{"id":4370,"date":"2013-10-24T00:04:43","date_gmt":"2013-10-24T04:04:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=4370"},"modified":"2013-11-06T14:51:30","modified_gmt":"2013-11-06T19:51:30","slug":"politics-as-usual-red-october","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/politics-as-usual-red-october\/","title":{"rendered":"POLITICS AS USUAL: Red October"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas<\/strong><\/p>\n

As I watched the latest show to hit the theatre that is politics in Aurora, and believe me, it\u2019s a show folks, a bad one, but a show none- the-less, I couldn\u2019t help but think of my favourite scene in one of my favourite movies.
\nThe movie is The Hunt for Red October and the scene is between Jack Ryan and Dr. Jeffrey Pelt, National Security Advisor.
\nAs Ryan protests about the proposed course of action, Dr. Pelt says to Ryan, \u201cListen, I\u2019m a politician which means I\u2019m a cheat and a liar and when I\u2019m not kissing babies, I\u2019m stealing their lollipops.\u201d
\nIt\u2019s a great line. It\u2019s great because it\u2019s great dialogue, but it\u2019s also great because it rings so true. He\u2019s saying, essentially, that politicians are always working the angles and to make no mistake, that it\u2019s always about what\u2019s best for them.
\nIt\u2019s true as a group, politicians \u2013 even the bad ones \u2013 are master equivocators. They don\u2019t necessarily lie \u2013 though some do, if we are to believe our national media \u2013 but they don\u2019t tell the truth either. They tell you what you want to hear because that way, you\u2019ll vote for them. Or at least, you won\u2019t vote for the other guy \u2013 which seems to be a popular strategy, certainly for some of the more bitter candidates.
\nA politician \u2013 pick your stripe, or party or ward \u2013 sees an issue that can be exploited or manufactured as is more often the case, seizes on it. Then gets a group within the community suitably agitated about this \u201cissue\u201d. As expected, the group of angry or upset folks send emails to constituency offices, or letters to Councillors\/MPP\/MPs or what have you. Community meetings are held and the \u201cissue\u201d gets a thorough airing, while the progenitor of it all sits aloft his\/her white horse, lance at the ready proclaiming that s\/he will \u201cfight for you,\u201d or words to that effect. Cue the applause.
\nThe concerns of the community are genuine. The response is most definitely not.
\nOften the \u201cissue\u201d as presented never had a solution at the local level. The decision rests in the hands of higher levels of government or worse, the courts. So your local politicians are safe to give the impression of \u201cfighting for you\u201d when in fact they know darn well that regardless of what decision or resolution is passed at the municipal level, it will be overturned at another.
\nBut that\u2019s not the point, is it? The point is politician X can look like the hero \u2013 fighting for a cause \u2013 that never was.
\nThe disingenuousness of it all is positively galling. Presenting a solution as possible, if perhaps not probable, without mentioning that the decision is not really theirs to make. This happens time and time again. It makes straw men of hard working folks who deserve better from our elected leaders.
\nPeople deserve the truth; the WHOLE truth about an issue. Not cherry picked phrases from an agreement that give the impression of a solution but have no real relevance to the issue at hand. Not bits and pieces, shards of information that if seen in totality would project a completely different picture. The whole, unvarnished truth. Believe me, folks can take it.
\nAngry, upset residents are not NIMBYists, though they often end up presented as such. What they are, is misinformed and often deliberately so, by those who have their own agendas.
\nLocal politicians may not be \u201ckissing your babies\u201d, but make no mistake they\u2019re probably, \u201cstealing your lollipops.\u201d
\nUntil next week, stay informed, stay involved because this is after all, Our Town.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas As I watched the latest show to hit the theatre that is politics in Aurora, and believe me, it\u2019s a show folks, a bad one, but a show none- the-less, I couldn\u2019t help but think of my favourite scene in one of my favourite movies. The movie is The Hunt for Red […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-18u","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-10 12:06:59","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4370\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}