National Post (National Edition)
Ontario’s election was not ‘historic’
ELECTION OF FIRST GREEN POLITICIAN? IT’S HAD A GOVERNMENT FULL OF THEM IN THE LIBERALS
People may recall when “historic” was reserved for events of mighty significance, outstanding in their singularity and magnitude of effect — Charles Martel defeating the Moors in 732, the barbarian invasions that brought about the fall of Rome, Nelson at Trafalgar or, closer to our time, the ferocious Battle of Stalingrad, the great hinge combat of the Second World War.
Friday morning as I glissaded over Google to sample the highs and lows of Doug Ford’s triumph in Ontario, it was oddly apparent that most of the press and commentariat saw within the evening’s results something worthy of being called historic. I better be clear. It wasn’t the election itself that grabbed the adjective, though you could make a trivial case for it. After all, the Tories self-detonated their party just as the contest began, suffered the manic divisions of an extemporaneous leadership race, chose what better minds viewed as a dread populist Trump wannabe, and yet still wiped the board. That was remarkable, surprising even, but not really historic.
It was the election of a Green candidate in Guelph that a thousand laptops proclaimed as historic. First-ever Green elected in Ontario — historic win. The Toronto Star, usually rationing its exuberance for matters genetically Liberal, went with the tide: “Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner makes history with victory in Guelph.”
What would the headlines have read if Ontario had elected two? One can but speculate. The great organs of world opinion and news would have worn such headlines as: World Staggers. UN Convenes Security Council. Trump Cancels Kim Summit, Will Meet Ontario Greens To Revise New World Order. Or, perhaps taken a slightly more subdued reading with something like “Great Hopes From Guelph. This is the moment when the rise of the oceans begins to slow and our planet begins to heal.” But part of that, I believe, is taken.
The chosen one himself, Green Leader Mike Schreiner, quite understandably was in consort with the mass judgment, exclaiming over his victory, “We’ve made history.” But, really, did they? Was it, really, historic? Guelph, for those marooned in the lesser provinces, is best understood as a kind of inland Salt Spring Island, a veritable nursery and greenhouse of save-the-planetism and millenarian global warming. It boasts an environmental movement near Calvinist in its determinacy and dourness.
“Historic” has gone the way of “awesome.” Just as “like” is a verbal hiccup, “historic” is a mere sound, a pothole filler on the journalistic highway, meaning if anything, “Hey, this is the first time that’s happened.” E.g., “Went to Rabba’s for a Kit Kat. They were out.” Historic.
Actually, there wasn’t much historic about the entire evening. The Liberals were savagely rejected. How could they not have been? Their rule is best described as insanely haughty and prescriptive. They imposed a centrally driven and coterie agenda on an entire province, ransacked the idea of accountability, chose righteousness over regard for the electorate, and most fatally, abandoned all the real duties of governance for a feverish and total embrace of the destructive and always delusionary climate-change agenda.
The fate of the Ontario Liberals is an “evidence-based” illustration of what happens to a political party when it is captured by Greenism. Inevitably it becomes a Father Knows Best government, ignores or dismisses real and present concerns of an electorate, and scorns the lesser obligations of governance: traffic, home heating, jobs and — every government’s principal reason for being — respect for life as it is being lived by its citizens. Add Greenism to furious “rights” mongering and social-justice infatuations, and you produce a government so far out of touch, that given half a chance, an electorate will leap in gymnastic urgency to any alternative, however dubious or untried.
Ontario did not elect its “first” Green politician Thursday night. It has had a whole government of Green politicians — named Liberals — for the past 15 years. For which Doug Ford is now infinitely thankful.