Jack Layton and the Message of Hope

It's hard to believe that it's now been nine years since Jack Layton died. It seems so long ago, yet I remember that day so vividly.

I was up early that day, and as I biked down by the lake where Jack liked to go biking, the sun came up a brilliant orange, and I knew he was gone.

But I'll never forget him, or his love for life, and his fighting spirit. 

And these words in his final letter to Canadians still inspire me.

My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.

So I was disgusted to see the ghastly National Post and other right wing rags trying to use that letter to smear Joe Biden.

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, a man not unaccustomed to allegations of plagiarism, is now being accused of copying the words of former New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton.

At a speech at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, Biden’s final address included the lines, “For love is more powerful than hate. Hope is more powerful than fear. And light is more powerful than dark.”

Which is absurd since Biden is a happy warrior like Layton was, and was only speaking their shared language of hope. Layton was inspired by Wilfrid Laurier.

The sentiments Layton made also channel lines from a speech former prime minister Wilfrid Laurier gave in 1916.

“Let me tell you that for the solution of these problems you have a safe guide, an unfailing light if you remember that faith is better than doubt and love is better than hate,” said Laurier.

And what really scares those right wingers is seeing those words of hope written in chalk by thousands of young and old people.

For there were so many of them writing their messages in the courtyard of the Toronto City Hall.

And it was the biggest and most amazing mass tribute I have ever seen.

I started drifting away from the NDP after Tom Mulcair replaced Jack's sunny optimism with his angry negativity, and took the party to the right of the Liberals.

And Jagmeet Singh's NDP has been another disappointment for it's more of the same old Trudeau bashing day after day after day.

And a man who claims Trudeau is another Harper is not my kind of leader, and definitely not another Jack Layton.

Layton was not perfect, he made his share of mistakes, including bringing down the Liberal government, which led to ten years of Stephen Harper.

Which was some mistake eh?

But I always felt his heart was in the right place, and because I also wear my heart on my sleeve, I forgive people like that.

So I made this video to remember him..

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It all seems so long ago.

Layton's memory is fading with the passage of time.

But we need his message of hope even more than we did then.

So hopefully it will live forever.