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But that resistance will come and when it does Ford and the PCs need to remember the lesson of Harris’ Common Sense Revolution.

The great revisionist myth about Harris’ time in office today is that the PCs lost power because they were too confrontational. That’s nonsense.

Harris’ biggest fights against the unions were in his first term of office from 1995 to 1999 and he was rewarded with a second majority government in 1999.

Ontarians knew then, as they know today, that government spending is out of control, that the provincial deficit and debt have soared to unprecedented levels and that righting the ship won’t be easy.

Ontarians awarded the Harris Tories a second majority mandate in 1999 because they had done what they said they would do.

What defeated the PCs in the next election in 2003, paving the way for the 15-year Liberal dynasty they just defeated, was that they lost their way in their second term of office.

By 2003, Harris had retired and the Tories were feathering their own nests.

The “Common Sense Revolutionaries” who had come to change the government became the government and were using their public office for private gain.

As a result, they were justly defeated.

The lesson of the last PC government to rule Ontario to this new one is clear.

Ford and the PCs will never go wrong if they do what they said they would do during the election, to the best of their ability, no matter how many special interests protest.

To the contrary, the greatest danger they face is from themselves, if they forget the message contained in their own throne speech in the Legislature last week that, “The power exercised here must always be — and only be — exercised with the people’s best interest in mind.”

If Ford and the PCs remember that, they’ll do fine.

If they don’t, they’ll lose. It’s as simple as that.