But first, a word from the Sewer

This is the 58th edition of the Sewer Socialists. And it’ll be the last regular one for a short while. I’m taking a brief break for the next few weeks while I complete some projects and tend to a couple of long-forgotten tasks.

There won’t be a usual edition on May 30 and, if there are editions on June 6 and June 13, they might look a little different.

As mentioned in previous editions, I’m hopeful I’ll be able to share some of what I’ve been working on soon. Stay tuned for new and interesting things!

Brevity is the soul of wit

I’ve been doing some reflecting lately. Maybe it’s been my very mild, but nonetheless inconvenient health issues. Maybe it’s been my uncertain work situation. Maybe it’s my impending 34th birthday. Maybe it’s the lingering fallout from losing all my remaining grandparents over the past two years. Maybe it’s my frustration over my inability to get my book manuscript revisions done. Maybe it’s the heat.

No matter what it is, I’m ruminating. I’m thinking about my place in the world and how I can make the biggest difference. I’m planning out the next couple of years, trying to balance my aspirations - personal, interpersonal, and political (yeah, you best believe this indebted, overeducated, idealistic millennial has his eyes on public office) - and position myself best to make the most positive impact I can.

Part of that means reflecting on how I’ve been presenting myself to the world and seeing if I shouldn’t try new things. I’ve been told my tone can be off-putting at times and that my overly flowery writing style can be a slog to deal with in various settings. But I’ve also been told those things make me a compelling writer and speaker. Sure, I know I can’t be everything to everyone every time I open my mouth or start putting words to screen, but still...

So I thought I’d conduct a fun experiment for this week’s edition of the newsletter. I challenged myself to try something really different and contain my thoughts on each topic this week to the maximum word count for a Hamilton Spectator letter to the editor - 250 words.

And woah boy was that a challenge. I purposely dig into topics and pull out details, historical facts, and context that might be missing in other places. Far too much of politics and public discourse today is focused on soundbites and short little blurbs. While those help convey a message quickly, they’re not really worth anything if they aren’t backed up by something more substantive. That’s why I take my time and include all the details I think are necessary to tell a compelling, factual, and meaningful story.

It was almost excruciating to contain my thoughts to 250 words. I had to rewrite each piece a few times just to keep things that short. And, in some instances, I fear I left out important details. But, still, a challenge is a challenge and I think I’ve succeeded.

But at what cost?

Anyway, enjoy!

The War on Drugs

*sizzling* This is your brain on populism.

Councillor John-Paul Danko put himself on the record as flip-flopping on council’s now two-year-old authorization of a future request to Health Canada to decriminalize small amounts of illicit drugs. Back in August of 2022, Danko supported the motion, but has since changed course amid a Canada-wide backlash against drugs that’s straight out of the 1980’s.

The theory is that, if we decriminalize drugs, build affordable housing, provide people meaningful addictions support, counselling, and jobs, then we can really address this epidemic.

Only, most jurisdictions that decriminalized drugs just gave up after that. The follow through just hasn’t been there, with most governments just expecting social service agencies to pick up the slack without a meaningful supply of resources. As a Toronto Star editorial noted, B.C. didn’t do what was necessary to ensure decriminalization worked, failing to make “the necessary investments in housing and anti-poverty measures that are widely seen as prerequisites for progress.”1

Danko told the Spec, “It’s pretty clear what we’ve seen out of B.C. and also out of the U.S….that’s it’s been an abject failure…”2

But, rather than consider why these project failed, he’s tacked to the populist right.

Too many big-and-small “L” liberals will soon echo Danko’s language. Those who say they are “fiscally conservative and socially liberal” have a noted antipathy toward actually investing in programs that would ensure their “socially liberal” approaches work. Kind of just makes that “socially liberal” talk seem like a shallow performance, doesn’t it?

Not In Anyone’s Backyard

Who has caused the homelessness crisis?

That can be answered two ways. The first takes a broad look into the past and considers economic, social, and political forces that support an economic system which inefficiently distributes resources and the failure of all three levels of government since the 1970s to meaningfully invest in social housing, mental health care, and a stable, secure economy.

The second answer is that our woke city council and NDP mayor “Horvath” [sp] made this crisis happen immediately after being elected because they want to turn Hamilton into a dystopic Portland of “ghettos with no law and order”. This answer is obviously nonsense.

Despite this, John Best’s Bay Observer, the online publication quickly becoming Hamilton’s ultraconservative blog-of-record, spun the second narrative on Sunday, highlighting two letters being distributed in the community and the pushback from some councillors regarding a review of the encampment protocol.

When I say Best’s Bay Observer is an ultraconservative blog, it’s because I get pop-up ads like this from a far-right Christian misinformation farm while reading his posts:

The aforementioned letters paint a dire picture and come from a place of anger from North Enders who have experienced property crime. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t shallow, cruel, and dehumanizing.

The question Best and the letter writers don’t care to ask is: where are people presently living in tents going to go? The letter writers just want vicious retribution without a solution. Best seems content to stoke division. Neither are real answers.

Quiet Concerns

Something’s been missing from the Saturday Spectator these past couple of weeks. Scan through all the pages of the May 11 and May 18 editions of the Spec and you’ll find anti-choice ads, promos for Ribfest events, and increasingly desperate calls from school bus operators for more drivers. But you won’t find a “Concerned Hamiltonians” ransom note anywhere.

It seems like Hamilton’s premiere right-wing populist front group has climbed down off their storied mountain and stopped their spending at just over $42,000. For the record, that’s over 8 times the annual average property tax bill in the city, over 50% of the annual median after-tax income in Ontario, and enough to cover over a year and a half of the median rent on a two-bedroom apartment in the city.

There have been gaps in “Concerned Hamiltonians” advertising in the past. They didn’t advertise during the first few weeks of January this year and had sporadic breaks during their first major ad campaign in the fall of last year. But $42,000 is a lot of cash to drop on a campaign that is so directionless, amateurish, and shallow, so maybe this is the end.

Then again, I don’t think we’re going to be so lucky. I’ve heard independently from multiple people that they’re nearly certain “Concerned Hamiltonians” is a project dedicated to list-building (collecting names, phone numbers, email addresses, etc.) to oppose a certain mountain councillor’s future political ambitions.

A conservative guess is that they’ll be back.

Ontario: Doug’s to Dishevel

The governing Progressive Conservatives are plowing ahead with one of Doug Ford’s primary obsessions: the “redevelopment” and partial privatization of Ontario Place. Ford wrote about this in his simplistic autobiography/manifesto, again referencing his love of Chicago and their waterfront, which he calls: “a hugely successful tourist attraction and revenue generator.”3

Last week, the province announced they would use an “enhanced” Minister’s Zoning Order (MZO) to speed up the redevelopment, which has the reluctant support of Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow after Ford “uploaded” responsibility over the crumbling, city-splitting Gardiner Expressway, among other things.

What is frustrating about this is the government’s enthusiastic use of an MZO for Ontario Place – an unnecessary project that, once again, is Ford’s way of soothing a bruised ego after not being made mayor of Toronto – but their inability to employ the same tool for anything meaningful.

According to “Yours To Protect”, an environmental advocacy coalition, two MZOs have been approved in Hamilton. One sped up conversion from commercial space to residential on the ground floor of First Place and the second was for the Century Manor grounds. On the latter, MPP Sandy Shaw has been trying to get answers on the plans for the historic site, but the ministry has ghosted Shaw like one of the spectral beings said to occupy the Manor.

The Ontario PCs keep using public funds and policies to settle scores, advance their own vanity projects, and enrich their donors. I suppose “For the People” really is just a theoretical slogan.

Liberal, Tory…

Speaking of provincial politics, things haven’t been going great with the third-place Ontario Liberals. Latest polls have Crombie’s OLP at 26%, within the margin of error from their 2022 results. Crombie’s post leadership polling bump has eroded and the OLP brand is suffering due to the federal Liberal collapse.

Last week, Crombie held a press conference – her first since the May 2 by-elections – and admitted that she has “a lot of work to do” and that she will be shifting the OLP’s strategy going forward. To everyone’s detriment, that shift is to the populist right.

The party’s new line of attack is that Doug Ford is a tax-and-spend socialist for setting a small business tax rate of 3.2%, which they plan to cut in half.

The OLP’s tack to the right is a sign of two things: desperation and “out-of-touchedness”.

Their desperation comes from their scattered by-election results. The party placed second in both and, to their embarrassment, the PC winner in Milton was a former Liberal. The OLP central party panicked post May 2, assuming Ontarians wanted another right-wing alternative to the PCs.

That’s where the “out-of-touchedness” comes in. The OLP website has no “policy” or “statement of principles” section, outside the shallow six bullet points on their “Meet Bonnie” section (a redirect to Crombie’s leadership website).

Ontarians don’t want another right-wing, status-quo party. They want real, meaningful ideas, and solutions to the problems we face. The OLP doesn’t seem to get that.

Liberal, Tory, same old story.

Block out the Tims

In fun development news, a group of neighbours is opposing a proposed condo building in Newmarket in an effort to save their crueler community.

A developer has applied to build a 9 storey, 216 unit condo building on a vacant lot on Davis Drive. That’s a major thoroughfare complete with BRT line, GO station, and access to the Highway 404.

Neighbours have begun making appeals about the character of the neighbourhood and concerns about traffic.

While concerns about the neighbourhood’s character are classic, they fall a little flat when you consider the neighbourhood is mostly 1950’s bungalows and sidesplits, punctuated by the occasional mall and residential tower. But the neighbour leading the opposition gives away their MO when they urged their council to “explore alternatives”, saying “single family homes would be a preferable option and would help maintain the unique charm of the area.”4

They’re being backed in their campaign by a planner retained by the owner of a nearby Tim Hortons. He opposes the development on the grounds it will hinder the free flow of their customers and possibly take up valuable parking spaces with people visiting the new condo dwellers next door.

Sure, I get people not wanting their sunlight blocked and people peering down on them from balconies. But if we don’t build better density (the missing middle), then we’re stuck with a sea of single detached homes and condo towers. And those condo towers have to go somewhere.

Sorry if that shades out your double double.

Obedient workers

“Shitposting”: the act of being deliberately provocative online, often posting off-topic, “cringy”, or inflammatory things in order to upset people, draw them into online fights, and generally troll people for your own amusement or gain.

Let’s talk about Victoria Mancinelli, the Director of Public Relations, Communications, Marketing, (deep breath) and Strategic Partnerships with LiUNA. On May 17, without prompting, Mancinelli commented on a tweet linking a Globe and Mail article critical of CUPE Ontario President Fred Hahn, who is outspoken in his advocacy for Palestine. In the tweet, she maliciously labels Hahn an “antisemite” before talking about the “many private sector unions and the members we proudly represent who build, maintain and strengthen our country.”

Mancinelli is veering into dangerous territory here. Indeed, she isn’t talking like a union leader at all, rather positioning her membership as obedient workers. She’s talking like a boss.

All this is reminiscent of the rhetoric of fascist syndicalists, who sought to reorient labour unions as dutiful, patriotic entities in service of strengthening an all-powerful state that is above critique. Mancinelli’s uncritical support for the current far-right Israeli government and relentless attacks on the NDP further solidify the notion that Mancinelli is the vanguard of a new extreme right-wing unionism in Canada.

Her tweet says that Hahn undermines “the work of unions”. I’d argue Mancinelli’s needlessly provocative social media behaviour and extreme right-wing commentary is a greater detriment to the labour movement in Ontario than Hahn’s advocacy.

Oh, one more thing… enjoy this comeback:

Wökegen-Dazs

If you haven’t heard of MP John Williamson, consider yourself lucky.

Williamson has a backstory so perfectly Conservative, it’s like it was written by a bunch of kids in short pants in some Tory war room.

After working for the National Post, he moved to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, before being hired by Stephen Harper as his director of communications. He was then shipped off to New Brunswick Southwest to be the Conservative Party’s candidate in 2011. He won, and immediately became one of the most controversial members of the House, quoting Martin Luther King Jr. when the Tories scrapped the long-gun registry and saying the Temporary Foreign Workers program was about paying “whities to stay home while we bring in brown people to work in these jobs.”

He lost re-election in 2015 but reclaimed the seat in 2019, where he has continued his right-wing trolling from the opposition benches.

Last week, Williamson again made news, this time for his inability to distinguish between types of ice cream. Apparently, he picked up some Häagen-Dazs that was plant-based, rather than milk-based ice cream. Rather than return the product and purchase a new tub, he took the opportunity to post about it on social media, concluding with “Vote for the NDP-Liberal Trudeau government coalition if you want to eat stealthy plants and bugs.”

Deal with the housing crisis and our eroding democracy and climate change and international conflict? Naw. Easier to blame Justin Trudeau for oat-based ice cream.

Remember: Oats is bugs.

Cool facts for cool people

• Former Ward 4 councillor Sam Merulla is in the Little Buff Boys Mr. Health and Fitness 2024 competition. If you do one thing today, please let it be taking a look at the photo he submitted to The Spec. Please please please. Please.

• Saskatoon is implementing an affordable housing plan that balances grants and tax breaks for developers with commitments to maintain affordable rents. The plan will give developers $27,000 per new affordable unit and a 5-year tax abatement in exchange for a 20-year agreement to maintain below market rents. Problem is, landlord advocacy groups have said there’s really no incentive for them to build anything that offers that long a commitment to affordability. During the city council meeting to approve the plan the CEO of the Saskatchewan Landlord Association insisted on calling his members “providers”. Not really committed to “providing” housing when that provision is predicated on you making the highest amount of profit possible, are you now?