David Menzies exposes Ontario’s liquor and lottery monopolies as hypocritical, citing OLG’s abandoned $100 daily betting cap—dropped after online casinos like the Toronto Star-licensed one emerged—and unenforced self-exclusion programs, including denying John Mirando’s $10,000 jackpot despite his exclusion. Meanwhile, Doug Ford dodges federal Emergencies Act testimony, with Menzies and Jim Karahalios questioning his legal excuses and Dean French’s unchecked role as a protest liaison, despite past conservative principles. Ford’s evasion underscores a pattern of prioritizing political survival over accountability, while systemic failures in gambling oversight and public trust reveal deeper cracks in "social responsibility" justifications. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, provincial governments justify their lottery and liquor monopolies on the proviso of social responsibility.
So why do these entities act so socially irresponsibly?
It's Halloween 2022.
I'm David Menzies and this is the Ezra Levent show.
Shame on you, you censorious bug.
The ostensible policy reason why provincial governments justify their liquor and lottery monopolies comes down to that nifty, albeit nebulous, term known as social responsibility.
Social responsibility boils down to this.
Because alcohol and gambling have the power to negatively affect consumers, i.e. one might become an alcoholic and or go bankrupt, then the management of these vices simply cannot be trusted to the private sector.
The private sector is all about money-obsessed capitalists making moolah regardless of the consequences, you see.
So if booze and blackjack were entrusted to those in the private sector, well, the next thing you know, you'd have 12-year-olds guzzling down Colt 45 as they emptied their piggy banks at the roulette table.
But G is for government and G is for goodness, you see.
And so it is that government, as opposed to private sector profiteers, always acts in good faith and in a socially responsible fashion.
That's a load of crap, of course, and I will indeed present evidence to prove this point.
But the crux of the matter is that social responsibility is the caveat governments cling to when justifying their monopolistic ways.
So it is that I found it quite curious to learn that the ever-scandal-plagued Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation recently decided to quietly jettison its social responsibility mission statement pertaining to sports wagering.
Well, not officially, of course, but the OLG did say au revoir to social responsibility nevertheless, and in doing so dismissed their very reason for existence.
You see, for decades, the OLG limited its sports gamblers to wagering no more than $100 per day.
So if you thought you had a sure thing parlay and you wanted to bet $500 or $5,000 or even $50,000, well, tough luck.
You were confined to that measly $100 limit.
You see, the social responsible OLG didn't want Joe Blow blowing the milk money on yet another doomed wager on the Toronto Maple Leafs.
That could lead to financial and family distress, and who wants to see that play out?
Oh, and if you were a cheeky monkey and you tried to exceed that $100 limit by purchasing multiple tickets at multiple different stores and you were to win big, guess what?
The OLG would simply refuse to pay out on those winning wagers.
The OLG would merely pay off on that first $100 bet, then refund the wagers on all subsequent wagers, and then they really just tell you to bugger off without paying out on those remaining jackpots, of course, because evidently that was the socially responsible thing to do.
Doug Ford's Liberal Jackpot00:03:05
Now, you may have picked up that I've been speaking in the past tense these past few minutes, because get this, I was recently tipped off by a sports gambler that the OLG very quietly dropped the social responsibility caveat pertaining to those $100 wagers vis-a-vis sports gambling.
Why?
Well, there's now some competition in the sports betting field.
competition where limits do not apply.
And why is there suddenly competition to the OLG's monopoly, you ask?
Well, Premier Doug Ford had to figure out a way to pay off his liberal buddies.
Oh, sure, it's one thing for the chief cherry cheesecake enthusiast to say that he stands shoulder to shoulder with Justin Trudeau.
But money talks and you know what walks and Dougie's growing cadre of liberal cronies desperately need some do-re-me these days and lots of it.
Indeed, check out this excerpt from an ad run by the new Blue Party, which exposes how Premier Ford decided to enrich his media party minions at the Toronto Star?
Oh, it's true.
It's true.
Did you know the Toronto Star got the first license in Ontario to make an online casino?
Why would Ontario let liberal and left-wing establishment media like the Toronto Star suck $500 million out of the pockets of Ontario families?
Will Doug Ford defund the Toronto Star?
No, because Doug Ford approved this liberal jackpot.
Doug Ford gave a $500 million online gambling license, the first of its kind in Ontario, to the Toronto Star.
And then he gave the Ontario Lottery Gaming Commission another $500 million of your taxpayer money.
And after all that, Doug Ford put the Toronto Star's lobbyist, a liberal lobbyist, in charge of it all.
Doug Ford.
Good for liberals, bad for Ontario families.
Now, naturally, the online casinos want no part when it comes to wager limits.
So what Torstar wants, Torstar gets.
They don't give a rodent's rectum about a gambling addict losing his or her house, which is kind of weird because the Toronto Star's motto used to be comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable.
Yeah, but that was way back when the Toronto Star was actually selling newspapers at a profit and Torstar wasn't a penny stock company.
These days, readers aren't renewing their subscriptions and advertisers continue to abandon ship, which means that there are far better profits to be had by operating a casino rather than a woke joke newspaper.
Why Casinos Beat Newspapers00:15:33
But surely the OLG would never acquiesce to limitless wagering, would it?
Because unlike Northstar and all the rest, the OLG is socially responsible, right?
Well, that was then, and this is now, folks, because the OLG, in the face of online competition, has decided to withdraw its betting limits too.
Now, I decided to reach out to the OLG to find out how it was socially irresponsible to bet more than $100 on, say, a baseball game back in August, but it's now perfectly fine to do so today.
And here is the word soup response I received from the OLG's communications department.
And you tell me if the OLG's Kareen answered my query in a clear and concise way.
Quote, OLG offers a competitive sportsbook, ProLine Plus, and in-store ProLine backed by the confidence and trust our customers place in the OLG brand.
We have recently updated a decades-old sport betting limit policy for ProLine at retail that will improve our player and retail experiences.
Pro-Line customers in Ontario are no longer be restricted to betting $100 per day per lottery retailer.
The $100 cap applies to each sports wager.
This update brings Ontario in line with prevailing practices across Canada and allows OLG to remain competitive in a growing sports betting market.
End quote.
Huh?
Was that really the answer to my question?
Hey, OLG Media Relations, to quote the penguin.
Make those messages clear.
Make those messages clear.
In any event, it would seem that the unclear message the OLG is trying to convey is this.
Ever since Fat Bastard opened up the online marketplace to competitors, screw social responsibility.
So it is that the OLG's new marketing mantra is, if you can't beat them, join them.
Besides, have you checked out Ontario's debt and deficit lately?
And by the way, is Corrine high on something when she states that ProLine is, quote, backed by the confidence and trust our customers place in the OLG brand, end quote?
In fact, that is the marketing message being pushed at retail stores these days.
Check out this poster.
It reads, quote, ProLine, your trusted sports book since 92, end quote.
Are you kidding me?
If you wanted truth in advertising, the slogan should be OLG celebrating three decades of corruption since 92, end quote.
I mean, confidence and trust?
Surely this is not the same government entity that was the subject of the most scathing ombudsman's report in the history of Ontario.
Check out the Ontario Ombudsman's report from March of 2007 entitled A Game of Trust.
This report was prompted by numerous scandals and allegations of insider wins that the OLG was embroiled in.
This report led to the dismissal of several senior OLG executives, but not all the skunks were cleared out of OLG headquarters.
Many OLG head honchos who were part of a corrupt culture in which jackpots were being denied while the Crown Corporation turned a blind eye to insider wins.
Well, they remain gainfully employed at the OLG today, earning six-figure salaries, no less.
In any event, I reached out again to Corine and politely stated that I don't think she answered my query clearly.
This time I got a response from Nicole Conte.
Quote, Dear Mr. Menzies, as to your follow-up question, we believe we have answered your question in our initial response.
As you stated in our social responsibility policies when it comes to gaming, also known as our responsible gambling, RG policies, allow us to share with you a news releases regarding our latest RG news.
End quote.
Oh, some breaking news on the gambling front, eh?
And what pray tell would that be?
Well, let's check it out, folks.
Quote, the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation, OLG, is continuing to expand its globally recognized responsible gambling RG program, PlaySmart, with the launch of MyPlay Break.
Our new enhanced and rebranded self-exclusion program offers customers more flexibility and choice whether they want to take a break from play at an Ontario casino, charitable gaming center, or an OLG.ca.
MyPlaybreak offers several new features, including defined renewable term lengths of three months, six months, one year, two years, three years, four years, and five years, as well as optional check-in calls from Responsible Gambling Council staff to allow for more timely, effective, and relevant referrals to treatment and support services.
End quote.
So what, pretty tell, does all that nonsense mean?
Well, the OLG is offering gamblers to voluntarily exclude themselves from betting.
But what if that compulsive gambler can't help him or herself and enters, say, a casino and hallelujah actually hits a jackpot at a slot machine or a table game?
Happy days are here again, right?
Wrong, because when the prize claim is made, the person cutting the check first checks out the potential winner's name in the OLG's database.
And if you are on the self-exclusion list, then this is what happens.
No prize.
That's right.
No cadot.
How do you say sucker in French?
You see, self-exclusion, which has been an option for several years now, is simply not enforced.
There are numerous people on the self-exclusion list who continue to visit Ontario casinos and gamble away their life savings, even though these casinos have facial recognition technology, which apparently doesn't work.
And besides, why would the OLG want facial recognition technology to work?
It's good business indeed, given that the rubes tend to lose.
And if they do happen to luck out and win, no soup for you.
This is precisely what happened in 2017 to John Mirando.
Mr. Mirando scored a $10,000 jackpot at a casino.
Well, sort of.
You see, because he had signed a self-exclusion document some 17 years earlier, the OLG refused to pay him his winnings.
Mirando said at the time the OLG, quote, didn't mind taking my money all these years.
It sure would have been a nice sum.
No, they don't want to pay me, end quote.
Granted, there's an old saying in the gambling business that goes, the house always wins, baby, but this is ridiculous.
Indeed, seeking clarity about the $100 bet limit being eradicated and the self-exclusionary policy as well, I phoned the OLG's 1-800 customer service line after being placed on hold for eternity and a day.
I finally got to speak with Carol.
Here's how that conversation went.
Thank you for holding.
I do apologize for taking so long.
Yeah, that restriction is no longer applicable.
So there is no limit then, right?
Yeah, Polemon customers in Ontario will no longer be restricted to betting $100 per day.
Okay, then I'm wondering why that is, because when I originally raised this question maybe decades ago, it was due to social responsibility that, you know, the OLG didn't want people betting the milk money, so to speak.
So I'm wondering what happened to the social responsibility caveat.
Okay.
So OLG has the PlaySmart program in place.
It's very accessible to customers that require it.
Yeah, but that's not the question.
It was socially irresponsible to bet more than $100 on ProLine back in August, say, but now it's perfectly socially responsible to do so.
So I'm wondering what changed.
So OLG is updating their sports betting limits to harmonize with the approach taken across Canada and improve on player and retailer experiences.
So that makes it socially responsible now to bet more than $100 as opposed to less than two months ago where you were capped to $100.
I get what you're saying.
But at the same time, they have in place the PlaySmart and it's very accessible to all customers to be able to take that help or if they need additional support, they have access to that now.
And there are other supports in place throughout Ontario and Canada, as a matter of fact.
Oh, I know PlaySmart is in place, but it doesn't work.
There's been stories in the news of people on that self-exclusion program going to the casinos, winning big jackpots, and the OLG denying the winning.
So I don't see how that's a viable option.
If you'd like more clarification on that, I'd be happy to set you up with a callback where someone else can explain it in better clarity.
But PlaySmart is the answer to why.
Yikes.
By the way, there's been a total blackout regarding mainstream media coverage about the OLG abandoning its social responsibility mandate.
Now, why would that be?
Could it be that lottery corporations and liquor boards are very, very big advertisers?
So if you are part of a sunset industry dependent upon government bailouts to make ends meet, are you really going to alienate the few advertisers that remain?
One doesn't practice journalism these days if a story is going to kill the golden goose after all.
In the meantime, since the OLG has completely abandoned its very reason for existence, how about the Doug Ford progressive conservatives dismantle this corrupt dog that doesn't hunt?
Well, fat chance, even if government's role when it comes to lotteries and liquor should be confined to regulation and taxation, period.
Government, especially a conservative government, should not be in the business of selling and marketing booze and blackjack.
Oh, wait a minute.
I almost forgot the current regime in power at Queen's Park is about as conservative as the Federal Liberal Party of Canada.
Again, Doug Ford is adamant that he stands shoulder to shoulder with Prime Minister Blackface McGroper.
So when it comes to doing the right thing in terms of reining in an out-of-control crown corporation such as the OLG, sorry, folks, all bets are off.
As the Emergencies Act inquiry hums along, there is a notable sidebar to the affair.
Namely, Ontario Premier Doug Ford is absolutely adamant that he should not have to give testimony.
One of the excuses being that this is a federal as opposed to a provincial inquiry.
Another excuse being that Ford should be exempt due to parliamentary privilege.
But the question arises, why does Premier Ford seem downright terrified to go to Ottawa and take the stand?
I mean, is there a cherry cheesecake shortage in our nation's capital these days?
And with his thoughts and analysis on this bizarre sidebar story is the leader of the new Blue Party of Ontario, and that would be Jim Karahalios.
How you doing there, Jim?
I'm good.
And thank you, Dave, for covering this because it's an important issue, and it's not got a lot of attention until Premier Ford decided to go to court to do everything he can to not appear in Ottawa.
But the situation actually arose a few months ago when the government of Alberta and the government of Saskatchewan, they all put in applications to have full standing at the inquiry, which gives them the right to send a lawyer or two, cross-examine witnesses and the federal government, hold them to account.
And Ontario, the Ontario government said, we're going to pass.
We're not interested in going.
So, Jim, let me rewind the chronology here.
Several days ago, Doug Ford said he stands shoulder to shoulder with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, which shocked the bejeepers out of so many conservatives I know.
I haven't heard a similar statement from Justin Trudeau about Premier Ford.
But what I'm getting at, Jim, is that since Doug has publicly stated he is sympathetic on how the Prime Minister handled the situation, what in the world is he so spooked about?
The federal government was justified in using the Emergencies Act to lift the occupation of downtown Ottawa.
Well, we have some of the top officials with the OPP testifying.
And yes, I stood shoulder to shoulder with the Prime Minister.
These folks were camping out, everything from whirlpools, disrupting downtown, disrupting the lives of the people of Ottawa.
We've worked collaboratively with the mayor and the prime minister over at the borders.
They were holding up a billion dollars of trade every single day, getting across our borders.
We were getting phone calls from governors.
It's unacceptable.
Dean French's Controversial Role00:15:13
Myself and I know the prime minister believe in free speech.
And if you want to protest, protest.
If you want to come down to Queen's Park and do cartwheels, but if you disrupt the lives of the people of Ottawa every single day, disrupt the lives of economic flow across our borders, I have zero tolerance for it.
Thank you.
Well, the only shocking thing about that is if you think that the Doug Ford PC Party is conservative, if you think they're a bit better than the Justin Trudeau liberals, then you'd be shocked.
And maybe some of those conservatives that were shocked had their head in the sand for the last four or five years.
I don't know.
But they're not.
They're not any better.
They're liberals.
They're called the PC Party, but they're progressives.
They're liberals.
And he's been in Sympatico with Justin Trudeau for at least four years now, and not just in Sympatico and shoulder to shoulder.
He's actually leading the parade.
I mean, when the Emergency Act and the Emergency Order came out, you remember, David, it was Doug Ford that did it first.
He came out the day before.
He condemned the protesters, called them names, vilified them.
He really set the stage and he rolled out the red carpet for Justin Trudeau to do the exact same thing at the federal level the next day.
And one thing that the convoy did was it took away a lot of the spotlight on the Ford PCs because before we had the international travel mandates by Justin Trudeau, most of the mandates that people were upset about in Ontario were at the provincial level, at the hands and total responsible, total responsibility of the Doug Ford government.
And that's in terms of repeat lockdowns, mandates, and Justin Trudeau was just spending like a drunken sailor, but he wasn't responsible for those mandates.
The protest allowed a lot of the focus to shift to Justin Trudeau and away from Doug Ford.
So he enjoyed that kind of shift.
And he rolled out the red carpet, did his buddy Justin a favor.
And then he escaped it for a few months here.
No one really questioned the Ontario government.
Why haven't you applied for standing to get standing like the government of Alberta, the government of Saskatchewan have at the inquiry to hold the federal government and Justin Trudeau's feet to the fire?
No one really asked those questions.
And until now, when he was summoned to go and testify, and he's using all the taxpayer money he can, all the legal tools at his disposal, rushing to go to court to say, no, no, no, no, don't ask me what I know because I don't want to tell you.
And he's, and it's a terrible look.
I mean, even some of the mainstream commentators are saying it's a terrible look because what it reveals is that he has something to hide.
And I think it's more than just, he's hiding more than just the fact that he's walking shoulder to shoulder than Justin Trudeau.
Number one, he doesn't want the spotlight to shift to him and all the mandates and the lockdowns that his Ontario government put in place for four years.
But there's more to that.
There's more there.
And I think we're just scratching the surface.
And Jim, I think you're right.
I tend to agree with everything you just said there.
But let's look at his excuses.
I mean, the crux of his argument, I remember more than a week ago at Queen's Park, he was stating, and I'm paraphrasing here, but this is a federal inquiry.
It's about something that happened in federal jurisdiction.
It is a federal matter, et cetera, et cetera.
Well, then, Jim, if this is all about federal entities and people testifying, then why have we been listening to the testimony of Ottawa police service officers past and present?
That's a municipality police service, not a federal police service.
So in that respect, does this whole idea of a jurisdictional argument, meaning that it's a federal matter, does that make sense to you?
From a purely legalistic, like, if you're going to ask me legally, he's kind of using weasel words to get out of it.
It's true that the inquiry is not mandated to look into what the provincial government did, right, with their state of the emergency and the law they passed to deregister or rip away the license of, what was it, like over 30 trucking companies that were at the protest got deregistered from an order from the Ontario government, from a minister.
It didn't even go through legislation.
And so the inquiry is not going to look into the provincial emergency that was called by Doug Ford and the powers that he exercised.
So that's true.
But what they're summoning him for is not to ask him what he did as premier in terms of provincial laws.
They want to know what was his interaction with the federal government, any discussions he may have had with the federal government and police.
Right, city police, provincial police, the OPP, in terms of how to handle the situation.
And this, we heard from Chief Slowly, or the former chief, just, I think it was today or yesterday, that he said this is a political problem that requires a political solution.
Well, as Premier of Ontario and the man responsible for most of the lockdowns and mandates, did he try to do anything to bring a peaceful resolution to the protests in Ottawa?
Or did he just hide and then come out and call them names and maybe even make the situation worse and try to justify the emergency that his buddy Justin Trudeau called?
So those are all the important questions that have to be asked.
And he's using kind of like this excuse from a legal perspective.
It might work.
It might work.
He might actually win the argument in court.
He's got all the money he needs to hire all the lawyers to go in court in a rushed basis to fight this.
And it might work.
He might get out of it.
But politically, the consequences are really high here that he's trying to use every tool at his disposable to avoid talking about and avoid speaking under oath.
Like that's what we're talking about here.
He doesn't get to lie when he's at the inquiry.
He's got to testify under oath.
You know, Jim, when we drill down to the nitty-gritty of what he might be fearful of, is it perhaps emails, text messages, voice conversations that might be made public that he thought back when those conversations took place, they would be forever private.
And maybe there's some very embarrassing things said.
Could this be what his reluctance is all about?
Well, this week, we're going to hear from a bunch of witnesses after the former Chief Slowly testifies.
Witnesses from the protester side.
And I'm going to be at the inquiry on Thursday, I think, representing one of the witnesses, one of the people that were involved in the protest acting as their legal counsel.
But here's a question that hasn't come up.
Maybe it'll come up this week from those testifying.
Doug Ford's first chief of staff and his close personal friend for decades, Dean French, appeared somehow after that first weekend at the protest when I was there.
Remember the New Blue Party set up the mic in the speaker.
Ezra used it.
We got on the flatbed because it was the first day of the protest.
After that first weekend, somehow Dean French appeared and he declared in a Toronto Star and Toronto Stun article that he was against legal protests on public property.
So he was against what was going on there.
But somehow Dean French, Doug Ford's close friend, got a meeting with the mayor and presented himself as representing the protesters or something along those lines, having a contact where he could negotiate or talk to the mayor on behalf of protesters.
So how did he get there?
Is it believable that he got there and Doug Ford, his buddy for many years, had no idea that Dean French was there?
And who told him that he should go and try to represent the truckers?
And furthermore, it's weird that the mayor of Ottawa would see this guy, Dean French, who's against the protest publicly, who's Doug Ford's first chief of staff, and he would accept Dean French as being some kind of spokesperson for the protesters.
I mean, that's like, Dave, that's like me negotiating with the rebel and someone from the CBC shows up and say, hey, we're here to represent the rebel in this negotiation.
I wouldn't buy that.
So how does the mayor of Ottawa, a liberal, buy this line from Dean French that, yeah, he's there representing the truckers.
And what does Doug Ford know about this?
Did he send Dean French?
And what was Dean French's role?
Was he really representing the truckers?
Or did Dean French go trying to empty out the protest and trying to clear out the trucks for Justin Trudeau and for Doug Ford?
Those are interesting questions that I haven't seen them being asked.
I haven't covered every minute of the inquiry, but this week's testimony from some key witnesses on the protester side is going to shed some light.
And I think Doug Ford is terrified of going under oath to talk about it.
Yeah, Jim, I mean, it's so weird.
There's no other word that Dean French would say that he is representing the truckers as opposed to, say, Tamara Leach, who is a legitimate representative of the Freedom Convoy movement.
And of course, it should be said: this is the same disgraced Dean French that had to walk away after one of the first scandals that hit this government.
Is that correct, Jim?
Well, you remember, yeah, he was one of the first in a lot of controversy in the PC government when he was in charge.
I mean, many blame him for Tanya Granite-Allen getting kicked out as a candidate.
Many blame him for the chaos and the fact that the Ford government was in pure chaos in the beginning and for the leftward trajectory of the fact that the Ford PCs have transformed officially into a wing of the Trudeau Liberal Party.
And so, in his role as chief of staff to Doug Ford, he was obviously working closely with Justin Trudeau and Justin Trudeau's team and Katie Telford, right?
Like they struck a deal, like we talked about in our last interview, on a carbon tax on industry in Ontario that Justin Trudeau agreed to.
So Dean French was working hand in hand with the Justin Trudeau officials.
And then he reappears after resigning in disgrace.
And, you know, the amazing thing is, didn't the CBC put him on in an interview, Dave?
Like, he resigned in disgrace for patronage appointments, patronage appointments, for all kinds of shady decisions that were being made in terms of why the Ford government was endorsing certain legislation, ties to lobbyists in disgrace.
But then the CBC brought him on like nothing had happened.
Like we just rewrote history.
They brought him on as a spokesperson on behalf of the truckers, saying, oh, yes, Mr. French was representing the protesters in this negotiation with the mayor.
Wow.
I mean, you got to like just basically stick your head in the sand and pretend like this is all true because the mainstream media is not asking any questions, not digging into it.
And no one's asking Doug Ford from a media perspective, how did this happen?
How did Dean French get there?
Did you know about it?
And maybe someone will ask the prime minister, was your staff in communication with Dean French?
And what did Dean French really want to do there?
Was he really trying to represent protesters, which, you know, I find it hard to believe any protester on the street would say, yeah, yeah, that's my guy, Dean French, that chief of staff of Doug Ford and his buddy Doug Ford, who put in all those lockdowns and mandates.
He's representing us.
Wow.
And what does Doug Ford know about it?
And we're not getting those answers.
Maybe that's why the commission said it's time to summon Doug Ford and the Solicitor General, who conveniently got COVID now.
And Doug is fighting tooth and nail not to go and not to answer questions because in front of the media, he gets to say whatever he wants.
He can say, they never asked me for an interview.
And then later it's revealed the commission was asking Doug Ford for an interview and he was denying it.
And now he's trying to fight the summons.
So amazing.
And Jim, it would seem to me to go back to your original point.
It looks like the CBC is espousing that ancient Middle Eastern proverb: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
But moving on from that, I got to ask a hypothetical question because I think one thing we've learned over the last five years, and the one thing that Ford Nation members have learned over the last five or so years, of course, Ford Nation people now referred to as a bunch of Yahoos by the premier, is that Doug Ford is not Rob Ford.
And Jim, I want to ask you, if the late, great mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, were alive today and observing this on the sidelines, what would he be saying about how his brother is behaving in the office of the premier?
Well, I got the pleasure of meeting Rob.
And, you know, we talked frequently in the last year of his life, and it was an honor and a privilege for me to get to know him and get to know the real Rob Ford, not what the media painted him out to be.
And he was a great guy and very reasonable.
And Dave, I know you had a lot of interactions with him.
And back then, he used to warn me, you know, he used to say, Doug's politics are not like my politics, Jim.
And I don't know.
You know, you just think it's maybe like a sibling rivalry.
But I don't know for sure what he'd say, but he'd probably say, I told you so.
I told you.
And there'd probably be a lot of conflict among them in terms of policy.
But, you know, the sad part is that the legacy of Rob Ford is so strong that it's actually working against Ford Nation in the sense that the values and principles of Ford Nation and what Rob built, and in many respects, he sacrificed so much doing it, like the abuse he got from the mainstream media and the left.
Those values and principles are being constantly undermined and under attack by his brother.
But he still maintains popularity because the brand is so strong that people just, they can't accept that Doug is a total opposite of his brother, that he doesn't really respect those values and principles, and that he's far happier standing in front of a mic and saying, I stand shoulder to shoulder with Justin Trudeau.
And because of Rob's work and all the sacrifice Rob did, Doug still, you know, benefits and he still got enough votes out there to give him another majority.
And it's going to take a lot of work for the new blue party to catch up.
But one thing we can do is continue to expose that what he's saying and what he's delivering is not the truth and that he has something to hide, whether it's on the trucker convoy or any other policy, fiscal, social in nature.
You know, everything they say in their emails and their press releases and their media avails are not what they're actually doing behind the scenes.
And we're on top of it every day, exposing it and trying to cover it, Dave, and holding them to account.
Well, I'll tell you the behavior, I think, of this government, Jim, it's equal part sad and infuriating if you are a true blue conservative.
Last question.
If you were a betting man in the days ahead, is Doug Ford going to be forced to testify or is he going to have a successful legal challenge and prevent himself from taking the stand?
Doug Ford Testimony Betting00:06:24
I don't know the arguments that have been presented in front of the court, Dave.
I haven't looked at them and I don't want to get into a scenario where I'm giving you legal odds on what a judge will do.
I think he's got, you know, from a legal narrow sense, a good argument on its face.
It'll really come down to, I think, the facts and the application of the legal test on whether he can rely on parliamentary privilege.
And I don't think it's ever been used before in the sense of a federal inquiry and whether a provincial politician or premier in this case has to speak.
So it'll be very, very groundbreaking.
But then the other question is, say he loses in court.
Is he just not going to go anyway?
And what's the inquiry going to do?
Put the premier in jail?
So he might just say, forget it.
I'm not going.
And if you guys want to come after me, we'll see what happens and drag it out.
Certainly if he's going to these lengths to avoid it, I don't see him even if he loses in court showing up this week to testify or next week or whenever they were thinking of doing it.
But the longer he drags it out, you know, I think if, Dave, if you were advising him or anyone, they would just say, just go.
But he's terrified of being under oath and getting cross-examined by like, I don't know, how many parties are there?
Over 15.
There's like almost 20 parties there.
Each of them have their lawyers.
It's not fun.
Maybe he just doesn't want to go because he doesn't want to, he doesn't enjoy it sitting there and actually asking questions under oath for the first time in five years.
Jim, undoubtedly, there's something there that he's scared of.
I don't know what it is exactly, but given his behavior, he is just looking terrified at the prospect of giving any kind of testimony.
And speaking of scary Jim, I want to wish you a happy Halloween.
Of course, in this province, in this country, it seems like it's Halloween every day of the year.
Things are so bizarre.
But, Jim, I really appreciate your thoughts and analysis.
And thank you very much, my friend.
Well, there's nothing that'll scare the PCs and Doug Ford more than accountability.
And there's no costume I can put on for Halloween that'll scare them more than that.
So we'll just do the scariest thing possible, which is tell people what's really going on behind the PC government.
Wow, fancy that.
Thank you again, Jim.
Thanks, David.
And that was Jim Carahalios, the leader of the New Blue Party of Ontario.
Keep it here, folks.
More of the Ezra Levent Show to come right after this.
Well, folks, tons of feedback from Friday's Ezra Levent Show, which was also guest hosted by yours truly.
The monologue was on the ongoing circus, I guess you can call it, at the Halton District School Board regarding Busty Lemieux.
And then I interviewed Alexa Lavoie about why she wasn't summoned to the Emergencies Act inquiry, given that, well, you know, she was kind of shot in the thigh by some kind of cylinder.
I think that's more important than some Ottawa snowflake having his or her feelings hurt by honking horns and diesel fumes.
In any event, Rule Roofer writes: Steve Bell was sure aware of all the hurt feelings, how odd he missed the real violence.
You are absolutely right, my friend.
We went to the press conference the day after Alexa was shot at police headquarters in Ottawa.
And when I asked Acting Chief Bell what he was going to do about the shooting of Alexa, he said he was ignorant to the fact, or he pretended to be ignorant of the fact.
This was news going around the world.
I mean, is the Ottawa Police Force a legit law enforcement agency or the second coming of the Keystone cops?
Unbelievable.
Lost Cord writes: one inch closer to that circular saw, and Busty is going to have a double masectomy.
You know, you're so right.
As I've always said, folks, when it comes to Busty Lemieux at Oakville Trafalgar High School, forget about the Ministry of Education.
Where's the Ministry of Labor?
Just about every shop safety rule is being violated by this so-called shop teacher, and yet nothing to see here.
What is it?
Calling foul on a safety rule being broken by Busty Lemieux would somehow be interpreted as being transphobia.
Oh, unbelievable.
And Mr. Barlow writes: Busty, from what I've heard, is a troll teacher.
He's bringing awareness to the ridiculousness they've allowed and defended.
I heard he was caught for toxic masculinity, so he decided to transition.
Culture jamming.
Well, you know, my friend, that is one of the theories out there, and it could be true.
There's tons of chatter about this on social media.
There was also a lot of chatter too that he could be suffering from some kind of sexual perversion.
I think it's one of the two.
I don't believe this is an individual genuinely transitioning from male to female.
If you were a trans person, you want to blend in.
You don't want to go through life as some kind of drag queen caricature.
But the thing is, right now we simply do not know for sure.
We've reached out to the school, the school board.
We've even gone to Busty Lemieux's condominium in Burlington to get an interview.
He's not interested in coming on camera.
So for now, speculation takes root.
But in the meantime, should we really have these kids at this shop class put up with this?
I say no, and shame on the Halton District School Board for ignoring this issue as opposed to what they should be doing, which is investigating this issue.
Unbelievable.
Well, folks, that wraps up another edition of the Ezra Levant Show.
I'll be back here tomorrow with more mirth and merriment.
In the meantime, happy Halloween.
And as always, stay sane.
Government Waste on Women's Health00:03:04
You won't believe this new and creative way the liberals are wasting your hard-earned money.
At Rebel News, we love to browse the government procurement and contract websites.
Canada Buys is a great one to watch.
And on that website, they've got a very voyeuristic and kind of perverty contract posted for tender on behalf of Women and Gender Equality Canada, what they call wage, which is ironic because I feel like they're wasting part of your wages by even being a thing.
Let me show you this contract.
It's from a government agency that I'm sure you can tell I think shouldn't exist, but it's trying to justify its existence by doing bizarre studies on its face.
It's your standard social justice study that you might expect from Justin Trudeau's federal government.
It's especially important right now when women are bearing the brunt of the impacts of COVID-19 and we face a she-session.
But just wait till we dig down.
It gets weird.
I don't know why anybody would wonder these things or try to study these things.
Here's what wage needs.
A research study examining barriers and enablers to addressing the primary reproductive and sexual health care needs of women and gender diverse people.
Okay, really at this point in Justin Trudeau's tenure, this is a run-of-the-mill study done by the Liberal government at an agency, again, that I think needs to justify its own existence by proving that there are barriers to things for women and others that really just aren't there.
I've been a woman my whole life, so I feel like a bit of an expert on all of this.
Anyway, here's where it gets bizarre under description of the tender.
The purpose of this request for information is to identify suppliers that have the required experience and expertise to conduct a three-year research project that aims to understand and respond to the primary sexual and reproductive health care needs of women and gender diverse people, wait for it, who have recently experienced criminalization and are living in the community.
Huh?
Knowledge generated by this project supports WAGE's joint mandate with Health Canada to ensure that all Canadians have access to the sexual and reproductive health services they need by providing key insight into the barriers and enablers of accessing health services for this population.
Experiencing criminalization is a hell of a way to describe recently released convicts.
And I'm not sure why we're studying the birth control preferences of recent criminals anyway, but I am sure this is going to be very, very expensive.
For Rebel News, I'm Sheila Gunread.
If you'd like to support our ongoing research project into all levels of the government through access to information, please consider making a donation at rebelinvestigates.com.
As always, I'll remind you, we are fiercely independent.
We take no money from any level of government to do the work we do.