02.06.2012 07:52 AM

The Anti-Ford candidate

Boy oh boy, she’s got guts.

Dunno if she’s going to be successful. But, ladies and gents, we now may well have a solution to the joke that is Mayor Rob Ford.

14 Comments

  1. James Bow says:

    Here’s my take on the matter at hand: why a subway-surface LRT on Eglinton is better than the all-underground Ford plan: http://bowjamesbow.ca/2012/02/05/i-am-not-anti-s.shtml

    What Stintz is doing shows considerable courage and tenacity, but she can’t do this alone. She has to have the backing of a majority of councillors in order to stand up to Ford, and it looks like she’s gaining it. The process of removing her as TTC Chair (which will be the Ford’s likely response) can also be thwarted by a majority of council. This is going to make for an interesting few weeks. Steve Munro has more on this here: http://stevemunro.ca/?p=5981 as well as a constructive critique of the Chong report: http://stevemunro.ca/?p=5971

  2. John says:

    She has the bona fides and did tip her toe in the Mayoral waters before the last muncipal elections before deciding against it. Conservative and Liberal connections. Street cred with the rest of Council.
    Totally plausible to see her make a run in 2014.
    Hell, I’d vote for her if I were a Torontonian!

  3. Mark Francis says:

    It’s what needs doing. Ford’s ‘plan’ is going to cost a mint to service fewer Torontonians with a system requiring far larger than normal subsidies to operate. It ignores East Scarborough and Etobicoke (ironically), and would cost more, take longer to build and do less than Transit City. Ford’s answer to transit seems to be to ignore what he can’t afford to bury, and to solve congestion by adding more cars.

  4. Christian says:

    I’m truly sorry Warren but she will not get my vote.

    While I’m happy to see this happen this entire situation should not have happened in the first place and Stinz is part of the reason it did. As I said in an earlier post she was there during the Miller years when Transit City was developed – specifically because studies showed that subways were unrealistic. As TTC chair she would have had access to all those studies and more. And as one of the veterans on Council she could have marshalled support for Transit City well before it got to this point. As I recall she didn’t say a word when Ford declared Tarnsit City dead and she was parroting the line from the Mayor’s office that cancelling Transit City would not cost the City anything. Now, thatnks (in part) to Stinz’s “go-along-to-get-along” attitude transit development in the City has been set back (again) and Toronto citizens are on the hook for millions. Meanwhil not one foot of LRT track has been laid.

  5. Jim Hayes says:

    I met Karen a while back and much to my pleasant surprise found her to be engaged, articulate and a real Toronto booster. I was a bit thunderstruck when she was originally painted as a Ford supporter. She likes not to rock boats for sure but will stand her ground on matters of principle.

    Stintz for Mayor

    • Ted B says:

      And the mayor needs to be someone who can reach compromise with all of the representatives of Toronto. Each one has a democratic mandate and none of them outrank any other when it comes to the vote, including the mayor.

      Being a bull in a china shop only leaves you with broken glass, cut and bloody feet, and a big clean-up bill.

      It’s dumb to be penny-wise and dollar-foolish.

  6. Dan says:

    What’s amazing is that Stintz was a right-winger. Then Ford came along and made those progressive conservatives look like Che Guevara.

    Transit is a crucial issue in Toronto. I always said that if Ford pulls off his transit vision, he’ll get re-elected, and if he doesn’t, he won’t. But I said that full on expecting that he wouldn’t be able to balance the books.

  7. JenS says:

    Leave it to Doug Ford to be so classy as to use an enema metaphor.

  8. ben burd says:

    This is an exercise in the elites (Crombie, Tory, high Libs) regaining control of the agenda. Stinz is a compliant tory not an out of control fat bastard. Same power but different style

    • Ted B says:

      Don’t think Crombie or Stinz or Tory inherited millions of dollars or a Muskoka cottage like the Ford brothers.

      Suggesting sensible, practical, affordable, live within your budget things does not make Stinz any part of the elite. It makes her much closer to the mainstream in fact.

  9. Neil says:

    I agree with Christian. There are no guts on display here.

    She was a Ford loyalist until the day before yesterday. Now that the wheels are falling off the Ford bandwagon (i.e. two weeks after Council adopted all those Colle-sponsored budget amendments), she’s jumping off it.

    Classic finger-to-the-wind leadership.

  10. Realist says:

    I’m all for her running. She’ll split the right-wing vote with Ford and allow Adam Vaughan to sail through.

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