For thread on the last election go here

The Bard said on Dec 7 2005:

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The campaign in TC will be launched tonight, at 519 Church St. Michael is also going to be hosting coffee parties to discuss the issues in apartment buildings throughout the riding.
I've got to say I got a flyer Shapcott which said Jack Layton: Putting People First (Clinton's slogan in '92). Please don't tell me the NDP will be using that slogan.

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2006 Candidates: CON: Lewis Reford
GRN: Chris Tindal
LIB: Bill Graham (Incumbent)
NDP: Michael Shapcott

The population of the riding is among the most transient in Canada. Renters outnumber homeowners 73 per cent to 27 per cent. Average family income is $124,082 (the third highest in Canada) and unemployment is 7.8 per cent. The majority of jobs are in the service sector, including finance and insurance. More than 34 per cent of residents have university degrees.

According to the 2001 census, 42 per cent of the population are immigrants, with a significant Chinese community.

The riding of Rosedale was established in 1933. Its name was changed to Toronto Centre-Rosedale in 1996 and to Toronto Centre in 2004, when it added a small part of St. Paul's in the northwest and Toronto-Danforth in the northeast.

Political History
In 2004, Liberal Bill Graham defeated New Democrat Michael Shapcott to win the riding for a fourth term. Graham was minister of foreign affairs from 2002 to 2004, when Paul Martin made him minister of national defence.

2004 Voting Results:

30,336 Bill Graham ( 56.5 %) LIBERAL
12,747 Michael Shapcott ( 23.8 %) NDP

Total Votes: 53,905 out of 85,165 on list
Voter Turnout was: 63.3%

[ 07 December 2005: Message edited by: lonewolf2 ]

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When we have some real electoral reform happening in Canada, one of the first things to do is to change this riding's boundaries. Let those rich people in Rosedale just have their own riding and stop them from voting against the interests of the majority of working people and working poor throughout the rest of the downtown core!

Bill Graham has done nothing to increase affordable housing in Toronto. Yes I realize the Liberals have made announcements, but where are the housing projects? I don't see anything being built! Which leads me to think it's just more liberal funding announcements, and announcements about announcements -- while the money for affordable housing, jobs, health care and education never actually gets to us!

Posted by: Carol Auld | Nov 29, 2005 1:38:49 PM

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The left has held the downtown ward ever since. With the exception of Gordon Chong winning 1 term when the NDP refused to support George Hislop because he was gay.

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Originally posted by jrootham:

The worst local gerrymander was St. Andrew St. Patrick for Larry Grossman jr. It went from the Islands up to Eglinton, getting narrow through the Annex.

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Larry Grossman was not a "jr". He followed his father Allan Grossman. Allan actually won one of the dirtiest elections in Ontario history when he beat JB Salsberg who was a member of the labour progressive party of Ontario in 1955.

But to return to Toronto in 2005/2006. Did anyone attend the Shapcott launch? He seems to be running strongly (save stealing Clinton's slogan).

There were speeches from Cathy Crowe, Adam Giambrone, Pam McConnell, Gene Lara, Lorraine Tagalog, and others.

The campaign office is at Parliament and Winchester - I haven't dropped in yet, but I plan on doing so.

Michael noted that the NDP vote was more than doubled in this riding, and he got more votes in his first election than Bill Graham got in his first run.

People should go and ask Bill Graham why cabinet won't let the war resisters stay given that they deserted because they'd been ordered to shoot innocent civilians and/or because they realised that the war is illegal (ie because they share Canada's position).

St. Jamestown Candidate's Debate
Wellesley Community Centre, 495 Sherbourne Street
Friday, January 6, 6:30 pm
Sponsored by the St. Jamestown Safety Committee

519 Church Street Community Centre Candidates' Debate
519 Church Street
Sunday, January 8, 7:30 pm

Saint Lawrence Neighbourhood Candidates' Debate
King Edward Hotel, Sovereign Ballroom, 37 King Street East
Wednesday, January 11, 7:00 pm
Sponsored by St. Lawrence Neighbourhood Association and the
St. Lawrence Market Neigbourhood Business Improvement Area

Bay Street Corridor Community Association Candidates' Debate
Alumni Hall, St. Michael's College, 121 St. Joseph Street, 4th Floor
Thursday, January 12, 6:30 pm

Ryerson Student Union Candidate's Debate
350 Victoria Street, Room 144 in the Podium
Monday, January 16, 2:00 pm

Christian Resource Centre All Candidates Meeting in Regents Park
Location TBA
Monday, January 16
Date, time and location have not been confirmed and may change. Please check back for updates

Cabbagetown Candidate's Debate
Cabbagetown Youth Centre, 2 Lancaster Street
Tuesday, January 17 (Time TBA)
Sponsored by the Dopn VAle Cabbagetown Resident's Association, Winchester Parks Residents, Cabbagetown South Residents
and the Old Cabbagetown Business Improvement Area

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Originally posted by spatrioter:
The campaign launch was very well-attended, with 200+ people packed into the upstairs auditorium of the 519...

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I seem to recall posting something here and it has dissapeared. I hope no moddlerater is stupidly trying to censor things here, especially information about candidates who are not what they pretend to be.

I should have posted information about this afternoons all candidates at St.Lawrence market neighborhood. This was a lot smaller than the one at the King Edward hotel last week, run by the neighborhood snobs, and it was a good antidote tto them. people could actually ask questions.

Hooray for Damien Brown of Market view coop for organizing it on five days notice. At the King Edward hotel they wouldn't let the communist candidate speak. Questions had to be submitted in advance. Eventually they relented and let him speak from a mike off to one side, in opening and closing remarks, but not respond to the questions.

This afternoon we had the communist, the representative of the second oldest party in Canada, and the Marxist Leninist, right next to the big guys. Well, no. Graham did not show up.

And I finally got to ask a certain NDP candidate whose initials are MS a question I have been dying to ask.

"Define the term 'poverty pimp'"

Zowie! Was his response revealing. His face got read and he started talking on and on about his life history. I could have said "I asked you to define it, not detail your career as one."

Unfortunately only the commies on the left side of the table got the joke. I think most of the people in the back of the hall did not hear me ask it.

I could also say about the proceedings that I was disapointed to have it affirmed by the green guy that Graham does indeed support Canadian participation the Yanqui missile defense system just to appease the US administration.

Afterward I got into an intersting discussion with an old european lady who has been here since the 1950s and doesn't like the new conservativism.

She asked me what a poverty pimp was and I was embarassed to realize that I did not have a ready one myself. So, here is one from my own web site, the page borrowed from "Bork"

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The term "poverty pimp" is defined as a derogatory label for an individual or group which, to its own benefit, acts as an intermediary on behalf of the poor.

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This page with its amusing description of poverty pimp behavior can be found at http://www.qaz.ca/povpimp.html

and is raccoon recommended.

My old freind hit the neo-con attitude on the head. It is the "I did it for myself" mentality. The people she knows who immigrated here in the 1950s can't understand that they were here in a golden age that will never come back. They were able to become midle class and own houses just on laboring work and they think this makes them superior somehow.

I added that then they have kids who think they are entitled to this too, and when they don't get it because the ttimes are now harder, they think someone is cheating them. All these are receptive to the conservative argument that government is just taxing their money to give to the free loaders.

It is like they think roads, schools, and hospitals happened by magic.

But back to poverty pimpness. You know, there is room here for some debates and discussions about the ethicality of anti-poverty work. It is almost impossible for poor people to do anything for themselves; they are trying to survive. But who has the right to claim to speak for them?

Creating an anti-poverty movement requires some resources and some people have to put in some time at it. How are these people supposed to live? It is hard for any kind of organization to sustain itself by volunteer work. If you have paid people, there is always the potential for them to give themselves job security by exerting control over the whoever they are supposed to be accountable to.

Maybe I will start a thread about this after everybody on rabble board gets over the election.

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Originally posted by raccoon:

I seem to recall posting something here and it has dissapeared. I hope no moddlerater is stupidly trying to censor things here, especially information about candidates who are not what they pretend to be.
TR

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This is all I'm going to quote, even though the rest of it is full of idiocy.

NOTE raccoon, you should know by now, babble does not delete or censor. Only in rare cases of potential legal bullshit do moderators shut things down.

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Originally posted by raccoon:
I seem to recall posting something here and it has dissapeared.

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Frankly, bs like yours plays right into the hands of the right who look for all and any excuse to cut social programs and dismiss anti-poverty activists.

That you voted for a Rosedale Liberal like Bill Graham who has probably never set a foot in St. Jamestown or Regen Park without an escort because Shapcott or one of his supporters called you on your often offensive behaviour speaks volumes.

If you called Bill Graham at 2am, or knocked on his door (even in broad daylight), or spoke to him the way you've spoken to dozens of people on the left, you'd have the RCMP on you faster than white on rice.

[ 15 January 2006: Message edited by: aka Mycroft ]

That being, I'm certain that the NDP will come in second here. Yes, the Tories are up nationally but this riding has a visceral hatred of any hint of social conservatism so they won't get more than 20%.
Hopefully they can pull a respectable 1/3 of the vote or so.

[ 16 January 2006: Message edited by: the bard ]

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Originally posted by Scott Piatkowski:

That's because you posted it here. Moron!

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Well, well. What do you know about this harassing and obnoxious behavior that is supposed to get me arrested by the RCMP?
What is the substance and exactly who did you hear it from?

I expect a reply or I will ask these questions on the board.

TR.

I think you misunderstood what I said. I did not say you did anything that would justify involving the RCMP. What I was trying to argue is that you voted for Bill Graham because you don't think Shapcott or his people are showing you enough deference, yet, Graham is part of the Rosedale elite and if you ever even looked at him the wrong way you'd find the RCMP swooping down on you. IE you voted for someone who'd never give you the time of day outside of an election campaign. You didn't vote for someone who you felt disrespected you and instead voted for someone who would have complete contempt for you because of your poverty and class.

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Mycroft, you know fuck all about me or what goes on with me and Shapcott and all the people like him in the poverty pimp/legal clinic/agency mafia network.

What do you think people will do to protect six figure grants which they never have to account for? I have been thrown in jail twice on false charges. They have tried to get me evicted. I and people I work with are in a ringfence of slander thrown around us to isolate us. I have had death threats. I have civil court cases going on about all this.

Shapcott has done all these things? According to who? Shapcott? These types of people are very good at claiming credit for everything but the sun shining.

As for Clarke, I have a different description for him; red commander. He is someone who gets other people into trouble and leaves them hanging, so he can play 'revolution.'

Whatever Bill Graham's faults, he does not pretend to be what he is not.

You have not answered me about what kind of crap you have been hearing about me and from who.

So I am posting this, as promised.

I would suggest to the managers of this discussion board that it be left alone!

You're outta here. I suggest you create your own web site and post that kind of stuff there.

P.S. You're probably thinking of this post which was not deleted. However, I did (just now) take the liberty of deleting three or four words from one sentence of the post which could potentially be libel.

[ 17 January 2006: Message edited by: Michelle ]

Guns, crime and income disparity
In study after study, relative poverty is a social corrosive
Jan. 15, 2006. 03:16 AM
LESLIE SCRIVENER
TORONTO STAR
For anyone worried about violent crime in Toronto, it's worth looking at a United Way report called Poverty by Postal Code. One of the scariest statistics in the 2004 study reveals the gap between the people in Toronto with money and the people without.
It's the widest gap in Canada.
Put simply, for every $1 the poorest families in Toronto have to spend, the richest families have $27.
Income differences that big are troubling in themselves, but when linked to violence, especially homicide, there is even greater cause for alarm.
Richard Wilkinson, a British epidemiologist, says at least 40 international studies (including one on Canada done at McMaster University) show "a robust relationship" between homicide rates and income inequality.
But income inequality goes deeper than looking at who has more money — it roots around in the murkiest parts of our relationships with our neighbours.
People who live in very unequal societies trust each other less, hostility is higher and there is more discrimination against minorities and women, studies show.
Wilkinson, who is an expert in public health, first started looking at inequality to understand why some studies show that people are healthier in more egalitarian societies.
The social environment affects our health, he found, with stress, social status and a feeling of connectedness as the most important features in contributing to a feeling of well-being. That is to say, we feel good if we measure up well against our neighbours.
About social status, he writes in Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, "We know ourselves partly through each other's eyes."
In short, we care about how others see us and we crave respect. "Remember the stomach-tightening feelings of shame and embarrassment, almost self-loathing, when we feel we have made ourselves look foolish in others' eyes?" he asks.
There's a great deal to suggest, he writes, "that the most frequent trigger to violence is disrespect, loss of face and people feeling looked down upon."
With more inequality, people will have fewer or worse jobs, lower incomes, and feel deprived of the clothes, the cars, and the houses — markers of status — that others have, and that elevate them to a higher status.
Vulnerable to the humiliation of relative — not absolute — poverty, they will be less willing to overlook incidents that appear to involve a loss of face, Wilkinson says.
This link is seen more in crimes against other people than in crimes against property, he adds in an interview from the U.K., where he is a professor at the University of Nottingham.
In the late 1990s, when Tony Blair's Labour government was keen to show that it was not coddling criminals, it launched a campaign that was tough on crime but also addressed the causes of crime. Violence rates went down a bit, said Wilkinson.
But for the most part in debates about violence in the U.K., research about the causes of crime and income disparities hardly comes into the discussion.
Last year there were 52 gun deaths in Toronto, nearly double the number in 2004.
Income inequality is only one part of the complex web of factors that lead to increased violent crime, and it has come up rarely, if at all, in the current federal election campaign.

At least 40 international studies show `a robust relationship' between homicide rates and income inequality

`We should try to
identify and preserve those uniquely Canadian social institutions
that have contributed
to our relatively low crime rate'

Looking at other predictors — poverty, inadequate housing, school failure, fatherless children — it is reasonable to think that Toronto could see the murder rate continue to rise.

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Originally posted by Cube432:
so I hope I'm not breaking any rules by posting this article.

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Originally posted by F.:
Bill Graham in Toronto Centre is at the top of my list of Liberal incumbants who will likely resign within one year

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So, I am surprised that there hasn't been more discussion of an enthusiastic opposition provided by the NDP. Certainly, Michael Shapcott would be a much more vigorous opposition member than a former cabinet minister.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
I could see both the Liberals and NDP going out of their way to recruit very high profile candidates.

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