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2018 Ontario Provincial Election Discussion

Doug Ford accused of buying memberships to help preferred candidate win Tory nomination

Ontario Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford paid for memberships for new Tories —contrary to party rules — and bused them in to help his preferred candidate win the PC nomination in the riding where he lives, say a former top Conservative official and a party member present at the 2016 vote.

The losing contender for the Etobicoke Centre nomination, lawyer Pina Martino, filed a complaint, which included testimony from members recruited by Ford, said the former official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. But the party decided to allow Kinga Surma to remain as the candidate, the source said.

Meanwhile, the Ontario Liberal Party announced Wednesday evening it would release a recording of Ford and Surma Thursday morning which it said would implicate Ford “directly” in a nomination controversy.

If true, the charges would call into question the PC leader’s frequent criticism of controversial nominations held under former leader Patrick Brown, and his mantra that he inherited a “mess” from the party’s previous administration and has been busy cleaning it up.
[...]
The former party official, who wasn’t at the meeting, said the appeals committee decided not to overturn the vote partly because such tactics for recruiting members are widespread, despite rules that say party members must pay their own dues. As well, the party under then-leader Patrick Brown did not want to start a “war” with Ford in a community where he is a political powerhouse.
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I'm just so shocked I tell you, shocked...
 
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Oh man. Pretty much went from a guaranteed victory with Brown, to a slow slide to the absurd with Ford. You bring a greasy loser on board what do you expect. In just a couple weeks a trailing hard-left party has already surpassed the PCs in the polls. Didn't seem possible, and these recent news articles should only tip that further. Granted a Ford base will naturally skew this: 'he cares about the little guy, the elites would never buy our memberships and bus us around'. ' The meeeedia!'.

I'm looking forward to P.Brown's lawsuit. All things considered there likely will be some clear and conspicuous grease prints leading to a couple houses in Etobicoke. Hiding paper trails is probably viewed as one of those elite things.
 
Yet consider that according to Ipsos/Global, the PCs went down 4 vs the NDP going up 2--and even the Libs going up a titch. Maybe the Libs have *already* hit bottom, and henceforth all the leakage will be from the PCs. (Might make sense, given all the dead cat bouncing the incumbent Libs running are poised to do.)

There are still a large amount of undecideds. Those are likely a combination of Liberals who would have been decided at this point but are waiting to see if the NDP really does become the anti-Ford party and Conservatives who don't identify with Ford as their leader and who can't decide what to do.

I'm less panicked than I was just a couple of weeks ago. Voters who want the Liberal era to end but don't see Ford as palatable now have a viable option. I think that the NDP has a lot of room to grow. I wouldn't be surprised to see them hit 40%. I just hope that those numbers are better distributed (not just in cities) and result in taking PC seats. It won't do us any good for the NDP to come out ahead in votes but behind in seats.
 
Is there any chance of the Liberals turning this around? Is there any precedent for a party so low in third place climbing out of the wreckage in two weeks? Is the best that they can hope for a narrow official opposition win?

No way. Maybe if there were a couple of months left in the campaign. Give him enough time and Doug would completely destroy the electability of the PC Party. Wynne would then be free to sell herself as a stable and steady Premier who's been far more competent than news headlines have pictured.

But 2 weeks away, the Liberals are toast. Time for a long walk in the woods. I hope they can choose a charismatic leader and return to governing in a couple of years if the PCs or NDP assemble a minority government. It's either Doug Ford or Andrea Horwath. Take your pick.
 
No way. Maybe if there were a couple of months left in the campaign. Give him enough time and Doug would completely destroy the electability of the PC Party. Wynne would then be free to sell herself as a stable and steady Premier who's been far more competent than news headlines have pictured.

But 2 weeks away, the Liberals are toast. Time for a long walk in the woods. I hope they can choose a charismatic leader and return to governing in a couple of years if the PCs or NDP assemble a minority government. It's either Doug Ford or Andrea Horwath. Take your pick.

It's so odd to see the 'strategic vote,' long the butcher of NDP hopes and dreams, suddenly working in the NDP's favour. Just how far will the 'strategic vote' take them? Will high crust doctors in St. Paul's hold their nose and vote for a Hamilton bread-and-butter populist? Will civic-minded boomers in Cooksville who have never seen an NDP pamphlet at their door, suddenly vote for Team Orange?
 
Hilariously, Hazel McCallion has endprsed both Finance Minister Charles Sousa's re-election and Doug Ford as premier in order to clean up the fiscal mess of the Liberals!
 
Hilariously, Hazel McCallion
Worst planner, or lack of planner city builder in the province. In 1976 when I moved to Mississauga there were green and brown fields everywhere, ripe for a good planner to build a great city. Instead she scraped the landscape of its farmland and replaced it with sprawl. Only now that she's gone can densification take place.
 
Worst planner, or lack of planner city builder in the province. In 1976 when I moved to Mississauga there were green and brown fields everywhere, ripe for a good planner to build a great city. Instead she scraped the landscape of its farmland and replaced it with sprawl. Only now that she's gone can densification take place.

No different from most suburbs of that era - and besides, by moving there you were party to that destruction, no?

AoD
 
No different from most suburbs of that era - and besides, by moving there you were party to that destruction, no?

AoD
Brutal but true.

Back to the delicious suspense of ongoing 'surprises'....

How long have the Libs had this recording? lol....The larger the asshole, the higher they hang by their petard...but the timing to release these things is exquisite. Like placing a bomb in a tunnel, the force if magnified many times. Political Terrorism multiplied by "Do Unto to Others"....

Gee, couldn't happen to a nicer guy...

Now about Elliot's srum on the validity of Ford's 'winning' ridings. What was the deal for her to keep her mouth shut?
 
No different from most suburbs of that era - and besides, by moving there you were party to that destruction, no?

AoD
Worst thing we can do for the planet is be born. From that moment on the best we can do is damage mitigation. Sure I've moved into a fourth-hand semi in a dense neighborhood and try to bikeshare and take transit whenever I can, but like any human I must necessarily consume energy.
 

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