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(Don't call them) New Year's resolutions for Guelph politics in 2022 – GuelphToday

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By the time you’re reading this, it’s 2022. Welcome to the Future.

In lieu of some New Year’s resolutions, which are doomed to failure because picking an arbitrary date to make massive life changes instead of working incremental towards a goal goes completely against human nature, let’s consider some ways we can make 2022 a little bit better over the next 12 months.

First, and I say this with all due respect, it’s been impossible to ignore that city council’s been a little bit bitchy with each other lately.

Blame the “box effect” as councillors are spending too much time siloed in their virtual meeting locations. It’s harder to fire passive aggressive barbs at colleagues if you have to look at them in their physical eyes across the council table, but so long as we’re continuing with the virtual format, I think I’m going to start keeping a running tally of “points of order.”

And it’s going to be hard to think about any council business this year without remembering that this is an election year. All but two members of council have been there for eight years, and seven of those people have been there for at least 12.

Again, I say this with all due respect, but I think some members of council need to do some deep thinking and soul searching about whether or not the time has come to open a spot for a new generation of local leadership.

This speaks to a big issue in local politics, which is the lack of engagement that results in people just checking boxes for the incumbent without any particular knowledge or insight into their voting record or stand on the issues. I’m not saying people have to think about politics every day, but maybe that’s the reason why council is, for the most part, one night a week.

And I’m going to make a push for this even though I know it’s unlikely to come to pass: We actually have two elections this year, a local one and a provincial one, and considering how many issues overlap those two levels, or how local action is sometimes stymied by a lack of action or interest on the part of Queen’s Park, this seems like an ideal time to find solutions that transcend jurisdiction.

This is not exactly a theoretical exercise either. Consider an Ontario Auditor General’s report from earlier this year that noted that while municipal councils have increased their spending on issues related to homelessness by 59 per cent on average, provincial and federal spending has only gone up by 32 and 29 per cent respectively.

This will be a great time to talk about a variety of crossover issues like getting a new hospital in Guelph, housing affordability and availability, and regional transportation. Don’t like the rate by which your taxes are going up in Guelph? We need to have a big conversation about the way we fund cities, and how little control cities have over their own purse strings.

As for who might run in the election, I’d like to lend a voice of support to Guelph’s young people, the ones who are leading the fight for social justice, climate action, and economic equality. I hope they consider formalizing their activism by running for office. Not to sound agist, but adding one person under 30 to council would increase its overall tech-savviness by a factor of 12.

As you can tell by some of these new year’s suggestions, it’s my desire to make this double-election year a time for serious discussions about serious issues with serious people. Of course, in this era of politics the word “serious” is synonymous with the term, “reality-based.” So looking ahead to 2022, can we be guaranteed that either of the coming elections will be fought on the basis of reality?

Granted, politics here in Canada is not being pulled into a rabbit hole of conspiracies, weird science, and half-truths, but we can’t ignore the trend. Ontario will have two far-right parties running candidates in the next provincial election, both notably led by politicians who traffic in vaccine hesitancy and COVID science denial.

Of course, it’s impossible to think about the new year without being reminded that we’re entering the third calendar year of the pandemic.

The hardest thing to reconcile about the COVID-19 pandemic is how it never unfolded the way we thought it would. We thought it would go away, especially after the vast majority of us got vaccinated, but now there’s this word “endemic” making the rounds. COVID is now being talked about as something we have to live with, so will we be able to find a way to live with it?

It’s a terrible thought, but New Year’s is not exclusively a time for happy thoughts, or at least it shouldn’t be. You can’t change the world in the same way that you can change a calendar on the fridge, so keep in mind that whatever change you seek in 2022 it can happen incrementally, and it probably will.

That’s one column down, 51 more to go!

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Trump is consistently inconsistent on abortion and reproductive rights

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CHICAGO (AP) — Donald Trump has had a tough time finding a consistent message to questions about abortion and reproductive rights.

The former president has constantly shifted his stances or offered vague, contradictory and at times nonsensical answers to questions on an issue that has become a major vulnerability for Republicans in this year’s election. Trump has been trying to win over voters, especially women, skeptical about his views, especially after he nominated three Supreme Court justices who helped overturn the nationwide right to abortion two years ago.

The latest example came this week when the Republican presidential nominee said some abortion laws are “too tough” and would be “redone.”

“It’s going to be redone,” he said during a Fox News town hall that aired Wednesday. “They’re going to, you’re going to, you end up with a vote of the people. They’re too tough, too tough. And those are going to be redone because already there’s a movement in those states.”

Trump did not specify if he meant he would take some kind of action if he wins in November, and he did not say which states or laws he was talking about. He did not elaborate on what he meant by “redone.”

He also seemed to be contradicting his own stand when referencing the strict abortion bans passed in Republican-controlled states since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Trump recently said he would vote against a constitutional amendment on the Florida ballot that is aimed at overturning the state’s six-week abortion ban. That decision came after he had criticized the law as too harsh.

Trump has shifted between boasting about nominating the justices who helped strike down federal protections for abortion and trying to appear more neutral. It’s been an attempt to thread the divide between his base of anti-abortion supporters and the majority of Americans who support abortion rights.

About 6 in 10 Americans think their state should generally allow a person to obtain a legal abortion if they don’t want to be pregnant for any reason, according to a July poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Voters in seven states, including some conservative ones, have either protected abortion rights or defeated attempts to restrict them in statewide votes over the past two years.

Trump also has been repeating the narrative that he returned the question of abortion rights to states, even though voters do not have a direct say on that or any other issue in about half the states. This is particularly true for those living in the South, where Republican-controlled legislatures, many of which have been gerrymandered to give the GOP disproportionate power, have enacted some of the strictest abortion bans since Roe v. Wade was overturned.

Currently, 13 states have banned abortion at all stages of pregnancy, while four more ban it after six weeks — before many women know they’re pregnant.

Meanwhile, anti-abortion groups and their Republican allies in state governments are using an array of strategies to counter proposed ballot initiatives in at least eight states this year.

Here’s a breakdown of Trump’s fluctuating stances on reproductive rights.

Flip-flopping on Florida

On Tuesday, Trump claimed some abortion laws are “too tough” and would be “redone.”

But in August, Trump said he would vote against a state ballot measure that is attempting to repeal the six-week abortion ban passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.

That came a day after he seemed to indicate he would vote in favor of the measure. Trump previously called Florida’s six-week ban a “terrible mistake” and too extreme. In an April Time magazine interview, Trump repeated that he “thought six weeks is too severe.”

Trump on vetoing a national ban

Trump’s latest flip-flopping has involved his views on a national abortion ban.

During the Oct. 1 vice presidential debate, Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social that he would veto a national abortion ban: “Everyone knows I would not support a federal abortion ban, under any circumstances, and would, in fact, veto it.”

This came just weeks after Trump repeatedly declined to say during the presidential debate with Democrat Kamala Harris whether he would veto a national abortion ban if he were elected.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, said in an interview with NBC News before the presidential debate that Trump would veto a ban. In response to debate moderators prompting him about Vance’s statement, Trump said: “I didn’t discuss it with JD, in all fairness. And I don’t mind if he has a certain view, but I don’t think he was speaking for me.”

‘Pro-choice’ to 15-week ban

Trump’s shifting abortion policy stances began when the former reality TV star and developer started flirting with running for office.

He once called himself “very pro-choice.” But before becoming president, Trump said he “would indeed support a ban,” according to his book “The America We Deserve,” which was published in 2000.

In his first year as president, he said he was “pro-life with exceptions” but also said “there has to be some form of punishment” for women seeking abortions — a position he quickly reversed.

At the 2018 annual March for Life, Trump voiced support for a federal ban on abortion on or after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

More recently, Trump suggested in March that he might support a national ban on abortions around 15 weeks before announcing that he instead would leave the matter to the states.

Views on abortion pills, prosecuting women

In the Time interview, Trump said it should be left up to the states to decide whether to prosecute women for abortions or to monitor women’s pregnancies.

“The states are going to make that decision,” Trump said. “The states are going to have to be comfortable or uncomfortable, not me.”

Democrats have seized on the comments he made in 2016, saying “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who have abortions.

Trump also declined to comment on access to the abortion pill mifepristone, claiming that he has “pretty strong views” on the matter. He said he would make a statement on the issue, but it never came.

Trump responded similarly when asked about his views on the Comstock Act, a 19th century law that has been revived by anti-abortion groups seeking to block the mailing of mifepristone.

IVF and contraception

In May, Trump said during an interview with a Pittsburgh television station that he was open to supporting regulations on contraception and that his campaign would release a policy on the issue “very shortly.” He later said his comments were misinterpreted.

In the KDKA interview, Trump was asked, “Do you support any restrictions on a person’s right to contraception?”

“We’re looking at that and I’m going to have a policy on that very shortly,” Trump responded.

Trump has not since released a policy statement on contraception.

Trump also has offered contradictory statements on in vitro fertilization.

During the Fox News town hall, which was taped Tuesday, Trump declared that he is “the father of IVF,” despite acknowledging during his answer that he needed an explanation of IVF in February after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children under state law.

Trump said he instructed Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., to “explain IVF very quickly” to him in the aftermath of the ruling.

As concerns over access to fertility treatments rose, Trump pledged to promote IVF by requiring health insurance companies or the federal government to pay for it. Such a move would be at odds with the actions of much of his own party.

Even as the Republican Party has tried to create a national narrative that it is receptive to IVF, these messaging efforts have been undercut by GOP state lawmakers, Republican-dominated courts and anti-abortion leaders within the party’s ranks, as well as opposition to legislative attempts to protect IVF access.

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The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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Saskatchewan Party’s Scott Moe, NDP’s Carla Beck react to debate |

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Saskatchewan‘s two main political party leaders faced off in the only televised debate in the lead up to the provincial election on Oct. 28. Saskatchewan Party Leader Scott Moe and NDP Leader Carla Beck say voters got a chance to see their platforms. (Oct. 17, 2024)

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Saskatchewan political leaders back on campaign trail after election debate

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REGINA – Saskatchewan‘s main political leaders are back on the campaign trail today after hammering each other in a televised debate.

Saskatchewan Party Leader Scott Moe is set to make an announcement in Moose Jaw.

Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck is to make stops in Regina, Saskatoon and Prince Albert.

During Wednesday night’s debate, Beck emphasized her plan to make life more affordable and said people deserve better than an out-of-touch Saskatchewan Party government.

Moe said his party wants to lower taxes and put money back into people’s pockets.

Election day is Oct. 28.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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