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If Olivia Chow wins, she is about to be the most attacked Toronto mayor ever

Jun 26, 2023

“With regards to political enemies Plato had a kill-and-banish principle. … In interpreting it , modern-day Platonists are clearly disturbed by it, even as they make elaborate attempts to defend Plato.”   Karl Popper

In 2011 The Toronto Sun tried to destroy Jack Layton in the run-up to the federal election, an election that saw Layton become the leader of the opposition and the NDP secure the most seats in the party’s history.

Some say the story, which was unfounded and, more importantly, allegedly happened 15 years before the election, actually helped Layton. The public was largely aghast that Post Media would attempt to use a salacious rumour to destroy one of the most beloved politicians in the modern era.

Over 12 years later, Olivia Chow finds herself all alone at the top of the heap in one of the most interesting elections in Toronto’s long history. She stood up for her husband when the massage parlour story came out, and seems destined to win the election today.

That’s when the real fight will begin, and will probably not end until the day Chow leaves office.

If the past decade has taught Canadians anything, it’s that we can no longer separate ourselves from our American cousins when it comes to how divided we really are. Just look at federal politics, where our two major parties continue to, in their own style, dehumanize either the leader or their loyal followers to the point that we can barely have a conversation anymore.

Chow will be immediately dismissed as a spendaholic socialist, determined to take Toronto to the breaking point economically while forcing us to emblazon our pronouns onto our foreheads. She will be accused of destroying the city, taking it backwards, being beholden to unions and against the police.

Most of it will be bullshit.

Chow, who has had some pretty public missteps over the years, most notably when she hired political leper Warren Kinsella to manage her previous mayoral campaign in 2014, is still a fairly savvy political force. But her talents could be overshadowed by her willingness to react to an onslaught of political attacks.

Chow needs to understand that Toronto, for all its progressive bona fides, is not a left-wing city. It is, even by the most crudest definitions, a city of moderates. If Chow plays her cards right, she will leader as a moderate, avoiding the trappings that painted previous mayors like David Miller or Rob Ford into their respective corners.

Contributing Writers

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