In an email to Big Blue Wave, Family Coalition Party leader Giuseppe Gori gave his thoughts about the report of John Tory's past drug use and impaired driving. He is rather forgiving of a person's past. He says that even if a person was somewhat dissolute in his youth...
Later in life people usually turn towards a more conservative attitude, when they are forced to work for a living and when our parents appear to be right most of the time.
However, even if many people engage in problematic behaviour and repent of it, it is still an issue:
The tendency of the liberal people to tolerate unrestrained behaviour remains. If they did any immoral or illicit behaviour, they would also be more likely to condone that behaviour in others (i.e.: be socially liberal).
In this day and age, however, the youthful misdeeds of public officials are not treated as something to be embarrassed about by the media, but as tidbits of "entertainment" to throw out to the public, thereby discouraging people of character from running for office:
They do not elevate to public office people with unblemished moral conduct, because these people generally want to stay away from a corrupt environment and would not be covered by the media for being conservative, religious, moral and having done "nothing" to be in the news.
In the end, what really matters, is not mistakes made long ago, but a politician's track record on integrity:
While we are all tolerant of mistakes made in youth and later on in life-- we all make mistakes-- we should also look for leaders who are consistently delivering higher moral behaviour, do not lie and can be trusted.
