John Tory is continuing to mount a desperate smear campaign against David Miller. At the same time, he is ignoring Barbara Hall.

I think there are three reasons for this strategy.

1. David Miller is the strongest candidate, with the most momentum. If Tory doesn't stop Miller somehow, it doesn't matter how many votes he can take from Hall.
2. There is also a general sense that voters who are thinking about this election are thinking about either Miller or Tory. Despite the supposedly-important differences in party affiliation, many people have told me that their choice was down to those two candidates. In fact, in my decision process, Tory was my second choice. And several Tory volunteers have told me they have good feelings for David, even going so far as to say, "we'd be proud to have [David Miller] as our mayor."
3. Someone on the Tory team must have decided that the only way to get around Tory's connections to Lastman-era failures is a direct and immediate appeal to the pocketbook.

Thus John Tory's single-minded focus on road tolls. (His new road tolls flyer can be found on Warren Kinsella's Musings for October 23. Additionally, John Tory is responsible for a single-issue website that features an image of David Miller altered to make him look like a criminal.)

Unfortunately for John, there is no candidate who wants to bring in road tolls.

David Miller only ever said that we might need to consider road tolls if the senior levels of government didn't step in to fund transit. (John Tory never said what he would do.) The point is now moot. The new provincial government has reconfirmed their promise to share the gas tax with Toronto and David Miller has therefore announced that road tolls are officially off the table. In today's Globe and Mail:

The new Ontario government's promise to share a portion of its gas-tax revenue with Toronto "ends the need to consider alternatives such as toll roads," Toronto mayoral candidate David Miller said yesterday.

DISCLOSURE: After a serious decision-making process, I joined the Miller-for-mayor campaign a few weeks ago. However, all comments on this website are my own, and do not necessarily represent the views of David Miller or his campaign. My role in the campaign is grunt-level and I haven't even met the strategists.

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