No one claimed the NDP disrupted municipal issues. Sigh. Let me spell it out the chronology that I assumed was obvious.
An NDP victory 1990-1995 is followed from 1995-2003 by the Conservative government of Mike Harris (with final days under Eves). It is the Cons that I suggest, through their Common Sense Revolution that gave us eight years of destroyed and disrupted cities. I have said nothing about the NDP above other than to suggest that a leftward swing might swing us back to a repeat of Harris/Ford attacks and defunding of cities.
Where could you possibly get from the above that I think another Ford term would be better? Myself, I’m voting for Crombie so that we might land in the middle. As long as Crombie does not have any Wynne/McGuinty MPs or cronies in her cabinet.
In that case, you might as well slam down the firewall on *any* left-leaning government out of fear that it'll tripwire an opposite reaction next time around. Which also goes for, municipally, David Miller as a foretaste of Rob Ford--and maybe Olivia Chow re whomever comes *after* her. Or Rachel Notley as a foretaste of Jason Kenney & Danielle Smith, or the Justin/Jagmeet deal as a foretaste of PM Poilievre. Or, of course, Obama as a foretaste of Trump (not that Obama was precisely "left-leaning"). Which is kind of like a perpendicular version of the old "a vote for the NDP is a vote for the Conservatives" canard.
I referred to 1990 less in terms of the NDP per se, than in terms of governments defeating themselves and where there's a will to turn to the next best viable alternative, there's a way. David Peterson called an early election knowing that the PCs were a near-broke basket case and the NDP "couldn't win". Well, the NDP won, in part due to the PCs being a near-broke basket case--though thanks to Mike Harris's clever campaigning, the PCs did well enough on a shoestring to increase their seat total and set a foundation for '95. The NDP won because voters were put off by the perceived sleaze of the Peterson Liberals, and because they noticed Bob Rae seemed to carry enough gravitas. Likewise, the perception-of-sleaze thing is what was critical in defeating Paul Martin on behalf of Stephen Harper in '06--and w/an overlay of dark extremism, what defeated Harper in his turn on behalf of Justin in '15.
The fact that it was the NDP that won in '90 is actually more incidental to the argument than it looks. And as per the '15 Justin counter-example, it could work either way next time, even if it'd involve the Libs polevaulting out of non-party-status to cinch the deal. But the OLP is actually, beneath the surface, in better shape than the PCs were going into the '90 election--and at least when it comes to seat numbers, so is the ONDP. And next to what we're learning about the PCs, whatever backroom-deal-and-crony sleaze the Peterson Libs were up to in '90 looks like kid stuff.
So just because *you* aren't hot on the NDP coming to power and feel the Libs are too far behind this time to matter, doesn't mean that that'll define the future electoral narrative--though one can safely say that if defeat awaits the PCs, it's all DoFo's boneheaded fault (by comparison, a Premier Patrick Brown scandal would probably be more Peterson-esque). And in the event that it's Stiles rather than Crombie who (at least momentarily) benefits--well, it's not like we ought to be constantly using Rae Days as a barometer for what could happen, just as the so-far placid Horgan/Eby tenure couldn't have been foretold by the BCNDP's pratfallish 1991-2001 reign in government.
(And just as governments defeat themselves, so do official oppositions who get leapfrogged in third-to-first-place cases--think of the OLP in '95, or the Mulcair NDP federally in '15.)
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