A man with a plan or a man who wings it?

John Tory did his best last night to present Dalton McGuinty as a man with no plan.

Coming from "One note Johnny", it didn't cut much ice with viewers.

Tory's major challenge is that he has one central campaign idea: he'll divert funds from the public education system to fund private religious schools. That's an idea that has infuriated about 70% of the voters. As one old geezer wheezed yesterday "The man's got foot in mouth disease."

When your major platform plank goes kersplat, what do you do?

Well, in last night's debate Tory went negative to such an extent most wondered who the hell he was talking about and what province he was in.

Going negative usually doesn't sit well with most voters, who can come up with their own criticisms of the government - what they want to know is what you stand for, never mind your opponent.

What, besides a lot of negativity, does Tory stand for? What's his vision, besides funding private religious schools? Well, he criticized the government and implied he would do the following:
1. eradicate poverty. McGuinty's made a start to address the years of neglect from the Harris government? Not good enough. Nothing but completely erasing poverty is acceptable. Ergo, I'll do it.

2. erase wait times in hospitals. McGuinty has made major strides in reducing wait times but that doesn't count. It's not good enough. I'll get rid of them completely.

3. do away with the health tax and add billions to the health system with no tax increase. Voodoo economics? If I say it, it will be because I will never break a promise and leadership matters and I will do what I say.

4. erase all crime. Under McGuinty, Ontario has the lowest crime rate in Canada. Not good enough - no crime will be tolerated and no crime will occur because I, John Tory, simply won't accept it. This is Ontario and we will not have crime here.

5. bring back all the manufacturing jobs that have been lost in Ontario during the McGuinty time in office. How dare the premier suggest that just because he's created 360,000 jobs we should consider he's done a good job? I'll create more jobs at higher wages and we'll completely restore the manufacturing sector. We will. Yes.

6. put an end to people having to accept $19 an hour jobs if they lose a $26 an hour job. No more having to settle for anything less than you have today. And a chicken in every pot and a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow and it won't rain on picnic days anymore either.

7. put an end to all violence in society. Under McGuinty the crime rate has gone down each year. But that doesn't matter. No sir - not good enough - all violence will end completely when I am premier because I simply will not tolerate it. It's not good enough for Ontario, therefore it will end.

8. I will become Captain Canada and will show those premiers from other provinces that they can take it easy now boys - here I am, John Tory, and I have the answers and Ontario is going to tell the nation once again what to do and when and how.

There was more but it was just as bad. What we got from Tory was a negative barrage of criticism, half of which was down right wrong and he knows it, and the other half that did nothing to say what HE would do if he had the chance.

The fact is, after watching Tory for an hour and a half it became crystal clear that the reason he was just being negative with absolutely no concrete ideas of his own being offered is because he has none. None. Zip. Zero. If he had, this was the time to put them in front of the voters. This was the time to say "if I'm premier here's what I'll do about poverty, here's what I'll do to resolve the wait times, here's what I'll do to reduce crime."

Tory didn't do that but McGuinty did. He set out, when he wasn't being drowned out by Tory and the other guy, what his government has done. In some areas I don't think it's enough. I wish they had moved much more quickly in dealing with the rising cost of post secondary education - it is too high and it needs to be addressed. I wish McGuinty was moving more quickly to replace roads and bridges and pipes and I wish the transportation grants were larger and coming more quickly.

But give the man credit - McGuinty has done something concrete in all of these areas - things are much better than they were four years ago, although they are a long way from perfect. And that's the point. Tory could have acknowledged what's been done and then outlined in detail how he'd do it better and faster and without blowing the provincial budget through the roof. He didn't.

The man without the plan last night was not McGuinty but Tory. The man who was being blasted from both sides, and who was the object of piling on again and again, stood his ground, continued to stand on the high ground, and continued to remind people of what his government had actually done.

I don't think either Tory or McGuinty won the debate but in terms of who has a plan and a vision for Ontario? No question - McGuinty is miles ahead.

Are we better off today than we were four years ago? Tory hasn't posed that question once, although it's a natural. The reason? Because everyone knows the answer-"yeah, I AM better off than four years ago."

When that's the answer, and when the opposition has no plan and no vision, then people don't upset the apple cart by changing governments. Why ever would they?