Barbara Hall is off the list; David Miller gets my vote

Over a month ago I mentioned that Barbara Hall was still a contender for mayor, as far as I was concerned. Well, not anymore.

Barbara Hall has been in danger of dropping from my list of eligible candidates for quite some time now. Frankly, she’s not a leader. Yes, she may be conciliatory and an effective manager, but I feel that Toronto needs someone who can really push the city forward. Hall has experience on her side, but that was as mayor of Toronto before amalgamation. A larger city needs stronger leadership who will take a stand, not backroom negotiation with peoples unseen.

Secondly, Barbara Hall continues to waffle on the future of the island airport and still looks to be leaning in favour of expansion. I dislike the idea of expanding the island airport, but I also dislike how Hall has not been clear on the issue.

David Miller will most certainly get my vote, and for reasons opposite to why I will not vote for Barbara Hall. Miller is a leader who has stood up for what he believes in. He fought for the MFP leasing inquiry, despite opposition from other councillors and from Mayor Mel Lastman. Miller comes across as ethical, which is exactly what Toronto needs after years of corruption. A mega-city leaves ample room for sleaze to go unnoticed, but I get the feeling, based on his past record, that Miller will keep watch.

John Tory also comes across as a strong leader, and I’m sure that Toronto would fare well with him as mayor. However, I do not agree with him on several key issues, namely his promise to ban panhandling, his proposal to introduce garbage incinerators, and his negative ad campaign against David Miller.

On a related note, my weblog is getting lots of hits from people searching for information on John Tory and John Nunziata. (Search on Google for both these mayoral candidates to see why.) The accesses continue to mount and threaten to replace “monkey” with “john” (203 vs. 196 at current count) as the highest ranking search keyword for my weblog. There’s a joke in there somewhere, I’m sure.