Not Gone Yet?

Not yet; not until the next election, and that won't be soon enough.  Neither for Ontarians, nor, evidently, the Liberal Party of Canada.  No, you just don't get it; Ontario wants to be rid of Dalton McGuinty, the almost-extinct Liberal Party of Canada wants to bring him aboard as their last-ditch hope for salvation; they don't even realize they're behaving like lemmings.

Just think of everything this man has done for Ontario.  Apart from bringing in universal daycare by stealth, calling it full-day kindergarten.  If we hiccough back to the beginning, there's the no-additional-taxes promise before election day that resulted in a health surtax, surprise, surprise.  We hardly knew that this was the writing on the wall.

In his triumphal accession to the premiership the man bemoaned the $5-billion deficit the previous Eves government left Ontario with.  In nine years of colossal mismanagement that deficit has gone skyward to $15-billion, and we're the debtors.  On the way to acquiring that unimaginable sum of debt we lost $1-billion on eHealth, another $1-billion on cancelled gas plant contracts and paid out huge sums to departing elite.

Oops, another $1-billion lost on ORNGE.  And Ontario energy users are dinged with losses by the province, over-generated, selling off electricity to foreign users in the U.S. at below-market rates.  We should be so lucky; all those green-energy initiatives, inefficient and costly, are profiting someone, perhaps South Korea which lucked into a deal with McGuinty, but not Ontario energy users.

Balancing the budget has now resulted in the sweetheart deals the McGuinty government managed, to boast of labour peace in our time, going down the drain because teachers and doctors kind of resent having to see their munificent salaries reduced.  Unemployment is rife, manufacturing is down, jobs hard to find and people learning to live frugally but not the entitled with public-union backing.

And now - Queen's Park is silent.  Parliament has been parked in a tight non-operational corner.  The hundred and more bills on the order paper have died an early death, and no business of government is being conducted.  This cop-out is the Premier's gambit to save his legacy; no government to take to task for wrong-doing, tch-tch. 

Comes a time when a man knows what a man's got to do.  Ontario isn't the only game in town.  Having scuppered the provincial Liberals, this skilled politician who has given Ontario the benefit of his wit and wisdom for two majorities and a quarter-time-minority is now prepared to sacrifice himself for the greater good of the entire country. 

He's adored out West; resented in Quebec for barging in on their transfer payments and Ontario voters just may not see their way clear to voting McGuinty leader of a resuscitated federal party anxious to claim the governing throne.  What he's done for the once-great province of Ontario he may attempt to foist on a still-great country.