(NDP)
The thing about election results is that they are always and by definition victories of experience over hope. Election days on the other hand can seem like an endless spring breeze. Just ask the legions of happy optimistic NDPers that worked the streets of downtown Toronto yesterday. I spent the day biking between the Parkdale-High Park and Davenport where Peggy Nash and Andrew Cash were on their way to wins over Gerard Kennedy and Mario Silva respectively. I chatted at their HQ’s with their respective tall, rail thin, ascetic, bespectacled campaign managers, both named MacKenzie (Dave and Dan). Both were sweet tempered and quietly optimistic (said Dan: “I could be spinning you but I’m not sure I know how”) that their candidates were on the verge of historic victories. Which they were.
But history has a funny way of pissing on an optimist’s parade. Michael Ignatieff’s historic (and in this case it’s not cheery hyperbole) collapse gave the Tories a whacking great majority. As a result Downtown Toronto is reduced to a sort of West Berlin circa 1959. The hordes of suburban Tories and Fordanistas that surround us are, er, suspicious of their brethren. What this could mean for the Pan Am games, the waterfront, affordable housing etc etc etc is an open question.
What it means for progressives in the core is clear. It’s the NDP or bust. In the midst of the Dipper love fest at the Convention centre they didn’t bother to turn up the sound on Ignatieff’s concession (and I promise it wasn’t due to technical difficulties). With Ignatieff gone (why he didn’t go on the night is a mystery as profound as the sphinx) the Grits have four years to figure it out but you’ve got to wonder whether it’ll be possible to reinvent themselves without seeking some sort of arrangement with the NDP.
As I write this I sit at the back of an underground cavern in the basement of the Metro Convention Centre. The Dippers are on the verge of an orgasmic moment of exultation as Jack’s about to speak. The leader of the opposition (wha?) pounds through the usual litany of Dipper concerns. Among them I don’t hear a lot about cities or urbanity; mostly he thanks his supporters and constituents in Danforth. Jack per usual goes on too long, defeating drowsy members of his own tribe. Not that it matters to most of this lot. They’re in heaven.
