A few random thoughts

Mark Carney has decided not to become involved in politics, at least not right now. This really does not surprise me. He is a man on a mission and if he would have become an elected politician he would have been constrained by that fact. Now he is free to pursue his mission as he sees fit without having to worry about being reelected. The Conservatives should not celebrate his decision too much. He is going to be pushing for action on climate change. He is very intelligent, knowledgeable about how both the political and business world works, extremely credible and considering he lead the Central Banks of two G7 countries he can be considered business friendly. He is going to make it very difficult for conservatives to keep their head in the sand over climate change.

Many conservatives are rightly accused of weaponizing outrage when it suits their purposes but those on the progressive side can do the same. We saw that with the Montreal Canadiens selecting Logan Mailloux at the recent NHL draft and the outrage expressed by many. While what this young man did was reprehensible we need to have a little perspective for the simple reason being that people eventually learn to tune out outrage. Really, if you become outraged about a young man taking and distributing pictures of a young woman without her permission people are likely to dismiss you when you become outraged by someone committing a more egregious act. In short, you diminish the impact of outrage if you constantly resort to it in every situation. Personally, I learned what this young man did, thought that is not right, but was then left shaking my head when I saw the over-the-top reaction to his selection.

What is up with the Ontario Conservatives? The creation of a vaccine passport is a winning proposition. It is widely popular amongst most Ontarians, with only Derek Sloan types being against them and vaccines. So it is a no brainer that the Ontario government should create one but so far they have completely refused to do so. There has been speculation that the Ford government's handling of the pandemic has made it vulnerable in the next election. The fact that they are pursuing a policy that plays to their base but could alienate a broad cross-section of the rest of the Ontario electorate may be a sign that there is some truth in that speculation.

Then there is my local Member of Provincial Parliament. He is a member of the Ford caucus and a member of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. Each quarter we receive a Householder from him, which explains what his government has been up to in Ottawa. All of the previous Householders have been Conservative blue and he always signed them with his name a party affiliation on the back. We received one last week and it was bright Liberal Red and his party affiliation what missing his signature. I double checked and has not crossed the floor so he is still an Ontario Conservative. My riding is a swing riding so maybe the Member's internal polling is showing he is in danger of losing 2022. One simple fact for the Ontario Conservatives is if they lose a riding like mine the next election night could be gruesome for them.