Though a few of us wondered why she was wearing a Liberal Red suit."
I think it had something to do with displaying solidarity with Polish immigrants, whose homeland flag is red and white.
Yes, we considered that as a possibility, derrida.
I believe the Freedom Party broke with the Libertarians because they did not like the Libertarians' anarchistic leanings. They sound a lot more like Ayn Rand objectivists than the Libertarians do. This may be the point of difference. Call them "Law and Order Libertarians" if you like. :-)
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