Saturday, June 22, 2019

DOUG FORD'S DUMPSTER FIRE

   Robin Urback:  Instead, just this week, the Ford government appointed a relative of French's wife, as well as a friend of French's son, as two of four new agents-general for Ontario, tasked with drumming up business outside of the province. Ford then revoked the appointments less than 24 hours later, apparently belatedly realizing that you shouldn't pluck names from your Christmas party list for prestigious international appointments.
   French, who has long been cited by both insiders and outsiders as the source of much of the premier's trouble, resigned as chief of staff Friday evening. This might be the structural reset caucus was looking for, but there's still a long way to go to rehabilitate Ford's image in the eyes of the public.
   This back-and-forth has become somewhat of a pattern for the Ford government: Make some sort of triumphant announcement (Bigger class sizes! New autism funding structure! Retroactive cuts to municipalities!), cock your head at the blowback (But kids will be more resilient in larger classes! Don't you want us to eliminate the autism wait list? You know how much waste there is at city hall?) and then surrender to the pressure (Here's some money to prevent teacher layoffs. OK, we'll rework our autism plan. Fine, we'll cancel those retroactive cuts).

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