Marianne Cerilli

A few weeks ago, very near to the time when the Mayoral candidates deadline to register, my friend came to me and requested that I sign Marianne Cerilli's petition to run for Mayor in this years civic election.

I signed.

What a mistake that was.

I don't know much about Ms. Cerilli ... she is a former NDP MLA from 1990 to 2003 in the Raddisson area.

This friend, whom I've admired for his writings for the past twenty years, and this other person who also is a regular writer are supporting Marianne's campaign.

The first guy says, "Jim, we convinced Marianne of the need for light rail in Winnipeg."

That says it all doesn't it. This person is normally in favour of subways for Winnipeg and also has a pretty good sense of who is for and who is against rail rapid transit in Winnipeg. But I guess if you carry the "labour" card around this town, well that somehow manages to trump the other values.

Why would I support a politician who says they were "convinced" of the value of rapid transit by another person, when indeed it is common sense that if you understand the dynamics of living in a big city and how to make it work properly you shouldn't have to be "convinced" of its value, it should just naturally become part of your urbanist values, right?

Not for Marianne and her minions though.

Secondly, and this has seemed to compromise my values when it comes to gender issues.

See Marianne refers to herself as an "eco-feminist". What is that you say? Well I'm more concerned about the feminist part. There are two kinds of feminists:

1. Eqality or Egaliarian
2. Gender

It is the second type that I strongly dislike. They are the root cause the breakdown of the nuclear family. They set out to feminize boys, and they wish to raise children on their own, sans Dad. They have absolutely no use for men, unless they can use them in some sort of way to help them reach to the top of some ladder -- in this case being Mayor of Winnipeg.

So while I did sign her campaign nomination paper, based on the usually good judgement of my transit friend, I think he missed the mark this time.

I have absolutely no plans to vote for Ms. Cerilli on October 25th. None. Nada.

I may choose to vote for Sam Katz this time because at least Mayor Sam took the initiative in late 2004/early 2005 to sample light rail transit in other cities. He didn't need to be convinced of this. He had also been quoted several times in the local media that he prefers LRT over BRT.

So there you have it. I think that Marianne is just leading these men around by the nose and that she is using them to further her

What Marianne also stands for is also to sustain the poverty industry here in Winnipeg. She has worked with, or supports or is in favour of the Social Planning Council. They are part of the problem, not the solution.

Further reading:
The Black Rod