Doug Ford tries to out-Trump Trump

It's pretty instructive to see Ontario Premier Doug Ford's contribution to the ongoing debate on American tariffs and their perpetrator, Donald Trump.

Following up on "He can kiss my ass as far as I'm concerned", Ford called Trump a "loser", a "dictator", a "bully" and the "king of bankruptcies". Ouch! Then, "I have more courage, more brains in my baby toe than he has in his whole body". Kapow! 

Predictably, Trump fired back very much in the same vein, calling Ford "the less charismatic, intelligent and overall unimpressive brother of the late, great Rob Ford". Zhang! And, to cap it all, he says he is "giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontatio to Lake America in that we don't expect to doing much business with Ontario any longer". So there!

Ford: "You think an insult from him hurts me? Well, bring it on buddy, I am read ready. Bring it on!" Kraak!

The next day, in a CNN interview, Ford admitted that, "Things got a little heated, it got a little personal yesterday". Yuh think?

They're two of a kind, aren't they? Neither of them have any filters or any off switch. Neither considers consequences or engages brain before speaking. How either of them got to where they are today is a mystery. They are supposed to be leaders of large and important regions, and they continue to talk like naughty schoolkids. I'm embarrassed by the pair of them.

Also like Trump, though, the more daft things he says and does, the more Ford's support increases (although while that was true at one time, Trump has shown that there are limits to this kind of counter-intuitive popularity bump - his popularity is now at an all-time low).

Should Ontario Appeals Court ruling overrule the earlier Superior Court ruling?

If a higher court overrules a lower court ruling, is it always the case that the higher court is more correct?

The Ontario Court of Appeal recently ruled that Premier Doug Ford's government can in fact rip out the bike lanes along Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue that Ford has a particular personal dislike of. In 2025, the Ontario Superior Court ruled that their removal would be unconstitutional because it would put people at increased risk of harm or death.

The Appeals Court, however, argued that there is no constitutional obligation to regulate roads in any particular manner, and that the government can choose to regulate roads however they like, and are under no obligation to listen to expert advice.

Well, I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that, whether or not you agree with that, the Appeals Court's ruling does not negate - does not even address - the Superior Court's previous decision. Surely, when the expert advice involves constitutional rights, they do need to be listened to.

So, who wins? Is this a partisan decision a la USA? Does it have to go all tbe way to the Ontario Supreme Court to decide? Maybe.

All those e-scooters you see? They're illegal

If you are becoming increasingly exasperated by those annoying and apparently lawless electric scooters, you are not alone.

Stats on e-scooter crashes with pedestrians are hard to find, but accidents resulting in e-scooter rider visits to hospital, and even deaths, are increasing exponentially, especially among children. There have been at least two deaths of e-scooter riders in July alone.

How does it make you feel, then, to know that pretty much all of the e-scooters you see zooming around our streets, sidewalks and bike lanes are doing so illegally?

Having said that, it depends on where you live. You see, there are no national or even provincial rules or laws in place regulating e-scooters. What rules do exist are municipal. (And when was the last time you saw municipal laws being enforced?)

Thus, in Mississauga or Brampton or Ottawa, e-scooters my be legal due to a six-year old provincial pilot program they are part of. Even there, though, they are only legal if the scooters are unable to go faster than 24 kph (can YOU tell?) and if the driver is over the age of 15 (again, can YOU tell?) Also, you can't ride with a passenger, under-18s must wear a helmet, you can't ride them on the sidewalk, and if there is a bike lane available you have to use it. In Mississauga specifically, you can't ride them on a road with a speed limit of more than 50 kph.

So, it's complicated, and most people you see are probably breaking at least one of those rules.

In Toronto, on the other hand, it's not complicated at all. Toronto is not part of the pilot project, and you can't legally ride an e-scooter ANYWHERE in Toronto except on private property (so up and down your driveway, for example). You can buy them, but you can't use them. Once again, no-one is enforcing this ban - e-scooters are everywhere.

Outside of Ontario, it's just as confusing. In Vancouver, Halifax and Calgary, for instance, e-scooters are allowed, at least in bike lanes. In Calgary, though, e-scooters are only allowed if they are rented/shared, not if you own your own e-scooter. Plus, you can use your (shared) e-scooter on some sidewalks in Calgary but not others. Like I said, it's complicated (and unenforced).

Ford Fest denies editing photos

Ford Fest is now a longstanding back-slapping exercise by Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Billed as a thankyou to Ford's right-wing base, it's more of an expensive public relations event than anything else, not dissimilar to those interminable taxpayer-funded Ontario adverts on local TV.

This year was a bit different, though. This year, Ford Fest was infiltrated in a big way by disgruntled members of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), wearing purple t-shirts emblazoned with the slogan "Worth Fighting For". The protesters drowned out Ford's speech and generally made a real nuisance of themselves. OPSEU is currently demanding increased finding for community, health and social services, an end to public service privatization, and a retroactive reversal of the Conservatives' controversial wage cap legislation.

When members of Ford's caucus shared photos from the event online, though, all of those protesting purple t-shirts were miraculously converted into conservative blue Team Ontario t-shirts. The posters denied all knowledge of subterfuge, and later, there was a rather terse message from the Premier's office explaining how the photo had had "default saturation applied to correct an orange hue", adding that "this type of colour correction is standard and routine practice". The fact that it converted angry purple t-shirts into friendly blue ones was purely coincidental. OK...

This seems like another example of Ford veering towards Trumpian tactics and artifice.

What to do when you get a tick bite (Ontario edution)

I guess it was only a matter of time before I or my wife got bitten by a tick. It happened to my wife this last weekend on an otherwise beautiful walk in the Rouge Valley. Except, we didn't realize it until two days later (it was on her stomach for one thing!)

I knew I had to take it off as soon as possible with tweezers (pull straight out, no twisting or smearing!) But I had no idea what to do next. Well, now I do!

First, I took a photo of it and identified the tick through eTick.ca - some kind of AI application, I guess. We received a positive identification within just a couple of hours and, sure enough, it was a black-legged tick, or deer tick, the kind that potentially carries Lyme Disease. Not all of them carry the disease, so all was not lost at this point. But that was a  pretty impressive service, I thought.

My next stop was the Public Health Ontario webpage on  Lyme Disease. This resource has a flowchart you can follow to decide whether or not you need to get a prophylactic antibiotic shot. The first question is: do you have the tell-tale bulls-eye rash and/or flu-like symptoms (fever, chills, headache, stiff neck, fatigue, decreased appetite, muscle and joint pains, joint swelling, swollen lymph nodes, etc). If so, go straight to see a doctor or nurse practitioner. In our case, though, the answer was no, so go to Question 2.

Question 2 assesses the level of risk of Lyme Disease, and asks if all four of these risk factors apply: the tick has been removed in the last 72 hours; the bite occurred in a high-risk area (Google it); the tick was likely attached for at least 24 hours; and you have no allergy to the antibiotic doxycycline. In our case, we "ticked" all of these, so a dose of doxycycline was recommended (that seems to be the ONLY antibiotic that is recommended). If we had not been able to tick off all four, then the advice is just to monitor the bite and see if any symptoms occur.

So, we went to our local pharmacy - pharmacists innOntario are now authorized to treat this kind of thing, no need for a doctor's appointment - bought 2 tablets of doxycycline (after the pharmacist briefly went over all of the above), and Bob's your proverbial uncle. Actually, he even waived the $2.99 cost, so the whole thing cost us ... nothing!

What a good system!

Erskine-Smith's hubris may have derailed his whole career

I live in the Beaches-East York riding of Toronto. It's a reasonably well-to-do area, but reliably left-wing politically. That can translate into Liberal or NDP, depending on the particular candidates involved. The same can largely be said for the next door riding, Scarborough Southwest. However, it has been a bit like musical chairs in the area's politics just recently, as a whole complex series of candidate moves have taken place.

It was all precipitated by the resignation of long-time Scarborough Southwest federal MP Bill Blair, who is to take up the position of High Commissioner to the UK (promotion? demotion? early retirement? merely a change of scenery?) The provincial MPP for the same riding, Dolly Begum, had a yen to break into federal politics, which she clearly sees as the Big Leagues. So, she resigned her provincial seat and stood as a federal candidate in Scarborough Southwest, which she promptly won (part of the recent wave of Liberal by-election wins and floor-crossings that has given them a majority status).

Meanwhile, ambitious Beaches-East York MP Nathan Erskine-Smith was not satisfied with his position in the federal government (and was also smarting from being demoted out of the cabinet by new Liberal leader Mark Carney), and had set his sights on leadership of the provincial Liberal Party. (Why, you ask? No idea.) Now, it's not essential, but it's vastly preferable for him to have a seat in the Ontario Parliament for such a move, and his old riding of Beaches-East York already has a Liberal incumbent (Mary-Margaret McMahon). So, he figured, easy, pick up Dolly Begum's old provincial seat in Scarborough Southwest, just next door. Still with me?

Except it wasn't so easy. Erskine-Smith has lost the Liberal nomination for the provincial riding to local pizza mogul, Ahsanul Hafiz. Erskine-Smith - polished, experienced and oh-so-ambitious - just assumed he would be able to walk into the Scarborough seat. Yet now he may have put paid to his ambitions for the provincial Liberal leadership, and possibly any parliamentary seat at all, federal or provincial. 

He can probably keep his current federal seat in Beaches-East York, which he never explicitly resigned from, even though that would be the usual protocol. (He only committed to resigning that seat if he won the provincial nomination.) That was in itself a point of contention for many Scarborough voters, and his yearning to move out of Beaches-East York - and just the man's naked ambition - may have damaged his brand there too.

So, Erskine-Smith has gone from a safe and secure position in the federal (now majority) government and, up until quite recently, a cabinet position, to a much shakier position and possibly an end to his aspirations to lead the Ontario Liberals (which are still in complete disarray anyway). Oh, how the mighty are fallen! And what a miscalculation for one who had such a reputation for political savvy! Hubris is the word that springs to mind.

Did the Ontario budget bring in record spending, or cuts, to services?

The Ford Ontario Conservatives - gods, how bored I am with them! - brought down a budget yesterday, forecasting (predictably, given the global situation) a large deficit of $13.8 billion, and pushed back again its plans to balance the books in the near future.

They say they are increasing funding for small businesses, education and healthcare. But then they say that every budget, and after every budget the opposition parties get up and say "Oh, no you didn't!". This happens every time. 

So, what's the truth? How can both claims be made with such passion and conviction? Did they increase healthcare funding, or didn't they?

Politics is all about spin. Like or not, that's the truth. So, of course, the party in power, the Conservatives at the moment, says they are making record investments in education and healthcare. That may be technically true - in nominal terms, the education and healthcare budgets are higher than ever before, including under the previous Liberal administration. 

But this misses some important context. Everything costs more now, especially when comparing with the previous administration, which was way back in 2018, a period of particularly high inflation. So, of course expenditure has to increase, just in order to standard still. Plus, Ontario now hosts over 1½ million more people than it did. So, real per-capita expenditure on education, healthcare and pretty much everything else is not keeping pace. In real per capita terms, the measures so glowingly announced by the Finance Minister were actually pretty savage cuts.

But what's a government to do? They can't preface their budget announcement with, "We're bringing in record cuts to essential services!" No-one would ever vote for them again. No-one likes austerity. But no-one likes tax increases either. So, governments tend to sugar-coat their budget announcements by claiming to be investing in services like never before AND giving the hard-pressed populace tax cuts. Of course, that's not true; the math wouldn't add up, even with a constantly increasing debt load from deficit after deficit. But it sounds impressive, and that's what really matters to them.

Once again, Ford makes inappropriate noises about the judiciary

Doug Ford again, I'm afraid. I'm getting tired of complaining about him, but he seems to have been opening his mouth without engaging his brain more and more just recently, as I have reported here several times in the last month or two.

Yesterday, in addition to his controversial comments about a trigger-happy homeowner, he parroted the Toronto Police Association's and Chief of Police's (dubious) assertion that veteran Ontario Superior Court Justice Anne Molloy should apologize to three Toronto Police officers after an Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) investigation found no evidence of perjury or collusion in their evidence at the trial of Umar Zameer, a man accused of fatally running over one of their colleagues. In his usual over-the-top, overwrought way, Ford stated that the judge "should apologize for accusing them of everything under the sun". 

For the record, Zameer was found not guilty back in 2024; that part at least is not at issue. So, in the end, the police officers' testimony - truth or lies - did not actually change the verdict.

The OPP report did indeed exonerate the three police officers, despite the fact that their testimonies were remarkably similar to each other, and totally at odds with the security video and the testimony of the two expert witnesses. It was this inconsistency with the other evidence, and the similarity of their own contributions, that led Justice Molloy to suggest that there was some collusion and perhaps even some untruths, in what was a case that was very close to home for them. Her comments were a reasonable conclusion, as many legal experts have averred. In fact, the OPP's report conclusions came as a surprise to many, and some have alleged a possible cover-up, particularly as the publicly-available report was severely redacted and, it is argued, the OPP is not the right body to be reviewing the actions of police officers anyway. There have been calls for a public inquiry into the matter, or at the very least the release of the full report.

Either way, it is entirely inappropriate for Doug Ford to be commenting publicly on the report, and especially inappropriate for him to be questioning the competence and independence of a senior Ontario judge, just because he happens to disagree with them. But then, "inappropriate" is Ford's middle name these days. I'm sure he sees what is happening south of the border, and concludes that he can get away with such nonsense too.

Doug Ford hits the controversy button yet again

Never one to be shy of making his opinions known, Doug Ford has been throwing his controversial views around again. It does seem like, just recently, pretty everything he says is contentious or dubious.

After a Vaughan home-owner foiled a home invasion attempt by shooting and injuring one of the would-be burglars, Ford couldn't stop himself from congratulating the trigger-happy home-owner: "Well, you know, these guys, they need to be shot. Congratulations for shooting this guy - should have shot him a couple more times as far as I'm concerned". He went on to attack the federal government for "going after legal, law-abiding gun owners" and berated "weak-kneed judges" for letting people out on bail. This sounds so much like Donald Trump, it's not even funny.

The home invader who was shot was actually injured, not killed, but he could easily have been killed, and presumably Ford would have been fine with that too. The injured man was seen in security video footage to be holding a gun, but did not use it. He is now facing charges of robbery with a firearm and "disguise with intent". No charges are being laid against the resident doing the shooting.

Predictably, many people took issue with Ford's outburst. NDP opposition leader Marit Styles called it "very irresponsible nonsense", and Green Party leader Mike Schreiner called it "irresponsible of the Premier to be making comments encouraging violence or celebrating the loss of life". A Liberal critic pointed out that "no-one should be congratulated for shooting another person". 

More than one commentator has observed that this kind of vigilante justice should be discouraged, not praised. Under Canadian law, the use of force is only allowed when "reasonable and proportionate in the circumstances". 

No, Mr. Ford, banning the Al-Quds Day rally is not the answer

Talking of putting himself on the wrong side of history again, Ontario Premier Doug Ford is on a roll recently, most recently by wading into the controversial pro-Palestine Al-Quds Day rally in Toronto, which is scheduled for later today.

In a very-last-minute attempt at intervention, Ford has called on the Ontario Attorney-General to ban this year's demonstration, which he says "is nothing more than a breeding ground for hate and antisemitism" and that "it glorifies violence, it celebrates terrorism". 

Legally, constitutionally, I'm pretty sure he can't do that. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA)  says it is "deeply troubled" by Ford's move, calling it "a sweeping attack on freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly".

The Al-Quds Day rally is an annual demonstration, part of a "global day against imperialism" that has been happening every year for decades now. Al-Quds is the Arabic name for the Islamic holy city of Jerusalem, as well as one of the holy names of God, meaning "the holy one" or "the pure one". In Toronto at any rate, the rally is first and foremost a pro-Palestinian protest, although, given the current situation in the Middle East, it will almost certainly include Iran and Lebanon under its banner this year. It is only anti-Israel insofar as Israel is the country oppressing Palestine and Iran, and only anti-Jewish insofar as Israel is motivated by Jewish nationalism.

That said, the protest has in the past pushed boundaries. While not actually violent, it has seen some pretty inflammatory anti-Israel, and, very occasionally, downright antisemitic rhetoric. This is unfortunate, but pre-emptively banning the demo at the last minute is not the solution.

The rally plans to go ahead inspire of Ford's calls for an injunction. There will almost certainly be a pro-Israel counter-demonstration too, which is the only thing that might cause it all to end in violence.

UPDATE

In the end, the Ontario Court denied Ford his injunction and the Al-Quds Day rally went ahead. It was noisy, boisterous and well-attended (about 3,000 in downtown Toronto and many more at other smaller rallies) and, despite the presence of a small pro-Israel counter-protest, there were just two isolated arrests. So much for Ford's predicted hate-filled bloodbath.

Ford professed himself "extremely disappointed" at the court's judgement, and no doubt he will be complaining again about our "biased" legal system and renew his calls for reform (he has expressed his preference for a partisan appointed judiciary, à la USA). But luckily, for now at least, we still have an independent judiciary so that, when Ford and his administration tries to pull illegal and unconstitutional stunts, as they are prone to do, there is an impartial legal system there to hold him to account.

Doug Ford moves to exert more power over Toronto

Doug Ford, Premier of the province of Ontario, is furthering his life-long ambition to be Mayor of Toronto, or at least to exert control over the city, one way or another. He has never forgiven Toronto for not voting him in as Mayor back in 2014, and has made it his MO as Ontario Premier to interfere in Toronto politics as much as he possibly can, from reducing the number of city councillors (in the middle of a municipal election) to closing down and moving iconic museums to trying (and failing) to get rid of the city's bike lanes and speed cameras.

In his latest shot across the bow of the city, Ford has vowed to take over Toronto Island's little Billy Bishop City Airport and expand it to accommodate jet planes. The plan as it stands is to extend the runway by as much as a kilometer into Lake Ontario, which will allow bigger planes to land there, and boost the little airport's capacity to FIVE TIMES its current through-put.

Currently, the small airport (often referred to as the "island airport") is only used by smaller turboprop planes operated by Porter Airlines and Air Canada. Ford wants to see "small jets" also able to use it, which would require an extension to the runway, as well as more parking and infrastructure in general.

The idea of jet flights from the island airport has been proposed - and defeated - many times, most recently in 2013. A limited number of business travellers may be in favour of it, but the residents and users of the Toronto waterfront and its parks have repeatedly rejected it due to the increased noise, pollution and development. Current Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow remains implacably opposed to expansion of the airport.

The airport is currently owned by a three-way agreement between the City of Toronto, the Toronto Port Authority (a federal agency) and the federal Government of Canada. While the City remains opposed to the idea, the Port Authority reportedly favours further development, and the federal government is reserving judgement thus far. 

Because of the way the municipality is structured and its legal subservience to the province, Ford and the province of Ontario could legally replace Toronto in this ownership structure, in which case the further development of the airport would be all but assured, even if it is against the wishes of the city's residents. Ford would have another victory over the ungrateful City of Toronto, and his business buddies would be very pleased with him.

Either way, Ford is putting himself on the wrong side of history yet again with this issue, and putting his business buddies ahead of the regular folk of the area. Sign the petition and send him an email.

Opening up alcohol sales not having the expected result

When Doug Ford opened up Ontario corner stores and gas stations to alcohol sales back in 2024, there was talk of a potential dangerous spike in alcohol consumption, as it became much more convenient and more poorly regulated. I confess I was part of that talk.

What actually happened, though, was that a whole load of Beer Store outlets closed down as a result of the increased competition, and fewer convenience stores than expected took up the offer of booze trading. The upshot, in retrospect? Alcohol sales are actually down significantly, by about 3% in volume and 3.4% in dollar terms. A graphical representation makes this very clear.

This perhaps surprising outcome - almost certinly not what Mr. Ford was looking for - is ppartly a result of fewer and less convenient Beer Store outlets, but also partly a demographic result of a greater preponderance of Gen Z youngsters in the population, a cohort that is notoriously (if that is the right word) shunning alcohol consumption.

Ontario moves to a more circular economy (but how does it work?)

As of January 1st this year, the collection of recycling in Ontario (the Blue Box Program) devolves from municipalities - Toronto in my case - to a not-for-profit organization called Circular Materials. In theory, this is a step towards a more circular, less wasteful, economy, but I am reserving judgement until I see how it works in practice.

The idea, so we are told, is not so much to outsource and privatize yet more city services, but to move to a model where the producers of all the packaging that gets recycled are the ones that pay for the recycling, a concept known as "extended producer responsibility" or EPR. Environmentalists are all in favour of EPR as it represents an extension of the "polluter.pays" principle. And it does make a lot of sense to me too, in principle at least. Plus. Circular Materials seem to be able to recycle a few more items than the old City-run program - toothpaste tubes, black plastic containers, nothing too crazy

The change is supposed to save Ontario's municipalities about $200 million a year (about $10 million in the case of the city of Toronto). Historically, under the municipality-operated recycling program, producers only funded about half of the costs, with the municipalities (i.e. taxpayers) paying the other half. Now, the organizations that produce the products and packaging will be responsible for operating and finding the entire program.

However, nothing I have read about it explains just how these cost are charged to the producing companies. It sounds like it would be a logistical nightmare. Does Circular Msterials somehow keep track of every paper, plastic and metal item that runs though its system and note down which producer was responsible for it? Surely not. But how else would it work?

Of course, the producers will no doubt recoup these additional costs through higher consumer prices - they're not charities after all - but the "producer pays" principle has been established, and in theory it is now in their interests to reduce their packaging in order to reduce costs. Except, in practice, as noted, they will probably just pass on the costs to us consumers anyway. But maybe consumers will become more picky about expensive over-packaged products, who knows?

Ontario anti-tariff ad is not fake, but was still ill-advised

Donald Trump has had another temper tantrum and called an abrupt halt to the ongoing trade negotiations between Canada the US.

The reason this time? A prime-time advertisement on American television paid for by the province of Ontario, using parts of a 1987 national address by then President Reagan, critical o9f tariffs and in favour of free trade. Trump freaked out when he saw the ad, calling it "FAKE" and "egregious", later adding that Reagan "LOVED TARIFFS FOR OUR COUNTRY AND ITS NATIONAL SECURITY".

Well, I'm not sure Trump is certain about the meaning of egregious, but the video is certainly not fake, and Reagan certainly did not love tariffs, only using them very sparingly in cases of absolute necessity (e.g. against Japan, which was the occasion for the address to the nation sampled in the Ontario ad). 

"Sometimes, for a short while, it works, but only for a short time", Reagan is quoted as saying in his 1987 speech. "Over the long run, such trade barriers hurt every American, worker and consumer." He continues, "High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries, and the triggering of fierce trade wars. Then the worst happens: markets shrink and collapse, businesses and industries shut down, and millions of people lose their jobs." Etc, etc. Ford's intention was to have President Reagan, still a revered icon for most American conservatives, show how Trump's policies will not work for them in the long run.

The Reagan video clips are quite real. His words are not altered in any way. The only thing that has been changed from the original address is the order in which Reagan's various statements occurred. I'm not sure why this was done - presumably the producers of the advertisement felt the rearranged clips had more dramatic effect - or why the BBC felt it important to explain this in great detail in their investigation and analysis of the ad.

And, of course, some of the address has also been cut out completely, in order to make a 5-minute speech fit a 1-minute ad. But none of the deleted parts negate in any way the import and sense of Reagan's comments. In fact, as the BBC analysis shows, most of what was left out would have made the anti-tariff point even more strongly. So, the claims of the Ronald Reagan Foundation that the ad is "misleading", in some unexplained way, seems incorrect too.

All that being said, I still wish that the ad had not been broadcast, and that Ontario Premier Doud Ford would stop sticking his oar into international politics. He is just making the job of the real trade negotiators harder than it need be. Even if the intention was laudable, Ford's timing was abysmal, the ads (and Trump's predictable reaction) aired just as real progress wasnbeing made on sectoral tariffs like steel, aluminium, lumber, autos. That hard-earned progress is now gone, and may never be recovered.

Ford is trying to live upto the "Captain Canada" persona some admirers have labelled him with, but, in reality, he is just a provincial premier with very limited power and influence. The last time he tried to unilaterally face off with Trump, he ended up with egg on his face as Trump promptly doubled Canadian tariffs, and Ford had to ignominiously walk back his own feeble attempt. He's not good at this stuff, and he really needs to stay in his own lane. Mr. Sensitivity he is not.

UPDATE

Ford has grudgingly agreed to take the ads down, presumably after Mark Carney and his negotiating team had some strong words with him.

However, thanks to the "Steisand Effect" (in which trying to shut something down results in many more people seeing it), the ad has been viewed over a billion times, making it, in Doug Ford's estimation, "the most successful ad in the history of North America, not just here". He added, " We generated a conversation that just wasn't happening in the US", which may or may not be true. And how can it be the most successful ad if it has achieved the exact opposite of what it intended (increased tariffs, not zero tariffs)?

UPDATE UPDATE

Because Ford didn't take the ads down quickly enough (or so Trump says), Trump has not only stopped all trade negotiations with Canada, but has slapped an extra 10% tarriff on everything exported to Canada "because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts, and hostile act". This comes long after Trump's initial reaction that he could have made the ad himself were he Ontario, until,, that is, he realized he could use it to his advantage.

So, any pretence of American tariffs being imposed for economic or national security reasons has now gone completely. Trump is now openly imposing US tariffs for random personal reasons. But, in the absence of a court ruling specifically disallowing them, the tariffs stand, illegal or not.

Once again, Trump called the Ontario ad "fraudulent", "crooked" and "possibly AI", and reiterated his belief that "Ronald Reagan LOVED tariffs". None of that is true, as I'm sure Trump himself really knows. But what IS true is that Doug "Bull in a China Shop" Ford should keep his butt out of sensitive international negotiations. He is not up to the task. *Sigh*

Of course, there are those who believe that Ford's antagonistic ad was not actually to blame for Trump's latest temper tantrum, but that Trump just used it as an excuse, a pretext, for an increased tariff threat against Canada, which he admits he finds hard to deal with. If it wasn't the ad, then, it would have been something else. Maybe this is just Trump's bizarre idea of "the art of the deal" - calling off negotiations from time to time, just to keep negotating partners off-balance. Well, that may or may not be true, but the point stands: Ford should not be handing Trump pretexts.

UPDATE UPDATE

A few weeks on, and it's becoming more apparent just how badly-judged Doug Ford's ad campaign was.

There is now evidence that, just before the Ontario ad aired in American TV, US and Canadian trade negotiators were getting very close to a deal on steel, that would have seen tariffs on steel reduced from the current 50% to somewhere in the range of 10-15%. That deal, which would have been a game-changer for the struggling Canadian steel industry, was upended by Donald Trump's reaction to the Ford ad.

Now how do you feel, Mr Ford?

Ford's Ontario government addicted to speed

It's becoming clearer why the Conservative provincial government of Doug Ford is so vehemently opposed to speed cameras in Ontario's cities, particularly in Toronto.

Apparently, Ford's cabinet ministers have racked up no less than 23 automated speeding tickets over the last few years, attracting fines of over $3,300, with several caught doing over 50 kph over the speed limit. One government employee was logged doing 162 kph in a company car (this one recorded by the car's own log, not by a speed trap, as it happens - the staffer in question is still working for the government).

Clearly, the Ford administration in general likes to speed, and does not seem to believe that municipal laws should apply to it. So, although pretty much all Ontario cities that use speed cameras want to keep them, arguing that they are instrumental in reducing accidents and accident severity, Mr. Ford and his buddies are sticking to the line that speed cameras are just a "cash grab" (he calls municipalities that use them "greedy"), and should be decommissioned forthwith. 

They are not a cash grab, Mr. Ford, they are just a way to get unruly citizens, like many members of your own cabinet, to observe the laws of the land, laws that were instituted to protect the vulnerable and the defenceless. Ford, however, does not want to hear this. The car is still king in the halls of Queen's Park.

Ford is all heart and no head in animal-testing question

Doug Ford has found himself a new cause célèbre to fixate on, not something he has ever expressed an interest in before, as far as I know. I guess he maybe sees it as a vote-winner?

The province of Ontario is to ban all testing on dogs and cats - "pets" as he calls them, in an attempt to play on the emotions - whether for cosmetics or medical research. "We're gonna catch you", warns Ford, who has decided that the practice is '"cruel" and cannot be allowed in his province.

This Paulian conversion seems to have happened overnight, after Ford was alerted to the use of young dogs in medical research at the Lawson Research Institute at St. Joseph's Health Care in London, Ontario, in pursuit of "groundbreaking research that has resulted in major strides in cardiac care and treatment".

The Institute uses dogs, mainly puppies, for tests. The puppies are then killed and their internal organs examined. As the Institute points out, all experiments are conducted under proper authorities and following all the relevant rules and regulations. Animal testing is only carried out when there are "no scientifically valid alternatives".

It also notes that both Health Canada and the US Food and Drugs Administration require "animal-tested protocols as proof-of-principle for efficacy and safety, before a new treatment can be used in human patients". So, I'm not sure how Ford's plan is going to work out.

There was a time when I would probably have applauded Ford's stance, and I would still applaud it in the case of cosmetics testing (Canada banned animal testing for cosmetics back in 2023). But as regards medical testing, my response is more muted and nuanced these days, now that my wife is suffering from an incurable neurodegenerative disease, and I have had several friends suffer from (and die from) various cancers and other medical conditions. As you get older your perspective changes.

The whole ethical issue of animal testing is of course a fraught one, and nothing like as simple and black-and-white as Ford makes it sound. On one side, the sentience of animals, the unreliability of predicting human outcomes, and the availability (in some cases) of alternatives. On the other, the contribution to medical advances, the similarities of animal physiology and responses to humans', and the minimization of overall suffering.

And then, of course, you get into which animals are ethically appropriate for testing - worms and fruit flies, mice and rats, dogs and cats, monkeys and primates? And what the animals are used for - non-invasive interventions, deliberate disease transference, organ harvesting, stress-testing until death? And then you get into the number of animals involved, the number of humans who might benefit, the value of the end product for humans, the difficulty of measuring animal pain and distress, the conditions animals are kept in, etc etc. 

The general rule on animal testing is to observe the so-called "three r's": replacement (use non-animal alternatives wherever possible), reduction (use the fewest animals possible), and refinement (try to improve experimental methods, housing and care to minimize pain and distress). Commonsense stuff, but not really a solution to all those tricky ethical dilemmas. 

We use much fewer animals (especially mammals) in research than we used to. But, at some point in the development of new drugs or procedures, testing on animals is a necessary evil (subject to to rigorous protocols and review by ethics committees, of course). And, contrary to what Mr. Ford says, these are not people's pets; these are animals raised for the very purpose (maybe you think that makes it even worse, but it needn't be). And if we don't test on animals, then we would need to test more on people, which of course has even greater ethical challenges.

Then, there is the narrative that animal testing is useless anyway because animals are too different from humans. There is a statistic doing the rounds of the internet, especially since Doug Ford's announcement, that 90% of drugs ultimately fail in human trials following animal tests (usually attributed to an NIH research study). But this, it turns out, is highly misleading for a whole host of reasons, ably explained on the Understanding Animal Research website, not the least of which is that it doesn't include the 40% of potential new drugs that are withdrawn completely during pre-human animal tests. In fact, animal tests are very good at predicting whether a drug will be safe in human tests.

The ethics of animal testing is not for the faint of heart. Kudos, in some ways, to Ford for jumping into the fray. But I get the impression, at least from the language he uses, that he is maybe only looking at one side of the equation (the emotive side, rather then the scientific side; heart, not head). Just wait till he, or someone close to him, gets diagnosed with cancer...

Doug Ford really doesn't like it when judges (and Ontario voters) oppose him

Doug Ford is desperately trying to be Mayor of Toronto again. He never quite got over losing that election back in 2014.

He has been trying to interfere in Toronto's bike-lane policy for months now. He claims it slows down his commute into the office. Well, that's not quite what he says in so many words, but reading between the lines...

The Ontario Superior Court, however, ruled, with evidence to back it up, that Ford's proposed lane removals would put people at an "increased risk of harm and death" and violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Now, he's claiming that "a judge overrules the people of Ontario because of ideology", and that the court ruling is "ridiculous" (by which he means he disagrees with it). Well, as it happens, the people of Toronto - the relevant part of Ontario in this case - are 80% behind expanding bike lanes according to recent polls. Ford's own reaction wouldn't be due to ideology, would it?

The man is well past his sell-by date. Bring on the next election.

Ontario letting Canada down on housing

I hadn't realized that things were quite so bad in my home province. In an environment where house-building is a top priority at all levels of government, one province is performing worse than all the others: Ontario.

Supposedly the richest province, and an example to the world according to Premier Doug Ford, it seems like home-building in Ontario has plummeted recently, despite a pledge to "build, build, build" 1.5 million new homes by 2025.

While the rest of Canada saw a 17% increase of housing starts in the first half of 2025, compared to last year, Ontario saw a 25% decline, and a 35% decline from 2023. A few municipalities, like Ottawa, have seen substantial increases, but Toronto, the most populous city in the most populous province, registered a 44% decrease in housing starts, dragging down the rest of the province and the country. 

And this, remember, is despite billions of taxpayer dollars being spent on home-building initiatives in the province. However, Ontario, and Toronto in particular, still has some of the longest waits in the country for municipal housebuilding approvals and the highest development charges. Ontario has also recently decided not to allow four-units on residential lots, despite the recommendations of its own task force. Steep construction and labour costs in the GTA have also contributed to the unfortunate slow-down.

Doug Ford has beem notably quiet in recent months, suspiciously quiet. Now we know one reason why.

Ontario as a province is not faring well

Here's a slightly shocking article about the province of Ontario from TheHub.ca. Assuming that the source data is real, Ontario, Canada's largest and richest province, is also one of the country's greatest underperformers on a whole host of indicators.

(TheHub.ca has a centre-right political bias, but is considered High in terms of factual reporting, according to Media Bias/Fact Check.)

I have seen my province taking the wrong course for some years now under the populist leadership of a grinning Doug Ford. But, although Ford and his Conservatives also get a failing grade, this article suggests that the rot set in much earlier, including under the Liberal governments of Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne.

With its low-carbon power grid, world-class universities, and a diverse and well-educated population, Ontario should be a star among Canadian provinces. But according to this article, it is actually stagnant, slow-moving and structurally stuck.

Among the exhibits of evidence, the article lists:

• In the year 2000, Ontario's real GDP per capita was 5% higher than the rest of Canada; today it is 3% lower. Over that.same period, Ontario's real GDP per capita grew at 0.55% per year, while the rest of Canada grew at 0.91%.
• Real median incomes for young people (25-34) have grown about 9% since 2000, compared to 20% for Canada as a whole, and over 30% in Quebec and the Atlantic provinces. In Toronto, the real median incomes of young people actually fell by 4.5%.
• Ontario's current unemployment rate is currently 7.9%, compared to 7.0% nationally. In Toronto, it is almost 9%, and youth unemployment a staggering 16.3%, up from 10.9% just three years ago. This increase is also higher than in Canada as a whole, and higher than any other single province.

The article goes on to elaborate on the author's explanations for these alarming statistics, which strays into the domain of politics and opinions, rather than straight economics, so I will spare you that. But the bare stats themselves are certainly food for thought (although, annoyingly, the stats and graphs lack credits and sources).

Doug Ford goes full Trump

Doug Ford has gone off on a rant again - he admits as much himself. Still smarting from an Ontario Supreme Court ruling that stops him from taking out a bunch of recently installed bike lanes in Toronto, which Mr. Ford finds inconvenient on his commute into Queen's Park, he has gone full Trump, painting the whole judicial system as full of "terrible, terrible, bleeding heart judges" who make decisions based on "ideology". 

This comes about a month after another Ontario judge ruled against Ford's ill-advised (and apparently illegal) plan to shut down all supervised drug consumption sites. So, maybe Ford's oversized ego is feeling a little bruised.

"I can't wait until they retire", he rants, "matter of fact, I'll pay them to retire early ... just get out of the system". He went further: "Let's start electing our judges, holding them accountable".

Of course, what Ford means is that he respectfully disagrees with their decisions, decisions made impartially on their own merits, based as they were on Canadian and Ontario case law and statutes. But that's a long way from what he actually said, and he overstepped his boundaries by a long chalk. Clearly, it is actually Ford who is acting on ideology. He is saying that these respected judges' considered decisions are wrong just because they don't jibe with his own political views.

And calling for American-style elected judges? - and we've seen how THAT is going - that is just beyond the pale. Maybe Ford was just having a bad, frustrating day, but a professional politician just doesn't say these things out loud, whatever they may say in the privacy of their own toilet. 

This was an unfortunate and embarrassing rant, and it even elicited a joint statement by Ontario's three chief justices, chastising Ford for his inappropriate outburst and defending an independent judiciary as "a cornerstone of our constitutional democracy", reminding Ford that "an independent judiciary protects the public, not just judges. It means a society governed by the rule of law."

For a guy who set himself up as a bulwark against the excesses of Donald Trump during the recent provincial election, he sure sounds like Donald Trump sometimes.