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2014 Municipal Election: Toronto Mayoral Race

Rumor on twitter has it that Kouvalis may be ditching Tory's campaign... The million dollar question though is where he might end up.

It would be a big boost for Ford if Kouvalis rejoins Ford's team, though it remains to be seen whether or not their past issues are forgiven and forgotten. Here's hoping that Kouvalis sits this one out.

And then again, Kinsella is behind that tweet so take it with a spoonful of salt if you can.
 
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NorthYorkEd said:
We were led to believe that she would be an impressive candidate, and we simply don't see any evidence of that to date. And for the record, NONE of the candidates have our vote right now.
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Who exactly is this "we" you are talking about?

I haven't heard/read the "white male" comment in context, so I can't fully judge. It does sound like she stuck her foot in her mouth, though.

People should feel good about the prospect of having a mayor who is a woman and/or visible minority. Something is fundamentally wrong with a city as diverse as ours that elects only white men as leaders. That said, Chow cannot actually say "vote for me because I'm not a white man". Just like Obama could never say "vote for me because I'm an African American". There is, however, a big difference between Chow saying something like "I'm a woman, an immigrant, and a visible minority, and I had to struggle all my life in an unequal society go get where I am today", and for Stintz to say "I'm just like you: a home-owning, car-driving soccer mom". The former says something about character, the latter is just about being exclusionary (like when Sarah Palin said that she only cared about the "real Americans in the heartland").
 
Silence&Motion said:
There is, however, a big difference between Chow saying something like "I'm a woman, an immigrant, and a visible minority, and I had to struggle all my life in an unequal society go get where I am today", and for Stintz to say "I'm just like you: a home-owning, car-driving soccer mom". The former says something about character, the latter is just about being exclusionary
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Only if you choose to see them that way. Stintz didn't mean her comments to be exclusionary. They were probably a bit tone-deaf, being as Toronto may have a higher percentage of people who rent, don't own private vehicles and don't live in traditional families, but she was aiming for the broad middle-class with a common platitude. And Chow probably wasn't giving her comments any special emphasis, just answering a question. Both comments were equally harmless and content-free, but gave opposition openings to spin the their intentions. While Toronto would benefit from a strong candidate who isn't the traditional white male, I hope Chow doesn't trade too hard on being a non-white female, especially when she's partly got "where I am today" by being part of a political dynasty. You know, there was what appeared to me to be a strong "non-white, non-male" candidate running in the last election for Pantalone's vacated seat, but the NDP went with the white male instead.
 
Silence&Motion said:
Who exactly is this "we" you are talking about?

I haven't heard/read the "white male" comment in context, so I can't fully judge. It does sound like she stuck her foot in her mouth, though.

People should feel good about the prospect of having a mayor who is a woman and/or visible minority. Something is fundamentally wrong with a city as diverse as ours that elects only white men as leaders. That said, Chow cannot actually say "vote for me because I'm not a white man". Just like Obama could never say "vote for me because I'm an African American". There is, however, a big difference between Chow saying something like "I'm a woman, an immigrant, and a visible minority, and I had to struggle all my life in an unequal society go get where I am today", and for Stintz to say "I'm just like you: a home-owning, car-driving soccer mom". The former says something about character, the latter is just about being exclusionary (like when Sarah Palin said that she only cared about the "real Americans in the heartland").
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To add to what typezed is talking about, Chow can't bank on her status as a "woman, immigrant and visible minority". Even though we live in a majority-minority city, minorities aren't a unified bloc. By making these comments, Chow doesn't come off as representing the 50% of the city that is a woman, 50% of the city that is a visible minority and >50% of the city that emigrated from somewhere else. She comes off as representing the 5.7% of the city that is Chinese and female.

It's unfair that white men are the default option, and people of all ethnicities aren't going to associate John Tory, Rob Ford or David Soknacki with the 12.5% of the city that is a caucasian male (using the term caucasian very loosely), but it's not accurate to think that minorities can be represented by a unified candidate.
 
typezed said:
You know, there was what appeared to me to be a strong "non-white, non-male" candidate running in the last election for Pantalone's vacated seat, but the NDP went with the white male instead.
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Glad to hear I'm not the only one who thought Karen Sun was the better candidate. Despite its stated ideology, the NDP is just another large, institutionalized organization. Like any large organization, it tends to internally reinforce social inequalities. Just ask Amarjeet Kaur Chhabra.

Hipster Duck said:
To add to what typezed is talking about, Chow can't bank on her status as a "woman, immigrant and visible minority". Even though we live in a majority-minority city, minorities aren't a unified bloc. By making these comments, Chow doesn't come off as representing the 50% of the city that is a woman, 50% of the city that is a visible minority and >50% of the city that emigrated from somewhere else. She comes off as representing the 5.7% of the city that is Chinese and female.

It's unfair that white men are the default option, and people of all ethnicities aren't going to associate John Tory, Rob Ford or David Soknacki with the 12.5% of the city that is a caucasian male (using the term caucasian very loosely), but it's not accurate to think that minorities can be represented by a unified candidate.
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I definitely agree that this comment was a mistake. It was divisive and tone-deaf. I'm also not suggesting that Chow could or should attempt to unite the "ethnic" and "woman" vote against the "white male vote". What I'm saying is that having a minority female as mayor would be a refreshing change for our city, and it's not reverse racism to think this way (not that you were suggesting that).
 
What I will find as a refreshing change is a candidate that goes beyond these divisions, be it race or gender, downtown or suburbia, left or right, and aims to work with everyone to achieve the greater good.

For this reason, Chow's decision to think her race and gender as relevant qualifiers for the job, disappoints me. I'm not looking to vote for a Chinese, Women NDPer as mayor, I'm looking to vote for Olivia Chow's vision of Toronto. If OC's vision of my city includes continuing to play up these harmful societal divisions, well she is gradually losing my vote too.
 
WislaHD said:
What I will find as a refreshing change is a candidate that goes beyond these divisions, be it race or gender, downtown or suburbia, left or right, and aims to work with everyone to achieve the greater good.

For this reason, Chow's decision to think her race and gender as relevant qualifiers for the job, disappoints me. I'm not looking to vote for a Chinese, Women NDPer as mayor, I'm looking to vote for Olivia Chow's vision of Toronto. If OC's vision of my city includes continuing to play up these harmful societal divisions, well she is gradually losing my vote too.
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I don't think she was expecting people to decide to vote for her just because she's the female Chinese NDPer that the others aren't. She was responding to a question that came down to 'I hate David Miller and I'm a lazy thinker who assumes you'll be a Miller retread. Tell me why I shouldn't think that'.

She addressed that fairly flippantly at first, then outlined what she would do. To focus on the identity politics part is missing the big picture.
 
the lemur said:
I don't think she was expecting people to decide to vote for her just because she's the female Chinese NDPer that the others aren't. She was responding to a question that came down to 'I hate David Miller and I'm a lazy thinker who assumes you'll be a Miller retread. Tell me why I shouldn't think that'.

She addressed that fairly flippantly at first, then outlined what she would do. To focus on the identity politics part is missing the big picture.
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It seems like she was implicitly trying to say, "I'm a progressive because I understand and identify with the underprivileged in our city. Miller was a progressive because he had a bunch of left-wing professors at Harvard." It makes me cringe. But the fact that the Right has managed to portray Miller as an out-of-touch elitist puts progressives in a very awkward position. Miller was not an out-of-touch elitist. He did more for underprivileged communities than Lastman and Ford combined. But why would Chow or any other left-wing politician waste time trying to defend Miller's legacy? They're essentially forced to distance themselves from Miller the person while adopting many of his policies.
 
http://www.thestar.com/news/city_ha...s_again_in_toronto_mayoral_election_poll.html

Forum Research Poll from Monday April 14
Chow 34%
Ford 27%
Tory 24%
Stinz 6&
Socknacki 4%

The true gap between Chow in first and Tory in third might be closer than the headline numbers suggest. Tory leads among the seniors who are traditionally most likely to vote, Chow among the young people who are traditionally least likely. Pollster Forum Research does not factor turnout patterns into its data-weighting so far from the Oct. 27 voting day.

Ford and Stintz had the lowest approval ratings, 46 per cent, compared with 65 per cent for Tory, 60 per cent for Chow and 47 per cent for Soknacki. In a finding consistent with those of previous polls, 49 per cent of respondents said they would never vote for Ford — almost twice the 25 per cent who said they would never vote for Chow. Only 3 per cent said they would never vote for Tory.
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I found this interesting from the Star article

The results provide more evidence of the loyalty of Ford’s base: 82 per cent of the people who said they will vote for him also said they don’t know who their second preference is.

By contrast, 35 per cent of Chow supporters said Tory is their next-favourite candidate, and only 44 per cent said they don’t know. Chow and Ford were each the second preference of 21 per cent of Tory supporters, while 29 per cent said they don’t know.
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I've also been toying with the notion of the "troll voter", i.e. those who are absolutely ignorant and disinterested in (municipal, at least) politics, to the point where they can't even be bothered to vote, normally--unless it's a Rob Ford type.

Given the normally low turnout in municipal elections, that may well be the case--and even more so w/Ford's "905" support: remember how dismally low turnout is in a lot of the 905, and imagine how it might bump if you put the name "Rob Ford" on the ballot...
 
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