A Sea Of Orange Hope

It's not fashionable to be earnest these days when irony and cynicism are the king and queen. But they've been deposed today at Roy Thompson Hall where there is a sea of people - many on orange shirts and hats, the colour of the NDP. My guess is that there are 10,000 or so here for Jack's funeral.

As I'm listening and watching, along with my partner Kathryn and daughter Beatrice, Stephen Lewis is speaking the eulogy. He has just received a sustained, speech stopping applause with whoops and whistles for describing jack's final letter as an ode to the hope promised by social democracy. The applause returns when talks about the issues of importance to Jack - equality, justice, gay and lesbian rights, climate change, gender equality and the fight against sexist violence. The list goes on and so does the applause.

Whatever is going on here it is not just sadness. There's a lot of inspiration that is charging people up to change the world. That, after all is what Jack would have wanted.