This is the third in a series of opinion columns on the 2022 Ontario provincial election, written by Josh Lieblein for The CJN.
Who, our most esteemed pundits wonder aloud, is Ontario Liberal leader Steven Del Duca? Let me attempt to answer…
The rally Mr. Del Duca is talking about in the above tweet from nearly a decade ago—a reply to my Twitter account at the time—was on the lawn of Queen’s Park for Al-Quds Day.
For those who don’t know, the last Friday of Ramadan was designated as a day of “international solidarity of Muslims in support of the legitimate rights of the Muslim people of Palestine” by the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran in 1979. Traditional events include the gathering of crowds, the making of anti-Israel speeches, and the shouting of “Death to Israel” and “Death to America.”
You might be wondering whether shouting “Death to Israel” from the lawn of Queen’s Park might constitute some form of incitement, and whether the Liberal government of the day allowing that to happen might constitute the sending of some sort of message. Of course, if you’re Steven Del Duca, that wondering is patently ridiculous. The man said there would be “no tolerance for hatred.” That’s not good enough for you?
(The reply was repeated on his account as a public statement—so that it could be seen by all his followers on Twitter, not just me.)
Almost two election cycles later, I headed up to Vaughan for Del Duca’s official nomination as a Liberal candidate.
By this time he had been a cabinet fixture for several years, so one might wonder why a formality such as his nomination required the renting of one of the area’s many high-class ballroom/meeting halls, an introduction by Jean Chretien, close to a thousand Liberal diehards inside—and a small army of union protesters that had erected a giant balloon outside in the likeness of a rat meant to represent Mr. Del Duca.
And again, for Del Duca, that curiosity would have been matched by his curiosity about why you were asking. The Liberals being decimated in the next election, losing his seat after spending an insane sum of money on this coronation, his former union comrades despising him for everything he’d done and failed to do as a member of the Wynne government… all mere trifles when weighed against the chance to stand at a podium and speak words about values and community and tolerance and collective respect to that group of supplicants.
Some people are similarly curious about other things that Del Duca has been involved in, before or since. Like the time a Toronto Star investigation showed that he wanted two more GO Transit stations built over Metrolinx’s objections. Or the controversy over wanting a personal pool built on public parkland. Or the time he and his family achieved brand synergy with Pizza Hut in a dunk on Doug Ford’s decision making time-frame, just before the Hut got hit with a class-action lawsuit over violating employment laws.
Would you be surprised by this point to learn that Del Duca respectively dismissed all three concerns as an exercise in political leadership, an honest mistake, and a bit of fun? By this point, I hope not.
You see, Del Duca knows that there are the Liberals who will cut off their own limbs before they do anything other than vote Liberal—and then there’s everyone else. And when it comes to this provincial election—win, lose, or draw—Steven Del Duca does not, and has not ever, needed or particularly cared that much about the “everyone else.” They do not matter, and truth be told, neither does Del Duca himself.
What matters is that the all-powerful Liberal message is delivered to the faithful until the party regains power.
Josh Lieblein can be reached at [email protected] for your response to Doorstep Postings.
