I took a walk through my immediate neighborhood yesterday (I'm downtown), and was surprised to see only one candidate sign on a front lawn. (It was for Bailao, if anybody cares.) This is pretty unusual for my area, and I can only conclude people are weary of the constant elections we've been getting in recent years. That may also explain the surprising lead Chow seems to have: She's been around for many a year, is a familiar face, seems harmless/inoffensive enough, people like her well enough - or, at last, aren't repulsed by her. Well, except for the Toronto Sun crowd, that is. Heh, heh, heh.
The attempts to portray her as some dangerous radical really are embarrassing. She's always struck me as a fairly modest social democrat type. Oddly, I think she's the John Tory of this election, providing a comforting familiarity along with a lack of drama. Yes, that latter point is still a significant factor IMO*. If Tory were running this time I think he probably would be re-elected for that reason alone. With no Tory, she's the closest thing, it's just that she's just approaching the situation from the left-of-center instead of the right-of-center.
*It's bizarre that a certain obese, brain-dead, crack-addicted and thankfully dead moron is still affecting things like this after all these years. But here we are. "Lack of drama" is still something people seem to badly crave after that subhuman cretin's rampage in public office. Tory was still benefitting from it until things fell apart for him just recently.