With Doug Ford, Ontario is in for 'rough and wild ride': Toronto councillor   
      
   'He'd just go for your throat if you were threatening what he wanted in any   
   way'   
      
      
   Doug Ford was one of John Filion's favourite people to have lunch with back in   
   the days when both were city councillors at Toronto City Hall.   
      
   "He's very affable, very funny. He can be extremely charming," said Filion, a   
   longtime municipal politician who currently represents Ward 23 in Toronto.   
      
   But once lunch was over, Ford was back to brawling in city council chambers.   
      
   "He'd just go for your throat if you were threatening what he wanted in any   
   way," Filion said. "He needs to be dominant and he's very good at that."   
      
   Filion reacted with a mixture of fascination and horror this week as he   
   watched Ontario voters elect Ford as their next premier.   
      
   "Doug is a very unusual guy. I've never met anyone like him and certainly not   
   a political leader like him. I think we're in for a rough and wild ride."   
      
      
   Similar, but not quite Trump-ism   
      
   Filion is the author of a book about the tumultuous years of Rob Ford's   
   mayoralty from 2010 to 2014 entitled The Only Average Guy: Inside the Uncommon   
   World of Rob Ford.   
      
   According to Filion, Doug Ford, like his brother Rob and U.S. President Donald   
   Trump, is brilliant at appealing to voters who feel they haven't had a fair   
   chance in society.   
      
   Unlike Trump, Doug Ford is extremely self-confident, says Filion. But he sees   
   many similarities between the two populist politicians: a need for attention,   
   an us-versus-them style that divides the world into friends and foes, and a   
   reliance on gut    
   instinct instead of advice from experts.   
      
   "Doug would have a conversation in his office with somebody who thought we   
   should build the world's largest ferris wheel on the Port Lands," said Filion.   
      
   "The next thing you knew, he'd be setting up a podium in front of the mayor's   
   office to announce it."   
      
      
   Distrust of mainstream media   
      
   What Ford also shares with Trump is a distrust of mainstream media, which   
   worries freelance investigative journalist Justin Ling.   
      
   "We expect our leaders … to tell the truth generally and not lie to the   
   faces of reporters or voters," Ling said. "The fact that we couldn't hold him   
   to account on what he was promising to do — because frankly he wouldn't   
   answer questions — is    
   problematic."   
      
      
   "He lied about his record."   
      
   During the chaotic 2013 meeting to limit his younger brother, Rob Ford, right,   
   powers as mayor, then-councillor Doug Ford traded barbs with onlookers in the   
   packed council chambers and snapped at a fellow councillor. (CBC Toronto)   
      
   Ling suggests Ford's oft-repeated claim that he and his brother Rob saved the   
   city of Toronto $1.1 billion dollars during their tenure at City Hall is a   
   "mystifyingly resilient lie."   
      
   After running the numbers, Ling concluded that when Rob Ford was elected mayor   
   the City of Toronto, and all of its agencies and utilities, spent $9.3 billion   
   a year. In 2014, when he left office, that number was nearly $9.7 billion.    
   Higher property    
   taxes were needed to fill the gap.   
      
   Ling is frustrated that Ford was elected premier without addressing how he   
   planned to find the spending efficiencies he promises.   
      
   "This is as clear sign as you can ever possibly imagine to every other   
   would-be conservative leader in the country that they can run a populist   
   campaign devoid of policies, devoid of costed spending, and devoid of   
   specifics, all while ignoring questions    
   from the media and still win."   
      
   "That's really troubling," he said.   
   Ontario PC leader Doug Ford greets supporters as he arrives for a breakfast   
   meet and greet in Ottawa on Saturday, June 2, 2018. (Justin Tang/Canadian   
   Press)   
   An unpredictable premier   
      
   Both Ling and Filion agree Doug Ford has smashed political norms in Ontario,   
   by appealing to voters fed up with politics-as-usual.   
      
   "We know the public is frustrated and cynical about the state of politics and   
   we need to fix that," said Ling.   
      
   "But these populists are not actually trying to fix it. They're trying to tap   
   into it and exploit it and it is exploitable."   
      
   For Filion, Ford's populist approach to running the province will be every bit   
   as unpredictable as his approach to municipal politics.   
      
   "I always think of him as having a crocodile brain, sort-of survival instinct,   
   and being guided by that," he said.   
      
   "It's worked very well for him."   
      
      
   https://www.cbc.ca/radio/checkup/with-doug-ford-ontario-is-in-fo   
   -rough-and-wild-ride-toronto-councillor-1.4699645   
      
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