Monday, January 31, 2011

History Repeating Itself

Looks like some people are a little annoyed that PC Party of Ontario brass are talking to Rocco Rossi, the guy who coulda been a contender for mayor of Toronto, about being one of Tim Hudak's candidates.

This sort of thing is great for gossip, and it does put the interesting question out there about exactly what the Liberals have done to keep their people from drifting away.

Anyway, a little perspective is always a good idea.

Here's what one of these annoyed people said some years ago about John Tory, who just happens to be another centrist-y guy who ran for mayor of Toronto, and who ended up being a part of the PC Party, and who afterwards almost ran for mayor again.
“How can John Tory actually claim to be a ‘progressive’ conservative, as he does,” I asked this writer, “when he has allowed a knuckle-dragger like Randy Hillier to be his candidate up near Ottawa? How can he, on the one hand, express moderate disapproval of Hillier before the nomination - and then, just on Saturday, applaud Hillier as he was introduced onstage? How can he - and I am quoting verbatim from the Lanark Landowners Manifesto, here, written by his candidate Hillier - embrace a man who has written this: ‘Using taxpayer’s dollars, our governments support and promote Quebec, Native, Arts, Homosexual, Urban and Multi cultures. However when it comes to the independent, peaceful rural culture in Canada, government support is stifling, suffocating and controlling.’ That’s what John Tory’s candidate, Randy Hillier, wrote!”
I was warming up, a bit, so I kept going: “Shame on John Tory! Shame on him! Shame on him for claiming to be an urban, urbane ‘progressive’ conservative, and then turning around and permitting the candidacy of someone who rails against ‘Quebec, Native, Arts, Homosexual, Urban and Multi cultures’! ”
Oddly enough, this same person later pushed Tory to run for Mayor of Toronto again, despite Tory's association with Hillier, then settled on Rossi, who also lost, and then let loose with an attack quite similar to what he said about Tory some years ago!

When you spin too hard, you end up in the same place where you started.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Federal/Provincial Liberal Slapfight Continues

First we had the Fonseca debacle.

Then we had federal Liberal ads attacking the idea of a corporate tax cut at the same time that provincial Liberal Finance Minister Dwight Duncan defends corporate tax cuts (third paragraph of the article).

NOW we have Dalton and Sandra Pupatello (two Liberal puppets!) calling out the Prime Minister over the U.A.E spat, even though a few weeks ago the U.A.E. was Bob R.A.E.'s pot to stir.

Will Dalton continue to take his eye off the ball and continue this dirt-kicking match with Iggy? We sure hope so!

CSI: Ontario

Frank: Horatio, it looks like Ontarians have been paying $1 billion a year to pay down a $7.8 billion debt which is still somehow as big as it has always been.

Horatio: Well, Frank......I guess DALTON......has....given us a DEBT sentence...



YEAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Saturday, January 22, 2011

Question for Liberals......

I understand you have to defend your sinking Premier to the death, but when he can't even be bothered to maintain the basic Liberal principle of screwing over developers in the name of maintaining government privilege, what's the point?

From the article:

A clearly frustrated legislative Speaker Steve Peters, who’s been fighting the condo project, said the two towers will undermine the grandeur and importance of the provincial parliament building.
 
“I don’t think that we as members of the 39th Parliament want this to be one of our legacies,” Peters said.
 
“It’s a decision that isn’t retractable; it’s not something that a future government can fix down the road.”

Any other Liberals out there get the feeling they're quickly about to become expendable?

Friday, January 21, 2011

This Train's Left The Station....

Barrie MPP Aileen Carroll has decided to head for the hills (or Blue Mountain perhaps?) before becoming Barrie-d under the upcoming Tim Hudak avalanche. As the list of Liberal MPP's deciding to get while the getting's good gets longer and longer, I think it's safe to say that the Ontario Liberals are in full retreat. 

What do you do when you're in full retreat? Why, you grasp at straws, of course. That's why Dalton, terrified that his party will be reduced to a mid town/downtown Toronto rump, has utterly capitulated to Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and allowed the TTC to become an essential service.

A fantastic idea to be sure, but don't be fooled: Dalton had many chances to act on this issue, but he waited until now to make it happen so that he could kiss the considerable behind of Toronto's new Mayor. And to do it, he sent out Charles Sousa, the MPP for Missisauga South (whose political career may be going south in October) who hung onto his seat by a 5000 vote margin in an election where his caucus colleagues dominated everywhere else.

I bet all the Liberal staffers who slogged around T.O. on George Smitherman's mayoral bid are just thrilled to see this craven begging.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Laughter is the Best Medicine....

....but it's always a good idea to run a background check on the person in the white coat before you see him or her. (I should know). And when that doctor is a member of Dalton McGuinty's caucus, well, extra scrutiny is definitely a good idea. :)

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario is quite helpful in this regard. It keeps records of every doctor in the province and makes a note of any disciplinary hearings they've been subject to. (Try it on your doctor!)

Let's take a look at the record of one Dr. Kuldip Kular, MPP for Bramalea-Gore-Malton-Springdale. Oh dear....it seems that back in 1993, this physician forgot his Hippo-critical Oath and pled guilty to a charge of improper prescribing of narcotics. And the best part is, it happened before 1995, so no one can blame Mike Harris for it!

The gory details of the proceedings tell us that he "displayed a serious lack of knowledge, skill or judgment which adversely affected the welfare of a group of patients." Fits in pretty well with the rest of Dalton's crew, doesn't he?

This isn't the only time Dr. Kular has displayed a "lack of knowledge." There's also the time that he fled the scene of a car accident, one in which he hit a pedestrian with his car. He said he didn't know if he actually hit the guy. Riiiight. Couldn't he have tried to be a little more creative and said it was a doctor-assisted suicide that didn't work?

Let's hope Dr. Kular will be back to doing surgery on trees after the next election. I can just imagine the following dialogue between McGuinty and Kular:

Kular: Mr. Premier, your government has only 9 months to live.
McGuinty: But I spent all the money and I can't pay my doctor's bill!
Kular: Great! That means I can give the government another 9 months!

Monday, January 17, 2011

Silently Slipping Out The Back

Over at Camp Dalton, things seem to be very quiet. Dalton seems to be adhering to the strategy of, "If you can't do anything right, don't do anything at all." Besides testing out a speech in which he lamely defends the indefensible.

Every other Liberal in Dalton's mangy militia has good reason to voice concerns, however. That's why so many of them have skedaddled.

Let us enumerate them herein. They pass, leaving in their wake a ruined province:

David Ramsay.

Monique Smith.

Bruce Crozier.

Steve Peters.

Wayne Arthurs.

Peter Fonseca.

Jim Brownell.

Pat Hoy.

Jim Watson.

George Smitherman.

Michael Bryant.

Adieu, adieu. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

FAIL!

Now, when I saw the news on the Toronto Star website that McGuinty's packing it in after 2011, I thought that was pretty good.


Oh, but then.....then I scrolled down underneath the picture on the website....and look what I found.....



Who would have expected such honest journalism from the Toronto Star? :D

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Game Misconduct

In a video that has a whopping 306 viewings as of the writing of this post (one of those being mine, I'm sorry to say) the Premier says in his usual robotic fashion that he thinks Buffalo should be made into an honourary Canadian city.

Maybe then people won't have to travel there anymore for health care they can't get in Ontario.

Let's hope Dalton's video doesn't jinx the juniors. Go Canada Go!

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

New Year, Same Old Liberal Spin

Good tidings to you, BT boys and girls! It's a new year, one in which Dalton will go down for the count.

This year, my resolution is to explode every piece of Liberal BS I come across for the benefit and enjoyment of all. (It's going to be a messy year indeed.)

We've already dealt with the Harris boogeyman and the idea that Deregulation Kills. That's two arrows in the Liberal quiver blunted, but there's another nasty tactic that you just know those Liberals are going to use, and that's because they use it every. single. time. I like to call it "A Conservative Said Something".

This is more annoying to me than the Hidden Agenda, which we'll touch on closer to the election. Hidden Agenda is an implication that there is something we Conservatives want to say or do, but won't say or do.

A Conservative Said Something involves taking something a conservative (ANY conservative, anywhere, anytime) actually did say or do, lamenting how horrible it is, and then implying that ALL conservatives think this way, and if you vote for this conservative or any other conservative, then you are also horrible.
This is the M.O. of The Blogging Tories In Their Own Words.

For those of you who don't know about TBTITOW yet, let me explain: The person or persons running this site pick through the BT blogs, find posts or comments that people are supposed to find horrible and offensive, and post them.

If you don't like a post or comment that I or anyone made, and if that post or comment bothers you, that's fine. But TBTITOW goes farther than that. This is how they introduce the blog:

"According to one its more prolific members, Roy Eappen, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is appreciative of the Blogging Tories’ efforts, and has acknowledging that the group has not only “helped to counter a media that is not very friendly to the party”, but has “helped hold the party’s feet to the fire.”"

So what our friends at TBTITOW are trying to say is the following:

1.This blog is a collection of posts from Blogging Tories that people are supposed to find offensive.
2. Stephen Harper endorsed the Blogging Tories and said they hold the party's feet to the fire. (He "has acknowledging the group", after all. Whatever that means.)
3. Therefore, Stephen Harper endorses the posts that people are supposed to find offensive.
3a. Well, actually, Roy Eappen said that Stephen Harper said the Blogging Tories helps to counter unfriendly media and hold the party's feet to the fire.
4. Therefore, according to someone who isn't even actually Stephen Harper, Stephen Harper endorses the posts that people are supposed to find offensive.
4a. Well, actually, the only part of the sentence above that concretely describes Stephen Harper's feelings about the BTs is that he appreciates their efforts. Everything else is kind of hard to interpret because there is an undisclosed person "has acknowledging" the group, which could be Harper, Eappen, or someone else altogether.
5. Therefore, according to someone who isn't even actually Stephen Harper, Stephen Harper appreciates the efforts of the BTs, and by "appreciating their efforts" it means he, or possibly someone else altogether, actually agrees with all the posts people are supposed to find offensive.

But wait, there's more! It turns out that "the more prominent members [of the Blogging Tories] include Rick Anderson, Keith Beardsley, Monte Solberg, and MPs Maxime Bernier and David Anderson."

Wow! That must mean that if you are on the same blogroll as the people making posts people are supposed to find offensive, you must AGREE with the opinions in the posts people are supposed to find offensive! The title of the blog is, after all, "The Blogging Tories In Their Own Words." It isn't "*Some Of* The Blogging Tories In Their Own Words."

And it goes farther, too! Some posts, like this one, are from blogs which aren't part of the Blogging Tories anymore. But what's that at the bottom of the post in red type? "Moose and Squirrel asked to be removed from the Blogging Tories on November 28, 2010. These words pre-date its removal. "

Get it? These words appeared, and were allowed to stay, on BT for a period of time before the blog was removed! So, even though these particular words, which people are supposed to find offensive, were removed, they were, at one point, endorsed by BT, which means they were endorsed by Stephen Harper and conservatives everywhere, and that all conservatives are horrible people.

Now, why was this blog removed? Was it "too conservative"? If so, that must mean that "real conservatives" aren't welcome on BT. But wait! The blogger asked to be removed. That must mean BT itself isn't "conservative enough!" But wait again! Here's a post that TBTITOW draws attention to where not-very-nice things are said about Red Tories. This post was allowed to stay on BT.....so Red Tories must ALSO be unwelcome on BT....and on and on it goes.

Do you see what TBTITOW is really trying to do? Not only is it trying to turn people who otherwise wouldn't care about what conservatives say, but it is also trying to pit conservatives against each other. Because some conservatives....some BT members, even....might see one of these posts, and go, "Well, um, I don't agree with that..." and then it becomes an issue of what or who is allowed on BT. Pretty soon we're all looking over our shoulders, trying to make sure everything we say is appropriate and doesn't offend anyone.

Now, this sort of silliness isn't confined to anonymous blogs. The Liberal war room's recent attempt to torque the recent nomination challenge in Eastern Ontario into "The Landowners Are Taking Over The PC Party" is more of the same.

You see, "Joe and Jane Frontporch", as they are called by Liberals who like to talk down to people, really don't care about some dramabomb out east. And the Liberals KNOW they don't care. What the Liberals really want is for this to happen....intra-party sniping about who really speaks for the conservative movement, which mushrooms into one wing of the party staying home during election time, which leads to a Liberal win.

A lot of Conservatives, myself included, are wary about what the Liberals are going to do to us with respect to human rights commissions later this year. But what people are overlooking in all of this is that the only reason Liberals want to talk about human rights commissions is not because they actually care about them, or are well informed on the subject. It's because the Liberals know that a) it can be used to try and scare ordinary voters into thinking the wrong things, and b) that it will scare conservatives into trying to avoid the issue or backing down.

If b) happens, then it is a lot more likely that a) will happen.

These are Liberals. They don't really care about the people they say they care about. How do we know this? Because the Premier who styles himself as the only thing protecting Ontarians from the forces of darkness out in Eastern Ontario sat idly by and let his civil servants access "militancy and extremist" websites.

Now, I don't want to imply that the Premier, his war room, his entire caucus and party, and everyone who has voted or may be voting Liberal agrees with the stuff these civil servants were checking out while they were supposed to be working. I'm just saying that stereotyping is a bad idea and that Liberals will be called out on their misleading spin by yours truly throughout 2011. :)

Oh, and, um, since TBTITOW will no doubt be looking at this blog, I recommend that they fix the grammar error in their sidebar that I pointed out in this post. That thing is truly offensive.