Politics is too important

Premier McGuinty and his caucus of Liberal MPPs seem determined that people in our province are not capable of acting responsibly. The Premier seems determined to act as everyone's Premier Dad to enforce his government's vision on the people of Ontario.While one might think that the real priority in Ontario would be getting our province out of 'Have-not' status. One might also think generating a manufacturing jobs strategy would top the to-do list in Ontario. Instead the Premier and his government seem determined to enact legislation regulating Ontario citizens, and fining them for being bad .The latest example is Ontario's new legislative restrictions on drivers who have a beer, glass of wine, or a cocktail, and then drive home. While it makes sense to fight impaired driving, and crack down hard on people who drive over the legal limit, this latest move is yet another example of the government of Ontario acting like only they, rather than the people of Ontario are capable of being responsible.This legislation, means as of May 1, 2009, Ontario has targeted measures to help take more drinking drivers off the roads. Drivers who register a BAC from 0.05 to 0.08 (known as the warn range ) lose their licence at roadside for 3, 7 or 30 days. Consequences also get tougher for repeat occurrences. What will be interesting would be to see a checkstop set out around a political fundraiser, and all of the people who attended ending up with the new law impacting their lives. It will also be interesting to see what happens with this new legislation to the restaurant and bar industry, not to mention Ontario's wine industry as patrons realize that having a glass of wine with dinner will impact their lives in this latest legislative move.The McGuinty government attempted to enact restrictions on young people and their driving priviledges, earlier this year. The youth in Ontario erupted in online action that forced the Premier's merry band of do-gooders to back down. Obviously fearing a youthquake in the next provincial election, those proposals were peeled back.As the McGuinty government enacts legislation that increases restrictions on individual freedoms of Ontarians there really is only one group which is fully responsible. It is us. During the last provincial election, real issues were ignored as the Ontario Liberals made it a campaign over a promise made by former Progressive Conservative leader John Tory to fund all schools. Although Tory's position was identical to one held by the Premier previously, none of that mattered. Voters in Ontario allowed the politicians to set the agenda. We are now seeing the results of allowing that to happen.It gets worse, do you remember the long debates over the merits of blending the pst and gst during the last provincial campaign? If you can not, do not worry it isn't your memory that is failing, it is that it wasn't an issue. We will be paying a financial price, and will be paying it for years, as the unpromised blending of the provincial sales tax with the federal gst gets past the political payments that will end a few months before the next election in 2011. Of course by then the government will launch a summer of announcements and spending to convince us that they are doing a great job.Ontario voters have been training our elected officials that we don't punish them at the polls. That has, over the past several elections led to the growth of political arrogance. What it ends up leading to is a feeling of superiority and arrogance inside the political inner circles. Eventually it will likely lead to an electorial vote-quake where the government is swept from office. That may well, if the Ontario economy continues to stagger, and the Premier continues to act like the province's official Dad , happen in 2011.The focus of government should be on the important issues, not on serving as a provincial nanny, or in Premier McGuinty's case as Ontario's unelected Dad .Right now, to quote Bill Clinton, Its the economy . Charles De Gaulle once said, “I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.” De Gaulle was right, but likely, especially in Thunder Bay, until more people come to the same conclusion, we are likely to only see more of the same in the political arena.James Murray