An election that left more questions than answers

Marking the ballot
Marking the ballot

Driving along Dupont Street in Toronto on Saturday night, you might have noticed something rather peculiar. Planted in a narrow strip of soil adjacent to a mostly empty supermarket parking lot stood three election campaign signs, one each for Mark Adler, Michael Levitt and Hal Berman, the Conservative, Liberal and NDP candidates, respectively, in the riding of York Centre.

Perhaps, you could have thought to yourself, the campaign staffers tasked with collecting lawn signs in the days after the Oct. 19 federal election had simply missed this troika. Except that explanation would inevitably raise more questions – namely, why would three York Centre candidates have been campaigning in the University-Rosedale riding? And if they hadn’t been, as was surely the case, then how had these signs seemingly travelled more than 10 kilometres southward on their own?

Failing to make any sense of this, you could have concluded that perhaps the signs were meant to offer some sort of statement on the campaign that just concluded – something about the deep entrenchment of politics in our daily lives, even after the battle has been won and lost. Or maybe someone had left the signs out, like an old sofa, hoping they would find a good home elsewhere.

Whatever the explanation, the mystery of the misplaced signs might stand as a symbol of the uncertainty left in the wake of the federal election. In this week’s CJN, we begin to examine how the results could affect the Canadian Jewish community. Sheri Shefa reports on Prime Minister-elect Justin Trudeau’s momentous victory, and the legacy of outgoing Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Meanwhile, Benjamin Shinewald suggests that the Liberal triumph signals a new day for Canadian Jews, while Michael Diamond argues that the Conservative defeat will be a bitter pill to swallow for our community. And in his final Campaign Notebook column, Daniel Wolgelerenter wonders how the election might affect Jewish community organizations.

There are few answers so soon after the election, of course. For now, all we can do is ask the questions.