…and that’s just some of the nice things I say.  Check it out.

I pull out the Tim Hudak flip-flops. This marks the only occasion when Brian smiles at me.

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OTTAWA — A local Conservative is endorsing the Liberal candidate for the provincial election in Carleton-Mississippi Mills, calling the “narrow-minded” politics of Progressive Conservative candidate Jack MacLaren “the wrong choice for the riding.”

Matt Muirhead ran for city council in 2006 and again in 2010. He is a former executive director of the riding’s provincial Progressive Conservative association and the past president of the riding’s federal Conservative association.

Muirhead said Wednesday that MacLaren’s recent “unnecessary ousting” of 33-year veteran and nine-time cabinet minister Norm Sterling showed “a total lack of class and respect.”

The nomination upset highlighted tensions inside the conservative Caucus. Sterling called fellow MPP Randy Hillier and MacLaren “political opportunists” who “want to use the good name of the Progressive Conservative party to push their very narrow and right-wing agenda into the provincial arena.”

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Custom footwear I developed for my Sun News appearances today. And watch out – I’m even co-hosting a show tomorrow morning!

It got very heated on Lilley’s show – I think I may have called Hudak a “goddamned hypocrite” about this.

Check it out if you dare!

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New immigrants to Ontario must wonder how they suddenly went from being valued Canadians, whose skills our economy needs, to being publicly derided as “foreigners.” On day one of a provincial election campaign, no less…

Hoping for political gain, Hudak is happily stirring up tensions by claiming that unemployed Ontarians will be left behind. His party even rushed out a new campaign ad saying that “Ontarians need not apply” under the Liberal plan…

But the controversy that Hudak is stirring up is not about the substance of particular policies. It’s about wedge politics. On Tuesday he claimed that the tax breaks offered by the Liberals would help companies hire “anybody but you.”

That kind of language divides Ontarians into an “us” and a “them.” Creating divisions between struggling, unemployed workers and newer immigrants is dangerous to our long-term social cohesion. In Toronto, half of us were born outside Canada. There is no us versus them. Theyare us. And the faster we get newcomers into good jobs in the workforce and paying higher taxes the better for us all.

There’s a lot on the line during an election and parties often go a bit overboard to score points on their opponents. Hudak’s rhetoric and the PC party’s “Ontarians need not apply” ad go too far. It amounts to a thinly veiled attack on immigrants.

There may be political advantage to be had in this approach; we’ll find out on Oct. 6. But regardless of the outcome, this is the politics of division. It is angry. It is ugly. And it’s not what Ontarians are about.

 

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Holy Stock Day!  Check this out.

“Hudak won’t say whether he’d crack down on doctors charging illegal user fees

TORONTO (CP) – Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak says he’s committed to a publicly funded and universal health care system, but refused to say today whether he’d crack down on illegal user fees if elected premier.

A doctor in Whitby, Ont., is facing a disciplinary hearing for charging patients a $1,000 annual fee to receive care.

Asked repeatedly whether he would go after doctors who charge user fees, Hudak rattled off a list of platform pledges on health care, such as bringing in more doctors to underserviced areas…

He says he also doesn’t want to see “obstacles” in the way to stop patients from receiving treatment.”

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He told a Globe reporter 36 minutes ago that he has never, ever said “foreign workers” to describe the targets of his race-baiting new policy. To wit:

Ladurantaye: Why do you keep calling immigrants foreign workers?

Hudak: I’m not.

Uh-huh.

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Quote unquote, here:

“Words almost fail. A proposed Liberal tax credit to encourage businesses to give new immigrants a leg up in the Ontario economy “doesn’t fit the values of Ontario families.”

So says nativist/Teabagger Tim Hudak, leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives.

The proposed program would restrict eligibility to new Canadian citizens who have lived in Canada for at least up to five years.

Citizens, geddit?

But to Hudak, these Canadians are “foreign workers.” Not real Canadians. Not real Ontarians.

His minions have cranked out an attack ad entitled “Ontarians Need Not Apply.”

Which Ontarians, Tim? Why are you deliberately leaving out so many of them, perhaps a little duskier in hue than you and your angry yokel base?

That’s not a dogwhistle, old boy. That’s a foghorn.

[H/ts fern hill, Warren Kinsella and Terrence Watson]

UPDATE: Hudak’s rank hypocrisy.”

 

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As I was lined up for another espresso this morn, a citizen said to me: “You know, it’s interesting that, in the same week you guys started running McGuinty front and centre in your ads, the PCs took Hudak out of theirs. Is it because women hate Hudak?”

Me: “Yep.”

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How interesting.

The letter below is out on the wire. Minutes after it became public, a senior Ontario PC operative called me – I won’t say who he/she is – to say that, having read Morley’s letter, they are now ready to play “Let’s Make A Deal.” Quote unquote. He/she sounded unsettled.

So, it looks like they are backing off from the kind of thuggish tactics detailed in the letter below. If so, and if that holds, then we’re prepared to be liberal, as it were, too.

In any event, read the letter. There’s a reason we called Jason the “The Lie-taer.”

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