moderate

Saturday March 24, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday March 24, 2018

An Election with no Centre

As Doug Ford was declared the new leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, critics and political opponents wasted no time portraying the new party chief as a radical, hard-right conservative who poses a threat to civil liberties and women’s rights.

November 28, 2017

A statement by the Ontario Liberal Party declared that Ford’s win signalled the Tories had “gone back in time to pick the most conservative leader they could find” and by selecting Ford had in part chosen “religious extremism over the rights of women.”

De Clercy noted that during the leadership campaign, there was little ideological distance among the candidates.

Kathy Brock, a political scientist at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., said he has to bring together factions of the party and appeal to a broad base of voters.

“Doug Ford is a very politically astute person,” she said. “It doesn’t mean that he’s not going to say some things that are polarizing, but he also understands the need to build with different communities.”

June 11, 2014

Ford himself recently told CBC News that the party is “always going to be progressive” and “have a big social heart for a lot of social issues.”

Conservative strategist Jason Lietaer says Ford ran a relatively moderate, measured and practical leadership campaign. 

“It certainly wasn’t an ideological campaign other than a strong commitment to fiscal conservatism and low taxes.”

He said the Liberals are just engaging in fear-mongering, and that when voters start paying attention, they will ask themselves if Ford really looks like the “radical right-wing lunatic” his political opponents are making him out to be. (Source: CBC News) 

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Tuesday March 13, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday March 13, 2018

Christine Elliott concedes to Ontario PC Leader Doug Ford

Christine Elliott is conceding defeat to Doug Ford, congratulating the new Ontario Progressive Conservative leader and promising to run for the party in the June provincial election.

Her move brings to an end the extended drama of the party’s tumultuous leadership race, triggered six weeks ago by the sudden resignation of Patrick Brown amid allegations of sexual misconduct.  

Elliott initially disputed the results announced late Saturday, alleging “serious irregularities” in the voting. The party declared Ford the winner by a margin of just one percentage point.

But in a statement issued Sunday night, Elliott struck a conciliatory tone.

“Our team took the last twenty-four hours to review the results of an election that was incredibly close,” she said in the statement. “After completing my review, I am confident in the results. I extend my congratulations to Doug Ford on a hard-fought campaign.”

As CBC News reported first, Elliott initiated a meeting with Ford on Sunday afternoon. The pair met for “several hours,” according to a senior official on the Elliott campaign.

While the official said the campaign team believes they have a good case to dispute the result, the only recourse would be to go to court, and that is not something Elliott or her team want to do with the party facing an election on June 7.  

“Christine is choosing not to challenge this,” said the official. “Christine and the team were unanimous that this was the right way forward. The name of the game is unifying the party.”

“Ontario needs a Progressive Conservative government to finally defeat Kathleen Wynne,” Elliott said in her statement. “I look forward to running as a candidate.” (Source: CBC News) 

 

Friday October 26, 2012

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Friday October 26, 2012

How ‘Moderate Mitt’ might steal this election

Hope and Change offered by Barack Obama and Mitt Romney

What’s welling up in America’s ruling Democrats is not yet a full-throated scream of desperation.

But as Samuel Johnson famously remarked, the prospect of being hanged in a fortnight concentrates the mind wonderfully.

For the most part, Barack Obama’s supporters are still clutching the cloak, woven of equal parts optimism and moral certainty, that they wrapped around themselves four short years ago.

But the fear that their world is falling apart has begun to take hold. As it should.

Four Novembers ago, they were marching, led by the first biracial president-elect, a man who would, by his very appearance and preternaturally calming nature, restore the world’s faith in America and end the hateful, paralyzing polarity into which this country had descended.

I was in Chicago’s Grant Park to watch him accept the nation’s resounding verdict last election night. I count it among those rare moments of history that reporters occasionally get to witness.

Barack Obama fairly glowed with an aura of triumph and generational change, and soon after would promise to preside over a great “healing.”

How, then, did he arrive at the place from which he debated Monday night in the third and last of this election’s televised debates?

Resorting to rehearsed zingers and smallish attacks, as the rather awkward fellow who couldn’t even capture the Republican nomination four years ago sat, taciturn, across the desk, politely deflecting him? (Source: CBC News)