Well, the results are in and the Fords are out. More precisely, out but not down. Alas: while Doug (the mean, older Bozo) let slip the chain of office, he nonetheless managed to dredge up a third of the vote, and the younger Bozo, Rob (all this familiarity in the media makes them sound almost like members of the family, don’t it?) the ex-mayor and drunk, held on to his old seat in Etobicoke.

Makes you think that Etobicoke must be one of the more benighted places in the country, except that John Tory, the new, and thankfully far less entertaining mayor, did quite well in the larnier parts, down by the lake, and in parts of Scarborough, the other Ford stronghold, which suggests that the suburban/downtown divide may be less rigid and – well, divided – than is generally assumed.

Which must be good news, of a sort, suggesting, as various members of the commentariat have been pointing out, that while amalgamation has been an acknowledged disaster, the way forward for Toronto lies forward, not back. Onwards to – if not exactly unity and mutual understanding, at least some sort of workable accommodation. And the aptly-named Tory may, let it be said, be the man to accommodate, or at least straddle the divide. For Olivia Chow, the third main candidate, was, and is, clearly too closely associated with the old Toronto, the downtown, liberal core.

Sorry, Olivia, that you didn’t fare better – your gracious speech acknowledging defeat, and congratulating your opponents, was probably the high point of your campaign. And much as I might have preferred you, personally, as my mayor, I have to admit that the city probably needs John Tory more. Not as the perfect, but as the compromise figure, when compromise is what the city most needs.

Sometimes, as they say, the best is enemy of the good. And sometimes, unfortunately, good is better. This, quite possibly, is one of those times.