David Menzies critiques Ontario’s government-run cannabis monopoly, exposing its 74.6% underage purchase failure rate in 2013—worse than private stores—and mocks OPSU’s opposition as "hallucinatory CRAPOLA." Doug Ford’s council reduction to 25 members ahead of October’s election sparks debate: Christine Van Guyn defends it as cost-saving ($30M) and efficient, while critics like Mayor John Torrey push for a referendum. Meanwhile, Disney fires Guardians director James Gunn over offensive tweets, igniting a clash with cast demands for reinstatement, raising questions about Hollywood’s inconsistent standards on past statements versus criminal actions. Menzies ties Ford’s bold moves to the broader theme: political progress requires calculated risks, even if they provoke backlash. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, reports are suggesting that Premier Ford wants private retailers to be able to sell marijuana and the progressives, well, they're acting paranoid.
Did they start smoking before it's legal?
I wonder.
It's August 1st.
I'm David Menzies, and this is The Ezra Levin Show.
Why should others go to jail when you're a biggest carbon consumer I know?
There's 8,500 customers here and you won't give them an answer.
You come here once a year with a sign and you feel morally superior.
The only thing I have to say to the government about why I publish it is because it's my bloody right to do so.
We are only a few months away from the legalization of cannabis in Canada.
And whether or not you imbibe, there was some good news recently for those who are fans of the free market economy.
Namely, Ontario Premier Doug Ford is hinting that pot might be sold in private retail stores.
Hey, that's far out, man.
Although not everybody is happy, of course.
Now, full disclosure, I have never smoked marijuana.
Hey, forget wacky tobacco.
I've never even had a cigarette.
You're looking at a real square here, folks.
But this rant isn't about the various forms of combustibles.
It's about which channel should sell those products.
Now, in Ontario, under the previous Kathleen Wynne Liberal government, the plan for cannabis was that it would be sold the same way liquor is retailed in the province.
Namely, it would be made available only via a government-run retail monopoly.
But recently, newly elected Premier Doug Ford suggested that pot might also be retailed at private sector shops too.
Hallelujah.
Indeed, the marijuana file is a snapshot that fully illustrates the difference between the Wynn Liberal way of doing things versus the Ford PC way of taking care of business.
In fact, remember last May during the election campaign how former Premier Wynn tried to channel fear-mongering regarding pot sales at private shops?
It was like a 2018 rendition of reefer madness.
So it was that in vilifying the private sector, Wynn ridiculously said Ontarians don't want, quote, cannabis sold next to candy bars, end quote.
Really?
Based on what survey, Ms. Wynn?
Or was this based on a gut feeling in your old role as the province's top nanny statist?
Wynn is yesterday's news, of course, but the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, well, they're likely here forever, unfortunately.
And check out their little tidbit of reefer madness by way of a press release they sent out yesterday.
Here's the opening line.
Quote, as the outcry grows against Doug Ford's leaked plan to privatize the sale of cannabis, OPSU president Warren Smokey Thomas is calling on the rookie Premier to give it some sober second thought, end quote.
Yeah, gee, what is Smokey smoking these days?
Right off the bat, old Smokey spreads a heap and helping of fake news with his pronouncement about there being a growing outcry against privatization of pot sales.
A growing outcry by whom, Smokey?
The rank and file of OPSU?
But check this out, folks.
In the second paragraph of the release, Smokey goes full-on fear factor.
Quote, the haze is clearing on this half-baked scheme and people are realizing that it's going to cause a lot more problems than it solves.
Who's going to pay for all the extra policing we'll need?
Who's going to pay for all the extra inspectors?
And except for profiteers and organized criminals, who else would actually benefit?
Nobody, end quote.
Whoa, profiteers and criminals running wild on the streets of Toronto, all because of little mom paw shops selling marijuana?
Oh, give me a break.
Alas, what Smokey is peddling is so much hallucinatory CRAPOLA.
And I'm sick and tired of the private sector being maligned by the government and public sector unions that are entitled to their entitlements.
That's because the numbers prove that when it comes to social responsibility tied into age-restricted products, it is the private sector that actually does a far better job than the nattering nabobs of negativity running the nanny state.
Just check out a mystery shopping study conducted by Statopex Field Marketing five years ago.
It was revealed that when tested with underage secret shoppers, it was convenience stores that scored the highest challenge and refusal rate.
Convenience stores scored an 87.3% pass rate.
The beer store chain came in second at 80.7% and lo and behold, the Liquor Control Board of Ontario, which is fully owned and operated by the provincial government and staffed by OPSU members, came in dead last with a 74.6% pass rate.
That means one in four minors successfully purchased age-restricted products from the LCBO, as opposed to one in five from the beer store and one in eight for convenience stores.
Also, far from a growing outcry against privatized pot sales, I would suggest if there is an outcry, the outcry is for privatized pot sales.
Again, consider the numbers in a 2012 Ontario Convenience Stores Association petition, which was delivered to Queen's Park calling on the Ontario legislature to allow for more competition in beer and wine sales through convenience stores.
That petition boasted more than 112,000 names from more than 200 communities across the province.
It was the single largest petition ever collected in the history of Ontario.
Clearly, Ontarians want those age-restricted products sold by the C-Store channel.
Why would it be any different when it comes to pot once pot is legalized?
So, hey, Smokey, why don't you put that data in your pipe and smoke it?
And you want to know why the private sector is so much better at selling age-restricted products than government stores, folks?
It's because privatized retailers have the most to lose.
The government routinely runs sting operations to catch convenience stores selling tobacco to underage customers.
If these operators are caught doing so, they face big fines.
They might even be stripped of their license to sell tobacco, which is effectively a retail death sentence for them.
Yet, what happens when the LCBO sells booze to a minor?
Well, the answer is nothing.
Case in point, six years ago when I was with the Sun News Network, I organized a little experiment in which a 14-year-old boy wearing a disguise visited three LCBO stores to purchase hard liquor.
Not only did all the stores sell him bottles of sambuka, in each case, he wasn't even asked to display identification.
And what, pray tell, happened in the aftermath?
Did these stores have their business licenses temporarily revoked?
Were any of the employees reprimanded?
Nope.
Rather, here's what LCBO spokesman Chris Layton told the Toronto Sun in a follow-up story, quote, maybe we need to remind our staff of their obligations under the Liquor License Act, end quote.
Yeah, no harm, no foul.
We just forgot to follow the rules, that's all.
We'll try harder next time.
Pinky square.
As for the liberal brainstorm of servicing the entire province of Ontario with just 38 government-run Ontario cannabis stores, just talk about a major fail waiting to happen.
38 stores cannot possibly meet the anticipated demand in a province the size of Ontario, all of which will guarantee that the black market will continue to thrive in this province.
Indeed, even the logo for the Ontario cannabis stores monopoly was a fiasco of titanic size proportions.
Just check it out, folks.
A simplistic OCS in black letters on a white background corralled in a circle.
The sort of thing a 10-year-old might produce on an ECHA sketch, except that the previous Liberal government paid an ad agency some $650,000 to come up with this tripe.
Yes, $650,000.
Hey, pass the duchy on the left-hand side.
I think I need to get high to help reduce the pain I'm feeling thanks to government stupidity.
Bottom line, let's hope Doug Ford and provincial governments right across Canada, for that matter, allow cannabis to be sold at private stores.
And please, let's hope they also dismantle the various provincial liquor and gambling monopolies too.
Government's only role when it comes to any product, even age-restricted products, is to regulate those products and tax the stuff, not retail it.
especially when nanny state government monopolies tend to do such a profoundly awful job doing so.
Cutting Councilors Close to Elections00:10:56
Ontario Premier Doug Ford dropped a bombshell last Thursday night when he announced that he was cutting the number of Toronto city councillors from 47 to 25 ahead of the October 22nd municipal election.
And I think the career politicians at Toronto City Hall are still screaming hysterically about this austerity plan because, hey, after all, government, in their viewpoint, is supposed to get bigger and bigger, not go on a diet.
Joining me now to talk about Premier Ford's bold move is Christine Van Guyn, Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
Hey, Christine, welcome to the Ezra Levin Show.
Thanks for having me on.
Always a pleasure.
So tell me, Christine, is this City Hall slimmed down good governance on the behalf of the Ford PCs?
Or is this an attack on democracy as the progressives would lead us to believe?
Yeah, so I think three things about this move.
First, I think it's a good move for taxpayers.
It's going to save at a minimum $30 million.
That's the estimate from the Toronto Star.
The government spent $25 and a half.
But based on last year's public disclosures of spending by council on salaries and staff is closer to $30 million, it's probably even more than that because if you don't have, if you have 22 fewer city council members, you have 22 fewer pet projects for them to spend money on.
The other thing is this is going to be good for the governance of the city of Toronto.
Right now, their council meetings are completely bananas.
Last week they had a council meeting that went on for five days.
The meetings go late into the night.
Councilors will vote on things at 11 p.m., sometimes worth millions of dollars.
They'll spend as much time debating something like a traffic light as they will a multi-million dollar contract.
So having fewer city councilors, fewer voices wanting to be heard with their own special interests, this is going to streamline democracy.
And the third thing that's good about it from my point of view, just so can conclude, is it's actually good for democracy because the current plan to move to 47 wards creates a big disparity between the wards.
You'll have some wards that are really small and some that are quite large, like more than double the size of the smallest ward.
So it gives bigger voice to some people and a smaller voice to others.
With 25 wards, they're all closer in population and giving better voter parity, which is a good thing for democracy.
No, I tend to agree.
And to address your second point, Christine, I've seen it myself at City Hall.
Paralysis by analysis going on for hours, even days, about really trite issues.
It springs to mind the adage of too many chefs spoiling the broth.
But tell me, what fascinates me is the hypocrisy.
Mayor John Torrey is all of a sudden saying, well, we need a referendum on this.
We need to hear from the people.
Well, why wasn't there a referendum when they decided to increase the size of city council from 44 to 47?
Oh, then the great unwashed masses, I guess their opinion doesn't count for much, but when some of these cats are losing their jobs, suddenly the people are very important, eh?
Yeah, so from my point of view, I'm never against bringing a question to the people.
And I wish that our system of governance actually had more referendum on issues, because I think the people usually know better than their elected politicians who get into these positions of power and then use it to promote their own self-interest.
So I'm always in favor of a referendum.
I don't think in this case it's going to actually happen in time.
The referendum wouldn't be possible before the October election, the October municipal elections.
So we're in a position where we're forced to say, are we going to increase to 47 wards?
Are we going to have a referendum?
And I think that the move to 47 wards is a bad move and it's going to be bad for the city.
And then we stuck with it for four years.
But I am generally in favor of putting questions like this to the people.
And I wish that we did that more often than just when politicians hides are at risk.
Oh, no, it's a different set of rules when it's slimming down as opposed to larding up.
But, you know, the other thing, Christine, is that this allegation that this came from out of the blue that we can't believe you're doing this.
I mean, did any of these people listen to what Doug Ford was saying on the campaign trail when he was saying things like the party on the taxpayer dime is over and less government and respect for taxpayer dollars?
He campaigned on less government, more efficient government.
Why are they having us believe that this is a complete shock to them that he would do something like this?
So it's true that Mr. Ford campaigned on the promise to make government smaller and it looks like he's starting by making Toronto City council smaller.
I don't know what making government smaller could mean other than something like this.
But it is true that he didn't explicitly say that he was going to make this move.
However, I think that if you are shocked by this, you're really not paying attention and you don't know who Ontario elected.
Mr. Ford, Premier Ford, has been involved in Ontario politics and Toronto politics for a really, really long time.
He's very passionate about the city.
He said repeatedly throughout his career how dysfunctional Toronto City Council is.
And his own brother, when his brother was mayor, his brother supported a motion to reduce city council to 25 members.
So it's really not coming out of the blue.
People kind of are lighting their hair on fire and saying it's a big shock.
Mr. Torrey's exact words were that Premier Ford had raised this with him, but he didn't think he was serious.
At the press conference, when confronted with this fact, Premier Ford laughed.
He said, I don't know why he thinks I raised it if I wasn't serious.
So I don't think people should be shocked.
Yeah, and I know there's also been allegations that this is really being driven by a vendetta against Tory, who, of course, four years ago, Doug Ford lost to in the race for mayor.
I don't think those are valid.
But the thing is, Christine, city council isn't going quietly into the night.
They're contemplating a legal challenge.
I think that's a fool's errand.
I think that's just more wasting of taxpayer dollars because at the end of the day, I think the province is constitutionally sound to do this.
Municipalities in Ontario exist by the will of the province.
So do they have any basis for a lawsuit to try to reverse this decision?
I mean, it's hard for me to comment on the basics of a lawsuit.
There are, it's clearly within the powers of the premier to do this, but there are also principles of democracy.
So it would be something that if the city wants to bring a lawsuit and challenge this, they would say that there's an unwritten principle of democracy and that this principle is being undermined by the move of the premier doing this so close to the election.
The challenge would be related to the timing of the move rather than the substance of the move.
And I think that that's, at least for voters, it's not particularly persuasive to say this is the right thing to do, but it's the wrong time.
So it's hard to say when the right time is to move ahead with a move like this, especially when you know that no matter what, when you do it, council is going to be opposed to it.
And you know, you raised something there too, Christine.
The voters, do you think the people, I'm not talking about the political insiders, you know, people such as yourself that are watching the political game, but I'm just talking about Joe and Jane Public getting by.
Do you think that they really care about city council being cut almost in half?
Or are they just collectively shrugging about this and life goes on?
I mean, in the debate, some city councilors said that they had received a total of, I think, four emails from one councilor saying four emails on this issue, two against and two for.
So the reality is, unfortunately, I think a lot of people don't even know who their city council counselor is, let alone which ward they live in.
Or before this debate popped up, how many wards there are in the city of Toronto?
And I do wish that people were more engaged in their local democracy because it's important that we are so that we can hold our politicians to account.
But to say that this is the number one issue in Toronto right now, in Ontario right now, it just shows that there are vested interests at stake.
It shows that there are people with something to lose.
And those are the politicians and those are the people who are laying their hair on fire.
This is not an issue that regular people are really consumed with.
I think where people line up passionately on this, if they're not somehow involved, is if they liked Premier Ford to begin with or if they didn't like him to begin with, and their position on it is largely falling along those lines.
Yeah, I agree.
If there's any vendetta, it's the anti-Ford people that are playing their cards in regard to this announcement.
You know, Christy, we're almost at an end here for this segment, but how about we leave it on this?
When you look at the numbers, right, I look at the city of Los Angeles, their population, almost 4 million people.
They have 15 councils, sorry, 15 people on council.
Toronto, the population's 2.8 million.
It's going to go down to 25 members of council.
So I guess what I'm saying to you, Christine, if a city of 4 million people like Los Angeles can get it done with 15, surely a city of 2.8 million like Toronto can get it done with 25, no?
Yeah, I mean, there's no magic number for what the right size for council is.
And Los Angeles does have only 50 councilors, but they have smaller sub-councils that are also playing a role there.
But other cities like Brisbane has a council of 26 councilors, and they're closer in size to Toronto.
Calgary has a smaller city council.
There isn't a magic number, but what we do know is that right now, Toronto City Council is highly, highly dysfunctional.
So any move that might improve the functioning of that body should be welcomed by people instead of hailed as some kind of end of the world.
I agree.
As the farmers say out west, time to call the herd, if you will.
Christine, a pleasure speaking with you on this latest decision by the Doug Ford PCs.
James Gunn's Toxic Legacy00:10:09
Yeah, thanks for having me on.
You got it.
And folks, keep it here.
More of the Ezreal event show to come right after this.
Holy headache.
When old Twitter comments made by Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn surfaced last week, his employer Disney was not amused.
Gunn had made jokes about rape, pedophilia, 9-11, and even the Holocaust, many found to be very unfunny, very vulgar, and totally inappropriate.
Disney decided to fire Gunn from directing the next Guardian sequel, but faster than you can yell, Avengers Assemble, the cast members of Guardians of the Galaxy issued a joint statement imploring Disney to reinstate the disgraced director.
And with more on this story is our Hollywood conservative, Amanda Head.
Welcome to the Ezra Levent Show, Amanda.
Thank you.
Thanks for having me.
I think this is my first time on Ezra's show.
Oh, well, you always remember your first time, they say, right?
And I better watch what I'm saying given what happened to Mr. Gunn.
But I guess, Amanda, the most relevant question in this story is simply this.
Will the Guardians of the Galaxy cast get their way when it comes to getting Gunn back on board?
Or will Disney stick to its rocket raccoon guns?
I sincerely hope that they stick to their guns because that's going to set a precedent in Hollywood.
And I frankly think that the cast was wrong to come out and defend this guy.
You know, if you remember two years ago when the hot mic moment came out about Donald Trump, obviously when that emerged, the conversation between him and the e-news guy had, or was it e-news, had happened, you know, 10 years prior to that.
And liberals in Hollywood were like, it still matters.
It still matters.
And yet these cast members are coming out and saying, oh, but he said it so long ago, not that long ago.
And the things that he said were, he joked about raping children and pedophilia.
And one or two jokes here or there can come across as just making, you know, having poor judgment and making egregious jokes.
But the sheer volume of content that's out there of things that he said along these lines, I'm not trying to pathologize his situation, but it kind of makes you wonder if there's a deeper issue.
And Disney is a company who makes children's movies and content.
And so I think that Disney, you know, of course, it begs the question, is this freedom of speech?
Well, yes, of course it's freedom of speech.
But same with the NFL, private company, private ownership.
You have the right to hire and fire at will.
And I think that they made the right decision because I think that the franchise would have suffered if they had not fired him.
And I think that there is a very strong likelihood that the third installment of the franchise still will suffer because these cast members came out and defended him.
But you know, Amanda, I'm really struggling with this one.
I'll tell you why.
We seem to have, I think we're going into a period of outrage fatigue where, you know, finding something, anything that somebody said as being a source of outrage and always, always, always, it seems, given the social media mob mindset that's out there, the only solution, of course, is to fire that person, economically blacklist them.
We saw it happen with Roseanne Barr last month, a Winnipeg morning man, Dave Wheeler, lost his gig because of a joke he made about a transgender person that his higher-ups didn't like.
What I'm getting at, Amanda, is that are we in a timeframe right now where just by saying or doing something offensive, it automatically means the death penalty in terms of your career, as opposed to the old days where there used to be like suspensions, fines, that sort of thing.
You know, what are your thoughts on that?
I don't think it'll be the death penalty for his career.
I think that there are places who cater to that type of humor.
You know, Adult Swim on Late Night Cartoon Network or, you know, any network that carries that type of salacious and offensive humor.
So I definitely don't think that his career is over.
But, you know, the left has been doing this to people on the right for a very, very long time.
And people on the right have suffered professionally and emotionally and within their community.
And it's finally being done back to them.
And, you know, they're not happy about it.
But I love the comparison with Roseanne because, you know, she put out this tweet and people said, oh, her tweet means that she's racist, which is why she should be fired.
But yet, when this guy tweets about raping little boys and little boys touching him in his silly place, that's not an indication of any type of psychological issue regarding pedophilia.
Yeah, no, I agree.
The jokes were vulgar and they were crude and probably the worst of all, they were unfunny, which is the nature of a joke.
But the other issue I have with what we're going through, and you are right, the left began this witch hunt.
And, you know, I have problems with the double standard there as well.
But another thing I'm getting at, Amanda, is that how far back do we go in somebody's life in terms of an electronic or printed footprint and finding out something that was salicious or vulgar?
I mean, right now, I'm kind of concerned, maybe, did I write something in my yearbook from high school that's going to hit me over the head?
It seems that we're all kind of living with the sword of Damocles over our heads right now.
Well, David, I think that if you had written in some, if you were a senior in high school at 18 years old and you wrote in a first grader, a first grade female's yearbook, I would like for you to touch me in my silly place, and you worked for Disney, I'm sorry, but I think you ought to be fired.
Yeah, no, I know what you're saying, but again, it's the timeline.
It's the fact that I guess the other thing I'm getting at too, Amanda, these were jokes.
I totally agree with you, distasteful, vulgar, unfunny.
But I contrast that with Roman Polanski, who actually did rape a underage girl many decades ago.
And you'll see once in a while, maybe it's different now post-Me Too movement, but you'll see every once in a while some speech given at the Golden Globes or the Oscars where the person is imploring to have Roman Polanski come back and there's like a quasi-standing ovation.
Now that guy is a scumbag for what he did, 100%, because he actually did this.
Guess what I'm getting at?
There's a difference between doing something and making some jokes that really miss the mark.
Yeah, and I agree with you there.
But again, we go back to the corporate interest of a corporation like Disney who makes children's content.
If this had been, you know, the NFL and someone making jokes about football players, then it might be the same type of situation.
But when you have a corporation whose number one purpose is putting out children's content, you can't have someone on staff who is making jokes about raping children.
And Disney is a private company.
They have the right to hire and fire whoever they want.
And by the way, without cause.
But this is 100% cause.
And the issue with Roman Polanski, I mean, that begs a larger question of the culture within Hollywood and the normalizing of really disgusting, abhorrent criminal behavior.
No, you are quite right.
And Amanda, one last question, because we have to wrap here soon.
Moving forward, I'm just wondering why the cast is showing this solidarity.
I mean, you know, given these terrible jokes aside, is this a really good director, a really good guy?
And secondly, when it comes to the new director coming in, if Disney is indeed going to stick to its guns and keep this guy on the bench, do you think there's going to be kind of a toxic environment created on the set?
To your first question, I gave up trying to get in the minds of celebrities years ago.
I left Hollywood.
I can't really imagine why they would.
Maybe because their experience with him was 100% pleasant.
But as we know, I mean, I'm in the middle of watching a documentary about a guy who allegedly and possibly murdered two women.
But, you know, on the surface, he seemed, you know, genteel and normal and all of that.
I mean, you never know the other side of things.
And what was your second question?
Oh, the idea that since they're going to bat for this guy, whoever comes in and takes over the directorial reins, is that going to cause a lot of friction on the set and maybe the product suffers for it?
I hope not.
I hope that they can remain professional and understand the situation that James Gunn put Disney in.
This is not a situation that Disney created.
This is a situation that James Gunn caused himself.
So I hope that these actors and actresses can remain professional.
But then again, these are the types of people who cheer on, you know, holding the president's beheaded head and bashing Donald Trump star.
And they cheer on, you know, brutalizing conservatives.
Friction On The Set00:02:35
So who knows?
All right.
Well, Amanda, we're going to have to leave it at that.
Thank you so much for weighing in on this latest Hollywood drama from behind the cameras.
Really appreciate it.
Thank you.
And that was Amanda Head, everybody.
And please keep it here.
More of the Ezra Levin show to come right after this.
On my interview with Mark Morano from ClimateDepot.com about the plastic straw ban, Deborah writes, just wait until the plastic freaks go after medical supplies.
It shouldn't be long now.
Well, that's the thing, isn't it, Deborah?
Today it is plastic straws, and if they win that battle, tomorrow they will campaign for the eradication of another plastic product, all the while using a multitude of plastic products themselves, of course, because they don't want to negatively impact their standard of life.
And on my monologue yesterday about Doug Ford cutting Toronto City Council in half and working at the speed of business as opposed to the speed of bureaucracy, Paul writes, the career politicians in Toronto are scrambling.
According to the Liberal Party-sponsored news, an injunction is or has been filed in an attempt to save their useless asses.
Well, actually, Paul, the last I heard is that council has requested city lawyers to explore options and get back to them on August 20th.
Yeah, August 20th.
Just think about that for a second.
Their asses are indeed on the line here and they are up against the clock.
And these guys still need three weeks to explore options?
Wow.
Even when many of these counselors are facing unemployment, they still move at the speed of government.
And Keith writes, I had a dream last night.
Doug Ford, Prime Minister of Canada.
Well, you know, Keith, your dream is a progressive's worst nightmare, but hey, people scoffed at the very idea of Rob Ford becoming mayor of Toronto.
And the usual suspects laughed aloud about Doug Ford becoming PC party leader and then Premier of Ontario.
So who's really to say that your dream sometime in the future won't indeed come true?
Well, that's it for tonight's show, folks.
I'll be back in filling for Ezra again tomorrow.
In the meantime, never forget, without risk, there can be no glory.