The Canadian Trump (Rob Ford, former Mayor of Toronto)

[applegrove]

The Canadian Trump

By John Filion at Slate

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/12/the_uncanny_similarities_between_rob_ford_s_mayoral_candidacy_and_donald.html

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Ford voters also included another surprising category: people who don’t vote. Except for Rob Ford. “There are a lot of people in every election, when you go to the door, they say, ‘All politicians are liars.’ That’s the common phrase,” Wexler said. “The people who thought that way, by and large, were supporters of Rob Ford.” They turned out in such large numbers that the total vote was 25 percent higher than four years earlier.


Ford blamed AIDS on homosexuality and cycling deaths on cyclists.


Among the disenchanted, attacks on Ford by other politicians only made him more of a hero. “I think everyone who opposed him in the end were the ones who made him: the left and the Toronto Star,” said Doug Holyday, Ford’s deputy mayor for most of his term. “They created an image for him that they couldn’t unravel.” Under any normal circumstances, creating the profile to run for mayor requires years of promoting righteous causes, presenting new ideas, and forming relationships. Ford merely stood his ground and let his attackers do the rest. “The media made him,” continued Holyday. “They just created this guy, who never could have done it by putting forth ideas or championing things.”


To complex questions, Ford offered the most simplistic of solutions—the type you tend to arrive at when you know little about an issue. When his opponents attacked him for it, the average guy—whose opinions weren’t based on facts either—sided with Ford.


When the media attacked him, it was even better. “We called it ‘the wind in our sails,’ ” said Ford campaign manager Nick Kouvalis, who figures the effect was already happening even before Ford ran for mayor. In a 2008 speech at council, in a city where more than half the population was born outside Canada, Ford had this to say about Asians: “Those Oriental people work like dogs … They sleep beside their machines … I’m telling you, the Oriental people, they’re slowly taking over.” He also blamed AIDS on homosexuality and cycling deaths on cyclists.



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