i’m approaching my stint here as a riding blogger as a chance to chronicle my own decision making process, simply put i need to decide whom i’m going to vote for.

to that end today i interviewed Sharon Howarth, the green party candidate for toronto-danforth. i was curious about to see how well she would communicate the green platform, what personally was driving her, and i was also somewhat curious as to her feelings about running against a national party leader.

Sharon is, as all politicians must be, friendly in person . i came away from my interview with her knowing that she really, honest and truly, believes in her candidacy. when i asked her about the whole “running against Jack” issue her attitude she seemed puzzled that i even bothered to ask. she believes that the big three established parties have had their chance and why not give the greens a chance, especially consider the wonderful policy platform they have (ok i’m paraphrasing here, but you get the gist)

on a policy front Sharon opened with the green economic policies, while she didn’t (to her credit) accuse the liberals of stealing the green policy platform (cough cough green shift cough cough) you can see just where the original thinking came from. taxes on consumption and pollution with corresponding reductions in income taxes, to me it sounds like a great idea… however i’m curious about specifics and on that front i left unsatisfied. in particular i wanted to know how this taxation shift would look from an average persons perspective, would the new taxes and the reduced income taxes happen at the same time or are we in for a painful transition period, do our pay-cheques get bigger before or after prices rise? (Sharon promised me answers to that question, i’ll post them as a comment when they arrive)

one particular area of concern i have specific to the greens is social policy, i had heard amongst my political wonkish friends that the green social policy wasn’t exactly as progressive as you might imagine. after talking to Sharon i think it’s a little more complicated than that. i do think they, or at least Sharon, cares strongly about reducing poverty, increasing equality and opportunity for all, but i’m not convinced that their policy positions are sufficiently well thought out to accomplish those goals. their main social policy plank, the guaranteed minimum income (one program to replace all ‘the mish-mash of social program’ aka welfare, child benefit, ODSP, etc) seems to me a naive at best. just imagine the chaos of trying to eliminate and replace all those programs! i somehow doubt it would end up being revenue neutral when all is said and done…

all in all though, the greens have little hope of forming government, so i can forgive them their political naivety on the social policy front.

finally we spent some time talking about strategic voting, and oh boy you can tell the practice pisses Sharon off. i can understand why, i imagine it’s frustrating to have voters tell you they agree with you but then turn around and vote for you political opponents. Sharon is a true believer, she really believes that she can (and will win) if she can just pierce the veil of cynicism we’ve all developed.

me i’m not so convinced (high cynicism content), however she’s definitely in the running for my vote at least (not that it counts for much

oh, and i promised Mary Ann, Sharon’s friendly campaign manager, that i’d mention that the toronto-danforth greens are hosting a debate party, thursday october 2nd at the Maverick Pub @ 802 danforth ave. i probably won’t be there (you know you’re a wonk when you’ve got multiple debate party invites) but if you want to meet Sharon yourself i imagine that would be a good opportunity