It was s a real pleasure being taken on by Adam Radwanski yesterday for criticizing David Miller. Unlike certain French language bloggers/columnists who shall remain nameless, Adam feels no need to resort to cheap ad hominem attacks and unlike said unnamed bloggers/columnist, he actually makes an argument rather than throwing forth vapid rhetoric. His argument is of course flawed, but at least he has one.
Before I get into Adam's flawed argument, let me disclose two conflicts here so no clever commenter has an "aha" moment:
1. I own a house in Toronto. I own and run a business in Toronto. Earlier this year, I spent some of my own money buying a website all about Toronto so it wouldn't be shut down. I care about Toronto, have put my money where my mouth is in that regard and I am distressed about the decline I have seen in the city over the last six-years.
2. If Karen Stintz runs for Mayor, as has been disclosed publicly previously, I will volunteer hundreds, more likely thousands of hours to help ensure she wins. I have never been paid to work on a political campaign before and won't be this time but I want to make sure everyone knows exactly where my bias lies.
I am doing number two - helping Karen if she decides to run - because of number one (my concern about the city's decline) and because I am convinced she is the only potential candidate who can bring real change to the city.
That's my bias, for better or worse.
Anyway, on to Adam's post.
First off, he ridicules the San Francisco Chronicle's story that became an all-day, full-on CNN story yesterday. The headlines I saw on CNN included "Toronto the Dirty" and "Toronto the Stinky". (And to be clear, I don't watch CNN all day unless they guarantee me wall-to-wall Michael Jackson coverage. That guarantee worked for two weeks but yesterday they kept slipping in "news" coverage so it was of little interest to me).
Adam ridicules the Chronicle, and by extension the CNN story as absurd. Surely any rational person, Adam argues, would rather come here than somewhere in the midst of a coup or fighting off the bubonic plague. Yes, the bar has been lowered to the point where he actually had to write this out.
He is of course right, factually. The notion that Toronto is a worse place to visit than a plague- or flu-ridden destination is absurd.
That doesn't make the coverage any less devastating.
It was also absurd that people didn't visit Toronto after SARS (the odds of actually contracting the disease were always miniscule). Or after Mel Lastman's long forgotten comments (I'm not sure why a silly comment by a politician would ever influence a tourist's travel plans).
And yet, we know that perceptions - whether accurate or inaccurate - about cities matter. Not just in terms of jingoistic civic pride but in real dollar terms - tourism, investment.
If perceptions didn't matter then cities, from Toronto to pretty much every other city in the world, wouldn't spend millions of dollars promoting their brand to tourists, potential investors and residents.
They spend that money because cities - at least serious cities - realize they are a brand like any other brand. They also realize a decade of hard work building positive brand attributes can be undone in literally a day.
A full day of CNN kicking the crap out of Toronto has done more damage to Toronto's brand than the multi-million dollar ad campaigns that the city launched post-SARS could possibly have done on the positive side.
I have no ability to quantify the damage at this point but it is real and substantive. Given point one above, that makes me even angrier about the state of our city.
But on to Miller.
Adam's main point is: "What his critics seem to be hinting at - because it's the only present alternative to the strike continuing - is that he should capitulate, giving the workers more or less what they want."
The main flaw with Adam's argument is one of timing. He is focused on today; given the mess we find ourselves in, should Miller capitulate or stand firm? Aren't I a giant hypocrite because I both rant against the strike and want him to stand firm?
