Hudak's PCs in Conflict of Interest with Role as Official Opposition?

A lot could be said – and is being said – about the Progressive Conservatives response – or rather, non-response – to the budget. The prevailing line of commentary is that Tim Hudak and the PCs failed to “show leadership” by deciding to vote against the budget before even knowing what it contained; and for failing to take part in the budget negotiations that have occurred in the weeks since its release. That they failed to show leadership may be true, but one would be hard pressed to demonstrate that that represents some kind of recent development. No, the essential issue arising from PCs’ conduct in respect of the 2012 budget is not a lack of leadership: it is a dereliction of duty. Read more

[IMAGE] Understanding Ontario's Budget Deficit: Painfully True Humour

Two photos, compared, should tell you almost everything you need to know about what is wrong with government monopolies, and how they contribute to budget deficits.
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Ontario's 2012 Budget: Put-up or Shut-up Time for Tim Hudak's Progressive Conservatives

It is widely regarded as true that, in the lead up to, and during, the most recent Ontario provincial election, Ontario Progressive Conservative Party leader Tim Hudak spent his time telling Ontario voters what the governing Liberals were doing wrong, but came up woefully short on how his PCs would govern differently. That pattern has continued since the October election. In fact, as recently as February 23, 2012, the PC-friendly Toronto Sun published a column by Queens Park columnist Christina Blizzard in which she submitted that Hudak continues to lack “a cohesive strategy for the party that will give them a clear and intelligent message”. Her recommendation to Mr. Hudak:

“Come up with an alternative budget. Set out a clear, coherent document that shows exactly how he’d get the budget back in balance by the target dates set out by Drummond.”

Of course, Mr. Hudak and the PCs did not oblige (though Freedom Party of Ontario did, with its March 21 release of its “2012 Opposition Budget“). Instead, Mr. Hudak opted to submit an OpEd to the National Post, which printed it today: budget day. Those who read it will, I expect, shake their heads in disbelief. In his column, Mr. Hudak continues with the same strategy that allowed him to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory during election 2011: lots of over-played ranting about what the government’s doing wrong, and absolutely nothing in terms of specific proposals to which the public could hold Mr. Hudak and his PCs accountable.

To see what I mean, I’ve broken his submission into individualized paragraphs, and I’ve summarized each paragraph where the paragraph actually talks about things done wrongly, or things that should be (or should have been) done differently. Don’t look for anything like a promise going forward: Mr. Hudak speaks only of what he would have done, looking back over the last several months since the election. However, even where Mr. Hudak speaks of what he and the PCs would have done had they won the election in 2011, notice that Mr. Hudak’s would-haves are hopelessly vague and ambiguous. Read more

University of Toronto Objectivist Society: Shrugging Off Atlas Shrugged?

Early this morning I received from a FaceBook friend an invitation to an “Atlas Shrugged”-themed dinner hosted by the University of Toronto Objectivist Society. The dinner is tonight, and going would involve about three hours of driving. However, I would not be going were the dinner held next door.

The full title of the dinner is: “Atlas Shrugged and Ontario Politics Dinner With MPP Randy Hillier”. Randy Hillier is a member of the Ontario Legislature. He sits as a member of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. The invitation claims he is an “Ayn Rand fan”.

Years ago, Randy Hillier joined the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. He actively sought and obtained that party’s endorsement for his candidacy. The endorsement arguably allowed him to win a seat in the Ontario Legislature.

What is the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario? It is one of the three socialist parties holding seats in Ontario’s Legislature. In fact, it is the mother of Ontario socialism. Read more

Survivor, Colton Cumbie, and the World's Perception of America's Racist Snobbery

It was a disturbing reverberation from the dark attitudes of the early 1960s. On CBS’s long-running show “Survivor”, a contestant by the name of Colton Cumbie stood up at “tribal council” to let us all know that there remains a southern U.S. sub-population of people who think that their genetics and their inherited wealth make them better than those who work hard to pursue their happiness. Read more

Implementing Drummond Report A Mistake

The long-awaited 2012 report of the Commission on the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services (a.k.a. the “Drummond Report”) has been delivered. Ontario’s official opposition, and almost all journalists, are speaking about the report as though it is tough medicine that now must be swallowed if Ontario’s budget is to be balanced in 2017-18. Though the report does finally put to rest the nonsense – nonsense spouted by both Liberals and Progressive Conservatives until now – that Ontario is on course for a balanced budget in 2017-18, the report is not medicine at all. Ontario’s budget cannot be balanced by 2017-18 or any other year by attempting to implement the Drummond Report’s 362 recommendations, even could they all be deciphered and concretized. Consequently, all of the arguments you will hear among PC, Liberal, and NDP MPPs over the coming months – about how and how quickly the report should be implemented, and to what extent – will serve only to ensure that the action needed to solve Ontario’s fiscal woes never gets discussed. Read more

[AUDIO] Multiculturalism, Islam, and Censorship

As a courtesy to those who prefer to listen to audio books, and to the blind, I am happy to provide this audio version of my January 22, 2011 essay Multiculturalism, Islam, and Censorship (formerly titled “Why Lars Hedegaard is Being Tried”):

[TO LISTEN TO THE AUDIO VERSION OF THE ESSAY, CLICK HERE]

Quick Note to Objectivists on Participation in the Electoral Process

A well known Objectivist, and one I greatly admire, recently commented on his facebook fanpage that:

This Repub field and the results from Iowa just prove that it’s still much too early for politics. Lots of educational work still to do…

It was an echo of a comment expressed by Ayn Rand shortly after the failure of the Goldwater campaign in the 1964 presidential election, and that sentiment got a few nods from the fanpage’s presumably Objectivist fans. That is not unexpected: many Objectivists, on the basis of what Rand wrote, and on the basis of what they think she meant by it, routinely state that “it’s too early” for participation in politics, or that “it’s earlier than you think”.

As I see it, Rand did not intend that Objectivists vacate participation in electoral or party politics, and I find it a galling cop-out when Objectivists poo poo any invitation to get involved in electoral politics. The usual response is that now is the time for education, as though education and electoral politics were mutually exclusive exercises, and as though most Objectivists are actually involving themselves in teaching in lieu of political action. The truth, for perhaps 99% of Objectivists, is that they are not involved in either. Too many, in a manner not unlike the libertarians, are in practice just curling up in a ball, navel gazing about ideal societies, re-reading Atlas Shrugged, and moaning “what a pity”. Well, something’s a pity, alright.

When time permits, I intend to write a more detailed piece about what Rand wrote, and what she meant by it, in context. In the interim, I below reproduce my response to the Objectivist gentleman’s recent facebook comment. I’ll just add that his comment was no more qualified or detailed than the quotation of it I make above. Accordingly, I cannot know, from that comment alone, whether or not he was implying that Objectivists should not participate in electoral politics. My response is less a response to his views on the subject, and more a response to those Objectivists who would take his statement to be confirmation that they can and should continue to remain uninvolved in electoral politics. And now, without further ado, my reply: Read more

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