Hot Takes – Jan 28, 2021
Every Thursday I join Round One on NEWSTALK 1010's Moore in the Morning to take on the issues of the day with a panel of pundits. Here's my take on today's topics.
1. Governor General’s very, very, very bad report card. I’ve been a critic of the GG for some time, but this report didn’t impress me much. They’ve redacted all the evidence, leaving only vague allegations of a “toxic workplace” and employees “walking on eggshells.” This does nothing to help me assess whether Payette is the anti-Christ she’s been portrayed as – or, just a hard-charging, demanding boss who speaks bluntly, expects results and holds people accountable. The type of boss most of our listeners have had more than once. The latter would be so different from what any civil servant is accustomed to that they may well interpret it as toxic.
From a political strategy and communication perspective, publishing this document in its heavily redacted condition will ensure this remains a story for weeks to come. Whoever made that decision is no fan of Payette – and clearly hoping to further distract public attention away from the Prime Minister.
2. Exasperated Doug Ford may impose mandatory tests at airports. Great. Do it. It’s well past time. We have the rapid tests, make it happen. Don’t let arriving passengers leave the bonded area before they’ve been cleared with a negative rapid test. They should then be required to get another test three days later. And, don’t stop at airports. Everyone entering an LTC home, hospital, school, densely-populated workspace, or COVID-19 hot zone, should be rapid tested every single day. If they test positive, they should be segregated immediately and be given a PCR test for diagnosis.
3. Is the Premier’s Office gunning for big mouth doctors? This seems unlikely – simply for the fact that this hurts the Premier more than helps him. Dr. David Fisman is a lightning rod on social and mainstream media who embraces and adores the slings and arrows as long as he’s the centre of attention. I’m yet undecided about whether the fact he’s a paid advocate for the teachers’ union is a problem, or not. But, he seems to be enjoying his notoriety.
The doctor from Michael Garron is similar – he appears to relish being the outlier and there’s nothing that would burnish his reputation more than being perceived as Doug Ford’s nemesis. The third doctor is a nobody. He lost his job and appears to be looking for someone to blame. The fact he insisted NEWSTALK 1010 show host Jim Richards never associate him with his hospital during any interviews, suggests he knew all along he was coloring outside the lines and doing something his hospital bosses had told him not to do. There are many reasons for that – maybe the hospital thinks his perspective is unscientific and erroneous and they don’t want to burn their brand. We just don’t know. But, going against legitimate direction to not speak with media is a firing offence in any workplace.
However, we do know that some politicians and some political staff do occasionally reach out to employers to squelch criticism. Toronto mayor John Tory – or someone very senior in his office – did it to me, after he was embarrassed by an interview I did with him on NEWSTALK 1010. He or they reached out to my boss at the radio station – and at Postmedia where I was Editor-in-Chief of Sun News – in an attempt to get me muzzled or fired. It didn’t work.
All that said, this Toronto Star column starts with “It looks like a pattern. First, three prominent critics of the Ford government’s pandemic response were targeted by a newspaper with close ideological ties to the Ontario PC government.” That seems a bit rich from a columnist who works for a newspaper with close ideological ties to the Liberal parties of Canada and Ontario.
4. Is this a stupid place for a new highway? Really?? If you’re looking for an article cataloguing the complaints against the new highway 413 plan, this is the one to read. It pretty much completely ignores or buries the fact that almost all the communities along the proposed path are in favour of this new road. The Etobicoke house I used to live in was originally surrounded by orchard when it was built at the end of the Second World War. What a stupid place to put houses! But, 75 years later, it’s a beautiful, happy neighbourhood of established homes and families that have spent generations there. Progress happens. As we keep adding people – 100,000 per year – to the GTA, we need to build out our infrastructure. The lame suggestion that “road pricing” will solve the problem is ridiculous. Road pricing ensures that only the rich can use the roads. It doesn’t speed things up, it just destroys jobs.
5. Make homeless shelters more home-like? Maybe this is a good idea. I don’t know. But, it’s certainly an excellent way to increase the cost of shelter spaces – which will mean we can’t build as many of them as we otherwise could. Toronto needs to have the conversation it has never had: What’s the purpose of social housing and shelters? We’ve never asked – let alone answered – that question. I’m not saying we shouldn’t have social housing or shelters. I’m saying, it’s about time we agreed on why we have them. Because, 90 percent of the “friction” that consumes every discussion about what we should be doing for poor and homeless people comes from the fact that we are all trying to achieve different things. Should shelters be a place you want to stay for months? Or, are they places you process through as quickly as possible to get somewhere else? Should social housing be a place that generations of families call home? Or, should they be transitional and supportive places to live until you can get back on your feet? We’ve never articulated our objectives or our strategy. We just keep arguing over how to succeed – something we’ll never do unless we define “success.”
6. Bored miscreants wreak havoc on institutional investors. So, a handful of bored mischief-makers can bring a huge institutional hedge fund to its knees. Kind of warms your heart, doesn’t it? Sure this is public mischief, and probably illegal to the extent it is a conspiracy to manipulate public markets. But, what was the hedge fund doing, exactly? It was betting on a company to fail and using its buying power to help ensure that happened. So, what’s the difference?
This story shines a tiny light on the fact that there is a huge swath of our financial world that exists in an artificial, made-up universe – creating, trading and profiting off theoretical financial products that add zero real value to the world we live in. At some point, maybe soon, it will be time to revisit this entire, murky and distasteful world.
7. Kraft punishes world with pink candy-shaped KD. This is just WRONG! If God wanted Kraft Dinner to be pink, he would have made it that way. KD is Canada’s national food and perverting it should be a capital crime.