Ontario is hard done by provincial politicians

Frank Touby —

It’s not a good time for women in top-level politics. At least not in the U.S. and definitely not in Ontario. But let’s look mainly at the government with the most immediate influence over our lives. That is the dollar-mongering regime headed by buck-passing buck-grabbing Premier Kathleen Wynne. If you had any doubt that money rules politics, this crooked for-sale regime blows away any remnant of uncertainty.

It’s all about money: Money to buy more years of power, as in campaign contributions. Money to reward friends and perhaps punish or deride opponents. Money for trips, dinners, you name it. What we have in this misnamed Ontario “Liberal” government is an unabashed display of greed and corruption akin to the church selling indulgences in the Middle Ages. Need to lobby a key member of Wynne’s government?

Why just open your wallet for a few grand and a flesh-touching with the minister will be arranged. “They came, they saw, they paid,” to paraphrase another wicked woman leader, the homicidal war-mongering harridan Hillary Clinton, murderess-by-proxy of the leader of what was Africa’s most advanced nation: Libya. She also murdered—among others—that nation, which has become a killing field and a base for ISIS, which the U.S. created in the 1980s as Mujahedeen to fight the Russians in Afghanistan. Then the U.S. replaced the Russians there.

The Mujahedeen metamorphosed into ISIS-ISIL and Daesh. Back to Ontario and our own villainess who at least isn’t homicidal (we hope). The lady in charge is, like the failed Liberal premier Dalton McGuinty before her, another octave of the man Now Magazine once dubbed on an epic front cover, “Public Enemy No. 1.” Naturally that pertained to all the horrors cursed upon Toronto by the then just-separated-and-skirt-chasing premier Mike Harris.

Mike’s most egregious evil was Amalgamation where our once-glorious city was smashed into a miserable ungovernable pulp with 44 councillors. From a so-called conservative favouring smaller, less government, Harris quickly became an advocate for mega government! That was all part of what the bozo termed his Common Sense Revolution. Common Simpleton’s Revolution is what he handed us.

Don’t spend on the deadbeat citizens; just the elites. (Even his former right-hand man, Guy Giorno, admits Amalgamation is a flop and should be undone. After all, don’t real conservatives believe in less, not more government?) A born-again redneck-style right-winger, “Progressive Conservative” Harris believed that unrestrained private enterprise—with its insatiable lust for profits and unfair advantage—would benefit his conservative credentials. He was right. Ridiculously far right. He sold off Highway 407 to a foreign corporation and wanted to sell off all of Ontario’s electricity systems to private price gougers.

It was a fond hope of Harris that Hydro be able to exploit Ontarians in favour of corporations. Ex-premiers can get cushy board seats on major corporations who’ve benefited from their reigns in office. Harris resigned in disgrace and “Liberal” Dalton McGuinty (who later did likewise) followed the temporary Mike Harris replacement, Ernie Eves. Ontarians next invested their hopes in the provincial Liberals. With a developer-family scion as his top advisor, among McGuinty’s first acts in power was to let a developer build 900 homes on the environmentally sensitive and crucial Oak Ridges Moraine.

While the developer-oriented Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) continues to violate city planning department decisions in favour of big-bucks high-rise builders, McGuinty failed to disband the suspicious agency. Wynne hasn’t done that either. Developers mainly prevail at the OMB which an honourable premier would have shut down long before now. To be realistic, developers have money. Money fuels campaign expenditures. Wynne wants to remain in power and money can usually make that happen. Now it’s catching up with her. Her approval ratings amongst the populace are in the basement and likely never to crawl back up.

Oligarchs love her because they can rent her time and that of her top aides, both elected and appointed. She’s already brought to reality Mike Harris’ dream and sold off a big chunk of Hydro. How about selling highways 401 and 427? And the Gardiner? How about a condo skyscraper above Queens Park? How about selling Toronto Islands? The inventory of our public holdings is huge. All it needs is a greedy premier to stir the pot. Oh. Right. We already have one.