Norm Kelly v Rob Ford: The Right Wing Mayor Is Dead. Long Live The Right Wing Mayor!

Happier days for the populist right

Well, it was indeed a circus at city hall yesterday. I wasn’t able to attend the performance live but did have the pleasure of watching some of it unfold via the miracle of the interwebs. Those Ford brothers sure know how to do a great imitation of The Sopranos – belligerent, bullying, pulling faces like a couple of 12-year old school yard pricks. Better writers than me have detailed the whole gory affair, including former fan club president, Christie Blatchford.

So, I won’t dwell on the specifics of their performance. Just to note that, in the end, Ford was stripped of much of his power. Of course, it came after a predictable performance that the Ford gang has realized will garner them international attention and ensure, if not a political future, it’s definitely building their media career. A lot of North Americans love UFC. The Fords played to that fan base.

What is more interesting, besides the easy to talk about spectacle, is just what we have gotten in replacement of Rob Ford: Norm Kelly. This is what the left voted for in stripping Rob Ford of his powers – they voted for Norm Kelly to take over the mayoral role. So, who is this guy? Well, certainly he will be less entertaining but will he be “better” for our city? I mean he must be, after all, even council lefty Gord Perks was tweeting that if the Ford bros. tried to remove Kelly before yesterday’s vote they’d just put him back in place so that they could make him interim mayor.

Kelly, made Deputy Mayor by Rob Ford himself, is a political veteran, having been in and out of various levels of office since Trudeau the senior was Prime Minister. He was also once the head of history at Upper Canada College – a prep school for ruling class boys in Toronto. And, most importantly, he’s just as odious as Rob Ford. As he himself said as recently as August, when he was made DM, on his role:

“There has to be a commitment to the core policies and core direction of the mayor...”

He’s not kidding there, in fact, he voted with Ford over 96% of the time. Like Denzil Minnan-Wong, Cesar Palacio and other council right-wingers, Kelly has happily played the role of Ford hatchet man whenever it was needed, removing the TTC chief General Manager Gary Webster back in February, 2012 – at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars – because he didn’t furnish Ford’s castle in the sky with the necessary furniture by endorsing his outrageously expensive and impractical subway plan. It should be noted that Kelly previously voted in favour of Miller’s transit city plan seven times. That’s the plan that Ford tore up as soon as he was elected because he wanted subways, not LRT. Of course, at the time Kelly was on Miller’s executive, which is both a demonstration of Miller’s judgment and Kelly’s opportunism.

Besides his role as chief toady, Kelly is also a climate-denier or, as he would say “we just don’t really know anything now do we?” Tell that to the families of the 10,000+ dead in the Philippines. Nor is this some recent aberration, according to this 2003 article in NOW:

[Kelly] holds the distinction of being the only TTC commissioner who doesn’t believe in increased funding for public transit. Member of the city’s powerful policy and finance committee and an unabashed supporter of the Island Airport expansion, Union Station, Front Street extension – you name it. Believes in privatizing waste, water and public housing. One of the worst voting records on council on the environment as well.

So, let’s be honest. Like Minnan-Wong and the rest of the Ford Nation minions at City Hall, the only thing that has changed for Kelly is that Ford’s incompetence has made it impossible for him to implement the austerity agenda that they support. Ford has fallen out of favour with the real powers that be in the city and with the mostly right wing, pro-austerity media. For certain this palace coup includes a fair share of careerist maneuvering by Ford’s former allies, but at its core it’s all about re-arming neo-liberalism on Toronto City Council.

And the left on council are playing the role of enablers – not of Rob Ford’s self-destructive, substance-abusing behavour – but of austerity and privatization. They are helping the right wing to re-arm by helping them remove the right’s own worst enemy. They could have exposed the tawdry nature of this whole spectacle, the dubious nature of the police surveillance operations and the opportunism of council’s right wing. Instead, what they seem to want is “business as usual”, calm and cooperation.

The city council left could have used this crisis as an opportunity to derail the austerity agenda. But they didn’t. And they aren’t alone. Andrea Horwath, provincial NDP leader raised no questions about what is going on at City Hall, endorsing the Liberal government's intention to now deal with Norm Kelly. “If Mr. Kelly is now the person who is the head action person when it comes to city of Toronto decision-making . . . then that’s the appropriate thing to do,” said Horwath. Really? All the NDP can do is big up right-winger Norm Kelly? And the union movement in the city has been no better sadly. Having failed to mobilize any sort of sustained fight against attacks on jobs and conditions by the council right wing, they did manage to make an effort to mobilize an audience in council chambers yesterday to support the right wing’s push to oust Ford. I’m sure Norm Kelly will reward Toronto’s public sector workers with better conditions…not.

Personally, I hope Rob Ford sues city council and exposes further the hypocrisy that resides here - like when Doug Ford opportunistically pointed out that the head of the Police Services Board going on a fishing trip with the Police Chief, Bill Blair, is a major conflict of interest. The more the flailing of the Ford bros tears apart the right wing, discredits these supposedly austere institutions helmed by the responsible elite, and sets them at odds with each other, the better. The left should not be aiding the right to be more effective, they should be "enabling" their self-destruction, helping them hoist themselves on their own petards and exposing their rotten politics in the process.

Seeing this debacle unfold has made me realize that the Rolling Stones had it all wrong. It’s not true that you can’t always get what you want. In this case the left got what it wanted but it most definitely isn’t what we need.

Ford Saga: Left Gives Cover To Right Wing Palace Coup

Cuts, what cuts? It's all about bad behaviour
photo credit: @HeartsOnTheLeft

Not one word about cuts. Not one word about privatizing garbage collection. Nothing about his refusal to ever attend a single Gay Pride Parade. Zilch about his actual politics. No, everything is focused on his drinking, his drug use and his public displays of such activities. Oh, and in case you didn't notice: he's fat (because that deserves serious political discussion with regards to the mayoralty). The closest we get to something progressive is a councilor pointing out the hypocrisy in Mayor Ford’s “zero tolerance” stance on illegal drugs when he himself has purchased illegal drugs in the last two years.

Make no mistake, this is a right wing coup to get rid of a difficult former front man. That the left is getting caught up in this is a sign of how off the rails the left is, how disconnected it is from ordinary, working class people. I don’t expect much from the “left” on city council. The best that they could do when they were needed was to vote for a study of how efficient garbage privatization was after it was implemented. And, as I’ve said before, when Ford put forward a motion during the G20 debacle to laud the police, most of the left voted for it with 5 members walking out of the chambers in order to avoid having their vote counted. They couldn’t even bring themselves to publicly abstain on a pro-cop vote after all the round-ups of innocents, the kettling, the home invasions, Officer Bubbles, the display of "weapons"by Chief Blair that included a chainsaw and some medieval role playing gear. I’m not sure how you could manage to be more lame and still get out of bed in the morning.

But now they’re all over this, crusaders for truth, justice and democracy – and being led by the nose by right wing Rob Ford ally Denzil Minnan-Wong to, uh, depose Rob Ford. (edit - except for Gord Perks, who opposes deposing elected officials - though I will never forgive him for leaving the room during the G20 vote).

Besides the city council “left”, I’ve also been shocked by some of the stuff I see on Facebook. I’ve seen articles posted attacking Ford’s drug and alcohol use by people who I know have used drugs and alcohol to excess in the past. And done it in public. Some of them even got into fights while doing it. (For the record I have used both, and made an ass out of myself in public more than once. I also strongly believe in decriminalizing drugs so that users aren’t sent to prison and the drugs trade isn’t turned into a high stakes criminal activity involving guns and violence). Then of course there are the fat jokes, always the fat jokes. And the faux outrage because Ford said "eating pussy". Are you serious? I hear people say worse shit in the cash line at the grocery store for God's sake. Who. Cares.

More seriously, look at the rallies to depose Ford at City Hall. I dare you to find a single sign opposing cutbacks, privatization or bigotry. You won’t because they don’t or, rather, these rallies aren't about that - they're about moral outrage. The kind of morals that are about contempt for the great unwashed, of which I am proudly a member. Let’s take a step back for a second here. As wildly delusional as Rob Ford and his brother are – I mean, they consort with Giorgio Mammoliti and Doug compared Rob to Jesus of Nazareth – they are right that this is a witch hunt. Perhaps, dare I say it, even a conspiracy.

The police staged an expensive and extensive investigation against Ford, including airplane surveillance, stake-outs, interviews, etc. all because he got wasted on tape. Does this strike no one as an unusual use of police resources? They found nothing, apparently, with which they could convict him – and yet the details of this surveillance of an innocent (yeah, the word chokes a bit in my throat) man are released to the media. Does nobody else find this disturbing? Would you be troubled if the cops staked out Maude Barlow’s house, or David Suzuki or Olivia Chow – and then the courts released photos, transcribed interviews and CCTV footage that smeared them without ever laying a charge? Do you think that this is a good precedent for dealing with politicians who rub the powers that be the wrong way? And rub them he does.

Ford is a populist windbag and right wing bigot with a neoliberal agenda that includes cutting services for the most vulnerable in society. But he was not the candidate of the city establishment – George Smitherman was. Ford won because, unlike the left (or Smitherman), he speaks a language and expresses an anger to which many working people can relate – including the non-white, immigrant heavy suburbs. That’s not the route of preference for the ruling elite who would rather see things stay respectable and passionless. (Unfortunately, it’s also not the route of preference for the polite left.)

Sure, after Ford won they were willing to work with him but it was begrudgingly because he’s such a loose cannon and because he’s not totally under their control. Doug Ford’s wild attacks on the Police Chief Bill Blair are demonstration enough of that. As the inability of Ford to drive through an austerity agenda became clear this very conditional support waned. And when he was unable to come up with a credible transit plan in a city where gridlock is costing significant profits (as in billions of dollars every year), there was growing alarm. Not to mention his (and Doug’s) tendency to come up with the most hare-brained ideas when it comes to city development (ferris wheels for the waterfront, anyone?).

At some point this draining of ruling class support became an active desire to remove him. Again, not because he was a right wing bastard but because he was an ineffective right wing bastard. And not because he stirred up some active opposition with his neo-liberal policies. Does anyone really think that the ruling class gives a rat's ass about some protests and a relatively small and contained strike by library workers? Really? Have you seen the ruling class of Greece veer away from implementing harsh austerity in the face of monthly general strikes? Opposition they can deal with - Mike Harris weathered a series of city-wide general strikes and a demonstration in Toronto of 250,000 or more people. He never once lost ruling class backing. This is not about the relatively minor (though welcome) opposition on the streets of Toronto. Mayor Miller, a candidate of the centre-left with labour backing, faced bigger resistance.

Whether the growth in the sentiment amongst the elite turned into active conspiracy, who’s to know. For myself, I have a hard time believing that there isn’t some coordination and discussion going on when the police dedicate a whole squad to following him (Including with airplanes!! I want to know how much that operation cost.), and then the results of those investigations lead to a progressive and systematic tightening of the noose. First, there are hints in the press that there might be some information damaging to Ford in the report. Then his driver, apparent muscle and probable dealer, Alexander Lisi, is arrested and charged with dealing pot. Then part of the report is released and the Chief of Police himself announces – at a press conference – that the crack video exists and that they have it. At each moment Ford has refused to step down and they have upped the pressure on him. My guess is that at some point, if he doesn’t cry uncle and leave office, there will be a warrant for our Chief Magistrate’s arrest. They will destroy him. I won't weep for the guy, given his mendacious and pathological behaviour, but I'll shudder at the precedent.

The left, by trailing along behind this palace coup and acting like it’s some sort of uprising from the people – have given cover to the right wing and the ruling class, putting a progressive gloss on the whole operation. They have facilitated a moral panic about drugs and alcohol and bad manners that won’t be used against cocaine snorting bankers, cavorting with high priced call girls. It will be used against “gangbangers” to launch attacks on visible minority communities and the poor. And the left will be tarnished as being responsible for these attacks and will be seen for the kind of downtown, whitebread, middle class snobbery of which Rob Ford has accused us.

A final note: in all this, where is Karen Stintz? She’s being very quiet and letting people like Minnan-Wong and del Grande – not to mention the left – haul down the big guy. Her name is conspicuously absent on the open letter calling for Ford to resign. She is positioning herself to be the grand unifier who has no blood on her hands. If Stintz, a Tory, wins next year, the left will have itself to blame. Stintz actually stood up to Rob Ford while the left was still cowering at the mention of Ford Nation. She doesn't need to attack him now, she already established her anti-Ford credentials - when it took a spine to do so - now she can reap the reward. The left is helping her become our next mayor. Good work, guys. Just what we need, a more effective conservative.

No, just because Rob Ford is a total bastard it doesn’t follow that all means of getting rid of him are good ways. And it sure doesn’t mean that all ways will lead to a better city. That so much of the left thinks so is a stark reminder that the left has lost confidence in itself and, even worse, lost confidence in the power of mobilizing, particularly working class people. This proxy victory – using right wingers, police chiefs, the courts and the media to eliminate a right wing mayor – is no victory at all. It is a hostage to fortune.