As a former Kingston resident – and as a guy whose Mom is still there – I find this poll quite interesting. That is a solid Liberal seat.
If Ontario Liberals want to get re-elected, therefore, they need to cool it on the casino stuff. Big time.
Anticipated question at the next Ontario NDP caucus meeting:
“How do we vote for the Throne Speech or Budget now?
We live interesting times. Or, some people do, anyway.
NDP MP Andrew Cash is in an egregious conflict of interest. There can be no doubt or debate about that:
It doesn’t matter how he voted. He voted. That is not just a perceived conflict of interest, it is a real conflict of interest.
In the past, it is noteworthy that Cash has attacked Rob Ford for “dirty tricks” – which raises an interesting irony. In Ford’s well-documented case of conflict of interest, the amounts of money in issue were much smaller. And, in Ford’s case, the money did not go straight into Ford’s personal bank account. In Cash’s case, tens of thousands did.
When you do a Google scan of Cash’s piety in similar cases – including during the period where he was receiving CBC money while voting on the CBC – his hypocrisy is jaw-dropping. Take a look at this instance of Conservative conflict of interest, which Cash rightly derided as the Conservatives’ “new accountability standard.”
On the face of it, he has violated sections 8, 11, 13, 14, 16 of the Code and possibly more. The Act applies, as well. He must be investigated by the Integrity Commissioner and he must be sanctioned.
If he and his party were in way consistent, of course, Cash would be resigning his seat. That is what they would be demanding if a Conservative or Liberal had committed an offence as serious as this one.
Will he resign? Of course not. Will he do the “right thing”? Of course not.
And on and on the bullshit goes. Of course.
As I write this, I’m at Ted Reeve Arena, the rink in my neighbourhood. My son’s team, the Penguins, is playing Ted Reeve Thunder. If we lose, that’s the end of the season, pretty much.
Sitting here, I’m reminded of this story. It’s been on the minds of lots of coaches, players and parents, this week.
The fact that it involves the Penguins and Ted Reeve teams isn’t the only reason. I’m preoccupied with it because my son, Son One, should be playing tonight. But the doctor won’t let him.
About three weeks ago, at a tournament in London, my son was driven into the boards, hard, by a player who used his knee to do it. My son was carried off the ice and couldn’t walk.
He hasn’t played since. Yesterday, I took him to the doctor, and was told that the damage may be significant. Tomorrow, we’re trying to get him an MRI.
It isn’t how we figured the season would end. Why did it happen to our son, and other sons?
Well, other people have their reasons for the bad stuff that happens in amateur hockey. Us? We attribute lousy refs. In the GTHL, we have an abundance of crummy officials. They’re terrible. They’re the dregs.
Kids will continue to get hurt if we continue to have refs who don’t know what they’re doing. To me, to us, it’s that simple.
The kid who ended my kid’s season didn’t get a penalty. And he did it right in front of a ref.
Want kids to be safer when they play? Get better officials.
Oh, and one other thing: it’s just a game. It isn’t worth kids getting hurt.
UPDATE: We won! Not dead yet!
Son Three at this weekend’s meet, mid-stroke.
He won by going straight, going true, and without making any deals with an opponent swimming in another lane. Without trading anything away, in effect.
He won two medals.
The only reason pitchfork-wielding Canadian taxpayers aren’t charging onto the Hill to string up assorted senators, of course, is this: They’ve seen it all before. It’s an old horror movie and they know how it ends: Badly, for them.
Suggesting that parliamentarians abuse the rules to line their pockets, therefore, isn’t exactly front-page news. Nor is it a uniquely Canadian phenomenon — the current allegations around Canuck senators Pamela Wallin, Mike Duffy, Patrick Brazeau and Mac Harb notwithstanding. It happens everywhere, and it happens all the time.
The Mother of All Expense Account Scandals, we reckon, took place a few years ago, at the Mother of All Parliaments in Britain. Then, dozens of Members of Parliament were caught up in an expense account scandal that makes our honourable members look like mere pikers.
In the Brit scandal, MPs were found to have expensed mortgage payments for mortgages that had been paid off. One expensed nearly $4,000 for a floating duck island for the pond in his garden. Another statesman charged British taxpayers close to $5,000 to clean out his moat.
Another parliamentarian, the “care services” minister, apparently cared quite a bit about his London flat, and expensed about $100,000 to furnish it. A minister of justice, no less, tried to expense a $5,000 flat-screen TV.
Other stuff expensed: Nail polish, panty liners and (my personal favourite) diapers.
Whenever an expense-account scandal happens — and they seemingly happen all the time — they tend to follow a time-worn trajectory. The media go wild, and publish more. The public gets mad, and votes less.
Meanwhile, the politicos always follow the five stages of scandal: Silence, followed by cover up, then denial, followed by acts of contrition, and concluding with resignation. (As in, actual resignations.) All to be followed by born-again religiosity and memoir-writing.
But, for all that, one question remains stubbornly unanswered — why do they do it?
Why do people in high-profile positions spend taxpayer dollars as if it were their own? Don’t they know they will always get caught?
One American psychotherapist, Judith Acosta, tried to answer the question in an essay. She was blunt: Politicians, she says, are sociopaths.
It’s a tempting analysis, but having spent most of my adult life around politicians I am inclined towards a different, admittedly unscientific, assessment.
Politicians are (clearly) goal-driven. They tend to regard the universe as a win-lose proposition. They believe that, upon election or appointment, they have been admitted to another plane of existence, wherein (as Acosta says) the rules do not apply to them so much, or at all.
I’ve also found that they harbour deep resentments. Every day, they meet rich and powerful people who want things from them. Because they work hard, and they don’t have much of a life anymore, they feel — and my heart sank the first time I heard this now-storied phrase — they are entitled to their entitlements. Rules, begone.
That doesn’t make them sociopaths. They are, instead, next-door neighbours.
They see the grass on the other side, they see it is greener, and they want it.
So they go after it, and they don’t give a damn who is paying the bill.
As Daughter One and Son Two tear up the slopes, I write in the insanely overcrowded ski “resort” cafeteria. And I eavesdrop.
Based up the bits and pieces I have overheard, I offer the following:
1. The Ontario PCs have been hiring campaign managers and staff for weeks. They will vote against the Throne Speech and March’s budget. They’ve got a popular party and an unpopular leader. Despite that, they’re getting ready.
2. The Ontario NDP will let the Throne Speech pass, but will probably vote against the budget in March. The government will accordingly fall, and an election will happen, likely in May. The New Democrats have a very popular leader – and a party about which voters are less enthusiastic. They are less ready than the PCs.
3. Under Dalton McGuinty – who gave us Family Day, thank you very much – the Ontario Liberal coalition was mainly voters who supported McGuinty provincially and Harper federally. That’s why McGuinty was always careful never to move too far to the Left. His successor, however, wants to create a new coalition – progressive Liberals and fiscally-minded New Democrats. It’s a laudable goal, but she doesn’t have enough time. McGuinty’s coalition took years to create. You can’t create an entirely new one in a few weeks. Particularly when you’re in government. And particularly when your party has lost most of the central campaign managers who helped you win in 2003, 2007 and 2011.
So, after all that overheard stuff, what are all the Family Day families truly thinking?
They’re presently looking awfully orange, from where I sit.
He’s in lane two. But he comes first with Daddy-o.
Just noticed I now have more than 11,000 “followers” on Twitter.
That’s nice.