The Champion of Canadian Electoral Reform: An Open Letter to Tom Mulcair and all NDP members

Dear Thomas Mulcair, M.P., NDP Leader:

I have been an NDP Member and ardent supporter for decades.   Previously I worked shoulder-to-shoulder with Jane Jacobs, the urbanologist, John Sewell, the previous NDP Mayor of Toronto, Dan Heap, NDP M.P, Charlie DiNovo and hundreds of other democratic-socialist activists in Toronto for many years.  I was the organizer of the successful 45-year-old Karma Co-operative in Toronto’s Annex. We were all active members of Karma Co-op and of the Toronto NDP.  We were all dedicated to real “grass-roots” democratic-socialist principles and actions. 

Recently Cheri DiNovo, Charlie DiNovo’s daughter, has been very active in the media suggesting that you step down as Leader of the NDP.  Unfortunately, I generally agree with most of the arguments put forth by Cheri DiNovo.  At the same time, I believe that you are the best Leader that the NDP has ever had.  Please read my attached letter which I sent to you dozens of times during the election, The Democratic Coalition of Canada, DCC.

You would have been, and still possibly can be, the best Prime Minister that this country has ever seen.  As I said to you when   

I met you last fall at the Ottawa Museum of Nature, “When I look at you, I see the face of Canada.”   

You were excellent at stopping the development of Orford Park.  You were stellar as Leader of the Opposition during your time in the Parliament.  In the last months of the election, what happened to that feisty Quebec politician that Chantal Hebert lauded on CBC?? 

At times in some of the debates you seemed like Obama in his first debate with Mitt Romney in 2012…subdued and aloof.     

For the next 100 years, the two “seesaw” parties, the Liberals and the Conservatives, will just alternate as the party in power and maintain their first-past-the--post electoral system. The NDP, and all other parties, will be relegated to oblivion.

You NOW have a golden opportunity to lead THE REAL CHANGE to a truly democratic Canada.  I believe that you should stay on as Leader of the NDP only if you transform the NDP into THE REAL “OPPOSITION” and transform yourself into the FEISTY QUEBEC CHAMPION of Canadian electoral reform. Then you could be the Prime Minister in 2020! 

With kind regards,

Richard Merrill Haney, Ph.D. (Psychology)