Lame Party

Lame Party
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Exciting Party
Ah yes, the Big Sky High School graduation party...see how much fun everybody's having?

Emo Dude is Really Sad to be at a Lame Party for Tustin Tiller Days

Drunk Meg at a Lame Party
I got vomited on at this party. -David
[pics: flickr.com]


No Juice at the Top
by Andrew Cash
NOW Magazine - 02/12/09

Okay, I'll say it: this is a boring party, the place you'd be if you'd drawn the short straw

The Ontario NDP (New Democratic Party) is the Toronto Maple Leafs of politics. Like the hapless hockey crew, the ONDP has spent most of the last four decades near the bottom of the standings but dining out regularly on past glories.

Most NHL teams, when mired in the basement, take the time to rebuild, rediscover a sense of purpose, nurture their fan base and a crop of young keeners, and while no one is looking, start getting competitive.

The Leafs, over the last 40 years never did this. Alas, the ONDP over the last decade and a half hasn't either.

With what may be the largest reordering of the capitalist economy since the 30s underway, these should be heady times for provincial Dippers who next month pick a new leader to replace Howard Hampton.

Indeed, social democrats should be hitting their stride, but as they head toward a March 7 convention (mail-in ballots start next week and online voting Feb. 23), the NDP's gait is more lumbering than lifting.

"The party has atrophied," says Ryerson politics prof Bryan Evans. "It wasn't unheard of at one time that riding associations would have a 1,000 to 2,000 members. There were vibrant debates and a free flow of ideas. You have hardly any of that now."

Few in the Ontario NDP would disagree that the party needs to revitalize its grassroots. Problem is, most of those roots are decidedly grey. At a recent leaders' debate in Hamilton, the average age of the 200 in attendance was pushing 60.

Last Sunday's (Feb. 8) Toronto debate, while improving on youth representation, drew only about 150 to the Great Hall on Queen West - small potatoes considering the party's urban strength.

Membership has dropped from about 35,000 in the 70s to 24,000 today, although the population of the province has increased by about 2 million. In debt to the tune of $4 million, the party has saddled itself with a crippling fundraising formula that siphons the bulk of the monies raised in the ridings to head office, thus enfeebling local organizing.

Are any of the four leadership candidates ready for the daunting task of an overhaul? Hmm.

Toronto enviro Peter Tabuns has the personal grooming of a front-runner, which indeed he is, having the backing of many party heavy hitters. That's both a blessing and a curse, because some of those helped steer, if that's what you'd call it, the party into the ditch.
He has for a long time championed a green economy, and he sees policy as the key to revitalization. "People won't give money, time and energy if we don't inspire them," he tells me.

Another well-known T-dot (Toronto) pol, Beaches-East York MPP (Member of Provincial Parliament) Michael Prue, started out of the gate strong but is incurring wrath by insisting the party reopen the toxic Catholic schools debate. Was he out of town when John Tory got creamed? "In the last election, I was asked many times about a single school board," he tells me. "It's a debate this party must have."

The campaign of Timmins-James Bay MPP Gilles Bisson represents a cultural divide within the party that many downtown granola heads find an inconvenient truth: if the NDP is growing anywhere in the province, it's in the north.
Currently, the NDP holds seven northern Ontario seats federally and three provincially. Bisson's immense riding has more NDP members than any other provincial riding. He may also have the clearest sense of the rebuilding task, "We have to get our own house in order before we can expect the electorate to vote for us," he says.
But for a guy who's been at Queen's Park since 1990, he still has a long way to go in terms of name recognition in southern Ontario. It's also unclear how interested he is in squaring the circle between a cities agenda, the green economy and his political base in the northern resource economy.

Hamilton's Andrea Horwath is the newest caucus member and may squeak in by virtue of having the fewest enemies within the party. Endorsed by Wayne Samuelson, president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, and Wayne Fraser, executive director of the 30,000-strong District 6 Steelworkers, she says the NDP needs to focus on community organizng as a way to rebuild.
"This isn't rocket science," she says. Howarth's labour support is a plus, given that while the party has moved to a one person, one vote election, 25 per cent of votes are reserved for affiliated unions. Yet while she's the youngest contender, she can't resist hauling out old NDP excuses: blaming the right-wing media for the party's decline. Honestly, that talk makes me want to hit the eject button.

Speaking of heading for the door, that becomes a necessity once these debates get going, because very quickly all the oxygen has been used up. Not, of course, because of what is being said - the candidates don't actually disagree about much - but how.

This party is so, so unhip, so spectacularly devoid of even the smallest hint of style, groove, charisma...Okay, I'll say it. This is a boring party, someplace you'd only be if you'd drawn the short straw. Indeed, the party is looking for a new voice right now, but it might also want to consider some new clothes and a trip to the barber.