[LINK] "Run, Tory, Run!"

[rfmcdonald]

The two left-leaning Torontonian Facebook friends who linked to the Toronto Star article reporting that erstwhile politician John Tory, who last appeared here after deciding not to compete with George Smitherman for the position of Mayor of Toronto after having humiliatingly lost a by-election in a safe riding that would have given him the seat that he'd needed to lead Ontario's Progressive Conservatives, is considering a run for mayor. James Bow, among others, likes this idea; Bow thinks that Tory, his nominal party affiliations aside, is better placed than any of the candidates actually running to continue Miller's policies.

Toronto in 2003 had serious structural problems that ensured that it would always struggle for funds in the face of mounting infrastructure problems and hefty social service burdens. David Miller helped make a number of changes to the structure of council and the powers of the city that made council and the mayor’s office better able to respond to the issues. This was thanks, in part, to working with McGuinty on a new City of Toronto Act. I believe that on most of the critical decisions that took us from there to here, Tory would have done much the same, and thank God for that.

But two terms on, it can be argued that it is time for a change. For all the good that Mayor Miller has done, and for all the challenges he has faced down, he has spent considerable political capital to get where he is today, and the well may be running dry.

Ironic though it may be for me to say, it seems to me that the candidate best suited for continuing the good work that David Miller has managed to achieve in building Toronto, in spite of a city council that remains highly dysfunctional, is John Tory — the man Miller beat for the job. Like Miller, Tory is intelligent, and able to build a broad base of support. He may even be more of a consensus builder than Miller (despite his lack of electoral success at the provincial level, he did manage to herd the cats of the Ontario Progressive Conservative caucus). Most importantly, he is one who has, by and large, stayed out of the political fray on city council for the past seven years. His ideas are still fresh, and he has great potential to do much good for the city.

The time has come for a higher quality candidate for the job of mayor of Toronto. The time has come for John Tory.

Whether or not Miller's policies were good is another question, one I'll leave to my readers.