Listened to a bit of the interview of NDP mayoral candidate Jennifer Keesmaat this morning on John Moore’s indispensable radio program. She said she favours a Toronto sales tax.
I was pretty surprised by that, until a loyal reader reminded me that – for the candidate with a plan to have no plan – that’s always been part of the plan, here:
“I don’t really care” how to pay for stuff.
Not sure many folks would agree with that. Or could.
So, John Tory. That’s him a year ago at our place, for the Festival of Joy. It’s a year later, and I’ve decided I am going to support him, and vote for him, and (if he wants me) volunteer for him.
There’s ten reasons for that.
And it’s why I’m supporting the guy again. And it’s why you should too.
That was the frame in the epic 1992 Clinton vs. Bush matchup.
I talked to James Carville about it for my book The War Room. Snippet here:
In 1992, the strategy Carville designed for Bill Clinton was the same from the start of the primaries to voting day in the general election for president. Clinton was the candidate of change — the new ideas Democrat who would fix the economy. It was always the same strategy, the same plan, from beginning to end.
“Our staff, however, was frequently distracted,” Carville admits. So he put up a famous sign on the war room wall in Little Rock. Here’s what it said:
Change Versus More of the Same
It’s the Economy, Stupid
And Don’t Forget Health Care
Change, as James Carville recalls, was the message. Positioning Bill Clinton as the agent of change was the strategy. The message was heard; the strategy was a winner.
So.
Abacus is out this morning with this.
So almost 60 per cent of Canadians want a change – which means, per the cliché, if an election were held today, Justin Trudeau would be toast. Abacus decided to probe deeper about how truly committed these folks are to “change.” here’s what they found:
When asked if the government could do anything to change their mind, 14% (or 8% of the population overall) said “yes, for sure” while another 33% (19% of the population overall) said “there could be”. In other words, the number of “hard change” voters is about 30% in total.
Among voters who say they are inclined to vote for a change but could be persuaded to vote to re-elect, 30% voted Liberal in 2015, only 15% would today. 35% voted CPC – 41% would today. 26% voted NDP – 29% would today.
We asked people to tell us which of several potential factors had been contributing to their desire to change the government next year. Overall, fiscal and tax issues rank high in importance as do immigration and refugees issues and the PM’s trip to India.
They dug even deeper, too. They put together a ranking of why New Democrat-leaners and Conservative-leaners favour change. Here’s what they found.
What’s it all mean, Virginia? It means Trudeau is being squeezed on both flanks, with defined issues. It means that Trudeau’s detractors have identified clear reasons to defeat him. It isn’t just some amorphous desire for change to whatever.
And that India imbroglio? It pissed people off on both sides of the ideological spectrum. It is now, officially, the biggest Prime Ministerial trip-mess since Joe Clark’s ill-fated trip to the Middle East, forty years ago.
Change. When the desire for it takes hold, it’s pretty hard to stop.
After the shock wears off – after it’s replaced by anger and fear and then sorrow – we continuously end up in the same intellectual cul-de-sac: what can we do?
What should we do?
Everyone plays their assigned role, like we are trapped in some grim kabuki play that always, always ends the same way. The gun nuts take to social media, bombarding everyone with all-caps variants on “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” The bigots bleat that “lieberals” and “libtards” are to blame, because they let in Muslims and people whose skin isn’t white – you know, white as a Klansman’s sheet.
And, naturally, Ezra Levant and the winged monkeys at Rebel Media fundraise with it all.
The chiefs of police recite statistics, noting (correctly) that crime is down, insisting (incorrectly) that the police could do more if they simply had bigger budgets. The conservative politicians tweet “thoughts and prayers,” which has become 21st Century code for “I plan to do nothing.” And the liberal politicians wring their hands and pass laws that will also achieve nothing – because there are already nearly eight million firearms in the country. Now.
And, by the by: more than a million of those guns – like the one the killer used the Sunday before last – are already restricted or prohibited. His was stolen in a break-in in Saskatoon a few years back, before it commenced slouching towards Toronto’s Danforth Avenue.
And we in the media? We always play our assigned roles, too. Those on the conservative side of the spectrum shrug, and regurgitate the talking points of the NRA and its foul ilk. They call handgun bans “virtue signalling” symbolism – forgetting, or not knowing, that all of politics is about symbols, and the ceaseless pursuit of virtue.
And those of us in the media who mainly congregate on the left side of the continuum?
Well, let’s talk about how we have handled the slaughter on the Danforth by first admitting something, shall we? We didn’t know Reese Fallon.
Sure, this writer may have met her, once, when Beaches-East York MP Nate Erskine-Smith – who did know her – held an anti-racism event in Toronto’s Beaches neighbourhood. Erskine-Smith had a number of Young Liberal club members there, helping out. Reese was a member of that club. This writer remembers feeling sorry for these young people, because a group of neo-Nazis and white supremacists had shown up and were disrupting the meeting. It was pretty ugly.
So, most of us didn’t know her, and we will (sadly, tragically) never know her. We do know, however, that she was on Toronto’s Danforth Avenue for a birthday celebration with friends. We know that one of her Young Liberal friends was there, too – and young woman who was wounded and taken to hospital.
That’s what we know. That’s all that most of us will ever know – as we go on with our daily lives, and as Reese Fallon’s lovely face fades into what Ralph Waldo Emerson called “the Eternal Fact.” As she slips into some press clippings and our collective memory, joining the legions of others who were slain by a madman – because they are almost always men, aren’t they? – carrying a gun in their hands, like some black snake spitting death.
Here, too, something else we know, or should know: it was appalling, and wrong, for CBC Radio in Toronto to devote a lot of time, two scant mornings after Reese Fallon was slain, to the killer. In one part, they had what sounded like a professional actor breathlessly read the letter his family sent out – the letter that had been written by a professional spin doctor, and not the family.
In another part, they had a youth worker who knew the killer come on, and he genially related how the killer had “a million-dollar smile” and how he was “humble and reserved.” It went on and on and on like that, for a long time, on CBC Radio.
This writer doesn’t know if any those things are true, either. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. Most of us, however, don’t usually associate having “a million-dollar smile” with people who slaughter children on a city street.
In the end, as the blood-soaked kabuki play goes on and on, what we do know is this: it isn’t just politicians and the chiefs of police who have a role to play. They aren’t the only ones with a responsibility to prevent other Reese Fallons from being executed on the next available hot Summer night, simply because they were in the clichéd wrong place at the wrong time. Those of us in the dwindling ranks of the media have a role to play, too.
And that role does not include treating the killer with more deference than the killer’s victims.
Before they – two innocent children, for the love of God – are even in the ground.
From next week’s Hill Times column:
Everyone plays their assigned role, like we are trapped in some grim kabuki play that always, always ends the same way. The gun nuts take to social media, bombarding everyone with all-caps variants on “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” The bigots bleat that “lieberals” and “libtards” are to blame, because they let in Muslims and people whose skin isn’t white – you know, white as a Klansman’s sheet.
And, naturally, Ezra Levant and the winged monkeys at Rebel Media fundraise with it all.
The chiefs of police recite statistics, noting (correctly) that crime is down, insisting (incorrectly) that the police could do more if they simply had bigger budgets. The conservative politicians tweet “thoughts and prayers,” which has become 21st Century code for “I plan to do nothing.” And the liberal politicians wring their hands and pass laws that will also achieve nothing – because there are already nearly eight million firearms in the country. Now.
And, by the by: more than a million of those guns – like the one the killer used the Sunday before last – are already restricted or prohibited. His was stolen in a break-in in Saskatoon a few years back, before it commenced slouching towards Toronto’s Danforth Avenue.
And we in the media? We always play our assigned roles, too. Those on the conservative side of the spectrum shrug, and regurgitate the talking points of the NRA and its foul ilk. They call handgun bans “virtue signalling” symbolism – forgetting, or not knowing, that all of politics is about symbols, and the ceaseless pursuit of virtue.
I didn’t know Reese Fallon.
I may have met her, once, when Beaches-East York MP Nate Erskine-Smith – who did know her – held an anti-racism event in our neighbourhood. Nate had a number of Young Liberal club members there, helping out. Reese was a member of that club. I remember feeling sorry for these young people, because a group of neo-Nazis and white supremacists had shown up and were disrupting the meeting. It was pretty ugly.
So, I didn’t know her. I do know, however, that she is still being mourned – she isn’t even in the ground, yet – after she was murdered on Toronto’s Danforth Avenue Sunday night. She was there for a birthday celebration with friends. One of her friends was wounded and taken to hospital, too. That’s what I know. That’s all that most of us know.
Here, too, something else I know: it was appalling, and wrong, for CBC Radio to devote a lot of time, this morning, to the killer. In one part, they had what sounded like a professional actor breathlessly read the letter his family sent out. In another part, they had a youth worker who knew the killer come on, and he related how the killer had “a million-dollar smile” and was “humble and reserved.” It went on and on and on like that, for a long time, on CBC Radio.
I don’t know if any those things are true, either. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. Personally, I don’t usually associate having “a million-dollar smile” with people who slaughter children on a city street.
What I do know is this: it isn’t just governments that have a role to play in preventing other Reese Fallons from being executed one night. The media has a role to play, too.
And that role does not include treating the killer with more deference than the killer’s victims.
Before they – innocent children – are even in the ground.
Maximum Rock’n’Roll is the premier punk rock magazine, and has been for decades. It is the punk rock non plus ultra.
And MRR has reviewed the first Hot Nasties record in decades – calling it “less abrasive” and “poppier” and even says it recalls Joe Strummer’s 101ers! Wow!
Here’s their take:
And here’s the video for the lead tune – now available on Ugly Pop Records!
Just ten clams. Nineteen and over. Open until 4 a.m.
Steve Paikin is a nicer guy than me. As seen here, he is urging people to forgive Kathleen Wynne’s disappearance from the legislature.
I am not so forgiving.
The Ontario Liberal Party was my political home. I was proud to run its winning war rooms in 2003, 2007 and 2011, and to serve under Dalton McGuinty and Don Guy. I was equally proud to work with great people like Chris Morley, Laura Miller and Brendan McGuinty.
Kathleen Wynne – and her Wizard and her Board, the ones who pushed out dissenters and made themselves a fortune in contracts from both the party and the government – have destroyed the Ontario Liberal Party, perhaps for good.
This is Kathleen Wynne’s legacy:
• The loss of party status, and all that goes with that.
• A double-digit debt, one that will be impossible to pay off for years to come.
• The worst election performance in Ontario political history.
• A party that is reviled and despised, and with no sense of what it stands for anymore.
When the microphones and cameras were pointed her way, Kathleen Wynne was charming and exuded warmth. When they weren’t, Kathleen Wynne was just another politician: a ruthless operator, one who was willing to say and do anything to hold onto power. One who believed it was all about her.
To my friend Steve Paikin, then, I respectfully dissent. I say, instead, that this is all that Kathleen Wynne and her loathsome wrecking crew are owed:
Nothing.
When we have all been reduced once again to ashes – when the web site you now peer at is reduced to digital dust – thinkers will think, as thinkers do: how did Donald Trump win?
Because, you know, he did.
Donald Trump won. He beat us all. He has dominated the politics of this era like no other, standing astride it like a Cheeto-coloured colossus.
As I type this, there are 24 news stories on the main page of CNN’s web site. Fourteen of them are about Trump. The New York Times and the Washington Post’s front pages have six news stories each – and in the Times, three are about Trump. The Post, five of the six.
In Britain’s The Times, just two stories – one about their World Cup loss, naturally, but the other is about Trump, coming to have tea with the Queen. In Germany, the verdict in a homicidal neo-Nazi’s trial is ubiquitous – and then there is Donald Trump coverage, above or near every fold. And so on.
How does one define a political “win” in these uncertain, unpleasant times? With a weighty legislative change? Not really – Doug Ford is showing Kathleen Wynne how quickly those can be undone, like the flicking of a light switch.
Is stirring political oratory a win? Not that, either. Barack Obama’s best-ever speeches came when he campaigned for Hillary Clinton and against Donald Trump in late 2016 – but the latter still won, and the former still lost.
Is opposing prejudice and division a win? If only it were so. The forces of hatred, regrettably, are on the march in 2018 around the globe, achieving real power. While the majority of us look on, despairing.
At this point, in this year in this Century, winning is simply defined as sheer dominance. Winning is not just securing power – it is wielding power in such a way that no one else can be heard anymore.
And that is why Donald Trump is the winner: he does not merely dominate the news cycle. He is the news cycle.
A Democrat, of all people, predicted all of this more than 20 years ago. His name is David Shenk, and he wrote a book called Data Smog. It posits that information, once doled out like caviar, is now potatoes – abundant and tasteless. He writes: “At home, at work, and even at play, communication has engulfed our lives. To be human is to traffic in enormous chunks of data,” he writes, adding:
“At a certain level of input the glut becomes a cloud of data smog that no longer adds to our quality of life but instead begins to cultivate stress, confusion, and even ignorance. Information overload crowds out quiet moments and obstructs much-needed contemplation. It leaves us more vulnerable as consumers and less cohesive as a society.”
If you are peering at this opinion column on your phone, you are proof of Shenk’s claim. Every day, every morning, you are bombarded by hundreds of thousands of words and images. So, you do what humans do when they are overwhelmed by data smog: you turn it all off.
The only ones who can break through the data smog are those who are LOUD. Those who are BRASH. Those who SAY OUTRAGEOUS THINGS.
Ipso facto, Donald J. Trump. He does not merely understand Shenk’s data smog theorem – he embodies it.
So what, one may say. Is dominance truly a measure of political success?
Dick Morris, an advisor to both Republican and Democratic presidents, agrees that it is. He even has a phrase to append to it: “managing the dialogue.” If you manage the dialogue, you are winning.
Political debates, for example. A simple way to measure success in a debate is to count the number of debate minutes devoted to your side’s key messages (eg. for a progressive, health or the environment) and not the opposition’s (eg. for a conservative, tax cuts or “getting tough on crime”). You win when your side’s narrative has taken up the greatest number of minutes in any given debate. That’s it.
And that is why Donald Trump is winning: not because of his messages, per se. Not because all of the world has embraced madness, and is tilting towards fascism and nativism.
He is winning because his voice drowns out all others. He is, at any given time, the most-discussed topic on Earth. Because he is LOUD. Because he is BLUNT. Because he KNOWS HOW TO GET YOUR ATTENTION.
For the Democratic Party’s mid-term war room, this means abandoning traditional approaches – scandal-mongering, inappropriate quotes and votes – and dialing the volume up to eleven. It means hitting Trump twice as hard when he hits them even once.
For progressive rivals, like Angela Merkel or Justin Trudeau, all is not lost. If they abandon the progressive’s natural tendency to always observe boundaries and to always be inoffensive – to be colourless, and therefore without passion or values – they can compete with Donald Trump. Trudeau, in particular, is skilled at attracting attention (although, lately, it is the wrong kind of attention).
In the end, however, one immutable truth remains: Donald Trump is the face of this era.
When the rest of us are long gone and forgotten, he will be the one who is remembered.