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Politics isn't just irritating. It can be downright confusing. Consider Cecil Clarke as one of the greatest examples of both. Granted, I'm someone persistently critical of Clarke, the CBRM mayor and PC leadership candidate, for reasons I frequently explain at length. For those who support him, I anticipate your immediate preparedness to reject what I'm about to propose. However, I challenge you to unravel this conflict:

How can Cecil Clarke (a) boast about his leadership abilities in the CBRM during his PC campaign, (b) admit at home that we're "not sustainable", and yet (c) not only oppose more Equalization cash for us... but also advocate for getting rid of it altogether? It's very clear to me that such conflicted positions are both irritating and confusing.

I don't want you to believe me because I said so. I'd rather that you give it some thought because I showed you. Check out the following video. It'll take you on a 5-minute journey of somewhat surprising admissions and haphazard opposition from Clarke. And, fair warning, it may leave you feeling frustrated or conflicted too.

If you just watched the video and you're balking at it as just one of those "political attack ads", I'm going to give you the links you need to see the full meetings for the main sources of the excerpts. You can examine the full context, a few hours of time permitting, and decide for yourself.

Here's the Equalization meeting with Clarke. Here's the earlier Equalization meeting with CBRM Councillors. Here's the most recent PC leadership debate, part 1 and part 2. The final funny clip from CBRM Councillor Ivan Doncaster was unrelated to the Equalization discussion but captures the fundamental message of this entire article, don't you think?

If you're one of Clarke's supporters, you would be right to question whether I really have a valid point to make, or if I'm just a partisan Liberal or NDP supporter doing what partisans do: drinking the red or orange Kool-Aid with great satisfaction, but tipping over the pitcher of blue Kool-Aid with great malice. Spoiler: I'm non-partisan, and I support ideas and people, not political parties.

But I'd like you to consider the video and take a moment to contemplate whether or not you agree there is quite a contradiction here.

You're reading an Internet article, so nobody will know if you silently find yourself scratching your head and leaning towards the idea that maybe, just maybe, Clarke really is a career politician making some highly questionable choices that directly impact us.

The CBRM is "dying". It's metaphor, so in the metaphorical sense you can think of dying as having a large annual population loss (about 1,000 people) every year, high unemployment, high child poverty, high insolvency as people struggle to keep their homes (and others can't qualify to get one), insufficient municipal revenue to take care of our needs, and taxes so high it discourages people from building homes or investing in new business locations.

If 1,000 people a year are dying or leaving without being replaced, and our economy can't grow, eventually in a not-so-distant future our municipality is essentially insolvent: we can't pay for what we need anymore.

It's happened in the province before. Other municipalities have had to find another one willing to absorb them once they couldn't make it any further. And for the second largest municipality, it's not out of the question that insolvency awaits us too. We're very costly to operate, but our revenues aren't growing, and if people keep leaving, there's greater and greater pressure on the CBRM to start cutting back services or let our roads crumble a little more and stay that way a little longer. 

While we know this is true, and Clarke admits to the NSEF group that we're "not sustainable", he'll still boast about his success as a leader and share such things as this endorsement (see below) to his social media campaign pages:

Doesn't it beg the question: 

What "ship" has Cecil Clarke "turned around" in the CBRM?

How can he preside as the mayor of the CBRM, a municipality that he says is unsustainable, and still share such a campaign endorsement with good conscience?

How can he attack a fellow leadership candidate (Tim Houston) for pledging to increase our provincial Equalization cash from $15 Million to $30 Million?

And how can Clarke then commit to abolishing the Equalization transfer all together?

Over 6 years as mayor, Clarke's signature achievement should be the second cruise ship berth on the Sydney waterfront. Here we are in 2018, $4.75 Million over its $20 Million budget, uncertain about the final amount we have to pay for the land, on the hook for the millions we are over budget all by ourselves, or forced to scale it back and build less than what was promised.

It's very difficult to reconcile the idea of Clarke asking for our support to become Premier.

He collects a salary paid by us to perform as mayor while traversing the province applying for the job he wants next, but he won't do the honourable thing in resigning and letting us choose a new mayor who wants the job, and wants the job full-time.

Despite him knowing we're not sustainable and struggling financially, he somehow finds it within himself to criticize Tim Houston when Houston pledges giving us $15 Million more in Equalization.

Cecil Clarke should have been the first one in line to promise us not only $15 Million, but a lot more. That's what a true leader committed to the CBRM community would have been fighting for... not against.

He says he doesn't want to be the "last one to shut out the lights".

And maybe that's why he's so gung-ho to get out of the CBRM before that happens.

It's irritating. It's confusing. It's unethical. But it's a problem he'd like to leave us with... Just not quite yet.

We're functioning as his back up plan if he fails in his leadership bid. If the second berth ever gets built, it'll create great photo ops for his campaign flyer for a Federal run for MP in 2019 against Mark Eyking again, or as provincial MLA in 2021 if Alfie MacLeod or one of the ole boys decide to retire.

NOTE: The views expressed above are my own and do not represent lokol (goCapeBreton.com). Read more