Random Access

There are Thanksgiving leftovers and then there are election leftovers.
Too bad there isn’t any cranberry sauce to go with the election bits still left on the plate.

Is there any riding in Ontario, or Canada, that is more Liberal-friendly than Mississauga East-Cooksville? Doesn’t seem like it.
Peter Fonseca collected 59 per cent of the vote and finished 13,520 votes ahead of Conservative Zoran Churchin, who was a relatively strong candidate. Fonseca’s margin of victory was almost as large as the total of the votes cast for all of the other candidates — put together, which was 15,488.
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The Green Party made major local gains this time around, as in about five per cent per riding. Just think how they might have done if they had actually launched a campaign.
In most cases, Green candidates just put their name on the ballot and set up a website. Since the party has virtually no money, it doesn’t really canvas or run campaigns on the ground.
When Harinder Takhar, David Brown and Shaila Kibria were busy pulling the vote from their campaign offices in Mississauga-Erindale on election day, the very personable Green candidate, Rich Pietro, was at work. He got a very respectable 7.8 per cent of the vote.
The Greens are also being significantly helped by the higher profile of the federal party since Elizabeth May became leader. Under federal rules, in contrast to the provincial ones, the Greens actually get their hands on some cash to work with in Ottawa.
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MMP now stands for Mighty Mighty Passé. People did not understand it. Tory candidate David Brown said voters at the door wanted the 30-second version of the system, which was impossible to deliver.
That was the whole problem. Anything that takes 10 minutes to explain is far too complicated for most people. Maybe we better work on getting people to the polls before we start asking them to answer a simple yes or no to such a complex system.
Most people probably voted no because they did not have enough information on which to base their decision, not because they are opposed in principle. The yes forces better start a public education program now, if they want people to support them if the issue somehow manages to make it onto the ballot again in 2011.
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Finally, back to good old Mississauga South, where the most of the action was. One disgruntled Tory, an Effie Triantafilopoulos supporter, described her pain to me today in choosing between the enemy within, Tim Peterson, and the enemy without, Charles Sousa.
Even though she did everything possible to express her consternation at John Tory for hijacking the local nomination process and attended the faux “nomination” meeting where the party made Peterson the official candidate with an announcement from the podium, this long-time Tory ended up voting the party line.
“Some people said I should decline the ballot and some said I should vote Liberal, but after I mulled it over, I couldn’t do it. I am a Progressive Conservative. I held my nose and voted for Peterson.”
In a post-election e-mail to party President Blair McCreadie, who infuriated local Tories at the nomination with his mocking of their rhythmic clapping for Trintafilopoulos, the Tory tried to get the last word.
“I told him that I hate people who say ‘I told you so,’” she said, “but today I’m a proud member of that group.”