ONT NDP Leader Andrea Horwath will become Premier of Ontario 2

It was a level playing field and the NDP won.

Finally.

Horwath dares Wynne to force election over taxes and tolls

NDP won’t support ‘fees that hit middle-class families,’ leader says in hand-delivered letter to premier

Horwath’s letter indicates that her patience is wearing thin with the Liberals.

“Over the last 10 years, your government has asked middle-class families to pay more and more even while reducing taxes for some of Ontario’s wealthiest corporations and planning new tax cuts for the province’s wealthiest individuals,” the New Democrat wrote.

“The government’s current plan for the coming years includes: planned corporate tax cuts; a new corporate tax loophole that will allow Ontario’s wealthiest corporations to write off entertainment and other expenses; and the elimination of the Fairness Tax,” she continued, referring to the surtax the Liberals imposed on the affluent as a condition for the NDP not defeating the government in 2012.

“People feel their concerns are being ignored. They see the tax dollars they send to Queen’s Park wasted on everything from politically motivated gas plant cancellations — at a cost to taxpayers of about $1.1 billion — to million-dollar bonuses for public sector CEOs who get rewarded for failure with golden parachutes.”

Such sabre-rattling is in sharp contrast to her comments in the wake of Thursday’sbyelections when the NDP won Niagara Falls from the Liberals and the Tories retained Thornhill.

“The other two leaders might talk about elections all the time and whether or not they want an election or they don’t. What I’m going to talk about is the priorities of Ontarians,” Horwath said last Friday.

“We’re going to be focused not on election fever like the other two . . . may be. That’s the message from last night.”

Once the two new MPPs are sworn in, the 107-member legislature will have 49 Liberals, including Speaker Dave Levac, 37 Tories, and 21 New Democrats.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/02/18/horwath_dares_wynne_to_for...

First let's get elected.

Ontario election looms as NDP threatens to vote against Liberal budget

NDP says it won't support new taxes, fees; Wynne says she won't play Let's Make a Deal

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-election-looms-as-ndp-thre...

I just read her facebook... CBC reporting isnt faulty this time. She really needs to clarify and stop playing the conservative angle here. This year's budget is too important.

The ONDP isnt exactly polling strongly in Ontario. If it thinks it can pull votes from the tories by taking such an awkward stance on a budget that plans a major reform of a major social program I think its making one hell of a gamble. Wont rededistricting be a bit fairer under a minority gov that we have now?

Pierre C yr wrote:

I just read her facebook... CBC reporting isnt faulty this time. She really needs to clarify and stop playing the conservative angle here. This year's budget is too important.

I predict Wynne will dissolve and call an election on her own and the NDP won't actually have to pull the plug. BTW: The process for the Ontario boundaries to be updated to match the new federal boundaries is likely to take years and its considered a given that the next Ontario election will be fought on existing boundaries even if the election were put off to 2015.

Bravo!

Finally a leader who realizes that if you want to change things you have to first win the election. 

Andrea Horwath remakes NDP in her own image: Cohn

Leader has remade party from a progressive movement to a populist brand, appealing to the middle class ahead of the working class.

http://www.thestar.com/news/queenspark/2014/02/18/andrea_horwath_remakes...

NorthReport wrote:

Bravo!

Finally a leader who realizes that if you want to change things you have to first win the election. 

Andrea Horwath remakes NDP in her own image: Cohn

Leader has remade party from a progressive movement to a populist brand, appealing to the middle class ahead of the working class.

http://www.thestar.com/news/queenspark/2014/02/18/andrea_horwath_remakes...

I'm glad you like Ms. Horvath, but, for the love of Goddess, would you please stop acting like you are the only person here who cares about winning elections? 

Everybody else is interested in getting elected, too.  And neither you NOR Horvath have come up with any uniquely effective strategies.

Besides, the NDP doesn't have to distance itself from social movements, labour and the poor to win.  Most people don't buy into the Thatcherite/Reaganite/Harperite model anymore.

The ONDP is gaining ground and winning byelections because the people of Ontario are rejecting right-wing policies...NOT because Horvath has dissed workers and activists.   It's digusting that you'd gloat about the idea that the ONDP is distancing itself from the left...especially since it goes without saying that an ONDP government elected by doing that couldn't be different than a Liberal or PC government.

Why are you even on this board if you hate most of the people of the Left so much?  What did the Left ever do to you?

What Ken said.

NorthReport wrote:

And why not?

Andrea Horwath’s price for budget support is to dictate its contents

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/02/18/kelly-mcparland-andrea-ho...

Well, if she's taking the side of "the middle class" against labour and the poor, Horvath isn't going to ask for anything to the left of Hudak or even Wynne anyway.  That's what ditching the workers and the poor means...becoming a Harperite.  It means giving up on compassion and solidarity forever.  It means taking the side of the 1% against the 99%.  It means being AGAINST jobs, because "the middle class" doesn't care about jobs anyway, but only about the meaningless concept of "reducing the deficit".

Based on what you've told us, a Horvath budget and a Hudak budget would be identical.

Winning elections does NOT require distancing the ONDP from labour and the poor.   You know that.

And it's going to be impossible for the ONDP to do anything good for workers and the poor if it wins by running against them. 

The ONDP doesn't have to sound just as right-wing as the PC's and the Liberals to win.  The candidate who won in Niagara didn't run on a "unions and the poor are irrelevant losers" platform. 

The way to win elections is to actually make a real case FOR change.  Ontario is moving AWAY from Rob Ford-style right-wing selfishness...it's moving away from beggar-thy-neighbor.  So what does the ONDP have to gain by running a campaign, as you'd like, that tells its core voters to go to hell, that tells activists they aren't welcome and aren't respected, that promises to be as much like the PC's and Liberals as possible?

And how could an ONDP government, elected by running on right-wing populism(and we can assume that, in Ontario, ALL populism is right-wing populism)possibly  do anything that benefits workers and poor people? Tony Blair did things your way, and the workers  and the poor got nothing that mattered.

Why are you being so spiteful, negative, and defeatist?  Why do you assume that the Left can only win by accepting the idea that its most loyal supporters should be denounced and then ignored?  You know perfectly well that people  who hate unions and the poor have NO non-right wing views and wouldn't vote for any party remotely like the ONDP anyway...so why advoctate appeasing the unappeasable?

And really,  why are you so hostile to the left anyway?  If you're to be like this, shouldn't you just join the right and be done with it?  It's not like you could  disagree with Harper or Hudak or Ford on much of anything if you like the idea of cutting the poor and the unions loose.

I'd be reacting with a bit less hostility here if you hadn't posted the link to that right-wing column from Toronto Star and then GLOATED about the idea of the ONDP moving sharply to the right.

BTW, anytime you'd like to offer an actual argument FOR something, rather than just posting taunt links like that one, I think the rest of folks here would be much more likely to engage you in a real discussion.  Willing to consider  that?  Willing to treat the rest of us and our principles with a little respect? We'd all love to see that.

Populism equals Rob Ford.  It's disgusting that you'd want that.

NorthReport wrote:

Yup that's the left for you. Forget about winning elections and all your dreams are pipedreams.

Thanks but no thanks.

Yes, I recall from the BC election threads that you know all about winning elections.

Ken Burch wrote:

The only "power bloc" the ONDP should be fighting against is the 1%.  An ONDP government that disowns labour and the poor and focuses solely on those who see themselves as "aspirational" suburban middle-class isn't going to do anything a Liberal or PC government wouldn't do...and that fact, by itself, would make the election of an ONDP government meaningless.

I wouldn't make those kinds of assumptions about the middle class, or suburbanites for that matter, although I would agree that the term "middle class" is quite meaningless and easily misconstrued. You look at the average debt load in this country, it's around a buck sixty for every dollar earned, and with wages not going up, the stereotype of poor urbanites and comfortable suburbanites no longer holds. With that kind of debt load, poverty is actually growing in the suburbs, and in the US, it's grown to the point of being as much of a problem as urban poverty. There are also structural differences between suburban and urban poverty. For example, in urban areas, poor people can at least walk or take transit to where they need to go, but in the suburbs, a car is necessary unless you have hours and hours on end to spend gonig to work, taking your children to appointments and games, etc. And for someone who claims to understand the minds of the working class, when you are in that kind of debt and pinching pennies, it really doesn't matter where the break comes from, as long as it comes from somewhere. I used to work a low-wage job, and at work I heard much anger over the government's decision to raise the PST. And by the way, you would be actually shocked at the number of low-income earners, and even some on social assistance, who want the government to "get tough" on "welfare cheats." So I don't fault Horwath for taking on some of the populist issues that resonates really well for the PC party and the right wing. My issue is if these positions become an end unto themselves. The real challenge is how to use these issues to tie together a simple, straightforward narrative that effectively challenges the 1% (or to use a phrase from the 2008 election campaign, a narrative that clearly shows how we put the needs of the "kitchen table" ahead of the "boardroom table.")

Well, I did add the term "aspirational", which I believe is the sort of voters Horwath's brand of "populism" is targeted at.

Of course times are hard outside of the cities...but you target the appeal to those in the 'burbs and even in rural areas that are having the trouble...NOT those who see "welfare bums" as somebody else.

As to the transit issue in the 'burbs, you put together a plan to extend mass transit to those areas...you don't do a trivial tax cut that avoids addressing the suburban/rural transport issue and ends up forcing cuts to services the suburban poor need, as well as the urban poor.

What the ONDP should be doing is arguing that most people getting social benefits actually WANT to work and would work if the jobs were there...and then, you create jobs programs, publicly if necessary(and we can assume that it is necessary, because the private sector is universally committed to NOT putting people back to work and nothing will break their commitment)...you don't ENDORSE poorbashing and validate right-wing myths about the "welfare queens" and that sort of shit,  which is what Horwath seems to be stooping to.

And at some point, it has to be about getting a mandate for change...not just cobbling together a majority at Queen's Park by appealing to the LCD.  If you take power by, even in part, bashing the poor, that fact, by itself, makes it impossible to get people out of poverty, because we already know that policies based on Victorian sanctimony about "idlers" commits a government to doing nothing useful to break the culture of poverty...and breaking that culture is something that the poor themselves, as well as the left, have always been committed to doing.  Most poor people, even the long-term poor, never wanted to be in that condition and hardly anyone is actually comfortable simply living off of benefit when they could be doing something else.

What bothers me is that it sounds like Horwath may have actually embraced the Rob Ford/"King of Kensington"/"Archie Bunker" notion that those on the bottom are just "scroungers".

The left needs to campaign on the assumption that most of those it represents are basically good people and want to make something of themselves.  The sort of "populism" that that horrid TorStar link North posted totally rejects that assumption and leads to the ONDP becoming a party of the right...because what other sort of party can you have if you bash the poor and distance yourself from the labour movement?  You can't do that and have a party that still stands for anything at all that's distinguishable from Rob Ford's views. 

It's impossible to put together forward-looking, humanistic, progressive governance by appealing to those who resent people with less than them, or who hate workers who've committed the horrible crime of having union representation.  

That's what set me off...that and the fact that North seems to be gloating about the ONDP taking that horribly dark and reactionary direction, even though he knows that getting elected by appealing to right-wing populism means you have to govern as right-wing populist.  You can't run as Rob Ford and then turn into Tommy Douglas after you get sworn in, for God's sakes.

There have to SOME basic standards of progressive decency...if the ONDP has embraced all the things that TorStar article says it has, than it has none.

Ken Burch wrote:

There's no difference between being "populist" and being a Rob Ford supporter.

Depends if you are using populist in the general sense of the word, or in its historical sense.  Economic populism has been associated with the left for well over a century.  Cultural populism, or the nihilistic populism represented by Ford, is not economic populism.

In Ontario the Bob Rae albatross has been hanging around the NDP neck since the 90s. Finally the NDP has a leader that can move voters away from the memory of that debacle. But no some lefties want to shoot her in the foot, and are right up there with the Toronto Sun in attacking her. Thank goodness Andrea realizes you can not do anything if you don't win the election, and is not paying much attention to the nonsense, and is marching to the beat of her own drummer. NDPers might want to considerto thanking their lucky stars they have a leader like her.

6715

Ken, I get that your response is coloured by North Report's arrogant tone, but I still don't feel as if you've heard and understand anything I said. For one, the firm class lines that political junkies like to draw, the average people don't always see them. So it's not inconceivable that you have people in financial difficulty who both aspire to be in the middle class and think that "welfare bums" are a problem. So are these people suddenly worthy because they are struggling financially, or suddenly unworthy because they don't follow the rigid class boundary system?

I do agree with your examples of public transit and putting people to work, and I've said that Andrea needs to do a better job selling an overall vision. I think you and I agree more than we disagree on this topic.

And North, you are not above having to make an actual argument for your call for the NDP to move sharply to the right.  You HAVE to justify the following assertions:

1)That the NDP can ONLY win by ditching the poor and dissing the unions and the activists;

2)That the NDP can still be a radical party in power, can still be worthy of the support of any left person, or any decent person, can still even be norticeably DIFFERENT from the Austerity Twins(Wynne and Hudak provincially, Harper and Trudeau federally), if it DOES do that.

You've offered no support for either position-all you've offered is snark and insults-plus the false accusation that NDP "doesn't support jobs".

Care to actually engage in the discussion? Care to actually treat the rest of the posters here with at least a LITTLE intellectual respect?  You're mainly sounding like a refugee from The-Artist-Formerly-Known-as-"Freak Dominion" these days.

I am fine with Andrea Horwath trying to reach the middle-class voters.  I am also fine if she wants to do a little ideological shift from the left in toward the left-of-centre so long as she can explain why she wants to move in that direction.  Note: left and left-of-centre can mean different things to different people.  I just only wish she could explain an NDP platform that makes social democracy relevant to middle class voters.  Instead, I am afraid that she is trying to copy some of Hudak's policies which I don't think will work on election night.  If I were a conservative voter, I would likely choose the Conservatives over a pretend NDP Conservative party.  With Horwath trying to present quasi-conservative ideas, I am afraid that she will alienate some of the social democratic voters who are her base.  If she thinks that she can afford to lose some social democratic voters by appealing to a larger group of centrist and conservative voters, I wish her good luck.  I don't think she will be able to do it.

NorthReport wrote:

Andrea has said she will not comment on the minimum wage right now. I think she is just being astute to try and win the election.

She has never ever said she does not want to raise the minimum wage, nor has she ever said she does not care about the poor.

No wonder few debate here any more with the ridiculous personal attacks which only show posters losing the debates.

I wasn't losing the debate.  You weren't actually debating.  You simply posted a right-wing column from the TorStar and acted as if that column somehow proved whatever point you thought you were making.  If you had actually taken a position, and then offered evidence or argument in support OF that position, the response would have been different. 

Instead, you simply acted as if you were above HAVING to debate, or even having to explain what your point was. 

Next time, treat the discussion with respect, and don't act as if nobody else cares about winning elections. 

We ALL want to win elections...it's just that some of us reject the argument that the left or "center-left" can ONLY do that by treating its core supporters as if they are less important than this mythical "middle class" that Horwath obsesses about, or that the left or "center-left" has any reason to bother trying to get the votes of people who look down on labour unions, unionized workers, social activists and the poor. 

Put simply, the ONDP can't get the votes of  middle-class"aspirationals", especially the ones who get sanctimonious about "welfare cheats", without abandoning the social justice cause altogether and therefore reducing itself to New Labour Meets Rob Ford(which seems to be the strategy Horwath is embracing). 

No matte what the ONDP does,  It's only going to get the votes of people who feel left out in the cold by "free market" economics...it can't get the votes of "winners", because "winners" will ONLY vote for parties tht tell everybody else to go freeze in the dark in the dead of winger. That's what I'm trying to point out  here.  People who like anything in the post-Mike Harris status quo simply don't HAVE compassion or any sort of humane values.

It's bizarre that you think it helps the ONDP to be seen as turning from being a social movement to a "populist brand"...or that you think that anti-tax "populism" can somehow lead to progressive governance.   It's not possible to put together a progressive program without, at the very least, increasing the fairness tax.  There's no revenue-neutral way to be progressive.  And there's no way to help the poor once you've started attacking people on welfare.  Or to help workers once you've distanced yourself from unions.   If there were, the Liberal government would have managed to do that already.

It's astounding that you think that Bob Rae is hated for having been "too left-wing" or something, Bob Rae isn't hated because his government started out trying to be progressive...he's hated because his government sold out to Bay Street.   Do you think the ONDP needs to be even BIGGER sellouts than Rae was in order to make people forget Rae? How would being to Rae's right help the party at all? How does not being seen as a party that defends the poor help at all?  It appears, North, as if you assume that Ontario has gone permanently right-of-center and that all an ONDP government can even try to do is to simply be less nasty in imposing the beastliness.  Do you really feel THAT defeatist about what an ONDP government can do?

And do you really feel that hostile to those who stand up for the powerless?  If so, why?  What did they ever do to you?

Skinny Dipper wrote:

I am fine with Andrea Horwath trying to reach the middle-class voters.  I am also fine if she wants to do a little ideological shift from the left in toward the left-of-centre so long as she can explain why she wants to move in that direction.  Note: left and left-of-centre can mean different things to different people.  I just only wish she could explain an NDP platform that makes social democracy relevant to middle class voters.  Instead, I am afraid that she is trying to copy some of Hudak's policies which I don't think will work on election night.  If I were a conservative voter, I would likely choose the Conservatives over a pretend NDP Conservative party.  With Horwath trying to present quasi-conservative ideas, I am afraid that she will alienate some of the social democratic voters who are her base.  If she thinks that she can afford to lose some social democratic voters by appealing to a larger group of centrist and conservative voters, I wish her good luck.  I don't think she will be able to do it.

Trying to reach middle-class voters isn't the problem.  Many of the people who post here could be considered "middle-class" to at least some degree.  The problem is that Horwath, at least by omission, sounds like she's trying to reach them by sending the tacit message "don't worry...I see workers and the poor as peasant scum too".  She isn't doing the work of making common cause between the middle class on one hand and labour and the poor on the other.  And THAT is why I made the comparison with Rob Ford and his toxic form of "populism".

The real way to win elections is to do the hard educational work of showing the majority of the electorate that they have common interests and should unite...NOT by sounding like you're ditching one faction of the majority in favor of another, OR by sounding like you're just as committed to preserving the existing social order as the Liberals and PC's are.

Horwath SHOULD be working to make the case that continued poverty,  urban, suburban AND rural, hurts the middle-class by increasing their taxes and decreasing the ultimate quality of their lives.   She should work to push for breaking the poverty culture by making it easier for the poor throughout Ontario to find work(even if this means public investment) to get to that work(through expanded public transit, which would also create more jobs)and by greater funding for education in order to increase both the choices for the poor and the working class and the options in life for the children of the middle-class.  THAT would be a worthwhile "populist" program...whereas reductions in auto insurance premiums mainly benefit people who are already "winning" in the current system...people who would automatically be biased against voting for the ONDP no matter what.

Unionist wrote:

Quote:

It is surreal watching the Liberals position themselves to the left of the NDP in the debates at Queens Park.

This is not my grandchildren's NDP. I hope.

We have actually been down this road before...it reminds me of November 2005 when Paul Martin after ten years of rightwing pro-business policies suddenly faced a non-confidence vote thanks to his party embezzling hundreds of millions of dollars - and suddenly he made this 180 degree shift and in the greatest conversion since Saul on the road to Damascus becem this overnight champion of all the things he had spent his entire political career opposing - child care, climate change, money for aboriginals etc...Its always a sign of extreme desparation on the part of Liberals when they suddenly start sounding like they are trying to outflank the NDP on the left and its always totally insincere.  

Unionist wrote:

Now someone has sent a letter to Andrea Horwath:

Good letter, but he would have made his point much stronger if he mentioned that Gary Doer, the model everybody thinks the NDP should emulate, actually defended regular increases to the minimum wage whenever he was asked.

Unionist wrote:

Stockholm, I think the comment wasn't intended to suggest that the Liberals have suddenly converted. It's rather a sad comment on where the ONDP is heading.

 I have to agree with Unionist.  I think that with Hudak mounting a far right campaign, the Liberals will appear to become the default anti-Hudak party.  If Andrea Horwath ends up placing the ONDP between the Liberals and Conservatives, people will vote for the clear alternative against the Conservatives.  That alternative will be the Liberals.  It doesn't mean that if Kathleen Wynne maintains her position as premier that she will run the province like a social democrat.  She may turn hard right if the Liberals get a majority.