elections

Wednesday September 12, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday September 12, 2018

Local elections getting lost in the sound and fury

Between Doug Ford’s unprecedented antics at Queen’s Park, Donald Trump’s daily bombastic proclamations and NAFTA negotiations, it’s little wonder local elections — in Hamilton and across Ontario — are being drowned out. But it’s time for that to change.

Our municipal governments have more impact on our day-to-day lives than their more senior brethren. Yes, they’re at the bottom of the food chain — as Ford has so brazenly demonstrated — but they deliver front-line services. Our sidewalks and roads, our safe water supply, public transit, recreational centres and parks, waste disposal, libraries, animal control, tax collection — these and a host of other services and costs flow directly from city hall. 

And every four years, we have a chance to pass judgment on the current city council. We can endorse them, collectively or individually. We can change out people we’re not happy with. We can clean house if that’s appropriate (even though we get to vote only for our respective ward councillor, mayor and school trustees).

So while Ford and Trump may be more dramatic (and melodramatic), it behooves us to pay attention to what’s coming up on Monday, Oct. 22. The Spectator has already begun to do that, and we plan to ramp up our coverage beginning this week. 

Bottom line: If you live here, pay taxes, raise kids, retire, and you’re an engaged citizen, these elections matter. Don’t miss the opportunity to get involved in local democracy.(Continued: Hamilton Spectator Editorial) 

 

Thursday August 23, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday August 23, 2018

To impeach or not to impeach? Capitol Hill weighs the question after Cohen plea

Testimony from President Trump’s former longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen on Tuesday that Mr. Trump directed him to violate campaign finance law — claims he made as he pleaded guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations — renewed questions on Capitol Hill about the possibility of impeachment.

Cohen is not the only former Trump associate to be convicted of a crime — former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort was found guilty of financial fraud-related crimes on Tuesday, former national security adviser Mike Flynn is awaiting sentencing, and former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. But Cohen’s allegations point back to the president directly.

A number of Democrats are still being cautious on the possibility of pursuing impeachment. For Republicans, a top GOP aide tells CBS News Correspondent Nancy Cordes, “This is the most uncomfortable Republicans have been” about the president’s actions, but they still don’t plan to take more decisive action than they have in the past.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said impeaching Mr. Trump is “not a priority” for Democrats, telling the Associated Press after the Cohen and Manafort court decisions that “impeachment has to spring from something else.” Pelosi said she prefers that Democrats — if they take the House come November — conduct oversight hearings and let special counsel Robert Mueller do his job.

“I think that everyone is a little cautious about throwing around impeachment” — at least before the midterms, a Democratic strategist told CBS News. But if Democrats get win the House, that could change, the strategist added.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Illinois, said Cohen’s claims are serious and troubling — but it’s “premature” to discuss impeachment, because “more information has to come forward” and it’s “too early in the process to be using these words.”

However,  Durbin warned of a “constitutional crisis” should Mr. Trump attempt to fire Mueller. (Source: CBS News) 

 

Friday, February 20, 2015

Friday, February 20, 2015Editorial cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday, February 20, 2015

Elections Ontario finds ‘apparent contravention’ of Election Act by Liberals

Elections Ontario has found an “apparent contravention” of anti-bribery provisions in its Election Act probe of allegations two Liberal operatives offered a job to a former Grit candidate in the Sudbury byelection.

The case has been turned over to the Ministry of the Attorney General, which must now decide whether to refer the case to police, in what Elections Ontario chief Greg Essensa called “unprecedented circumstances.”

“This provision concerns bribery in connection with inducing a person to become, refrain from becoming, or withdrawing from being a candidate,” he added in a statement.

“No chief electoral officer of Ontario has ever conducted a regulatory investigation into allegations of bribery.”
Timeline: Sudbury byelection

The bombshell revelation fuelled opposition demands Premier Kathleen Wynne fire one of the people in question, her deputy chief of staff Pat Sorbara, and have Sudbury Liberal organizer Gerry Lougheed removed from the city’s police services board, which he chairs.

“Cut these two bad apples loose,” Progressive Conservative House Leader Steve Clark said in a raucous question period in the legislature.

“If you stand with these two, you’re going to fall with these two.”

Wynne defended Sorbara and said “we will let this process unfold.”

“We’ve all just received this information,” said Wynne, adding “this is just the next stage in Elections Ontario’s process.”

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath was aghast at the premier’s response and demanded the case be referred to an independent prosecutor.

“This is a shameful demonstration by a government that will simply not take responsibility for its actions,” she said, noting the OPP is also investigating the deleted emails in the government’s $1.1 billion gas plants scandal and questionable business practices at the ORNGE air ambulance service.

“The people of Ontario deserve better than this.”

Wynne has repeatedly maintained “there were no specific offers” of a job to Andrew Olivier in conversations he taped with Sorbara and Lougheed. (Source: Toronto Star)

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Wednesday, November 5, 2014Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Obama facing lame duck status as America goes to midterm polls

American voters head to the polls on Tuesday looking likely to take out their frustration with Barack Obama on his Democratic allies and hand control of the US Senate to his Republican opponents.

Polls show the American people have soured on their president after six years and are preparing to use today’s congressional midterm elections to give vent to their anger.

In the ten battleground states that will decide control of the Senate, Republicans are leading in seven and a number of Democrat senators are facing the prospect of being turfed out of office.

A Republican victory would give them complete control of Congress and doom Mr Obama to “lame duck” status in his final two years in the White House.

The President, whose poor approval ratings have largely kept him off the campaign trail, made a final appeal to black voters last night to turn out and prevent a Republican surge.

“It will make a difference in the lives of you, your family, and your community,” Mr Obama told an African-American radio station. “You’ve got that responsibility: live up to it.”

Mr Obama will watch the election unfold from the White House on Tuesday night.

Get some lame duck swag here

Get some lame duck swag here

Polls begin closing on the East Coast at 7pm (Midnight GMT) and will soon offer the first indication of what kind of night Democrats can expect.

Strategists in both parties will be closely watching the results in North Carolina and New Hampshire, two states currently held by Democrats and where the President’s party has maintained slim leads.

If either or both states fall to the Republicans it will be taken as a sign that Mr Obama’s party is in real trouble and potentially facing an electoral rout. (Source: Daily Telegraph)

 

SIGHTINGS

MinutemenNews.com

Wednesday June 11, 2014

Wednesday June 11, 2014By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday June 11, 2014

Don’t like ballot choice? ‘None of the Above’ an option for Ontario voters

Ontario voters fed up with the offerings of the mainstream political parties may feel sorely tempted to vote for none of the above come election day — and one party is well placed to capitalize on the sentiment.

Saturday, June 7, 2014Registered for the June 12th election is the None of the Above Party of Ontario — or NOTA — whose main plank is to press for elected politicians not bound by party control along with recall and term limits.

“Almost nobody knows we even exist and as soon as people do, they’re sending emails for lawn signs,” said leader Greg Vezina, a founding candidate for the federal Green party in 1983.

“I’ve only got candidates in eight ridings but I’ve got requests for lawn signs from Thunder Bay to Ottawa.”

Half of voters don’t bother to cast ballots while the other half want something different, said Vezina, who is running west of Toronto.

If voters find him NOTA good choice, they do have plenty of other options among the 20 registered parties.

They include Canadians Choice, Family Coalition and the Ontario Moderate party, along with John Turmel’s Pauper Party of Ontario.

For Turmel, who is in the Guinness World Book of Records for running and losing in more elections than anyone else, this will be the 80th election in which he’s been a candidate.

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“This is my third hat trick,” Turmel said proudly.

“Back in ’80 and ’82, I managed to pull off running in federal, municipal and provincial elections simultaneously.”

If elected premier, Turmel said, his first act would be to decommission nuclear power stations, which he calls the “biggest threat to all our lives.”

Besides adding some spice or even frivolity to the serious business of democracy, fringe parties, which collectively picked up about 54,000 votes in 2011, often press issues the main parties aren’t discussing.

For example, the Equal Parenting Party’s two candidates are adamant changes are needed to reform family law, which they say tends to favour mothers over fathers.

“If you want to divorce and you have children, it will be a 50-50 deal as far as time spent with, and money spent on children goes,” the party says on its website.

“This forces a mother to bargain and gives a father something to bargain with.”

Another party fishing for votes is the Vegan Environmental Party, which bills itself as “the voice for animal rights” with a platform focused on animals, the environment and social justice. (Source: CTV News)